by Stephen Lendman

Western support for Israeli high crimes is longstanding. Vicious persecution of an entire population evokes no opposition, except for duplicitous lip service.

Israel is a ruthless police state - a regime run by hate-mongering thugs, exercising total control over all aspects of Palestinian life, brutalizing an entire population, depriving it of fundamental human and civil rights.

Last month, the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) said Israeli security forces raided Palestinian homes on average 79 times weekly (nearly a dozen times a day) - terrorizing families, traumatizing children, making arrests without just cause - for fabricated security reasons.

“The West Bank witnessed a significant escalation” of Israeli demolitions of Palestinians’ homes “on the grounds of lack(ing)” permit permission to build on their own land, said OCHA.

Systemic violence “occur(s) in the context of a chronic lack of adequate law enforcement in the West Bank. Such violence is possible because of the environment created as a result of Israel’s decades-long policy of illegal settlement activities.”

On August 31, B’Tselem reported Israeli forces demolished over two dozen Al-Khdeirait bedouin community structures - property belonging to 11 families, leaving around 100 people homeless, including 70 children.

The operation “culminat(ed) a wave of demolitions by (Israel’s) Civil Administration during August,” said B’Tselem. Around 50 Palestinian residential structures were destroyed - part of Israel’s longstanding ethnic cleansing policy, wanting all valued land for exclusive Jewish development, flagrantly breaching international law, prohibiting occupiers from harming the welfare of people they control.

B’Tselem said it’s finalizing research on what happened. Updated information will follow. Last month, Palestinian Human Rights Organization Council (PHROC) members “condemn(ed) in the strongest possible terms Israel’s recent spate of demolition of Palestinian structures in and adjacent to the area known by the international community as ‘E1’, in the occupied West Bank…”

“(T)hese demolitions represent material acts upon which a finding of forcible transfer can be based. Accordingly, these acts constitute a grave breach of the Fourth Geneva Convention as well as war crimes and crimes against humanity under international criminal law, while violating numerous fundamental human rights.”

Fourth Geneva prohibits collective punishment (Article 33) as well as destruction and appropriation of private property (Article 147). Israeli actions are war crimes according to Article 85 of Additional Protocol 1.

They flagrantly violate Article 11 of the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights, saying:

“(S)tate parties recognize the right of everyone to an adequate standard of living for himself and his family, including adequate food, clothing and housing.”

Fourth Geneva’s Article 1 states “(t)he High Contracting Parties undertake to respect and to ensure respect for the present Convention in all circumstances.”

Article 146 calls for imposing “penal sanctions for persons committing, or ordering to be committed, any of the grave breaches of the present Convention…”

“(T)hey shall bring (culpable) persons…before its own courts” and hold them fully accountable.

“Each High Contracting Party shall take measures necessary for the suppression of all acts contrary to the provisions of the present Convention…”

Throughout its blood-drenched history, Israel was never held accountable. None of its government or military officials were ever prosecuted for high crimes too grave to ignore.

They continue daily - a relentless, merciless assault on an entire population, including repeated attacks on Gaza.

Again pre-dawn on Thursday. Israeli warplanes terror bombed a Hamas al-Qassam Brigades Falasteen military site. Fabricated pretexts are used to justify IDF aggression - this time claiming gunshots from Gaza.

True or false doesn’t matter. Israel uses any incident to justify attacking Hamas - launching air and ground attacks, using heavy weapons, often killing and/or wounding civilians.

Gunshots in US communities occur often. Would Washington be justified in launching air or ground attacks in response? In Israel, it’s standard procedure - unaccountable bandit acts.

-###-

Stephen Lendman lives in Chicago and can be reached at lendmanstephen@sbcglobal.net.

His new book as editor and contributor is titled "Flashpoint in Ukraine: How the US Drive for Hegemony Risks World War III".

http://www.claritypress.com/LendmanIII.html

Visit his blog site at sjlendman.blogspot.com.

Listen to cutting-edge discussions with distinguished guests on the Progressive Radio News Hour on the Progressive Radio Network.

It airs three times weekly: live on Sundays at 1PM Central time plus two prerecorded archived programs

Visit his blog site at sjlendman.blogspot.com.

Listen to cutting-edge discussions with distinguished guests on the Progressive Radio News Hour on the Progressive Radio Network.

It airs three times weekly: live on Sundays at 1PM Central time plus two prerecorded archived programs.