December, 26 2018, 11:00pm EDT
Civil Society Groups Vow to Oppose "Hateful Rhetoric, Violence, Intimidation and Persecution" by Bolsonaro Government
Forty-six environmental groups, academic organizations, human rights organizations, labor unions, faith-based groups and other civil society organizations have vowed to oppose any "hateful rhetoric and acts of violence, intimidation or persecution" by the incoming government of Jair Bolsonaro of Brazil, as they proclaim in an open statement today.
WASHINGTON
Forty-six environmental groups, academic organizations, human rights organizations, labor unions, faith-based groups and other civil society organizations have vowed to oppose any "hateful rhetoric and acts of violence, intimidation or persecution" by the incoming government of Jair Bolsonaro of Brazil, as they proclaim in an open statement today.
The groups, which include the Brazilian Studies Association, Amazon Watch and the AFL-CIO, along with Friends of the Earth U.S., express concern about "positions held by the president-elect that represent a serious threat to democracy, human rights and the environment," and "wish to reaffirm our support for the courageous individuals and groups in Brazil that strive to uphold constitutionally protected rights and freedoms in an increasingly challenging environment."
"The election of right-wing extremist Jair Bolsonaro as Brazil's next president represents a crisis for indigenous rights, the Amazon rainforest, and our global climate," said Christian Poirier, Amazon Watch Program Director. "A spike in violent attacks against indigenous peoples and social movements has already occurred since the election. Brazil's human rights and environmental community will not back down in the face of this emergency, and neither will we in our support for them."
The statement describes how "Bolsonaro has threatened to slash environmental safeguards on the Amazon's protected forests while abolishing constitutional land rights over indigenous territories in order to enable the expansion of destructive agribusiness, logging and mining operations."
Writing that "President-elect Bolsonaro has frequently taken positions that are fundamentally at odds with democratic values," the signers of the statement detail how Bolsonaro threatened not to recognize the presidential election results if he wasn't proclaimed the winner and that he's spoken favorably of Brazil's former military dictatorship. They also noted that he has talked of purging left-wing activists and has described members of the Landless Workers' Movement and Movement of Homeless Workers as "terrorists." He has said that Brazil's police, already notorious for killing thousands of people every year, should have less restraint in using lethal force and he seeks a more militarized response to crime.
The statement notes: "Two MST leaders were assassinated by masked gunmen on Dec. 8," and "many fear that Bolsonaro's hateful and threatening rhetoric is making Brazil - already the world leader in killings of land and environmental defenders - a much more dangerous place for activists." It also details various misogynistic, racist and homophobic comments that Bolsonaro has made, which many also see as contributing to a social and political climate that encourages violence and hatred toward minority communities.
"It is important that people in these communities in Brazil who have struggled so long for equality know that they are not alone. We will support them," commented Dr. Gladys Mitchell-Walthour, president of the Brazil Studies Association. "We will do our best to support Brazilian academics, activists, and citizens in general. We do not support anti-democratic actions by leaders and citizens."
"It is hard to exaggerate the threat that Bolsonaro poses to minority communities in Brazil, including to indigenous communities already threatened by extractive industries and land-grabbers," said Jeff Conant, Senior International Forests Program Manager at Friends of the Earth U.S. "No less severe is the danger that Bolsonaro represents for Brazil's invaluable rainforest and other environmental treasures, or indeed to the planet itself, since he seems to disregard climate change and to put business interests before everything else."
Friends of the Earth fights for a more healthy and just world. Together we speak truth to power and expose those who endanger the health of people and the planet for corporate profit. We organize to build long-term political power and campaign to change the rules of our economic and political systems that create injustice and destroy nature.
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People of Gaza Thank US Students Demanding End to Israeli Bombardment
"We hope they add pressure on Israel and the U.S. to stop the bloodbath that is taking place in the Gaza Strip and to prevent the invasion of Rafah," said one university student.
Apr 29, 2024
Spotlighting the decimation of their own education system by the U.S.-backed Israeli bombardment of Gaza over the past six months, dozens of Palestinian children and young adults held a rally in Rafah on Sunday to thank U.S. college students for dissenting against their government at mass protests in recent weeks.
The children held signs reading, in English, "Rebuild our schools and universities" and thanking students and faculty at schools including Ohio State, Harvard, and George Washington University for their expressions of solidarity since April 17, when an encampment was set up on the grounds of Columbia University in New York City.
