Leaked Israeli Documents Reveal New Insight into Treatment of Palestinians

September 4, 2011

By Tyler Yates
Impunity Watch Reporter, Middle East

TEL AVIV, Israel — A recently published cache of documents released by WikiLeaks has revealed new insights into Israel’s political and diplomatic relations. The documents cover sensitive topics ranging from information about U.S. citizens living in the West Bank settlements to Israel’s difficulty in dealing with non-violent protests in the West Bank. Perhaps the most damaging information however is not even from a specific document but the new revelations into the relationship of Israel and America, and their intents and attitudes towards the Palestinians.

While knowledge of the two countries’ close relationship is not really a secret, the candor of the documents is something not normally seen by outside eyes.

A document from a 2006 meeting between the U.S. ambassador and the Israeli foreign minister notes that the model for a secure Israel is to keep the Israeli Jews and the Israeli Arabs segregated. The Israeli foreign minister warns that in two years “Hamas will take over” the Israeli Arab population, and that the only reason why Israeli Arabs wish to remain in Israel is to receive the social benefits. When discussing the possibility of a two state solution the foreign minister advocates more “creative” thinking, including the “transferring” of more Palestinians out of Israel. The U.S. ambassador gives no response either positive or negative to the idea.

Another group of more recent documents reveals that U.S. officials have been well aware of Israel’s harsh methods of dealing with peaceful protests in the West Bank for a long time. A February 2010 cable sent to the U.S. ambassador reveals a premeditated effort to use force against such protesters. In the cable, the U.S. ambassador notes that government officials consider any such rally as grounds for the use of military force. At a later meeting, Israel informs the U.S. of it’s intention to use “dirty water” to break up protests even if they are non-violent. “Dirty water is a reference to the IDF’s chemically treated water that duplicates the effects of skunk spray,” reveals a leaked U.S. cable. In the same document, Amos Gilad, Israel’s director of policy and political military affairs, is quoted as saying, “we don’t do Gandhi very well.”

The scrutiny given to the WikiLeaks release will likely also be stoked by the U.S.’s announcement that it wishes the Palestinians to delay their bid for statehood at the United Nations General Assembly later this month. The U.S. wants the Palestinians to return to peace talks with Israel so that both entities can be satisfied.

The current plan, based on a broad vision laid out by U.S. president Barack Obama in May, seems to have the favor of Israel, but the Palestinian position remains unclear. There have been some signs that Palestinian president, Mahmoud Abbas, would forego the UN vote in favor of real talks, but senior Palestinian official Nabil Shaath, dismissed the proposal as inadequate and said a vote would go ahead regardless. Other Palestinian officials have said that they will not be deterred by the U.S. from seeking UN membership, and that “all [their] papers are ready.”

Currently, the Palestinians expect “more than 150” of the 192 UN member nations to back their bid, but this is still short of the required number needed.

The U.S. has veto power in the Security Council, whose approval is necessary to gain full recognition. Even with a veto from the U.S. the Palestinians should have enough votes in the general assembly to change their status from a nonvoting entity to a nonvoting observer state. This status change would allow them to join a number of international committees, and it could strengthen their ability to bring cases against Israel at the International Criminal Court.

A deep concern for many is the effect that an American Security Council veto will have on American-Middle East relations. Ghaith al-Omari, a former Palestinian negotiator who is now the executive director of the American Task Force on Palestine in Washington, warns “an American veto could inflame emotions and bring anti-American sentiment to the forefront across the [Middle East].”

There is also a “powerful argument…that this will provoke a Palestinian awakening…there will be new violence…and we’ll be blamed,” said Martin S. Indyk, a former U.S. ambassador to Israel.

The prospect of new violence taken together with the WikiLeaks revelations of how Israel plans to crack down on future protests casts a somber importance on the diplomatic discussions between the U.S., Israel, and the Palestinians leading up the UN vote.

