Rights watchdog accuses Hamas of torture, abuse of Palestinians

GAZA CITY -- Palestinians in the Gaza Strip are living under a criminal justice system that violates their human rights by using torture, arbitrary arrests and warrantless searches, according to a report released Wednesday by Human Rights Watch.

In a 43-page report, the international watchdog group blames the injustices on Hamas, the militant Palestinian group that controls the Gaza Strip. Officials of the group warned that if Hamas, which Israel and the U.S. label a terrorist organization, does not reform its justice system, it could face popular revolts similar to those that have swept across Egypt, Libya and Syria.

"After five years of Hamas rule in Gaza, its criminal justice system reeks of injustice, routinely violates detainees' rights, and grants impunity to abusive security services," said Joe Stork, deputy Middle East director of the group. "Hamas should stop the kinds of abuses that Egyptians, Syrians and others in the region have risked their lives to bring to an end."

According to Stork, Hamas is violating international law by subjecting civilians to military courts and denying prisoners their rights. The group accused Hamas of executing three detainees after obtaining forced confessions through torture. In 2011, 147 complaints of torture were filed against Hamas, according to Human Rights Watch.

Hamas officials said they would investigate the allegations, but denied there was widespread use of torture or political arrests.

"Maybe we have some violations from time to time, but it is not a widespread phenomenon," said Hamas Deputy Foreign Minister Ghazi Hamad. "Detention procedures are monitored by local human rights organizations, and we try as much as possible to follow international standards.”

One Gaza resident, who feared being identified, said he was arrested nearly two dozen times during recent protests calling for reforms and reconciliation with the rival Palestinian party, Fatah, which controls the West Bank. The young man said in an interview that he was beaten, shaved, humiliated, prevented from sleeping and burned with cigarettes during his detentions by Hamas.

"Hamas is lying and trying to hide its ugly face from the international community," he said.

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-- Rushdi abu Alouf

Abu Alouf is a special correspondent.

Hamas court in Gaza Strip convicts killers of Italian activist

GAZA STRIP - A Hamas-run military court in Gaza Strip on Monday delivered life sentences to two men, Mahmoud Salfiti and Tamer Husana, who were accused of the 2011 kidnapping and murder of Italian activist Vittorio Arrigoni.

Another suspect, Khader Jirma, was sentenced to 10 years for taking part in the murder and a fourth, Amir Abu Ghoula, received one year in prison for helping to harbor the kidnappers.

The verdict followed more than 20 court hearings during which Arrigoni’s family hired an Italian attorney to help monitor the case. Arrigoni was kidnapped in 2011 by Islamist extremists who were demanding that one of their leaders be released from a Hamas prison.

The family of the pro-Palestinian activist had requested that the death penalty not be imposed, according to the Palestinian Center for Human Rights.

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-- Rushdi abu Alouf

Photo: Men walk in front of a wall with graffiti depicting late pro-Palestinian Italian activist Vittorio Arrigoni in Gaza City. Credit: Hatem Moussa / Associated Press

 

Calls to protest movie mocking Muhammad spread to Algeria, Iran

The day after outraged Egyptians scaled the walls of the American Embassy in Cairo and Libyan militants attacked and burned the U.S. Consulate in Benghazi, protests and denunciations against an amateur movie mocking the Islamic prophet spread across the region, spurring warnings for Americans abroad.

Dozens of people turned out to protest in Gaza, chanting anti-American slogans and calling for the death of the  filmmaker behind it. In Tunisia, scores of protesters reportedly burned American flags outside the U.S. Embassy in Tunis; Reuters reported that police scattered the protesters using tear gas and firing rubber bullets into the air.

In Algeria, the U.S. Embassy cautioned Americans to avoid its building and other official government buildings Wednesday afternoon, sending an emergency message to U.S. citizens after calls for protests went out on social media.

Iranians angered by the film planned to protest Thursday in front of the Swiss Embassy in Tehran, which represents U.S. diplomatic interests in the country. As calls to protest went out Wednesday, an Iranian official faulted the U.S. for not stopping insults to Islam.

