Tag Archives: War Crimes

Why the normalization of hating the Jews

Oct-7-Hostage

Important Takeaways:

  • It apparently never occurred to either the heads of the UN or the EU to consider that if you are a terrorist organization that commits war crimes, you do not get to choose how a war that you started is waged against you.
  • If you do not want a “bloodbath,” do not take hostages, hide them among civilians, try to prevent a rescue, then if they are rescued, profess shock at the fallout that you yourself have teed up.
  • In contravention of the Geneva conventions, Hamas has refused to allow the Red Cross to check on the welfare of the hostages. One can imagine why.
  • To this day, there seems little-to-no interest in the fate or condition of the hostages still in Gaza. Instead, there is denial that the October 7 atrocities even took place, compared to an almost obsessive regard for the safety of, and humanitarian aid for Gazans. When the UN is unable to deliver the aid, Israel, not the UN, is blamed.
  • The Hamas murders, rapes, burning alive of babies and abductions – all the reasons why Israel was forced to go to war with Hamas to begin with — have retreated into the background.
  • What seems to matter instead to those who set the political and media agendas is to use the Hamas war once again to demonize the Jews as the world’s most inhuman people for wanting to live peacefully on their historical land without daily massacres from Iran and its proxies — Hamas, Palestinian Islamic Jihad, Hezbollah and the Houthis — which apparently plan to encircle them in a “Ring of Fire” — “six fronts of aggression

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Germany’s long-standing commitment to the defense of Israel has been thrown out the window: Germany now says it will arrest Benjamin Netanyahu if he sets foot in the Country

Israeli-foreign-minister-Israel-Katz

Important Takeaways:

  • Germany will arrest Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu if he enters the country amid allegations of war crimes by the International Criminal Court, a spokesperson has confirmed.
  • Steffen Hebestreit, a spokesperson for German Chancellor Olaf Scholz, confirmed on Wednesday the country would ‘abide by the law’ and arrest the under-fire Israeli leader should he visit the EU nation.
  • This comes after British prosecutor Karim Khan announced on Monday that he is seeking warrants for Netanyahu, Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant, as well as three Hamas terror chiefs including Yahya Sinwar, the ruler in Gaza who masterminded October 7.
  • Taking to X, formerly known as Twitter, on Tuesday Prosor wrote: “This is outrageous! The German “Staatsräson” is now being put to the test—no ifs or buts.
  • Staatsräson refers to Germany’s long-standing commitment to the defense of Israel, a policy declared by former Chancellor Angela Merkel during a 2008 speech to the Knesset.
  • The public statement that Israel has the right to self-defense loses credibility if our hands are tied as soon as we defend ourselves.’
  • Netanyahu has furiously condemned the ICC for ‘daring to compare’ Israel with ‘mass murderers’ after an arrest warrant was issued for both the Israeli prime minister and Hamas leaders.

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Diplomats from US, Britain walk out on UN meeting convened by Russia

UN meeting walkout

Revelations 6:3-4 “when he opened the second seal, I heard the second living creature say, “Come!” 4 And out came another horse, bright red. Its rider was permitted to take peace from the earth, so that people should slay one another, and he was given a great sword.

Important Takeaways:

  • US, Britain walk out at UN on Russian wanted for war crimes
  • The United States, Britain, Albania and Malta walked out on Russia’s envoy for children’s rights – whom the International Criminal Court wants to arrest on war crimes charges – as she spoke by video to U.N. Security Council members on Wednesday.
  • Britain and the United States blocked the informal meeting on Ukraine, convened by Russia to focus on “evacuating children from conflict zones,” from being webcast by the United Nations.
  • The International Criminal Court last month issued an arrest warrant against Russian President Vladimir Putin and Lvova-Belova, accusing them of illegally deporting children from Ukraine and the unlawful transfer of people to Russia from Ukraine since Russia invaded on Feb. 24, 2022.
  • Lvova-Belova said that since February 2022, some 5 million Ukrainians, including 700,000 children, had traveled to Russia.
  • “Russia claims it is protecting these children. Instead this is a calculated policy that seeks to erase Ukrainian identity and statehood,” British diplomat Asima Ghazi-Bouillon told the meeting

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Orphanage and Kindergarten Targeted as Russia Enters Kyiv

Matthew 24:6 “And you will hear of wars and rumors of wars. See that you are not alarmed, for this must take place, but the end is not yet.”

