Over 600 global academics, intellectuals call for end to Israel's apartheid regime

News Network
July 9, 2021

More than 600 scholars, artists, and intellectuals from over 45 countries across the world have lambasted the Israeli practices against Palestinians, calling for an immediate end to “Israel’s apartheid regime” in the occupied territories.

In a petition, organized by the Association of Academics for the Respect of International Law in Palestine (AURDIP), the signatories called for a “democratic constitution” that ensures equal rights and an end to discrimination based on race, ethnic origin, or religion, Palestine's official Wafa news agency reported on Thursday.

“Israel has established an apartheid regime over the entire territory of historic Palestine, directed against the entire Palestinian people, which it has deliberately fragmented," the signed petition reads.

“Israel no longer seeks to conceal the character of its apartheid regime, asserting Jewish supremacy and self-determination rights reserved for Jews throughout historic Palestine under the new Basic Law passed in 2018 by the Knesset,” it added.

The signatories also called for an immediate end to the “apartheid regime”, urging equal rights for all and the need to prioritize the “long-delayed right of return of Palestinian refugees driven from their towns and villages during and after the creation of” the Israeli regime.

Back in July 2018, Israel’s parliament (Knesset) adopted a controversial bill that declares the occupying entity as the so-called “nation-state of the Jewish people.”

The law prioritizes “Jewish” values over democratic ones in the occupied territories, declares Jerusalem al-Quds the “capital” of Israel, allows Jewish-only communities, sets Hebrew as the official language of Israel, and relegates Arabic from an official language to one with “special status.”

The AURDIP’s petition blamed “Western powers” for enabling Israel's violations against Palestinians.

“The Western powers have facilitated and even subsidized for more than seven decades this Israeli system of colonization, ethnic cleansing and apartheid, and continue to do so diplomatically, economically and even militarily,” the petition read.

The signatories also advocated the establishment of a “National Commission for Peace, Reconciliation, and Accountability”, which would support the transition from an “Israeli apartheid" to a regime sensitive to human rights and democratic principles and practices. 

They underlined support for formal investigations, led by the International Criminal Court (ICC), into “Israeli political leaders and security personnel guilty of perpetuating the crime of apartheid.”

The signatories included former president of Médecins Sans Frontières Rony Brauman, former president of the American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee Abdeen Jabaram, musician Roger Waters, Emeritus Professor of International Law at Princeton University Richard Falk, health researcher Sir Iain Chalmers, veteran anti-apartheid leader Ronnie Kasrils, and Nobel Peace Prize laureates Adolfo Pérez Esquivel and Mairead Maguire. 

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News Network
November 18,2024

Advisors to US President-elect Donald Trump have instructed his allies and associates to refrain from using the inflammatory language they previously employed when discussing issues related to migrants and the deportation of asylum seekers, in a bid to avoid “looking like Nazis.”

US media reports said that Trump’s associates had been asked to stop using the word “camps” to describe potential facilities that would be used to accommodate migrants rounded up in deportation operations across the country.

The reports said the US president-elect’s allies had been ordered to stave off such charged terms as they would bring to mind “Nazis,” and be used against Trump.

“I have received some guidance to avoid terms, like ‘camps,’ that can be twisted and used against the president, yes,” one Trump ally told American monthly magazine Rolling Stone.

“Apparently, some people think it makes us look like Nazis.”

The presidential advisers also cautioned surrogates and allies to keep racist terms, which have dogged Trump’s campaign, out of their remarks.

They said with Trump’s heated rhetoric that used to compare undocumented immigrants to “animals” and his slight that they are “poisoning the blood of our country,” detractors did not need to reach too far to find parallels to Nazi Germany.

Stephen Miller, who Trump tapped to be his deputy chief of staff of policy, specifically used the word “camps” to describe holding facilities that he hoped the military could put together for immigrants.

Tom Homan, who served as the acting director of Immigration and Customs Enforcement and is chosen by Trump to be in charge of the US borders, was no stranger to such language.

