Scenes from the ‘die-in’ last night outside Leinster House, Kildare Street, Dublin organised by Gaza Ireland Action and opposing the bombardment of Gaza..
Pics: Daniel Kelly
Tag Archives: Gaza
Children made homeless by the recent bombing in Gaza
Free Saturday?
Rachel Ray writes:
“I’m sure you’ve all seen the pictures and read the news about the atrocities being committed in Gaza. Over 200 children have been killed to date, thousands more injured and made homeless. I am planning to gather a collection of teddy bears to leave outside the Israeli embassy [Pembroke Road, Ballsbridge, Dublin] in form of a peaceful protest this weekend. Ideally enough to represent those children who have died. If you are interested in getting involved or have a bear you know wouldn’t mind being given up please either drop your bear to the Collection points (see link below]) or come along on Saturday and place your bear there yourself. Children and all other dolls/toys/rabbits welcome. The Plan is to put them out on Saturday at 3pm.“
Teddy Bear’s Silent memorial (Facebook)
Pic: New York Times
Saturday Update:
Outside the Israeli Embassy this afternoon.
Alan O’Regan, of Chompksy reboot fame, writes:
Fitting lyrics.
The Lazy Sunbathers, Morrissey
Thanks Alan
You need to know that your latest onslaught in Gaza guarantees that as a nation, you will be loathed and reviled by growing numbers of people around the world. No, not because you are jewish- that doesn’t come into it, but because you murder civilians in their 100s with your high-tech weaponry. Because you have burnt little children, blown their limbs off, killed their parents, their brothers and sisters, grandparents, aunts and uncles.
You have destroyed their homes. Because you fire flechettes at human beings, because you use DIME bombs in densely crowded civilian areas, you have rained white phosphorous down on a school, you have killed disabled people in their residential home, killed sick people in intensive care when you bombed a hospital. You bombed a UN school where women and children had taken refuge and then lied about it. You bombed a playground on the first day of Eid Al Fitr, a festival akin to Christmas. That was your present to the little children who played on a roundabout in their new outfits, now wrapped in sheets in their graves. Again, you sent out your propagandists to lie.
Since you destroyed the infrastructure of Gaza in 2008-2009, you have never allowed it to be rebuilt, leading to no sewage treatment, poor water supplies, sporadic electricity – in short you have made people’s lives as hard as they can possibly be. Relentlessly. You shoot farmers and fishermen who are doing their best to fight off poverty and fend for their families. You have done all these things and so much more, and then you lie to the world, trying to depict your victims as perpetrators, when it is you.
You are the occupying power, you are the aggressor. You bully the policy and decision makers and use political influence to ensure that your version of events is the one that is repeated, as if it were the truth. But you are not fooling us all, and you will pay for your crimes in the international criminal court – of that I have no doubt.
Call me an anti-semite and I will laugh at you as I know it is untrue, you will not shut me and others like me up. We will continue to speak out.
We will boycott your products, we will call out with millions of voices around the world for divestment of funds from Israel and sanctions against you until you comply with international law, until you:
1. End the occupation and colonization of all Arab lands and dismantle the Wall
2. Recognize the fundamental rights of the Arab-Palestinian citizens of Israel to full equality; and
3. Respect, protect and promote the rights of Palestinian refugees to return to their homes and properties as stipulated in UN resolution 194.
We will struggle against our governments and institutions that are complicit in your crimes until you find yourself alone.You can change your path. You can stand for rights, for justice, for humanity. I hope this is the choice you make. But in the end, the choice is yours.
Elaine Bradley
Elaine is a human rights activist working in the West Bank.
ALTERNATIVELY: Why Don’t I Criticise Israel? (Sam Harris)
Previously: We Walked In Solidarity
Further to RTE News’ Gaza translation ‘mix up’.
And their subsequent explanation.
Cunning Hired Knaves writes:
It is not just a question of her views being ‘paraphrased’, as RTÉ claims: proper paraphrasing requires due attention to the context. Her words about being ready to strap on an explosive device and fight are not because she is a combatant in one “side” of a “war”, which is what RTÉ suggests with the sequence of images and words in its report, but because she is witness to the death of children, as a consequence of precisely the kind of explosion caused by Israeli forces, but shown in the report as if it could have been generated by either “side”.
…As she says herself in the translation furnished by RTÉ: “Four to five children die every single day, where are you people? …a four-storey building fell on their heads, it is horrific”. Then: “I am ready to wear the explosive jacket and joint (sic) our fighters…all our children are dying”.