Important Takeaways:

  • Russian Forces Attack Kindergarten in Ukraine, Casualties Reported: Officials
  • “Today’s Russian attacks on a kindergarten and an orphanage are war crimes and violations of the Rome Statute,” he said in a statement on Twitter. “Together with the General Prosecutor’s Office we are collecting this and other facts, which we will immediately send to the Hague.”
  • The unedited photo shows at least two dead persons prostrated on the ground,” said Grozev on Twitter.
  • The news comes amid reports that Russian troops descended on the streets of Ukraine’s capital, Kyiv on Friday, and a day after Russian President Vladimir Putin announced a “special military operation” in Ukraine.
  • Ukraine’s ministry of defense called on citizens to prepare Molotov cocktails to fight off invading Russian troops, as Russian forces appeared to have infiltrated a residential district of Kyiv.

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UN rights boss says she has credible reports of Taliban executions

By Stephanie Nebehay and Emma Farge

GENEVA (Reuters) -The U.N. human rights chief said on Tuesday that she had received credible reports of serious violations by the Taliban in Afghanistan, including “summary executions” of civilians and Afghan security forces who had surrendered.

Michelle Bachelet gave no details of the killings in her speech to the Human Rights Council, but urged it to set up a mechanism to closely monitor Taliban actions.

Under a resolution agreed later on Tuesday by the Geneva forum, she is to report back at its September-October session on the situation and on any violations committed by the Taliban, and make a fuller written report in March 2022.

The Taliban treatment of women and girls would be “a fundamental red line,” Bachelet told an emergency session of the council, held at the request of Pakistan and the Organization of Islamic Cooperation (OIC).

Pakistan’s ambassador Khalil Hashmi said the resolution voiced grave concern over reports of violations and sent a “message of solidarity to the people of Afghanistan.”

Austria’s ambassador, Elisabeth Tichy-Fisslberger, speaking on behalf of the European Union, said it was joining the consensus even though the resolution “falls short.” The bloc had sought to launch an international investigation, she said.

Nasir Ahmad Andisha, a senior Afghan diplomat from the deposed government, called for accountability for Taliban actions, describing an “uncertain and dire” situation where millions of people fear for their lives.

“Monitoring is essential to prevent further atrocities and ensure accountability,” Andisha told the talks.

Independent U.N. human rights experts, in a joint statement, said many people were in hiding as “the Taliban continues to search homes door-to-door” and property seizures and reprisals were being reported.

“The acts of the Taliban over the course of these months and to date may amount to war crimes and crimes against humanity,” they said.

But China’s ambassador to the U.N. in Geneva, Chen Xu, said that the U.S. Army and the militaries of other coalition partners, including Britain and Australia, should be held accountable for alleged rights violations by their forces in Afghanistan.

The United States condemned attacks that it said were being carried out against civilians, journalists, activists and minority groups, but did not name the Taliban.

Amnesty International said that its investigation into the massacre of nine ethnic Hazara men in Ghazni province last month was “proof that the Taliban’s capacity for murder and torture has not diminished.”

“The UN Human Rights Council special session has failed to deliver a credible response to the escalating human rights crisis in Afghanistan,” Agnes Callamard, Amnesty International’s secretary general, said in a statement.

(Reporting by Stephanie Nebahay and Emma Farge; editing by Giles Elgood and Jonathan Oatis)

U.N. launches investigation into whether Israel, Hamas committed crimes

By Stephanie Nebehay

GENEVA (Reuters) -The United Nations Human Rights Council agreed on Thursday to launch an international investigation into alleged crimes committed during the 11-day conflict between Israel and the Islamist group Hamas in Gaza.

The independent investigation will have a broad mandate to look into all alleged violations, not just in Gaza and the occupied West Bank, but also in Israel during hostilities that were halted by a ceasefire on May 21.

Michelle Bachelet, the U.N. high commissioner for human rights, earlier told the council that deadly Israeli strikes on Gaza might constitute war crimes and that Hamas had violated international humanitarian law by firing rockets into Israel.

Israel rejected the resolution adopted by the Geneva forum and said it would not cooperate.

“Today’s shameful decision is yet another example of the UN Human Rights Council’s blatant anti-Israel obsession,” Israeli Prime Benjamin Netanyahu said in a statement accusing the forum of whitewashing “a genocidal terrorist organization”.

Israel’s foreign ministry said its forces acted “in accordance with international law, in defending our citizens from Hamas’ indiscriminate rocket fire”.

A spokesman for Hamas, which governs the Gaza Strip, called the group’s actions “legitimate resistance” and called for “immediate steps to punish” Israel.

Israel’s main ally, the United States, said it deeply regretted the decision in the forum, where it has observer status and no vote.

“The action today instead threatens to imperil the progress that has been made,” said a statement released by the U.S. mission to the U.N. in Geneva.

By a vote of 24 states in favor, and nine against, with 14 abstentions, the 47-member council adopted a resolution brought by the Organization of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) and the Palestinian delegation to the United Nations.

European countries were split, with Austria, Britain and Germany voting against. France and the Netherlands abstained.