“The U.S. government’s systematic and continued silence on such repulsive acts is the fundamental reason that they keep happening,” Foreign Ministry spokesman Ramin Mehmanparast was quoted as saying by state media. Mehmanparast made no mention of the attacks on U.S. diplomatic facilities in his remarks.

Gazans join protests against anti-Muslim film

GAZA STRIP -- Dozens of Palestinians in Gaza Strip on Wednesday burned an American flag in front of the United Nations headquarters to protest a U.S. film mocking the Islamic prophet Muhammad.

About 100 members of the militant group Popular Resistance Committees chanted anti-American slogans and called for the death of the California filmmaker behind the movie.

“We call upon Arab and Islamic countries to expel American ambassadors until Obama administration apologizes to Muslims around the world,” said one protester, who would only identify himself as Abu Mussab.

Leaders of Hamas, which controls Gaza Strip, called for more protest on Friday.

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Israel airstrike kills 3 in Gaza allegedly preparing rocket attack

GAZA CITY -- An Israeli airstrike killed at least three Palestinian militants in the Gaza Strip on Wednesday night as they were preparing to launch a homemade rocket into Israel, witnesses and officials said.

The men were killed while driving in a car outside the Bureij refugee camp, witnesses said. A fourth man was critically injured.

Among those killed were Khalil Jerba, 22, and Khaled Qerem, 24, medical officials said.

Israeli military officials said the men had been implicated in previous rocket attacks. So far this year Palestinian militants have fired about 450 rockets into southern Israel, the military said.

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-- Rushdi abu Alouf

Photo: Palestinians stand by the body of one of three men killed in an Israeli airstrike in the Gaza Strip on Wednesday. Credit: Mahmud Hams / AFP/Getty Images

Israeli court rules U.S. activist Rachel Corrie's death an accident

 
JERUSALEM -- Nine years after their daughter was crushed by an Israeli military bulldozer in the Gaza Strip, the parents of American activist Rachel Corrie on Tuesday lost their legal bid to hold Israel responsible for her death and force authorities to reopen their investigation into the matter.

A Haifa judge rejected the case by Corrie's parents, calling the death a unfortunate accident that the victim brought on herself.

"I am hurt," Corrie's mother, Cindy, was quoted telling journalists after the verdict was announced.

The court rejected the family's request for a symbolic $1 in damages and legal expenses.

For the members of the Corrie family, who live in Olympia, Wash., it's been an expensive and emotional process, requiring them to travel frequently to Israel for sporadic hearings over the last two years and listen to graphic testimony about how Rachel Corrie, then 23, was run over by a slow-moving bulldozer near the Rafah border of Gaza.

Corrie, a college student, traveled to Gaza with the activist group International Solidarity Movement to act as a human shield to prevent Israeli soldiers from demolishing Palestinian homes and farms.

During the trial, the Israeli bulldozer driver, who was never identified, said he did not see Corrie standing in front of his vehicle. He ran over the young women, then backed up and drove over her a second time, witnesses said.

Activists testified that the driver must have seen Corrie, wearing a fluorescent orange vest. They said it appeared Corrie became trapped in the dirt and debris and was unable to escape.

An Israeli military investigation blamed Corrie and other activists for putting themselves in harm's way. The inquiry suggested that the bulldozer was not directly responsible for her death and that she might have been fatally injured after falling into concrete and other debris.

No charges or disciplinary actions were brought against anyone involved. U.S. officials raised questions about whether the inquiry was credible.

The family argued in court that the military should have suspended the bulldozing operations until the civilian protesters had been removed from the area.

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U.N.: Gaza to be unlivable by 2020 unless serious action taken

The Gaza Strip will be drained of safe water to drink and perilously short on schools, homes and hospitals if serious action isn’t taken to help its booming young population, the United Nations said in a new report released Monday. The rising pressures could soon make Gaza unlivable, it warned.

The coastal Palestinian territory controlled by Hamas is expected to swell by half a million people by 2020, putting grave new pressures on an already strained area, the U.N. country team found.

