Depuis le début du conflit, la marge de manœuvre des plus de deux millions de Gazaouis est inexistante ou presque. Seule issue, s’exiler vers le désert égyptien. Tel-Aviv les y pousse mais ni eux ni les Égyptiens ne le veulent. Retour sur une longue série d’exodes entamée en 1948.

Tout commence avec la Nakba, « la grande calamité », après la proclamation de l’État d’Israël le 14 mai 1948 par David Ben Gourion. Ce printemps du sionisme sera l’hiver du nationalisme arabo-palestinien. Plus de 700 000 Palestiniens prennent le chemin de l’exode vers les pays arabes limitrophes, où ils vont aller s’entasser dans des camps de fortune. C’est le début de la diaspora et du « problème des réfugiés » palestiniens.

Sur les raisons du départ, pas de consensus. Pour les uns, les Palestiniens ont été forcé à l’exil par Tsahal. Pour les autres, les Arabes ont fui de leur propre gré. La vérité est probablement, comme souvent, à mi-chemin. Dans tous les cas, avec le départ forcé ou volontaire des Arabes, les Juifs devenaient majoritaires. Israël avait tout intérêt à ce que les Palestiniens fuient. Mais il fallait gérer en toute urgence le nombre important d’exilés.

C’est à l’ONU que revient la patate chaude. Pour ce faire, l’Office de secours et de travaux des Nations unies pour les réfugiés de Palestine dans le Proche-Orient (UNWRA) est mise sur pied afin de gérer spécialement la diaspora palestinienne. Elle va recenser 190 000 réfugiés à Gaza, 280 000 en Cisjordanie, 70 000 en Jordanie, 110  000 au Liban et 76 000 en Syrie.

Gaza la remuante

Étroite bande de quelque 500 kilomètres carrés, Gaza est d’abord administrée, de 1948 à 1967, par Le Caire, qui ne songera jamais à l’annexer. C’est une administration militaire qui s’apparente à un protectorat. Les Gazaouis deviennent des apatrides. C’est également dans les années 1950 que Nasser, ennemi juré de l’État hébreu, encourage la guérilla palestinienne. Les fedayin frappent le sud d’Israël, tuant indistinctement civils et militaires. Ainsi, sous la férule de l’Égypte va progressivement germer ce qui deviendra l’Organisation de libération de la Palestine (OLP), modèle du nationalisme palestinien. On le constate : Gaza est, depuis les origines, aux avant-postes de l’opposition armée et idéologique à Israël.

Après la défaite militaire de l’Égypte en 1956, suite à la crise de Suez, Israël prend le contrôle de Gaza et envahit le Sinaï. Les affrontements entre Tsahal et les fedayin sont très violents. Conséquence : des milliers de Gazaouis sont expulsés. Ils deviennent des doubles exilés. Débute dès lors une occupation effective de plus de 25 ans où quelque 100 000 Gazaouis vont travailler en Israël. Cela n’empêche en aucun cas les attentats terroristes.

En 1987, toujours fidèle à sa dynamique de confrontation, c’est à l’extrême nord de Gaza, dans le camp de Jabaliya, que débute la première Intifada, la « guerre des pierres ». La même année, le Hamas voit le jour. Suite aux accords signés entre Israël et l’OLP en 1993 à Washington, puis en 1994 au Caire, Gaza devient autonome. Elle voit l’installation de l’Autorité palestinienne dirigée par Yasser Arafat. Le Hamas reste sous contrôle jusqu’aux élections législatives de 2006. Un an plus tôt, Tsahal se retirait unilatéralement de la bande gazaouie, malgré les tirs de plus en plus fréquents de roquettes sur le sud d’Israël. Des zones palestiniennes, la bande de Gaza est la plus turbulente.

La Cisjordanie, elle, est dix fois plus grande que Gaza. En 1950, et contrairement à Gaza, elle est tout simplement annexée par la Transjordanie pour former, tout autour du fleuve Jourdain, la Jordanie. Les Cisjordnaniens deviennent de facto des citoyens jordaniens. Débute dès lors un long travail d’assimilation par lequel l’État central s’attèle à effacer l’identité palestinienne des réfugiés. L’économiste franco-égyptien Samir Amin l’explique clairement : « Les États arabes s’emploieront activement de 1947 à 1967, à […] empêcher le peuple palestinien de mener sa lutte de libération, qui ne peut être que révolutionnaire. L’administration jordanienne et égyptienne en Palestine arabe remplit cette fonction. De 1948 à 1955, elle impose le silence aux Palestiniens, victimes de la défaite . »

Septembre noir

Avec la guerre de 1967, un schéma plus ou moins identique à celui de Gaza se répète. L’exode dans l’exode. Quelque 250 000 Cisjordaniens traversent le Jourdain pour se réfugier en Jordanie. Ces « personnes déplacées », selon la terminologie officielle de l’ONU, ont un droit au retour comme le stipule la résolution du 18 décembre 1968. Vainement. C’est une fin de non-recevoir de Tel-Aviv. Ils continueront à grossir les rangs des réfugiés des camps palestiniens en Jordanie. La défaite des armées arabes coalisées face à l’État hébreu permet, paradoxalement, au nationalisme palestinien, au travers de l’OLP et de Yasser Arafat, de s’affirmer indépendamment du panarabisme et du nassérisme.

Les camps de réfugiés palestiniens en Jordanie deviennent inévitablement un terreau du militantisme et de l’activisme de l’OLP et de sa branche armée. Le clash avec les autorités jordanienne est désormais inéluctable. Il a lieu en 1970. Du 17 au 27 septembre, les milices du roi Hussein, au prétexte d’un complot contre la monarchie, vont passer au fil de l’épée des milliers de Palestiniens. C’est le « Septembre noir ». Les réfugiés, désormais persona non grata sur le territoire jordanien, s’expatrient au Liban.

Les exilés palestiniens de Jordanie viennent s’ajouter aux autres Palestiniens déjà présents dans les camps de réfugiés depuis 1948. Dans un Liban faible, la centrale palestinienne s’érige rapidement en une force armée avec laquelle il faut compter. « Le Liban, accueillant tous les réfugiés palestiniens dans les camps du sud et du nord, subissait le comportement d’Arafat qui s’érigeait en véritable chef d’un État dans l’État, encouragé en cela par les accords du Caire, lui permettant de se défendre contre les raids israéliens. Il luttait alors avec des armements plus lourds que ceux que possédait l’armée libanaise », détaille l’essayiste franco-libanais Antoine-Joseph Assaf.