There is a vast difference between a woman saying she will join the fight because “all our children are dying”, and a woman saying she is “ready to strap on an explosive device and fight” without any context or rationale for her words, amid the suggestion furnished by the RTÉ report that even ordinary women are combatants.…Thus the RTÉ report presents the situation in Gaza as a two-sided and even contest, but with the difference on the Palestinian side being that there is no distinction between a civilian and a combatant. The presentation of the Palestinian woman is therefore in keeping with the image of what pro-Israel advocate Alan Dershowitz once described as the “continuum of civilianality” to justify attacks that primarily injured civilian populations, and in keeping with Israeli propaganda more generally. RTÉ’s claim that it did not ‘misinterpret or misrepresent’ the views of this woman could only be justified if it were under orders from the Israeli military, and not subject to obligations as a public broadcaster in Ireland.
More here: Compounding The Deceit (CunningHiredKnaves)
Previously: Dear RTE
Meanwhile…
Scenes from Saturday’s march for Gaza from the Spire, O’Connell Street to the Israeli Embassy, Ballsbridge, Dublin.
A crowd estimated at 2,500 people, including Sinn Fein’s Mary Lou McDonald and Joan Collins TD (pic 4) and Clare Daly TD (above) took part in the protest.
(Sam Boal/Photocall Ireland)
Alternatively…
When numbers in #Gaza masquerade as fact http://t.co/ex3hI6olRl דרך @timesofisrael
— Israel in Ireland (@IsraelinIreland) July 28, 2014
RTÉ Responds
at
RTE wishes to clarify that the news report on Wednesday 23 July 2014 did not misinterpret or misrepresent the views of a woman featured within the footage from Gaza.
The pictures and information featured in the report were received by RTÉ from the European Broadcasting Union’s news service. The material contained pictures of a woman with a lengthy sequence of her shouting in the street. The woman begins by referring to children dying, but she then goes on to say that she is ready to wear an explosive jacket and join the fight.
The voiceover on the report was not intended to be a direct translation. The reporter was paraphrasing the woman’s view – clearly stated in the information RTÉ received – that she was ready to resist the Israeli offensive. There was no attempt on RTÉ’s part to misconstrue the woman’s message or any intention to cause confusion.
The following is information received by RTÉ accompanying the footage:
Date Shot: 23-JUL-2014
Location: GAZA
Country: PALESTINE, STATE OF
Sound: NATURAL Language: ARABIC
Various parts of Gaza streets are under the rubble. A four storey building collapsed last night leaving more victims among defenseless civilians. EPTV camera was there the moment the building turned into dust.
Shotlist of EPTV correspondent in the street along with residents.
10:27:54:09 Forward zoom of building collapsing live next to ambulance.
10:28:09:22 SOUNDBITE (Arabic), male resident: “There’s one dead their with a severed head, we also found a dead little girl. Down there, we found a dead woman and the corpses of three little girls around her.”
10:28:25:04 – VS of the survivor being rescued
10:28:29:09 – VS of ambulances rushing in the wounded to hospital
10:28:42:24 SOUNDBITE (Arabic), woman in shock and awe shouting: “Four to five children die every single day, where are you people? …a four-storey building fell on their heads, it is horrific, Allah is great, there’s no god but Allah and Mohamed his prophet.”
10:28:57:20 SOUNDBITE (Arabic), woman crying out in despair: ” Stop the war, stop the truce, never say Hamas, never say Fatah, just say Nation of Allah. Listen to me all, I am ready to wear the explosive jacket and joint our fighters…all our children are dying…”
10:29:27:13 – Close of dead teenager wrapped in shroud
10:29:34:05 – GVs of crowd holding stretcher down the street
RTÉ News Report on Gaza broadcast 23 July 2014 (RTE)
Previously: Dear RTÉ
Dear RTÉ
at
From RTÉ’s Nine O’Clock News on Wednesday
On the RTÉ Nine O’Clock News on Wednesday there was a segment by RTÉ’s Carole Coleman on the Gaza-Israel conflict, during which a woman in Gaza was on camera shouting.
As the woman is in the frame, Ms Coleman says in her report, ‘This Palestinian says she’s ready to strap on an explosive device and fight.’
Further to this, Abubakr Elsayed, in Donacarney, Co Meath, has created a petition calling for an apology from RTÉ.
From his letter to RTÉ:
I am writing to express my displeasure with your report on RTE news called “Hamas leader rules out ceasefire before negotiations” broadcast on 23/07/2014. In this report the news reporter states that the women in the segment says “She is ready to strap on an explosive device and fight”. Though this is not the case as she clearly said in Arabic “Everyday four kids die, everyday five kids die, where is the world, where is the religion”. This is obvious biased and deceitful reporting.
Anyone?