BACHELET ADDRESSES COUNCIL

Bachelet told the council her office had verified the deaths of 270 Palestinians in Gaza, the West Bank and East Jerusalem, including 68 children, during this month’s violence. Most were killed in Gaza.

Hamas rockets killed 10 Israelis and residents, she said. Israeli authorities put the number of those killed by Palestinian attacks in Israel at 13.

“Regrettably, the self-professed global champions of human rights continue to shield the occupier from global accountability, and literally provide arms and ammunitions for its widely reported war crimes and crimes of apartheid against the Palestinian people,” said Pakistan’s ambassador to the OIC, Khalil Hashmi, who was speaking on behalf of the OIC.

The conflict flared after Hamas demanded Israeli security forces leave the al-Aqsa mosque compound in East Jerusalem following confrontations there with Palestinians, and later launched rockets towards Israel.

The compound sits atop the Old City plateau known to Muslims as al-Haram al-Sharif, or The Noble Sanctuary, and to Jews as Temple Mount. It is the most sensitive site in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

Bachelet said “indiscriminate” strikes from rockets launched by Hamas constituted “a clear violation of international humanitarian law”.

She said Israel’s strikes in Gaza caused widespread destruction of civilian infrastructure and fatalities.

“Despite Israel’s claims that many of these buildings were hosting armed groups or being used for military purposes, we have not seen evidence in this regard,” Bachelet said.

“If found to be indiscriminate and disproportionate, such attacks might constitute war crimes,” she added.

(Reporting and writing by Stephanie Nebehay; additional reporting by Dan Williams and Jonathan Saul in Jerusalem and Nidal Al-Mughrabi in Ramallah; Editing by Peter Graff, Edmund Blair and Timothy Heritage)

Syrians in exile lose hope for disappeared loved ones as Assad re-election looms

By Riham Alkousaa

BERLIN (Reuters) – Holding a laminated photo of her father, Wafa Mustafa and dozens of Syrians stood next to the Syrian embassy in Berlin on Wednesday to protest against the almost certain re-election of President Bashar al-Assad for a fourth term in a national vote.

Mustafa’s father has been missing for almost eight years. She believes he is being held as a political prisoner at a Syrian government prison. A re-election of Assad on Wednesday would dampen her hopes of seeing her father anytime soon.

“As long as Assad is in power … my Dad and another 130,000 people will still be detained forcibly,” she said.

Wednesday’s election, set to extend Assad rule over the country, “is a clear message to the international community that al-Assad regime has impunity and that it has got away with all war crimes,” Mustafa said, adding that Germany’s decision to prevent voting at the Syrian embassy in Berlin was right.

Germany, which hosts around 700,000 Syrians, mostly war refugees, views the election as fraudulent. It denied a formal request from the Syrian embassy to allow Syrians living in Germany to vote, saying the election will not be free or fair.

“Most of the diaspora Syrians would not be allowed to vote under the current stipulations or would not vote out of fear of repercussions against them and their families following from a registration,” said Christopher Burger, a spokesman for the foreign ministry.

But not all Syrians in Germany agree.

Carrying photos of Assad, dozens of Syrians demonstrated against Germany’s decision on Thursday, saying banning the election was unacceptable.

“No matter how you feel about these elections … elections cannot be forbidden,” said Aktham Suliman, a Syrian journalist living in Berlin.

Suliman, who expects Assad to win, said the election was an internal matter for Syrians to decide.

“This picture that they have been trying to draw for years, of one person ruling and the whole nation being against him does not apply,” he added.

(Reporting by Riham Alkousaa, Editing by William Maclean)

Ex-FARC commanders accept Colombia war crimes accusations

By Oliver Griffin

BOGOTA (Reuters) – Former commanders from Colombia’s demobilized FARC guerrillas on Thursday accepted accusations by a transitional justice court that they committed war crimes and crimes against humanity during the group’s 50-year war with the state.

The ruling in January by the Special Jurisdiction for Peace (JEP), created under the 2016 peace deal between the government and the rebels, was the first time the JEP attributed criminal responsibility for hostage-taking to former leaders of the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC).

The former commanders were also accused of other war crimes connected with the treatment of kidnap victims, including murder and torture, among others.

“We recognize that during (the conflict) actions and conduct punishable in the eyes of international humanitarian law took place. Actions and conducts that have been individually and collectively recognized by the JEP, society in general, and in activities with victims,” a statement signed by six of the former rebel commanders and published on Twitter said.

The FARC used kidnappings for ransom to fund their war, while captured military or government personnel were used to pressure authorities into releasing jailed rebels, the JEP said last month.

By accepting the accusations, the former commanders could face restrictions on their freedoms for five to eight years.

If they had rejected them, the commanders would have faced up to 20 years in prison, per the terms of the peace deal.