En 1975, une terrible guerre civile, multicommunautaire, éclate. Chiites, Druzes, Chrétiens, Sunnites… Tous contre tous. Les Palestiniens sont happés dans le conflit et le tribut qu’ils paient est tragique. En 1976, lorsque les Syriens interviennent à la rescousse des Chrétiens libanais, ils font un massacre au camp palestinien de Tel al-Zaatar, au nord-est de Beyrouth. Au bas mot, 2 000 victimes. Nouveau carnage en 1982, dans le camp de réfugiés de Sabra et Chatila, à Beyrouth-Ouest. Sous l’œil complaisant des Syriens, phalangistes et milices chrétiennes, épaulés par Tsahal, exécutent jusqu’à 3 500 Palestiniens. « Ces événements montrent à quel point leur présence n’a jamais été acceptée par certaines franges de la société libanaise », observe le politologue Jean-Paul Chagnollaud.

Des exilés indésirables

On trouve également une diaspora palestinienne dans les pays du Golfe, particulièrement au Koweït. C’est une frange aisée. Mais la guerre de 1991 va changer la donne et les Palestiniens seront contraints de nouveau à s’exiler. En Syrie, les camps de réfugiés sont sous étroite surveillance policière. Il leur est interdit d’avoir une quelconque activité politique, syndicale ou associative de quelque nature que cela soit. Le secteur public leur est également fermé puisque la première condition d’embauche est celle de détenir la nationalité du pays. Il leur reste alors le secteur privé et les emplois non qualifiés. Plusieurs rapports de l’UNWRA, qui tente d’y remédier, dénoncent cet état de fait. La situation sociale et sanitaire des camps de réfugiés se caractérise par une forte précarité : insalubrité, surpopulation, maladies chroniques et surmortalité infantile y sont monnaie courante.

N’oublions pas, enfin, les exilés de l’intérieur, ceux qui vont devenir les Arabes israéliens. En dépit de leur naturalisation en 1952, ils demeurent des citoyens de seconde zone, soumis à des lois discriminatoires et souvent considérés par le reste des Israéliens comme une cinquième colonne.

Aujourd’hui, plus de la moitié des 5 millions de Palestiniens vit en-dehors de la Palestine historique. Israël refuse leur droit au retour malgré la résolution 194 des Nations unies. On comprend dès lors pourquoi les Palestiniens tiennent coûte que coûte à rester dans Gaza. Entre la peste des bombardements et le choléra de l’exode et du non-retour, l’enfer des bombes semble sans doute plus doux que l’exil perpétuel.

World Opinions – Jeune Afrique

L’article Histoire. La Palestine : un peuple, une histoire, des exodes est apparu en premier sur زوايا ميادين | Mayadin Columns.

Protests were held along the Gaza-Israel border in protest at the Israeli far-rights provocative march in Jerusalem.

 Israeli forces have used live fire and tear gas against Palestinians who joined a demonstration on the besieged Gaza Strip’s eastern border with Israel, injuring several Palestinians, as far-right Israelis held a so-called ‘flag march’ in occupied East Jerusalem’s Old City.

Voilà comment sont traités les êtres humains #Musulmans en #Palestine 🇵🇸par les occupants juifs israéliens qui volent les territoires !
Honte à l’Occident qui laisse faire et qui cautionne de telles violences !
pic.twitter.com/HUsLZAshg1

— ❌Zone 51🇪🇭 (@ufoflyings) May 18, 2023

Hundreds of Palestinians joined the protest on Thursday, which was called for by Palestinian factions in response to the Israeli march. The Gaza demonstration condemned the ‘flag march’ in Jerusalem, and called for an end to Israeli attacks in the Al-Aqsa Mosque compound.

Israeli authorities said their forces had fired after Palestinians threw explosive devices at the barrier between Israel and Gaza.

Palestinian man still visits his home his family were forced to free during Nakba!#Nakba#FreePalestine #Palestine 🇵🇸 https://t.co/Cthoa8Um12

— Lance Dyer 〓〓 (@Lance63) May 18, 2023

Osama Abu Qamar, a 50-year-old resident of Gaza’s Jabaliya camp, told Al Jazeera that he had ccome to participate in the march to protest against the “provocative” march in Jerusalem, where far-right Israelis forced the closure of several Palestinian throughfares in the city as they chanted abusive slogans and waved Israeli flags.

According to The New York Post newspaper, the state assembly of New York has announced its intention to review proposed legislation that aims to prevent registered US charities from funding illegal #IsraeliSettlements in the occupied West Bank.#Palestine #JerusalemUnderAttack pic.twitter.com/fwusXLy2zs

— farahZpalestine 1 (@farahzpalestine) May 18, 2023

The event, which is held annually to mark the occupation and annexation of East Jerusalem, has led to violence in recent years, and with a truce between Israel and the Palestinian Islamic Jihad only coming into effect this week after four days of fighting that killed 33 Palestinians and one Israeli, there was fear of it sparking further violence.

“We will not surrender and we will continue to demand our rights and defend our occupied lands and our sanctities in Jerusalem,” Abu Qamar told Al Jazeera.

Israel is a terrorist zionist illegal state,the illegitimate child of the western world.Whr r all those countries n human right organisations who were weeping yesterday fr Ukraine n condemning Russia fr violating human rights. #hypocrites #Palestinewillbefree #Palestine https://t.co/4kZcXDGYtW

— Laiyla Khan (@LaiylaKhan) May 18, 2023

Huda al-Salibi attended the march with her family.

“A few days ago, the Gaza Strip was under an Israeli attack that lasted for days in an attempt by the Israeli government to implement racist policies by [far-right National Security Minister Itamar] Ben-Gvir and other extremist ministers,” al-Salibi told Al Jazeera. “Today, the violations in Jerusalem continue with the launch of the provocative march.”

Today, #Palestinians raise #Palestine's flags in occupied #Jerusalem's Silwan neighborhood as a response to Israel's extreme-right provocative 'Flag March'.#Act4Palestine #JerusalemUnderAttack pic.twitter.com/tOpwKxl3Lc

— Free_Palestine (@zainafarah1) May 18, 2023

Israel deployed heavy security to prevent violence after past flag marches were marked by Israeli attacks on Palestinians and “death to Arabs” chants.

In 2021, the march was rerouted after violence erupted in the wake of the storming of the Al-Aqsa Mosque compound, Islam’s third holiest site, by Israeli forces and the evictions of Palestinians from the Sheikh Jarrah neighbourhood, also in East Jerusalem.

Des parlementaires #juifs israéliens du Likud, parti de Netanyahu, investissent l'esplanade des mosquées à Jérusalem et entonnent l'hymne israélien, pour provoquer la population #Musulmane de #Palestine 🇵🇸
Une provocation de plus. Ça dure depuis 75 ans.
pic.twitter.com/h9IzDw9y9L

— ❌Zone 51🇪🇭 (@ufoflyings) May 18, 2023

Hamas, which governs Gaza, called on international and Arab governments to stop the provocative flag parade in Jerusalem, warning that it would lead to further escalation in the coastal enclave, which has been under an Israeli air, sea and land blockade since 2007.