For more information, please see:

Al Jazeera — Palestinian statehood bid ‘papers ready’ — 4 Sept 2011

Al Jazeera — US cable tells of Israel’s ‘harsh measures’ — 4 Sept 2011

Bloomberg — Palestinians Expect 140 Nations to Back Bid — 4 Sept 2011

NY Times — U.S. Is Appealing to Palestinians to Stall U.N. Vote — 3 Sept 2011

Y Net News — WikiLeaks: Israel irked by West Bank protests — 3 Sept 2011

Mondoweiss — WikiLeaks: In ’06, Lieberman told US ambassador of need to transfer Palestinians from Israel – and US says nothing — 25 Aug 2011

Salon — WikiLeaks’ revealing information about U.S. citizens living in West Bank — 24 Aug 2011

Chilean Commission Uncovers Nearly 10,000 More Victims of Augusto Pinochet’s Rule

September 3, 2011

By Ryan T. Elliott
Impunity Watch Reporter, North America/Oceania

SANTIAGO, Chile— A report released last week by a Chilean commission found that there were many more victims under Pinochet’s rule than previously suspected or documented. In fact, the commission’s director, Maria Luisa Sepulveda, said the commission had identified an additional 9,800 people who had been held as political prisoners and tortured. This brings the total of people killed, tortured or imprisoned for political reasons to 40,018.

: General Augusto Pinochet (Photo Courtesy of Political Pathologies)

As part of this most recent report, the commission examined 32,000 new claims of human rights abuses over the past year and a half. In order to be recognized as a victim during Pinochet’s rule, the person must have been: (1) detained or tortured for political reasons by agents of the state or people at its service; (2) victims of forced disappearances or been executed for political reasons by agents of the state or people at its service; (3) or been kidnapped or been the victims of assassination attempts for political reasons.

During the latter part of the Cold War, and Chile’s 1970 presidential election, the United States became more and more troubled at the prospect of a Socialist by the name of Salvador Allende who seemed likely to prevail in the upcoming election. This fear was rooted, among other things, in Allende’s economic plan, which involved the nationalization of the country’s industry, including U.S.-owned companies.

Not much of this was definitively known until 2000 when the CIA released a document entitled “CIA Activities in Chile,” which outlined the CIA’s role in trying to deter and ultimately prevent Allende from becoming Chile’s next president. Despite their effort, when the ballots were cast and counted, the CIA had failed and Salvador Allende succeeded.

On September 11th 1973 a bloody coup, supported by the United States, took place. The Chilean presidential palace, La Moneda, had been bombed and Allende had subsequently committed suicide. Shortly after the bombing, the military appeared on television with General Pinochet, the newly appointed army commander.

While a majority in Chile’s Congress supported the coup, many Chileans believed that the army would restore social and economic order and then hold democratic elections. With the backing of the army, however, Pinochet did not secure democratic elections, but a dictatorship. In short order, Congress was dissolved, political parties were banned, and opposition leaders were exiled. While many of Allende’s nationalization efforts were thwarted, most Chileans watched in horror as a democracy that stretched back to the 1930s faced a swift death at the hands of Pinochet

For seventeen years, Pinochet ruled, and the violence he let loose was unprecedented in Chile. Pinochet’s first order of business involved capturing, torturing and killing thousands of Allende supporters across Chile. Government-sponsored reports, including the National Commission on Political Imprisonment and Torture Report, found that 3,200 people were murdered under his dictatorship, half of them in the first year. Some 30,000 more were tortured. These reports were much more than attempts at unearthing an unsavory past, it was hoped that they would give Chile an opportunity to reach some sort of reconciliation with its past. However, reconciliation was made difficult by the fact that Pinochet, as a life long head of state, was never brought to justice.

As a result of the recently released report, survivors and victims of abuses under Pinochet will receive a lifetime pension of about $260.00 a month. Meanwhile, relatives of those killed receive about triple that amount. Victims are also entitled to health, education and housing benefits. In sum the government will have to increase its compensation by roughly $123 million a year to victims.

The report was presented to the current Chilean President, Sebastian Pinera, earlier this week at his presidential palace. Neither the details of the kind of abuses faced by the victims nor the names of the victims were released, however. These details are expected to remain confidential for the next fifty years.

