Taking Action to stop war crimes in the Middle East.

[Tom Joad]

We need to take action to demand that Israel is held accountable for its attacks in the Gaza Strip and violations of the US Arms Export Control Act and Foreign Assistance Act. Urge that military aid to Israel be cut off as required by law.

At this moment, most of Gaza is without electricity. That means that hospitals may not be able to provide life-saving medical needs, food storage is endangered, water supplies threatened. The attacks on the Gaza Strip mean that over one million face a looming humanitarian disaster.

http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/732995.html

"Gaza is three days away from a deadly humanitarian crisis unless Israel promptly restores fuel and electricity to the densely populated area after its offensive to free an abducted soldier, the United Nations aid chief warned on Thursday."

If you go to this site, http://www.democracyinaction.org/dia/organizationsORG/uscampaign/campaign.jsp?campaign_KEY=4460
you can sign up to send this message to your your elected representatives.

Israel is using weapons supplied by the United States to target Palestinian civilians and civilian infrastructure in the Gaza Strip in violation of the US Arms Export Control Act and the Geneva Conventions. I demand that you hold Israel accountable for violating US law and cut off military aid to Israel as required by law.

* On June 9th, Israel shelled a beach in Beit Lahiya killing 8 civilians and injuring 32. At the site of the killing, Human Rights Watch found evidence of a 155mm artillery shell consistent with those fired from an Israeli M-109 Self-Propelled Artillery. Between 2000-2005, the United States licensed to Israel $69,163 worth of M-109 spare parts and 155mm artillery shells.*

* On June 13th, Israeli aircraft fired missiles at a van in an extra-judicial assassination of two Palestinians in Gaza City. A second barrage of missiles fired shortly afterward killed nine Palestinian bystanders.

* On June 20th, Israeli aircraft fired at least one missile at a car in an extra-judicial assassination attempt on a road between Jabalya and Gaza City. The missile missed its intended target and killed three Palestinian children and wounded 15.

* On June 27th, Israel launched a massive invasion of the Gaza Strip. Israeli aircraft fired missiles targeting civilian infrastructure. In illegal acts of collective punishment, Israel demolished three key bridges, the Gaza Strip’s only electricity generation plant, and part of a university, thereby endangering Palestinian human rights to food, water, health, electricity, education, and freedom of movement. Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert admitted that the purpose of these measures is to “apply pressure” to the civilian population of the Gaza Strip.

The Israeli air force fighter squadrons are composed of Lockheed Martin F-16I Fighting Falcons and Boeing F-15Is, which fire US-manufactured AMRAAM, Sidewinder, and Sparrow missiles. Between 2005-2005, the United States licensed to Israel at least $1.062 billion of spare parts, engines, and missiles for its F-15 and F-16 fighter planes.*

Israel’s month of killing civilians and destroying civilian infrastructure in the Gaza Strip is a clear reminder that Israel remains the occupying power of the Gaza Strip despite last year’s “unilateral disengagement”. Living under military occupation, the Palestinians of the Gaza Strip are “protected persons” under the terms of the Geneva Conventions. Israel’s targeting of civilians and civilian infrastructure in the Gaza Strip is a violation of the Geneva Conventions and constitutes war crimes.

In addition, by using US-supplied weapons to commit these atrocities, Israel is violating the terms of the US Arms Export Control Act and Foreign Assistance Act. The Arms Export Control Act restricts the use of US weapons to legitimate self-defense and internal policing; US weapons cannot be used to attack civilians in offensive operations. The Foreign Assistance Act prohibits US aid of any kind to a country with a pattern of gross human rights violations.

* Statistics for US weapons licensed to Israel are compiled from the State Department’s annual report to Congress pursuant to Sec. 655 of the Foreign Assistance Act.
_________________________________________________________________________

Take action. Do not be silent. Do not be intimidated. Do not fail those men, women and children who suffer under a US-supported occupation and military attack. We can insist the rule of law, is applied fairly in the Middle East, and that the Bush administration is forced to take action, instead of merely saying empty words of "urging restraint".

[still_one]

1. The only action that should be taken is to force both parties to negotiate

[Poll_Blind]

2. Unfortunately, one of the parties has rounded up most of the...

...government of the other parties and tossed them in jail and is in the process of stripping them of their citizenship which makes negotiation somewhat difficult.

PB

[still_one]

3. Then the U.S. should pressure Israel to release them

and Egypt, Turkey, or whoever should pressure the Palestinians to release the soldier, AND FORCE THEM BOTH TO THE NEGOTIATING TABLE

This could be done...

[Poll_Blind]

5. Ron Suskind's new book "The One Percent Doctrine" describes...

..., in part, why Bush is not likely to intervene and why it is incumbent on U.S. citizens, themselves, to become involved(excerpt from this article):

This atmosphere of cooperation, Suskind states in his book, has reinforced the sense that President George Bush wants to assist Israel and was not disturbed by the military operations that Ariel Sharon's government authorized in the territories. Suskind quotes Bush as saying during his first National Security Council meeting that the U.S. must refrain from active mediation in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

To then secretary of state Colin Powell's argument that such behavior could be interpreted by Sharon's government as a green light to apply force, Bush responded that sometimes a show of force can clarify the issue at hand.

  The only way we can help bring peace, stop or at least slow down the bloodshed, is to exert whatever pressure we can. The United States senate just passed a law banning financial aid to the Palestinian government. It even limits humanitarian aid to innocent Palestinian people which are suffering greatly at the hands and because of the actions of the Israeli army.

  However, we are still providing Israel with billions of U.S.-taxpayer dollars every year, yet no strings are attached. This latest incursion into Gaza represents a calumny against the concept of human rights. Using the financial leverage we have with Israel is vital to curbing these atrocities in hopes of pressuring Israel.

PB

[Poll_Blind]

4. The Democratic party is THE party of Human Rights in the United States.

  I was just pouring over the Democratic Party platform and noticed that my Subject line for this message is a motif which occurs again and again in that document. This summation from the platform seemed especially relevant to the message posted(from the platform, itself):

Together, we can make America safer, stronger, and more respected. We can do it in a way that safeguards all the greatness of America by protecting our people, securing our homeland, and reinforcing our values – faith and family, duty and service, individual freedom and a common purpose to build one nation under God. We can do it in a way that keeps faith with the best measures of American leadership around the world – the builder of alliances, the defender of freedom, the champion of human rights. We can do it, and we will.

  As the political party which is self-defined as "the champion of human rights" it is incumbent on us to speak out against these crimes against basic human rights wherever they occur, no matter who the perpetrator is.

PB

[mom cat]

6. Thanks for giving some avenues to try to abate the humanitarian

disaster in Gaza.

[sweetheart]

7. Sewers of seeds

Lay down the seed, water with pride,
breeding womblike the desires of deluded men,
200 kilogram high explosive seeds hide,
sprout evil deeds circuitious devil's den.

Seeds fired from guns, depeted and toxic,
deeds that tears run, fetid and caustic,
never left the fear of overkill antiantisemitic,
the lashback justice thrill explosive realpolitik.

Buried entombed in bunkers of hatred,
unforgiven presumption masters, vile and sick,
repeated mistakes of tyranny, war criminal and unpoetic.
Seeds of a thousand unloved children, broken hearts in an atomic explosion.
sewers of seeds, sow, sew, so...