#Palestine || A group of settlers attack a Palestinian youth in the old city of #Jerusalem. 18.5.23 pic.twitter.com/8GC1tAQAS4

— Hala (@Hala31775951) May 18, 2023

‘Confront the occupation’

Abd Allatif al-Qanou’, a spokesman for Hamas, told Al Jazeera: “We will not allow Israeli occupation to pass a plan to extend its sovereignty or impose its control over Al-Aqsa Mosque through facilitating the march of the settler flags or the repeated incursions into it.”

🇵🇸 #Palestine || The Israeli occupation forces detain a Palestinian woman after raiding the flag of Palestine in Salah Eddin street in Jerusalem. 18.5.23 pic.twitter.com/VHgKvKRXSi

— #FreePalestine (@Noura_Pal) May 18, 2023

“We call for all Palestinians to go to Al-Aqsa to participate in the defence of the compound in order to protect it and to confront the occupation,” he said.

Al-Qanou’ accused the Israeli government of using what has become known as Jerusalem Unification Day to encourage, facilitate and protect the frequent storming on Al-Aqsa Mosque by Israeli settlers. The latest occurred on Thursday morning in the run-up to the flag march and was led by Israeli ministers and Knesset members.

The flag of Palestine flies in the sky of Gaza in response to Israel’s provocative “Flag March”#Palestine #FlagMarch #Gaza pic.twitter.com/EfMEQ3GP59

— ParsToday English (@ParsTodayEN) May 18, 2023

“This disgraceful behaviour represents a flagrant violation of our greatest religious symbols, our Islamic sanctities and our sacred capital,” he said.

The leftist Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP) said in a statement that the Palestinian people and their resistance “will not be silent in the face of the so-called march of flags and the [Israeli] occupation’s repeated incursions of Al-Aqsa”.

“We call for urgent action to condemn these occupation policies and attacks against the Palestinian people, their rights and sanctities,” said the PFLP, which has presence in both the occupied West Bank and Gaza.

Reham Owda, a Gaza-based political analyst, told Al Jazeera that Palestinians consider the flag march a provocative attempt by settlers and the far-right government of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to change the status quo in occupied East Jerusalem by “Judaising” it and exerting its control on the Old City.

Palestinians fear Israel has gradually been expanding its control over the Al-Aqsa compound, where Jews are not supposed to be allowed to pray.

The international community backs the so-called two-state solution to resolve the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, but successive Israeli governments have approved settlements in the occupied West Bank and East Jerusalem, which is supposed to become the Palestinian state’s capital. Palestinians say the expanding settlements diminish the prospects for a viable, sovereign State of Palestine.

World Opinions +  AL JAZEERA

L’article Israel fires on Palestinians protesting ‘flag march’ in Gaza.. Video est apparu en premier sur زوايا ميادين | Mayadin Columns.

Israel’s parliament has sworn in Benjamin Netanyahu as prime minister, inaugurating the country’s most far-right, religiously conservative government in history.

Netanyahu, 73, took the oath of office on Thursday, moments after Israel’s parliament, or Knesset, passed a vote of confidence in his new government. Of the parliament’s 120 members, 63 voted in favour of the new government, with 54 votes against.

Benjamin Netanyahu’s incoming hardline government put West Bank settlement expansion at the top of its list of priorities on Wednesday, vowing to legalise dozens of illegally built outposts and annex the occupied territory as part of its coalition deal with its ultranational allies.

The coalition agreements, released a day before the government is to be sworn into office, also included language endorsing discrimination against LGBTQ+ people on religious grounds, as well as generous stipends for ultra-Orthodox men who prefer to study instead of work.

The package laid the groundwork for what is expected to be a stormy beginning for Netanyahu’s government and could put it at odds with large parts of the Israeli public and Israel’s closest allies abroad.

Its lengthy list of guidelines was led by a commitment to “advance and develop settlement in all parts of the land of Israel”, including “Judea and Samaria”, the biblical names for the West Bank.

Israel captured the West Bank in 1967 along with the Gaza Strip and East Jerusalem. The Palestinians seek the West Bank as the heartland of a future independent state. In the decades since, Israel has constructed dozens of Jewish settlements there that are now home to about 500,000 Israelis living alongside about 2.5 million Palestinians.

Most of the international community considers Israel’s West Bank settlements illegal and an obstacle to peace with the Palestinians. The US has warned the incoming government against taking steps that could undermine the dwindling hopes for the establishment of an independent Palestinian state.

Netanyahu’s new government – the most religious and hardline in Israel’s history – is made up of ultra-Orthodox parties, a far-right ultranationalist religious faction affiliated with the West Bank settler movement, and his Likud party. It is to be sworn in on Thursday.

Several of Netanyahu’s key allies, including most of the Religious Zionism party, are ultranationalist West Bank settlers.

In the coalition agreement between Likud and Religious Zionism, Netanyahu pledges to legalise wildcat settlement outposts considered illegal even by the Israeli government. He also promises to annex the West Bank “while choosing the timing and considering the national and international interests of the state of Israel”.

Such a move would alienate much of the world, and give new fuel to critics who compare Israeli policies in the West Bank to apartheid South Africa.

The deal also grants favours to Itamar Ben-Gvir, a far-right politician who will be in charge of the national police force as the newly created national security minister.

It includes a commitment to expand and vastly increase government funding for the Israeli settlements in the divided West Bank city of Hebron, where Ben-Gvir lives among a tiny settler community amid tens of thousands of Palestinians.

That agreement also includes a clause pledging to change the country’s anti-discrimination laws to allow businesses to refuse service to people “because of a religious belief”. The legislation drew outrage earlier this week and concerns about impingement of LGBTQ+ rights. Netanyahu has said he will not let the law pass, but nonetheless left the clause in the coalition agreement.

Among its other changes is placing Bezalel Smotrich, a settler leader who heads the Religious Zionism party, in a newly created ministerial post overseeing West Bank settlement policy.

Netanyahu is returning to power after he was ousted from office last year after serving as prime minister from 2009 to 2021. He will take office while on trial for allegedly accepting bribes, breach of trust and fraud, charges he denies.

His partners are seeking widespread policy reforms that could alienate large swaths of the Israeli public, raise tensions with the Palestinians, and put the country on a collision course with the US and American Jewry.

The Biden administration has said it strongly opposes settlement expansion and has rebuked the Israeli government for it in the past.

Earlier on Wednesday, Israel’s figurehead president expressed “deep concern” about the incoming government and its positions on LGBTQ+ rights, racism and the country’s Arab minority in a rare meeting called with Ben-Gvir, one of the coalition’s most radical members.

The government platform also mentioned that the loosely defined rules governing holy sites, including Jerusalem’s flashpoint shrine known to Jews as the Temple Mount and to Muslims as the al-Aqsa mosque compound, would remain the same.