“It’s not gonna be a mass sweep of neighborhoods,” he said in an interview earlier this week. “It’s not gonna be building concentration camps. I’ve read it all. It’s ridiculous.”

Becoming a little more forthright about the new government’s aggressive deportation plans, Homan likened the early days of the Trump administration to the initial invasion of Iraq in 2003.

“I got three words for them – shock and awe,” he said. “You’re going to see us take this country back.”

Trump made immigration a central element of his 2024 presidential campaign but unlike his first run, which was mainly focused on building a border wall, he has shifted his attention to interior enforcement and the removal of undocumented immigrants already in the United States.

People close to the US president and his aides are laying the groundwork for expanding detention facilities to fulfill his mass deportation campaign promise.

The businessman-turned-politician deported more than 1.5 million people during his first term.

The figure do not include the millions of people turned away at the border under a Covid-era policy enacted by Trump and used during most of Biden’s term.

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News Network
November 18,2024

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Mangaluru: The Ullal police have arrested Manohar, the owner of Vazco Beach Resort, and its manager Bharath in connection with the drowning of three college girls from Mysuru at the resort’s swimming pool on November 17.

City Commissioner of Police Anupam Agrawal confirmed the arrests, stating that a case has been registered under Section 106 of BNS. The bodies of the victims, all in their twenties, have been handed over to their parents. The women had arrived at the resort for a weekend getaway on November 16.

Following the tragic incident, the resort was sealed by officials led by Mangaluru Assistant Commissioner Harshavardhan. The trade license of the resort, issued on June 13, 2024, has been suspended, and the tourism department has temporarily revoked the resort's registration. These actions prohibit the resort from engaging in any tourism-related activities until further notice.

Someshwara TMC Chief Officer stated that the suspension was due to the resort's failure to implement adequate safety measures, which resulted in the loss of three lives. Further investigations are underway.

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News Network
November 21,2024

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Hamas says the Israeli regime’s sole objective lies in “erasing” the entirety of the Palestinian population from across the Palestinian territories.

Khalil al-Hayya, a ranking official with the Gaza Strip-based Palestinian resistance movement, made the remarks to the Palestinian al-Aqsa TV on Wednesday.

“The occupation targets everyone—it strikes hospitals, civil defense, women, children, and the elderly,” he said, adding that the regime sought to “empty Gaza of its residents, and displace the Palestinian people to fulfill its dreams of building a Zionist Jewish state across all of Palestine.”

The remarks came amid the regime’s October 2023-present war of genocide on the coastal sliver that has so far claimed the lives of nearly 44,000 Palestinians, mostly women and children.

“This unprecedented aggression in modern times evokes scenes from the dark ages of human history, having crossed all red lines and exceeded every expectation of brutality in the modern era,” the Palestinian official lamented.

He also regretted that the regime had added “systematic and dangerous starvation to its aggression, falsely claiming before the world that it allows 250 [aid] trucks into Gaza daily. In reality, the number of trucks is far fewer.”

Hayya, meanwhile, regretted that “scenes of children torn apart, women screaming over their children, and heart-wrenching destruction have failed to stir enough humanity to stop these crimes.”

He decried the United States for vetoing the United Nations Security Council’s resolutions that are aimed at bringing about a potential ceasefire in the war, saying this indicated Washington’s “partnership in the aggression” and a simultaneous siege that the Israeli regime has been enforcing on Gaza.

Addressing Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, the official asserted that, despite what the Israeli official is after, Hamas would not hand over the regime’s captives “without [the regime’s] stopping the war.”

He called Netanyahu “the main obstacle” in the way of cessation of the aggression, saying the Israeli premier “blocks any progress for political reasons,” and citing his preventing conclusion of a ceasefire agreement in July.

Hayya also warned that the regime sought to expand the war beyond Gaza, but asserted that its goals are “impossible and will never happen.”

“Today, the enemy exposes its true intentions of extermination and displacement, but it will fail,” he stressed.

“The Palestinian people are resilient and will not surrender, as they believe in their humanitarian and political cause. The enemy and its allies will not succeed in achieving their goals. This steadfast people will endure, and the occupation will not prevail against them.”

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