Under an Israeli blockade meant to isolate and disarm Hamas, the Gaza economy “is fundamentally unviable,” the U.N. says in its report. Though Israel eased the blockade somewhat two years ago and Gaza's economy has recently grown, the territory remains heavily dependent on outside aid and illegal smuggling to survive. Nearly a third of its people are unemployed.

Israeli leaders say the blockade is needed to stop weapons from reaching Hamas, an Islamic militant group that has refused to recognize Israel. The blockade remains deeply controversial among aid agencies and human rights activists, who argue that it hurts ordinary Gazans.

SERIES: Beyond 7 billion

Gaza is already suffering a shortfall of 71,000 housing units and as many as 250 schools. Over the next eight years, a projected population increase  to 2.1 million from from 1.6 million would require roughly 800 hospital beds and 190 more schools on top of the existing shortfall, the U.N. found.

The boom would also necessitate more than twice as much electricity for Gaza, where people already face regular power cuts, and could irreparably damage the coastal aquifer that supplies almost all of the territory's water. Palestinians in Gaza already consume far more water than flows back into the aquifer, depleting the water supply and causing salt water to leak in at troubling levels.

Gaza Strip beauty salon damaged in bomb attack

GAZA CITY -- Islamic extremists are suspected in the bombing Wednesday of a beauty salon at the Nusseirat refugee camp, officials said.

No one was hurt because the shop was closed, officials said, but the building suffered substantial damage.

It was the first such bombing in Gaza in more than two years, following a crackdown by Hamas, the militant group that controls Gaza, against smaller groups affiliated with Al Qaeda. Such groups had targeted beauty salons, Internet cafes and churches.

No group immediately claimed responsibility for the most recent attack.

The explosion comes a week after Hamas released two leaders of one of the Gaza-based extremist groups, Hisham Saidny, 56, and his deputy, Mahmoud Talib.

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Israeli soldier agrees to plea deal in shooting deaths of Gaza women

JERUSALEM -- An Israeli soldier who was indicted two years ago in the fatal shooting of two Gaza Strip women during the 22-day military offensive Operation Cast Lead has agreed to a plea bargain in which he will serve 45 days in jail for illegal use of a weapon, Israeli Army Radio reported Sunday.

The soldier, who was not identified, could have faced up to 20 years in prison on the manslaughter charge.

His case was one of a handful of criminal prosecutions -- and one of the most serious -- to arise from Israel's conduct during the 2008-2009 offensive against Hamas-controlled Gaza, an operation aimed at stopping militants from firing rockets into southern Israel.

The incident was among those mentioned in the United Nations' Goldstone Report, which accused Israel of deliberately targeting civilians during the conflict.

Majda Abu Hajaj, 35, and her mother, Raya Salama Abu Hajaj, 64, were killed as they fled fighting with a group of civilians carrying a white flag, witnesses at the time reported.

Israeli human rights groups viewed the case against the soldier as an acknowledgment by the military that at least one of its soldiers deliberately fired at civilians.

The soldier admitted during a preliminary investigation that he fired his weapon into the group without permission, hitting one of the people, according to Israel media. He said he first fired warning shots and feared militants hiding among the group. 

His attorneys later argued that there was no conclusive proof that his client killed either of the women.

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Israel credits preparedness for averting deaths in Sinai attacks

 
This post has been updated. See the note below for details.

JERUSALEM -- As Egypt deployed attack helicopters Monday to the Sinai Peninsula to search for militants who killed 16 Egyptian soldiers, Israeli officials credited advance intelligence and a quick response for averting what they said was meant to be a large-scale suicide attack on their side of the border.

Israel Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu toured the restive area and praised the country’s security forces for quickly destroying a stolen Egyptian armored vehicle after it crashed through a border fence.

As many as 35 militants attacked an Egyptian security post Sunday night as soldiers were breaking fast from the Ramadan holiday, Egyptian authorities said. The attackers stole two armored vehicles and began racing toward the Israel border crossing near Karam abu Salem.

One vehicle, loaded with an undetermined number of militants wearing suicide vests, exploded into an Israeli border post that had been evacuated as a precaution. The second vehicle then entered Israel and was immediately destroyed by an Israeli airstrike, killing eight militants, Israeli officials said.

There were no Israeli casualties during the 15-minute attack.