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Supporters of the U.S. protests also wrote messages of thanks on their tents in Rafah, where about 1.4 million Palestinian civilians have been forcibly displaced since Israel began its attacks.
"There is no way to express our gratitude to the student protesters in America other than writing a letter of thanks to them [on] the displacement tents," one man told the Turkish outlet Anadolu Agency. "We thank all the students who stood with us and expressed their solidarity as a result of the genocidal war taking place in Gaza."
On social media, Lebanese diplomat Mohamad Safa on Sunday also expressed thanks to demonstrators in Spain and Iceland for marching in solidarity with Gaza, where at least 34,488 Palestinians have been killed since October, two-thirds of whom were women and children.
Nonviolent protests by students at Columbia and others across the U.S. have been met with major shows of force by local and state police, with violent arrests caught on video at institutions including Emory University, University of Texas at Austin, and Indiana University.
As Columbia administrators suspended more than 100 students and summoned the police to arrest them on April 18, the United Nations issued a report saying that "with more than 80% of schools in Gaza damaged or destroyed, it may be reasonable to ask if there is an intentional effort to comprehensively destroy the Palestinian education system, an action known as 'scholasticide.'"
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The protests at U.S. schools have escalated and spread across the country as Israel has indicated it plans to move ahead with a ground offensive in Rafah, where six women and five children were among nearly two dozen people killed in an airstrike on Sunday night.
Israel's near-total blockade on humanitarian aid has also left parts of the enclave already facing famine and about 70% of the population of northern Gaza "experiencing catastrophic hunger," according to Human Rights Watch.
By continuing to permit police crackdowns on nonviolent protesters on campus as the humanitarian crisis in Gaza spirals, said former Greek Finance Minister Yanis Varoufakis last week, "U.S. university administrators [are] committing moral suicide in public."
On Monday, Columbia University officials set a 2:00 pm deadline for students to disperse from the encampment set up on the school grounds after talks between student organizers and the administration failed to reach an agreement. Students have called on Columbia to divest from all financial holdings in companies that support the IDF—a condition president Minouche Shafik said the school would not meet—and have said they won't end the protest until it does.
Organizers at the Ivy League school called on students to help "protect the encampment" ahead of the deadline.
Over the weekend, hundreds of arrests were reported at Northeastern University, Arizona State University, and Washington University.
According to The New York Times, more than 800 people have been arrested at campus protests since April 18.
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Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is reportedly growing increasingly concerned that the International Criminal Court is preparing to issue arrest warrants for him and other top government officials for committing war crimes in the Gaza Strip.
The Times of Israelreported Sunday that the Israeli government, in partnership with the U.S., is "making a concerted effort to head off" possible arrest warrants from the ICC, which first launched its war crimes investigation in the occupied Palestinian territories in 2021.
Israel does not recognize the ICC's jurisdiction and has refused to cooperate with the probe. The ICC says it has jurisdiction over Gaza, the West Bank, and East Jerusalem.
Citing an unnamed Israeli government source, The Times of Israel reported that "a major focus of the ICC allegations will be that Israel 'deliberately starved Palestinians in Gaza.'" Other officials who could face arrest warrants are Defense Minister Yoav Gallant and Israel Defense Forces (IDF) Chief of Staff Herzi Halevi.
The Times of Israel's reporting came shortly after Israeli journalist Ben Caspit wrote that Netanyahu is "under unusual stress" over the possibility of arrest warrants and is leading a "nonstop push over the telephone" to forestall ICC action.
Like Israel, the U.S. is not a party to the Rome Statute, which established the ICC in 2002. The legal body is tasked with investigating individuals, not governments.
The U.S., Israel's leading arms supplier, has opposed the ICC's Palestine investigation from the start, with Secretary of State Antony Blinken saying in a 2021 statement that the court "has no jurisdiction over this matter" because "Israel is not a party to the ICC."
But the Biden administration vocally supported the ICC's decision to issue an arrest warrant for Russian President Vladimir Putin over war crimes committed in Ukraine, even though neither Russia nor Ukraine are parties to the Rome Statute.
Seeing commentary that ICC arrest warrants against Israeli officials would create a dangerous precedent because Israel isn’t a party to the Rome Statute.
Guess who else isn’t a party to the Rome Statute?
Russia.
ICC already crossed that bridge with warrant for Putin.