This is the fourth report of its kind examining the human rights abuses under Pinochet since 1990. The report doesn’t alter the material facts known about the abuses during Pinochet’s rule, but it does change what is known about the number of abuses during this era, and it is yet another step toward accurately capturing this historical period of Chile.

While the commission has completed its work, the investigation is far from over as there are still hundreds of cases pending before Chilean courts.

For more information, please see:

Chile recognizes 9800 More Victims — August 18, 2011

Chile recognizes 9,800 more Pinochet victims – August 18, 20011

Chile recognizes 9,800 more victims of Pinochet’s rule — August, 2011

After Pinochet — December 13, 2006

Augusto Pinochet – December 13, 2006

Augusto Pinochet: The passing of a tyrant – December 13, 2006

Pinochet’s legacy to Chile: The reckoning – September 16, 1999

Human Rights Chief Condemns European Participation in U.S. Counter-Terrorism Efforts

September 3, 2011

By Alexandra Halsey-Storch
Impunity Watch Reporter, Europe

BRUSSELS, Belgium – On September 1, Thomas Hammarberg, the Swedish Diplomat and Commissioner for Human Rights at the Council of Europe, released a statement condemning European nations for aiding and committing countless crimes against humanity over the past ten years in collaboration with the United States and its War on Terror.

Thomas Hammarberg, Curtesy of World Peoples Blog — Thomas Hammarberg (Courtesy of World People's Blog).

He accused several EU nations, including Germany, Italy, Lithuania, Macedonia, Poland, Romania, Sweden, and Britain for permitting, protecting and participating in the United States’s Central Intelligence Agency’s (“CIA”) Rendition, Detention and Interrogation Program (“RDI”), which has deeply violated the systems of justice and human rights protection. There is “no doubt,” Hammarberg said, “that all 3 elements of this program have entailed systematic violations of human rights.”

For example, in June 2006, the Council of Europe released a report discussing the “unlawful inter-state transfers of detainees” by European nations bound by the European Convention on Human Rights and the European Convention for the Prevention of Torture. The report claimed that the United States had operated under the precept that combating terrorism was outside the scope of issues governed by international criminal laws and the Geneva Convention. Using new terminology and concepts like “enemy combatant” and “rendition,” the United States, with the help of European counterparts, was thereby able to generate a “spider’s web” of disappearances, secret detentions, and otherwise illegal inter-state transfers of detainees that run contrary to international principals of human rights.

The report determined that the spider’s web has included a “world-wide network of secret detentions on CIA ‘black cites’ and in military or naval installations.” Furthermore, some Council of Europe member States “knowingly colluded with the United States to carry out these unlawful operations” while some “tolerated them or simply turned a blind eye.” Regardless of the type of participation, “all involved nations have gone to great lengths to ensure that such operations remain secret and protected from effective national or international security.”

Being held at the “black cites,” kept the suspects “outside the reach of any justice system and rendered them vulnerable to ill-treatment,” said Hammarberg. The February 14, 2007 report issued by the International Committee of the Red Cross, details, in great depth, the treatment of “high value detainees” held by the CIA. Specifically, when initially captured, high value detainees were photographed with and without clothing, subjected to evasive body cavity checks (including rectal examinations), and thereafter shackled and blindfolded — in some instances so tightly that severe wounds resulted.

Hammarberg said that European governments were “deeply complicit” in U.S. counterterrorism strategies, including the pervasive torture techniques meant to coerce cooperation during interrogations. Often, detainees were not permitted to use the toilet and in some circumstances were forced to urinate or defecate into a diaper or on themselves. Interrogation methods included suffocation by water, prolonged stress standing (naked, with arms extended and chained above one’s head for two to three days at a time), beating and kicking, confinement in a box, which severely restricted movement, prolonged nudity, sleep deprivation, exposure to cold temperatures, and starvation.