Ben-Gvir and other Religious Zionism politicians had called for the “status quo” to be changed to allow Jewish prayer at the site, a move that risked inflaming tensions with the Palestinians. The status of the site is the emotional centre of the decades-long Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

World Opinions- Agencies

L’article Analysis. Netanyahu government makes West Bank settlement expansion its priority est apparu en premier sur زوايا ميادين | Mayadin Columns.

If he wanted to get in to the Al-Aqsa Mosque for the last Friday of Ramadan, he would have to wait for more than 11 hours overnight, and then find an opportunity to jump over Israel’s separation wall.

The wall divides the occupied West Bank, where Ahmad lives in the Aqabet Jaber refugee camp in Jericho, from occupied East Jerusalem.

But 20-year-old Ahmad does not consider the barrier to be insurmountable – he’d made the jump before, successfully.

Because of his age, and the fact that he is a Palestinian from the West Bank, Ahmad is unable to enter East Jerusalem. He would have to be over 50, or under 12, to get in on Fridays in Ramadan without a difficult-to-obtain Israeli army permit. Women of all ages are also allowed in on the same days. For the rest of the year, they are all also excluded.

Despite those restrictions, Ahmad and his friends will try to sneak in.

“[Going to Al-Aqsa is] deeply embedded in our hearts – it’s something that I can’t explain,” Ahmad told Al Jazeera. “This is holy land, and it is occupied. We go to pray, and the presence of the occupation itself is a reason for us to go,” he told Al Jazeera.

Ahmad and his friends left their homes in the camp in the eastern occupied West Bank just after midnight on Friday, and made it to the wall at 1am.

“We use a ladder to go up and we check out the other side. We throw down a rope and we go down slowly. When we get down to more than half, we jump,” Ahmad explained.

Ahmad and his friends had planned to be at Al-Aqsa at around 3am before dawn prayers, but they faced a problem – Israeli border police forces happened to be stationed at the other side of the wall from where they were planning to jump.

The Israelis confiscated two of the group’s ladders, according to Ahmad. But several hours later, they had another one.

By the morning, most of the young Palestinians attempting to make the jump had given up, and gone back home.

But Ahmad and his close friends spent a sleepless night waiting, and had their pre-dawn meal in a nearby restaurant, before starting their fast, and waiting for an opportunity.

West Bank Palestinians resort to dangerous trips over Israel’s separation wall to reach Al-Aqsa in East Jerusalem.

“We’re tired because we haven’t slept since yesterday,” Ahmad said in the morning. “The army [police] won’t budge. We’ve been trying all night – we go up every once in a while to check.”

“We just want to break our fast at Al-Aqsa, even if we don’t make it for Friday prayers. We want to experience that moment. The shabab [youth] are adamant to go – they’re saying, ‘We don’t want to go back.’”

‘Walk with confidence’

Hundreds of Palestinians have jumped over Israel’s Separation Wall since its construction began in 2002 during the Second Palestinian Intifada. The eight-metre-high concrete wall is lined with military checkpoints, surveillance cameras and barbed wire.

Israel has claimed that the wall is for security reasons, and that it has reduced the number of attacks in Israel, but 85 percent of it falls deep inside the occupied West Bank and annexes with it large chunks of Palestinian territory occupied in 1967, including East Jerusalem.

Rights groups have classified Israel’s wall and the separation of the West Bank from East Jerusalem as an element of the severe restrictions imposed on the movement of Palestinians in the occupied territories.

For Palestinians like Ahmad, those restrictions mean that they are usually unable to visit Al-Aqsa, one of Islam’s holiest sites, and a national Palestinian symbol.

Ahmad was 17 before he saw Jerusalem for the first time, on a school trip with a permit. His visits since have all involved having to jump the wall.

But Ahmad said he had never been stopped. One way to blend in: wearing a silver chain necklace on the outside of his shirt, which he said is the fashion among young Palestinian men in Jerusalem.

“I also try to copy the way that Jerusalemites talk – they are urban people,” he said between laughs, and mentioned that it was important to “walk with confidence”.

“The Old City is full of soldiers – of course, if they see you nervous, they may ask you about your ID. I walk like I’m a son of the city,” remarked Ahmad.

“This way, you basically don’t show.”

‘Security ban’

When Al Jazeera contacted Ahmad just before midday, most of his friends had made the jump, but he had hung back, waiting for his turn with one other friend.

In the meantime, Ahmad explained that his family, like thousands of other Palestinians, have what is known as a “security ban”, and are not eligible for permits to enter Jerusalem or Israel.

Such military-issued orders are at times given to individuals who have served prison time or were involved in “security offences’” as well as their family members.

Despite not being able to travel into Israel legally, Ahmad still encounters Israeli forces, when they frequently raid the camp he lives in and arrest youths.

Ahmad also claimed that his eldest brother was once shot in the thigh with live ammunition during confrontations with the Israeli military.

All of this means that, for Ahmad, the idea of applying for a military permit, with such a low chance of success, is unpalatable.

“To be honest, I am ashamed to go and apply for a military permit,” said Ahmad. “It’s our land, I don’t understand why I have to apply for a military permit … This is shameful and it feels horrible that we can’t go anytime.”

But jumping over the wall is not easy. On Wednesday, which many Muslims believed to be “Laylat al-Qadr”, the holiest night in Ramadan, the Palestinian Red Crescent said it had to deal with several injuries as a result of people jumping over the wall.

For a while, Ahmad’s friends who had reached Al-Aqsa had not heard from him, and thought that he may have not made it across.

But, in the mid-afternoon, he arrived, happy, and relieved, to have made it through.

“It’s a very nice feeling to have entered after all that effort – I’m happy and I feel satisfied. I’m going to stay here until iftar,” Ahmad told Al Jazeera, from inside the Al-Aqsa Mosque compound.

“It was very worth it – I would have done more to enter,” Ahmad added.

“Anything we can do for Al-Aqsa, we do it. If I hadn’t gotten in, I would’ve kept trying – and I will keep coming back.

WORLD OPINIONS +  AL JAZEERA

L’article Over the wall: One Palestinian’s journey to Al-Aqsa Mosque est apparu en premier sur زوايا ميادين | Mayadin Columns.

Israeli forces have destroyed the home of a Palestinian family in Sheikh Jarrah neighbourhood in occupied East Jerusalem, days after the family tried to stave off the demolition by threatening to blow up the house.

Palestinians collect the belongings of Salhiya family from the rubble of their home which was demolished by the Israeli occupation forces predawn today. Huge Israeli forces besieged the neighborhood, detained the family, assaulted them and demolished the home.#SaveSheikhJarrah pic.twitter.com/e8vKjy29qY

— Quds News Network (@QudsNen) January 19, 2022

Large numbers of Israeli police and special forces raided the Salhiyeh home and cordoned off the surrounding area at 3am (01:00 GMT) on Wednesday. The family told Al Jazeera that dozens of heavily armed forces broke into their home while they slept and assaulted family members, arresting six of them including the head of the household, Mahmoud Salhiyeh.