— Brian Finucane (@BCFinucane) April 28, 2024
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Reports of potentially imminent ICC action have sparked alarm among conservatives in the United States.
U.S. House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) wrote on social media Friday that the court should "should stand down on this immediately."
In an
editorial published that same day, The Wall Street Journal suggested the U.S. and United Kingdom could "risk finding Americans and Britons under the gun" next if they don't warn ICC Prosecutor Karim Khan against issuing arrest warrants for Israeli officials. Human rights organizations and legal experts have said Biden and other U.S. officials could be held liable under international law if they continue supporting Israel's war on Gaza.
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Trita Parsi, executive vice president of the Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft, argued Sunday that "there is absolutely no reason for Biden to be involved in this."
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"Today's leak should mark a final end to this impunity. President Biden has no choice but to fully enforce the law and halt aid to Israel."
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A newly leaked internal memo shows that officials at four U.S. State Department bureaus don't believe the Israeli government's assurances that it is using American weaponry in Gaza in compliance with international law, rejecting them as "neither credible nor reliable."
The memo, first reported by Reuters on Saturday, is a joint submission from the State Department's bureaus of Democracy, Human Rights, and Labor; Population, Refugees, and Migration; Global Criminal Justice; and International Organization Affairs.
The leaked document raises "serious concern over non-compliance" with international law, specifically citing the Israeli military's repeated attacks on civilian infrastructure, refusal to investigate or punish those responsible for atrocities, and killing of "humanitarian workers and journalists at an unprecedented rate," according to Reuters.
The memo also points to Israel's arbitrary rejection of humanitarian aid trucks, which has fueled famine in the Gaza Strip. The bureaus' conclusion matches that of officials at the United States Agency for International Development.
Human rights groups have been documenting Israel's atrocities and systematic obstruction of aid for months, but the Biden administration has continued approving weapons sales for the Netanyahu government despite U.S. laws prohibiting arms transfers to countries violating human rights and blocking American humanitarian assistance.
Sarah Leah Whitson, executive director of Democracy for the Arab World Now (DAWN), said Saturday that "the State Department's leaked confirmation that Israel has restricted the transport and delivery of U.S. humanitarian assistance leaves no doubt: U.S. law requires the suspension of military aid to Israel."
"For too long, the Biden administration has breached or ignored U.S. laws that require the suspension of aid to an abusive regime like Israel, fueling Israeli belligerence and rewarding its atrocities," said Whitson. "It's time for real consequences."
"Suspending military aid is the bare minimum the U.S. must do to avoid further complicity in these abuses."
In March, Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant penned a letter assuring the Biden administration that the Israeli military's use of American weaponry has been in line with international law. A spokesperson for the U.S. State Department subsequently indicated that the Biden administration has not found Israel "to be in violation of international humanitarian law," drawing outrage from analysts and members of Congress who say it is obvious Israel is committing war crimes. in Gaza.
The U.S. State Department is expected to deliver its final assessment of Israel's assurances to Congress in early May.
The written assurances from Israel were required under a White House policy known as National Security Memorandum 20 (NSM-20), which has the ostensible aim of preventing "arms transfers that risk facilitating or otherwise contributing to violations of human rights or international humanitarian law."
NSM-20 states that "in furtherance of supporting Section 620I of the Foreign Assistance Act of 1961 (22 U.S.C. 2378-1) and applicable international law," the U.S. will "obtain credible and reliable written assurances from a representative of the recipient country as the Secretary of State deems appropriate that, in any area of armed conflict where the recipient country uses such defense articles, consistent with applicable international law, the recipient country will facilitate and not arbitrarily deny, restrict, or otherwise impede, directly or indirectly, the transport or delivery of United States humanitarian assistance and United States Government-supported international efforts to provide humanitarian assistance."
Raed Jarrar, DAWN's advocacy director, said Saturday that "Section 620I has been rendered toothless by State Department inaction and special treatment for Israel."
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Details of the internal State Department memo emerged just days after Congress gave final approval to a foreign aid package that includes $17 billion in unconditional military assistance for the Israeli government.
In a joint statement on Friday, dozens of civil society groups warned that the newly approved military aid risks deepening U.S. complicity in an assault that has killed more than 34,000 people and put millions at risk of starvation.
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"We urge the administration and Congress to uphold U.S. law and policy and international law by withholding the transfer of additional lethal military aid to Israel," they added.
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