The signatories were former top leader Rodrigo Londono – known best by his nom de guerre Timochenko – Jaime Alberto Parra, Pablo Catatumbo, Pastor Alape, Julian Gallo and Rodrigo Grande.

The JEP can also prosecute military leaders for allegations of war crimes, in addition to the cases it handles related to former FARC members.

Colombia’s conflict, which also includes former right-wing paramilitaries and drug cartels, has killed 260,000 people and displaced millions.

(Reporting by Oliver Griffin; editing by Grant McCool)

Russia, Turkey may have committed war crimes in Syria, U.N. says

By Stephanie Nebehay

GENEVA (Reuters) – Russia killed civilians in air strikes in Syria last year while rebels allied to Turkey carried out murder and pillage in Kurdish areas, U.N. investigators said on Monday – actions it said could amount to war crimes by both Moscow and Ankara.

A report by a U.N. commission found that Russia – the Syrian government’s main ally against rebels and militants – conducted air strikes on a popular market and a camp for displaced people that killed dozens of civilians in July and August.

“In both incidents, the Russian Air Force did not direct the attacks at a specific military objective, amounting to the war crime of launching indiscriminate attacks in civilian areas,” the report said.

It also described abuses by rebels allied to Turkey during an assault on Kurdish-held areas, and said that if the rebels were acting under the control of Turkish military forces, those commanders may be liable for war crimes.

Paulo Pinheiro, the commission’s chairman, said it had added names linked to the latest crimes to its confidential list of suspected perpetrators. It has received 200 requests from judicial authorities worldwide for information on crimes committed during Syria’s nine-year war, he told a news briefing.

In the report, which covered the period from July 2019 to February 2020, investigators denounced “deliberate” attacks by the Syrian government and allied forces on protected civilian sites, including hospitals and schools.

“There is a war crime of intentionally terrorizing a population to force it to move. We are seeing that picture emerging very clearly for example in Idlib where, because these places are being bombed, people are having to move out,” said panel member Hanny Megally.

Russian-backed Syrian government forces have thrust deep into Idlib province in the far northwest in a campaign to retake the last country’s significant rebel pocket. The onslaught has forced around one million civilians to flee.

Up to 10 children have died from the cold in the last weeks due to living in the open at the Turkish border, Megally said.

The U.N. report blamed Russia for an air strike in the city of Maarat al-Numan on July 22 when at least 43 civilians were killed. Two residential buildings and 25 shops were destroyed after at least two Russian planes left Hmeimim air base and circled the area, it said.

Weeks later, an attack on the Haas compound for displaced killed at least 20 people, including eight women and six children, and injured 40 others, the report said.

It also called on Turkey to investigate whether it was responsible for an air strike on a civilian convoy near Ras al Ain that killed 11 people last October. Turkey has denied a role in the strike, which the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, a monitoring group, said was conducted by Turkish aircraft.

(Reporting by Stephanie Nebehay; Editing by Mark Heinrich)

U.S. accuses Syrian government of chemical weapon attack in May in Idlib

U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo speaks during the United Against Nuclear Iran Summit on the sidelines of the United Nations General Assembly in New York City, U.S. September 25, 2019. REUTERS/Darren Ornitz

NEW YORK (Reuters) – U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said on Thursday that the United States had concluded the government of President Bashir al-Assad in Syria had used chlorine as a chemical weapon in an attack in May during a battle with insurgents in Idlib.

“The Assad regime is responsible for innumerable atrocities some of which rise to the level of war crimes and crimes against humanity,” Pompeo told a news conference in New York, where he has been attending the United Nations General Assembly.

“Today I am announcing that the United States has concluded that the Assad regime used chlorine as a chemical weapon on May 19,” Pompeo said.

The United States said in May it had received numerous reports that appeared consistent with chemical exposure after an attack by Syrian government forces in northwest Syria, but it had made no definitive conclusion as to whether they used chemical weapons.

The Trump administration has twice bombed Syria over Assad’s suspected use of chemical weapons, in April 2017 and April 2018.

The United States, Britain and France launched airstrikes in April 2018 against what they described as three Syrian chemical weapons targets in retaliation for a suspected gas attack that killed scores of people in a Damascus suburb earlier that month.

Assad launched an offensive at the end of April this year on Idlib and parts of adjacent provinces, saying insurgents had broken a truce.

“This is different in some sense because it was chlorine… but know that President Trump has been pretty vigorous in protecting the world from the use of chemical weapons,” Pompeo said, said declining to say what the U.S. response could be.

Pompeo said Washington had also added sanctions on two Russian entities for providing fuel to the Syrian government. Russia supports Assad in the more than eight-year-long Syrian war.

(Reporting by Humeyra Pamuk; Writing by John Irish; editing by Grant McCool)