At least 18 other Palestinians who were present at the home in solidarity with the family were also arrested.

The demolition began at the dawn call to prayer at approximately 5am (03:00 GMT) during a rainstorm on one of the coldest nights of this year’s winter season. The family of 18 is now rendered homeless.

Israeli authorities have justified the demolition to build a special education school for the residents of the neighbourhood.

Family member Yasmeen Salhiyeh, 19, said Israeli forces cut off the electricity to their home and fired tear gas canisters in and around the house. She told Al Jazeera that some 50 officers “raided the house and began beating up the men of the family – they also assaulted my aunt”.

After forcefully evicting the Salhiya family in freezing temperatures overnight, the Israeli occupation authorities proceeded to raze their homes and all remaining structures on their property. #savesheikhjarrah pic.twitter.com/A0UQYP4Mhj

— Quds News Network (@QudsNen) January 19, 2022

“They pulled my father out of bed, beat him along with my brothers and cousins,” before arresting them “without giving them the chance to put clothes on”, she said.

Yasmeen added that Israeli forces fired rubber-coated bullets at activists and journalists who were attempting to reach the scene of the demolition, leading to several injuries.

Videos shared online showed an ambulance being blocked from reaching the site.

Jawad Siam, head of the Wadi Helweh Information Center monitoring group, arrived at the scene at about 3:30am (1:30 GMT). He told Al Jazeera that there were “about 200 police, border police, Yammam and special forces.”

Hours after the demolition ended and Israeli forces largely pulled out, the family and lawyers continue to have no information about the whereabouts of those arrested, said Yasmeen.

The Salhiyeh home lies on the main street in the flashpoint neighbourhood of Sheikh Jarrah, about one kilometre (half a mile) north of Jerusalem’s Old City walls. Many families in the neighbourhood face imminent expulsion by Israeli authorities.

Israeli forces initially attempted to demolish the house on Monday, but the family barricaded themselves on their rooftop and threatened to blow the house up rather than face displacement, leading to a tense, day-long standoff with the authorities.

“I will burn the house and everything in it,” Mahmoud Salhiyeh said as he stood on the roof of his home surrounded by gas canisters. “I will not leave here, only from here to the grave, because there is no life, no dignity.

“I’ve been in battle with them for 25 years, they sent me settlers who offered to buy the house and I did not agree.”

Israeli authorities had issued a land confiscation order under the pretext that the six-dunam property (1.5 acres) would be used to build a special needs school, according to the family.

Israeli police said in a statement on Twitter on Wednesday that “this land was expropriated by the local authority for the purpose of establishing a special education school for the residents of the neighborhood.”

A final Israeli court hearing for the family’s displacement was set for January 23. Forced displacement in occupied territory is a violation of international law and a war crime.

“There was hope that the family would have more time,” said Siam. “The lawyers had put in a request to extend the time for the demolition – they were expecting that it would be temporarily halted.”

The family was forcibly displaced from their home once before, in the village of Ein Karem in the western half of Jerusalem, during the 1948 Nakba, or catastrophe, when Zionist militias violently expelled some 750,000 Palestinians to create the state of Israel.

Mohammad Abu al-Hommos, a local activist, said Wednesday’s demolition was about “revenge”.

“The Israelis just wanted to prove that they could get to the family even if the family managed to block the demolition for 48 hours,” he told Al Jazeera at the scene.

“They wanted to demolish the spirit of Mahmoud’s family, to kill its history and its memories. Mahmoud’s parents were displaced once before from Ein Karem, and here they are in 2022, they’re being displaced again,” added Abu al-Hommos.

“This is about the Judaization of Jerusalem,” he continued, describing the demolished home appearing “as though it was hit by an earthquake”.

Local NGOs and rights groups have long pointed to a range of Israeli practices and policies in Jerusalem aimed at altering the demographic ratio in favour of Jews, a goal laid out as “maintaining a solid Jewish majority in the city” in the municipality’s 2000 masterplan.

Unlawful settlement expansion, Palestinian home demolitions, and restrictions on urban development are some of the main ways being used to realise this goal, according to rights groups.

Israel militarily occupied the eastern half of the city in 1967. Only 13 percent is zoned for Palestinian development and residential construction, most of which is already built up.

Some 57 percent of all land in occupied East Jerusalem has been expropriated by Israeli authorities, including from private Palestinian owners, for both the building of illegal settlements and zoning of land as “green areas and public infrastructure”. The remaining 30 percent comprises “unplanned areas” where construction is also banned.

At least 280 Palestinian households in Jerusalem consisting of 970 people, including 424 children, are at risk of forced displacement by Israeli authorities, according to the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (UN OCHA).

Grassroots al-Quds, a Jerusalem-based Palestinian NGO, said Israel’s actions come as part of “a large-scale plan to empty al-Sheikh Jarrah of its Palestinian residents,” including plans to build new illegal Jewish settlements.

In May, popular Palestinian protests erupted when Israeli authorities attempted to forcibly displace six Palestinian families from their homes in Sheikh Jarrah for settlers to move in.

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Sous haute surveillance policière, plus d’un millier d’Israéliens arborant des drapeaux nationaux ont défilé mardi à l’appel de l’extrême-droite à Jérusalem-Est, premier test pour le nouveau gouvernement après des menaces du mouvement palestinien Hamas qui font craindre une escalade.

Les manifestants, dont des jeunes et des militants juifs ultranationalistes et d’extrême droite, sont partis d’un quartier orthodoxe de Jérusalem-Ouest pour traverser à Jérusalem-Est.

Le groupe s’est ensuite rendu sur la place devant la porte de Damas, donnant sur le quartier musulman de la Vieille Ville où se trouve l’Esplanade des mosquées. Des cris “Mort aux Arabes [Palestiniens, ndlr.]” ont percé de la foule.

Peu avant cette “marche des drapeaux” controversée, la police a fermé des artères menant à la Vieille Ville et bloqué l’accès des Palestiniens à la place devant la porte de Damas, ce qui a donné lieu à des heurts ayant fait une dizaine de blessés parmi les manifestants palestiniens, selon les secouristes.

Craignant un dérapage, l’émissaire de l’ONU pour le Proche-Orient, Tor Wennesland, a appelé “toutes les parties à éviter les provocations qui pourraient mener à un nouveau round de confrontation”.

La marche commémore “Yom Yerushalaim” ou “la journée de Jérusalem”, soit l’anniversaire pour la population israélienne de la “réunification” de la Ville sainte après son occupation en 1967 selon le calendrier hébraïque. Selon le droit international, Israël occupe illégalement Jérusalem-Est, également annexée.

Test pour le nouveau Premier ministre

Entrée en fonction lundi, la nouvelle coalition hétéroclite menée par le Premier ministre Naftali Bennett (droite radicale) et son associé le centriste Yaïr Lapid, a mis fin à douze ans de règne de Benjamin Netanyahu. Et la marche constitue son premier test.