As Hammarberg noted, it is evident that as we approach the ten-year anniversary of the devastating 9/11 attacks it is important to pay respect to those who lost their loved ones, but also crucial to reflect and analyze “whether the official responses to the attacks have been proper and effective.” In closing, he iterated that while “Europe has granted effective impunity to those who committed crimes in implementing the rendition policy” a “rethink is required to prevent this misjudged and failed counterterrorism approach from having a sad legacy of injustice.”

For more information, please see:

The Huffington Post – Rights Chief Slams EU for Cooperation in U.S. Renditions – 1 September 2011

International Committee of the Red Cross – ICRC Report on the Treatment of Fourteen “High Value Detainees” in CIA Custody – 14 February 2007

The Council of Europe – Alleged Secret detentions and un-lawful interstate transfers of detainees involving Council of Europe member states – 12 June 2006

Monk’s Self- Immolation Results in Murder Convictions and Crackdown on Fellow Monks

September 3, 2011

By: Jessica Ties
Impunity Watch Reporter, Asia

BEIJING, China – The self-immolation of a monk has led to three Tibetan monks being convicted as accessories to murder for allegedly helping a fellow monk burn himself to death in protest of government crackdown on Tibetan monks.

Three monks have been sentenced on murder charges for allegedly assisting in the self-immolation of a fellow monk (Photo Courtesy of Human Rights House).

Two monks, Tsering Tenzin and Tenchum, were sentenced to ten and thirteen years respectively for “plotting, instigating and assisting” in the self-immolation of the monk.

The third monk, Drongdru, was sentenced to eleven years for “intentional homicide” after a trial lasting only one day. According to authorities the sixteen year old monk, Rigzin Phuntsog, was kept in the Kirti monastery by Drongdru, his uncle, for eleven hours following his March 16 self-immolation.

There is disagreement between Chinese authorities and local Tibetans regarding the circumstances surrounding the monk’s death.

While Chinese authorities maintain that he died as a result of self-immolation combined with being hidden by monks to prevent authorities from taking him to the hospital, rights groups are reporting a different story.

Tibetan rights groups insist that police put out the flames and then began to beat the young monk before other monks. They say local villagers took him to the monastery to avoid the beating and then took him to the hospital a few hours later.

The U.S. State Department has expressed concern that the procedural rights of the three monks were not properly upheld. Other rights groups have expressed concern that the sentencing was a ploy to detract attention from the cause of the self-immolation and that sentences were handed down without evidence of the monks involvement.

Others however, found the sentences to be fair, expressing that “a monk who goes against dharma and against the law should be penalized.” The practice of self-immolation has been condemned by the Dalai Lama.

The death of Rigzin Phuntsog has caused renewed and heightened clashes between Chinese and Tibetans resulting in over 300 monks being taken from the monastery and the death of two villagers who were attempting to prevent the detention of the monks.

China repelled requests made by a U.N. human rights panel in June to provide information about the status of the 300 monks who had been taken from the monastery stating only that the monks were undergoing “legal education.”

“Legal education” refers to the Chinese government’s practice of systematically rounding up monks and forcing them to attend education sessions in which they are ordered to pledge their allegiance to China and denounce the Dalai Lama. This practice has largely fueled the conflict between China and Tibetans who feel that they are having their culture taken from them by the Chinese.

Although, the exact reason for the monk’s self-immolation is unknown, human rights groups have stated that the monk was protesting government policies in Tibet.

The relationship between Tibet and China has been severely strained since 1950 when the Chinese marched into Tibetan territory. Many Tibetans feel that their culture, freedom and worship are being suppressed by the Chinese government. Since fleeing Tibet after a failed uprising, the Dalai Lama has traversed the world advocating for increased Tibetan autonomy.

Some experts, such as Robert Barnett of Columbia University, fear that the stiff sentences given to the three monks at the monastery will aggravate tensions between China and Tibet because the sentences will “…be seen by the Tibetans as a manipulation of the law to intimidate people further.”