Watch RTÉ’s report in full here
Immediate apology for obvious biased and deceitful reporting on the Gaza issue (Change.org)
Thanks Droidus McMoidus via Snackbox O’Flaherty
Foreign Minister Charlie Flanagan (third from left) and officials from the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade discussing Gaza with the Palestinian Ambassador together with the Ambassadors of Morroco, and Saudi Arabia, and representatives from the Embassies of Egypt and UAE.
As told by Fine Gael’s Minister for Foreign Affairs, Charlie Flanagan, to Rachel English on RTÉ Radio One’s Morning Ireland earlier.
Rachel English: “Why did Ireland abstain?”
Charlie Flanagan: “Well there were two issues involved here. Firstly, due to the urgency. We wanted a more swift and direct response to using existing and current structures to the appalling situation and upsurge of violence, resulting from this conflict. So there was the time issue involved, we didn’t think it was appropriate to allow for a new, further investigation, having regard to current existing UN structures and secondly, we’d problems with the text. We wanted to include all violent acts on all sides, including Hamas and other militant groups in the region. We referred to the fact that the resolution failed to recognise the right of Israel as a democratic state in the region to defend itself and we worked quite intensely, all day long with, and in partnership, with our European colleagues and others to try and bring about a balanced resolution . That didn’t prove possible. And there are times, in the context of a four or five-page document when it isn’t possible to perfect the text in a way that we would have thought.”
English: “You talk there about using the current structures. But isn’t the problem at the moment that the normal approach isn’t working. We saw that yesterday with the shelling of a UN school. Something a senior UN official described to us earlier here as “a trend”.”
Flanagan: “That’s very true and that’s why I’ve clearly and consistently condemned the upsurge in violence and, on Tuesday, at the Foreign Affairs Council in Brussels, we played a very important and active role in ensuring that the European Union, with a voice of 28 states, in unison for the first time, condemning the very high level of casualty rate, resulting from actions and is important in the context of ensuring that we’re going forward firmly within the European Union and firmly within the UN. And there are times when we won’t get what we’d like out of these discussions.”
English: “But are you getting anything at the moment. Isn’t the EU being ignored?”
Flanagan: “Well what Ireland is doing, on the one hand, bi-laterally, and on the other hand, through the UN and the EU, it’s doing everything in our power to ensure that we can halt this cycle of violence. Last week I met with the Israeli ambassador. I conveyed to him, in no uncertain terms, the deep concern on the parts of the Irish people at the appalling level of casualties in Gaza. Yesterday I had the opportunity of meeting face to face with representatives of the Arab League. I had a first-hand engagement with the Palestinian representative. I spoke to the Egyptian embassy. It’s important that we, as a neutral country, with significant influence do what we can in order to mould this process because the absolute priority is a ceasefire and an end to all violence.”
Later
Flanagan: “We have a recurring problem in Gaza, every few years now and this crisis, however appalling as it is, it’s not the first such crisis and what we have to do is to hope that this is going to be the last one and that the underlying issues which contribute to the violence can be dealt with…”
Later
Rachel: “Many people who would normally be loathe to criticise Israel have been appalled by what they’ve witnessed over the past couple of weeks.”
Flanagan: “That’s true but I believe it must be in the context of the right of Israel as a democratic state to defend itself and to defend its territory. But we in Ireland have to be clear-sighted here because our voice, and this is important in the context of the EU foreign ministers’ meeting on Tuesday which I attended and the UN meeting in Geneva on Wednesday: our voice is stronger and our influence greater if we use it firmly within these institutions. There are times when we wont’ get all we like in these discussions but the best contribution that we can make is to ensure that both the EU and the UN are strong and effective players in adding our voice.”
Rachel: “So you’ve no regrets then, about the abstention then? You have no regrets about the abstention the other day? You still believe that that was the right decision?”
Flanagan: “I believe that it was an opportunity lost because the resolution could have been stronger, it could have been better. But we now have it. And we’ll now move forward within the context of what we have.”
Later
English: “I know you’ve spoken in the past about attitudes towards Israel and the Palestinians in this country, indeed you told the Sunday Independent last year that ‘Israel had been demonised an Irish media who were content to dance to the Palestinian drum beat’. Is that still your view?”
Flanagan: “Well, listen, this conflict is serving nobody’s interests and it needs to be brought to an end, as speedily and as quickly as possible and there needs to be accountability for what has occurred and that’s why we will continue to call for investigations into breaches of all humanitarian law, we will continue to be clear and consistent in our condemnation of violence resulting from this conflict and from whatever source, that includes rockets fired by Hamas and it also includes Israeli military actions which have resulted in a huge and unacceptable level of civilian casualties.”
Listen back in full here
Previously: Abstained
(DFA/Photocall Ireland)