Face à cette marche, des factions palestiniennes y compris le Hamas, ont appelé à une “journée de colère” dans les territoires palestiniens pour “défendre” Jérusalem.

Depuis l’enclave palestinienne de Gaza sous blocus israélien, des ballons incendiaires ont été lancés en direction du sud d’Israël, selon des témoins. Les services de pompiers israéliens ont fait état d’une vingtaine d’incendies liés à ces projectiles.

Selon un porte-parole du Hamas, Mohammad Hamadeh, les “médiateurs” œuvrant à un cessez-le-feu durable avec Israël ont demandé aux factions palestiniennes de “ne pas s’engager dans une escalade militaire sur la base de la marche des drapeaux”. “Mais toutes les options sont sur la table.”

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Les armes se sont tues vendredi à Gaza et en Israël, quelques heures après l’entrée en vigueur d’un cessez-le-feu. Le Premier ministre israélien a parlé d’un “succès exceptionnel” contre le Hamas alors que le mouvement palestinien a évoqué “l’euphorie de la victoire”.

L’opération israélienne contre le mouvement islamiste palestinien avait été lancée après des échauffourées à Jérusalem il y a onze jours, puis des tirs de roquettes du Hamas.

“Nous avons atteint les objectifs”, a affirmé le Premier ministre israélien Benjamin Netanyahu, en commentant l’offensive militaire israélienne contre le territoire palestinien pauvre et exigu de Gaza contrôlé par le Hamas depuis 2007 et où vivent quelque deux millions de Palestiniens.

A l’annonce du cessez-le-feu, des milliers de Palestiniens ont célébré dans la nuit à Gaza la fin des bombardements israéliens, de même qu’en Cisjordanie et à Jérusalem-Est occupées. “C’est l’euphorie de la victoire”, a lancé devant les manifestants Khalil al-Hayya, un ténor du Hamas dans l’enclave soumise à un blocus israélien depuis près de 15 ans.

La trêve est entrée en vigueur à 02h00 locales, à la suite d’efforts intenses des Etats-Unis et de l’Egypte principalement. Joe Biden a estimé qu’elle était “une vraie opportunité” d’avancer vers la paix, et exprimé sa “sincère reconnaissance” à l’Egypte, qui a conclu de précédents accords de trêve avec les deux protagonistes.

Deux délégations égyptiennes doivent être envoyées en Israël et dans les Territoires palestiniens “pour surveiller” le respect du cessez-le-feu, selon des sources diplomatiques égyptiennes. Et le chef de la diplomatie Antony Blinken doit se rendre au Moyen-Orient “dans les prochains jours”.

La communauté internationale, appelant à une solution “durable” au conflit, s’est globalement réjouie vendredi du cessez-le-feu entré en vigueur dans la nuit.

DFAE: il faut régler les “causes profondes”

La Suisse a également salué le cessez-le-feu, mais appelé les parties à “se pencher sérieusement sur les causes profondes du conflit”. “Il est temps de mettre un terme à ces cycles de violence dont les populations civiles palestiniennes et israéliennes n’ont que trop souffert”, a affirmé le Département fédéral des affaires étrangères (DFAE) dans un communiqué.

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The United States has provided Israel with the military means and diplomatic cover it needs to defeat Hamas in Gaza, while devastating the livelihood of more than two million Palestinians, in what qualify as war crimes.

The Biden administration has covered for Israel at the United Nations and lied about it. Its denial of having obstructed a mere statement by the UN Security Council (UNSC) calling for a ceasefire, makes it look foolish, disingenuous and weak.

Washington has stood alone among the members of the council in its opposition to consensus on a ceasefire, not once, not twice, but three times in the past few days.

The White House spokesperson insisted that the US is pursuing an “effective” approach of “quiet, intensive, diplomacy”, but as it turns out, President Joe Biden has been merely buying Israel time to get on with “finishing the job”.

According to a New York Times report, the US president told Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu that he might not be able to deter growing international and domestic pressure for much longer, with the mounting death and destruction caused by days of pounding Gaza.

When Biden finally asked Netanyahu to start winding down the war, the arrogant Israeli premier rebuffed him, insisting instead on taking his time to realise his objectives in the war, come what may.

Israel has concluded from the previous three Gaza offensives that it could no longer accept a “strategic tie” with Hamas; that its military victory must be quick, real and resounding; that Palestinians and other regional nemeses must learn that they cannot achieve by force what they failed to achieve through diplomacy; and that Israel will do what it must to win, regardless of how long or how much the world whines.

On that basis, Israel is making an example of Gaza, sadistically destroying its administrative, municipal and economic infrastructure, including electricity, water and sewerage systems, setting it back years if not decades.

The images from Gaza speak louder than words.

Netanyahu is making Gaza suffer in a cynical ploy to satisfy his vengeful ultra-nationalist base and continue to maintain his grip on power.

If he loses his premiership, he is likely to end up in jail, like his predecessor Ehud Olmert, on any one of the three serious charges he now faces in court – fraud, breach of trust and accepting bribes.

Netanyahu was in dire straits only days before his fascist allies began to run amok in occupied East Jerusalem, terrorising its residents. He had failed yet again to form a coalition government and was finally forced to stand trial after repeated postponements.

But, lo and behold, as soon as the escalation got under way, his opponents failed to form a government, and as the escalation worsened, his chances to remain in office improved dramatically, with smaller right-wing parties like Yamina rallying behind him.

One has to wonder if any of this is in the US national interest.

The short answer is no, none of it. Nada. Zilch.

Indeed, the ensuing grave humanitarian crisis and the deepening hatred for Israel and its enablers in the region and beyond is damaging to US credibility and national interest.

This is especially true when the Biden administration claims to put human rights at the centre of its foreign policy, while its spoiled brat of a client takes advantage of its sympathy and support to commit war crimes.

Even the much-touted war on the Islamist movement, Hamas, is not in the US best interest, not when it destabilises the region, and not when the alternative is a negotiated settlement that could achieve peace and security – peace for Israel and security for the Palestinians – based on freedom and justice.https://094ee0c6b645bae036b07b696e17dc16.safeframe.googlesyndication.com/safeframe/1-0-38/html/container.html

Unlike other pan-Islamic groups that threatened the US and Western security, Hamas is a national liberation movement with religious undertones, and like countless liberation movements, it uses force to achieve its objectives.

Like it or hate it, Hamas has consistently limited the scope of its activities and objectives to freeing Palestine from Israeli colonialism, and it has long entrusted the negotiations to the Palestine Liberation Organization.

For its part, Washington has negotiated an agreement with the Islamist Taliban, which it has also long accused of terrorism and which proved far more radical and less compromising than Hamas, in order to bring peace to Afghanistan.