For more information, please see:

The Tibet Post –Int’l Rights Groups Condemn Unjust Sentencing of 3 Tibetan Monks – 1 September 2011

BBC – China Jails Two More Tibetan Monks Over Fire Death – 31 August 2011

The New York Time – China: Two Tibetan Monks Receive Lengthy Prison Terms – 31 August 2011

China Daily – Two Tibetan Monks Sentenced in Murder Case – 30 August 2011

Los Angeles Times –Tibetan Monks Get Stiff Prison Terms in Burning Death – 30 August 2011

BBC – Q&A: China and the Tibetans – 15 August 2011

New Libyan Government Reaffirms Vow of Democracy to World Leaders

September 2, 2011

By Zach Waksman
Impunity Watch Reporter, Middle East

PARIS, France – Yesterday, the leaders of Libya’s National Transitional Council (NTC) met in Paris with representatives of 63 countries to discuss the country’s transition to a democratic regime. The nations in attendance agreed to give the provisional government $15 billion worth of frozen assets so that the rebuilding process can begin. During the meeting, NTC chairman Mustafa Abdel-Jalil vowed that Libya would have a new constitution and elections for a permanent government within the next 18 months.

While former leader Colonel Muammar al-Gaddafi’s regime is all but dead, the man himself remains at large. The NTC has promised to continue its search for the recently deposed despot until he is found “dead or alive,” and would not consider the present conflict to be over until then. Despite this, Guma El-Gamaty, its representative in London, said that starting to undo the damage he wrought during his 42-year rule and the last six months of internal strife should not wait until that time comes.

“As long as Tripoli, the capital, is stabilized and secure and safe, which it almost is now, and the overwhelming majority of other cities and towns, then Libyans can get on with the process of transition and stabilization and the new political process,” El-Gamaty told the BBC.

Today, reconstruction minister Ahmad Jehani and rebuilding team member Aref Nayed, met with experts in post-conflict rebuilding from several groups, including the International Monetary Fund. Libya’s financial situation was further buoyed when the European Union lifted sanctions on 28 entities, including its oil companies and banks, which should ease the financial burden on its reconstruction needs. Five international oil companies have already arrived in order to help resume its operations.

“The issue of damage is not much and you can get procurement very fast,” Jehani reportedly said. “This is helped by the fact the producing wells are under contract to international firms, if they feel they can deploy their people.”

In the short term, the temporary government must restore supply lines for food, water, and medicine, while also ensuring continued security. Over the long term, the country expects to be capable of funding its own reconstruction because it is an oil-rich country with a small population.

Despite the positive vibes that emanated from the conference, which was held on the anniversary of Gaddafi’s ascension to power, the NTC remains in a tenuous position. Libya is a historically tribal nation. During the rebellion, these various tribes and ethnicities did not always fight as a single force, so unity is unclear. Because so many interests exist, the NTC will have to first gain their trust before they can continue with its ambitions plan to set up a government, which include having a draft constitution within eight months and full elections in 2013.

The road to prosperity may be long, but the NTC is optimistic. Though he said the world’s bet that the rebellion against Gaddafi would succeed paid off, Jalil did not consider the fight to be over yet.

“It’s up to you [the Libyan people] to accomplish what we promised: stability, peace and reconciliation,” he said. “We have to make sure that we fulfill our side of the deal. We must have security in Libya. Tolerance and forgiveness must be promoted. The state of law must be respected.”

More than 70 countries, including the United States and Russia, have recognized the NTC as Libya’s legitimate government.

For more information, please see:

BBC — Libya interim leaders vow tolerance and respect for law — 2 September 2011

Reuters — WRAPUP 3 – Libyans pledge democracy as they win Gaddafi billions — 2 September 2011

Tripoli Post — European Union Lifts Sanctions on Libya Imposed Under Al Qathafi — 2 September 2011

Tripoli Post — Libya’s New Leaders Reaffirm Commitment to Democracy, Good Governance — 2 September 2011

New York Times — Libya’s Supporters Gather in Paris to Help Ease New Government’s Transition — 1 September 2011

New York Times — Russia Recognizes Libya Rebels as World Leaders Meet — 1 September 2011