All of which begs the question: Why is the Biden administration doing Netanyahu’s dirty bidding, instead of helping to reach a similar agreement in Palestine?

Netanyahu’s answer is simple: “America is a thing you can move very easily, move it in the right direction.” This is what he said in 2001, while assuring Israeli settlers that Israel could destroy the Palestinian Authority and continue with illegal settlement building, regardless of the US position.

With the Democrats’ razor-thin majority in the Senate, Biden cannot afford to alienate a single pro-Israel Democrat if he is to pass his ambitious legislative agenda, not when the Republicans are blindly following Netanyahu.

Israel could also count on the overwhelming backing it enjoys in Congress and in the US in general, which is so substantial that Netanyahu aptly called it, “absurd”. Paradoxically, the two senators leading the effort for an immediate ceasefire, Bernie Sanders and Jon Ossoff, are Jewish.

More disturbingly, Netanyahu’s views reflect a general “disdain” among Israelis for Americans, whom they reckon are “inherently dupable people”, according to a report in the Jewish American publication, The Forward.

Over the years, the US has provided Israel with close to $150bn in direct assistance only, and in return they are rewarded with insult, for Israelis basically think the Americans, who long showered them with money and weapons, are suckers.

But then, these are the same Israelis who willingly made an infamous, cheating, deceiving, liar their country’s longest serving prime minister, heading not one, not two, but five governments – and counting.

It is no coincidence that, after engaging five US administrations over a quarter of a century, Netanyahu behaves so arrogantly towards US leaders. Not only has he gotten away with almost anything, even things contrary to US interests, he has also been rewarded for it.

Netanyahu called US President Bill Clinton “radically pro Palestinian”, even though the US president helped improve Israel’s regional and international standing in the 1990s, when foreign investment skyrocketed, the economy prospered, and trade increased while illegal settlement expanded.

Netanyahu’s chutzpah is best illustrated by his humiliation of US President Barack Obama, lecturing him on the Middle East, denouncing him on the Iran deal and his opposition to settlements, and snubbing him in his talk directly to the Congress.

And Obama’s defeatism is best illustrated by his absurd rush in the last months of his presidency to reward Netanyahu with a $38bn military aid package.

Such military assistance may have been justifiable during the Cold War, but today rich Israel is no longer a strategic asset; it is a strategic liability for the US. Israel may have served US strategy in the past, but that strategy proved bad for the US and the Middle East.

At any rate, if that was not weird enough, Netanyahu stalled, insisting on $45bn, before finally signing on it. Bizarrely, other Israeli leaders also complained about this “single largest pledge of military assistance in US history”.https://094ee0c6b645bae036b07b696e17dc16.safeframe.googlesyndication.com/safeframe/1-0-38/html/container.html

Wait, there is more.

Shortly after signing the deal, Netanyahu lashed out at the Obama-Biden administration for abstaining during a UNSC vote on Israel’s illegal settlements that Washington long opposed, calling it a “shameful anti-Israeli ploy”.

And then came Donald Trump, the gift that kept on giving concession after concession to Netanyahu. Among others, Trump recognised Israeli annexation of Jerusalem and the Syrian Golan Heights, as well as hundreds of illegal settlements in the occupied Palestinian territories.

It was no coincidence that Netanyahu made clear his support for Trump during the elections, but after becoming president, Biden resumed the relationship with the ungrateful premier, as if nothing had happened and even provided him with the diplomatic cover to fight his ugly war.

As Netanyahu plunged Palestine into another dark and tragic chapter of violence, and rejected Biden’s appeals to de-escalate the violence in order to reach a ceasefire, the Biden administration is rewarding him with a $735m arms sale that includes precision-guided weapons.

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Expect Netanyahu to ask for more in return for de-escalation, including more money and arms, and an invitation to Washington before Israel’s fifth elections in two years.

Insane!

And, well, insanely stupid.

Marwan Bishara – Senior political analyst at Al Jazeera

L’article Why Netanyahu thinks America is stupid est apparu en premier sur زوايا ميادين | Mayadin Columns.

Addressing the General Assembly, Antonio Guterres appealed to all sides to put down their arms and promised to launch an aid appeal for funding.

The fighting in the Middle East must stop immediately, United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said at a UN General Assembly meeting on Thursday, as he urged Israel and the Palestinians to call an immediate ceasefire and pledged to launch a full humanitarian appeal for funding.

“The past ten days have witnessed a dangerous and horrific surge in deadly violence in the occupied Palestinian territory, particularly Gaza, and in Israel,” Guterres told the meeting called by the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation and the Arab Group.

“I am deeply shocked by the continued air and artillery bombardment by the Israeli defence forces in Gaza,” the UN chief added.

“Horrified” by reports that nine members of one family were killed in al-Shati refugee camp, Guterres also emphasised: “If there is a hell on earth, it is the lives of children in Gaza.”

He said he was also extremely concerned about the destruction of media offices and the killing of a journalist in Gaza, stressing that journalists have a right to conduct their work.

According to the UN, the bombing has claimed the lives of 208 Palestinians, including 60 children, and injured thousands more. The firing of rockets by Hamas towards Israel has resulted in 12 fatalities including two children, and hundreds of injuries.

The hostilities have caused serious damage to critical infrastructure in Gaza, including roads and electricity lines, Guterres said. Crossings have been closed and power shortages are affecting water supplies. Hundreds of homes have been destroyed. Air strikes have also damaged several hospitals, which were already overburdened by the coronavirus pandemic.

Over 50,000 Palestinians in Gaza have fled their homes and many are seeking shelter at schools run by the United Nations Relief Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA), where access to water and food is limited, Guterres said.

Aid agencies must be able to carry out their mission, he continued, noting that the UN’s Central Emergency Response Fund and Humanitarian Coordinator plan to send $14m for the occupied Palestinian territories.

“Access for humanitarian goods is paramount. Attacks by militant groups on areas surrounding crossing points are unacceptable,” the UN chief stressed.

Guterres called on Israel to allow unhindered access for humanitarian aid – including food, fuel and medical supplies – into Gaza. He also expressed concern for the rockets fired from Gaza, which have reached as far as Tel Aviv and its suburbs and Ben Gurion Airport and have claimed civilian lives.

“There is no justification, including counterterrorism or self-defence, for the abdication by the parties to the conflict of their obligations under international humanitarian law,” Guterres added.

He urged Israeli authorities to abide by the laws governing armed conflict, including the proportionate use of force and called on them to exercise maximum restraint in their military operations.

He further urged Hamas and other armed groups to stop the indiscriminate launching of rockets and mortars from highly populated civilian neighbourhoods into civilian population centres in Israel, in clear violation of international humanitarian law. Densely populated civilian areas must not be used for military purposes, Guterres stressed.

The UN chief expressed deep concern over the continuation of violent clashes between Israeli security forces and Palestinians across the occupied West Bank, including East Jerusalem, and urged Israel to cease demolitions and evictions in the occupied Palestinian territory.

Guterres said he is working with Egypt, Jordan and Qatar to encourage all sides to halt the violence and is also engaging with all parties to the conflict, including Hamas, to secure an end to hostilities.

The United Nations supports a two-state solution on the basis of the 1967 lines, with Jerusalem as capital of both Israel and Palestine.

SOURCE: REUTERS

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Les forces israéliennes ont fait preuve d’un mépris choquant à l’égard des vies civiles palestiniennes en menant une série de raids aériens contre des habitations, tuant parfois des familles entières, dont des enfants, et provoquant des destructions injustifiées de biens à caractère civil, lors d’attaques qui pourraient s’apparenter à des crimes de guerre ou à des crimes contre l’humanité, a déclaré Amnesty International lundi 17 mai 2021.

L’organisation a recueilli des informations sur quatre attaques meurtrières lancées sans avertissement par Israël contre des habitations, et appelle la Cour pénale internationale (CPI) à enquêter de toute urgence sur ces attaques. Le bilan continue de s’alourdir dans la bande de Gaza, où au moins 198 Palestinien·ne·s, dont 58 enfants, ont été tués et plus de 1 220 autres blessés. En Israël, 10 personnes, dont deux enfants, ont été tuées et au moins 27 autres blessées par des attaques palestiniennes.

« Nous constatons avec horreur qu’Israël lance de plus en plus systématiquement des attaques aériennes contre des immeubles et des maisons d’habitation de la bande de Gaza. Dans certains cas, des familles entières ont été ensevelies sous les décombres de leur logement. Dans les exemples décrits ci-dessous, rien n’a été fait pour prévenir les civil·e·s avant l’attaque afin qu’ils puissent se sauver. Or, en vertu du droit international humanitaire, toutes les parties doivent faire la distinction entre les cibles militaires et les biens de caractère civil, et ne diriger leurs attaques que sur des objectifs militaires. Lorsqu’elles mènent des attaques, elles doivent prendre toutes les précautions possibles pour limiter au minimum les dommages civils », a déclaré Saleh Higazi, directeur adjoint pour le Moyen-Orient et l’Afrique du Nord à Amnesty International.

Nous constatons avec horreur qu’Israël lance de plus en plus systématiquement des attaques aériennes contre des immeubles et des maisons d’habitation de la bande de Gaza. Dans certains cas, des familles entières ont été ensevelies sous les décombres de leur logement.

 Saleh Higazi, directeur adjoint pour le Moyen-Orient et l’Afrique du Nord à Amnesty International

« Même si l’armée israélienne n’a fourni aucune explication sur les cibles militaires qu’elle visait dans ces attaques, il est difficile d’imaginer comment des bombardements d’habitations remplies de familles civiles, menés sans avertissement préalable, pourraient être considérés comme des attaques proportionnées aux termes du droit international humanitaire. Quand on utilise dans des zones habitées des armes explosives puissantes, comme des bombes larguées depuis des avions, dont l’explosion se propage sur un rayon de plusieurs centaines de mètres, on ne peut ignorer qu’elles feront de nombreuses victimes civiles.

« En procédant de façon éhontée et sans avertissement à ces attaques meurtrières contre des habitations, Israël a témoigné d’un mépris impitoyable pour la vie des civil·e·s palestiniens, qui souffrent déjà de la sanction collective que constitue le blocus israélien imposé à Gaza depuis 2007. »

L’armée israélienne affirme qu’elle n’attaque que des cibles militaires et justifie à ce titre ses frappes contre des habitations. Cependant, des personnes vivant sur place ont indiqué à Amnesty International qu’aucun combattant ni objectif militaire ne se trouvait dans les parages au moment des attaques en question.

« Les attaques délibérées contre des personnes, des biens et des infrastructures civils sont des crimes de guerre, de même que les attaques menées de façon disproportionnée. La CPI a une enquête en cours sur la situation en Palestine et doit mener de toute urgence des investigations sur ces attaques susceptibles de constituer des crimes de guerre. Les États doivent aussi envisager d’exercer leur compétence universelle à l’égard des responsables de crimes de guerre. L’impunité ne fait qu’alimenter la pratique systématique des attaques illégales donnant lieu à un bain de sang parmi la population civile, que nous avons dénoncée à maintes reprises lors de précédentes offensives militaires israéliennes contre Gaza », a déclaré Saleh Higazi.

Le Centre Al Mezan pour les droits humains, une organisation de défense des droits humains basée à Gaza, indique qu’au moins 152 habitations ont été détruites à Gaza depuis le 11 mai 2021. Selon le ministère palestinien des Travaux publics et du Logement à Gaza, les frappes israéliennes ont détruit 94 bâtiments, comprenant 461 logements et locaux commerciaux, tandis que 285 autres logements ont été gravement endommagés et rendus inhabitables.

D’après le Bureau de la coordination des affaires humanitaires des Nations unies (OCHA), plus de 2 500 personnes se sont retrouvées sans domicile à la suite de la destruction de leur logement et plus de 38 000 personnes ont été déplacées à l’intérieur de la bande de Gaza et ont trouvé refuge dans 48 écoles gérées par l’Office de secours et de travaux des Nations unies pour les réfugiés de Palestine dans le Proche-Orient (UNRWA).

Des tirs de roquettes effectués sans discernement par des groupes armés palestiniens vers des zones civiles israéliennes ont aussi fait des morts et des blessés parmi la population civile et endommagé des habitations et d’autres biens de caractère civil. Les roquettes tirées depuis Gaza vers Israël sont peu précises et leur utilisation viole le droit international humanitaire, qui interdit l’usage d’armes qui, de par leur conception, frappent sans discrimination. La CPI doit aussi mener une enquête pour crimes de guerre à propos de ces attaques.

Amnesty International a déjà publié par le passé des informations prouvant que l’armée israélienne menait une politique délibérée consistant à prendre pour cible des habitations civiles pendant le conflit de 2014.

Des attaques dévastatrices contre des habitations

Le 16 mai entre une heure et deux heures du matin, durant l’un des épisodes les plus intenses de bombardement depuis le début des affrontements, Israël a mené des frappes aériennes contre des habitations et des rues de la ville de Gaza. Ces attaques ont totalement détruit deux petits immeubles d’habitation appartenant aux familles Abu Al Ouf et Al Kolaq, faisant 30 morts, dont 11 enfants.

Les locaux du ministère du Travail de Gaza ont aussi été détruits dans ces attaques, qui ont par ailleurs bloqué la rue Al Wehda, l’une des principales routes d’accès à l’hôpital central de Gaza, Al Shifa.

Les familles qui vivaient dans le bâtiment de quatre étages appartenant à la famille Al Ouf, composé d’appartements et de boutiques, n’ont reçu aucune mise en garde préalable. Elles ont été ensevelies sous les décombres lors de l’attaque.

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