Ranil’s bad luck with Eastern Navy Command

2016-06-01

The Navy in the Eastern Province seems to present a very bad omen to Ranil's Government. Ranil's Government in 2002 collapsed because of the Eastern Navy leadership. This time, a massive problem had to be faced because of injustice done to Ranil's Government as well as to a Navy Official of the East. That is, the Chief Minister of the Eastern Province berating a Navy Officer of Trincomalee and insulting him in public because he had not been invited to a function at a school in Sampur.

Now, the Mahinda-friendly faction has used this to create a rift between the Maithri-Ranil Government and the Army. Public opinion is being built up against the Maithri-Ranil Government by the Mahinda-friendly faction organizing protests in favour of the Navy Official whom the Chief Minister berated, in his village and other areas as well. Those who are thus organizing protests are people who created opposition against Muslims across the entire country during Mahinda's Government. They are attempting to, through this incident, bring back to the stage, anti-Muslim sentiments.

What comes to mind when we see this incident is how, the then President Chandrika Kumaratunga used the Navy in Trincomalee against the ceasefire brought about by Ranil's Government in 2002. Chandrika obtained a report from the Chief of the Navy in Charge of Trincomalee then, Wasantha Karannagoda, that the setting up of Tiger camps around Trincomalee was a threat to national security. It was Mahinda who intervened to prepare this report. Mahinda toured Trincomalee and obtained this report and gave it to the media. The SLFP-JVP Alliance then used this report and built up anti-government sentiments across the entire country. Finally, based on this report Chandrika decided to take over the Ministry of Defence.

Today, Mahinda-friendly factions are trying to create anti-government sentiments across the island through the incident between the Chief Minister of the Eastern Province and the Navy Officer. Mahinda who said in the morning that he will cooperate with the government to provide relief to people affected by the floods, in the evening, issued a statement against the government, based on the incident involving the Chief Minister of the Eastern Province. What was stated therein was that there is a conspiracy afoot to disgracing war heroes who saved the country. Actually it was Mahinda himself who disgraced the Navy by handing over Yoshitha to them.

Great Britain Youth Officers' Training Course

Yoshitha who joined the Navy on 14 December 2006, exactly two weeks afterwards, that is on 1 January 2007, left the country to participate in the Great Britain Youth Officers' Training Course.

While Senior Navy Officers were questioning how, Yoshitha who joined the Navy just 14 days before, was given the opportunity to attend a training course in Britain the story that was spread around was that he had obtained a special scholarship. However, it was revealed only after Mahinda's defeat that a sum of Rs 6.2 million was spent by the Navy for the British Course for Yoshitha. This discovery was made through a report issued by a committee appointed by the Navy Commander to inquire into Yoshitha, subsequent to his father's defeat. He completes his British training course and returns to Sri Lanka on 7 December 2007.

That was the time when the war in the North was flaring and thousands of bodies of Army, Navy, and Air Force members arrived in Colombo in coffins. Yoshitha who came to Sri Lanka in December 2007, stayed in Sri Lanka only for a short period of five months. On 15 May 2008 he once again went abroad to study for the Sub-Lieutenant Technical Course. He was abroad until October and then returned to Sri Lanka in October of 2008. While there were secretive whispers regarding his trip abroad among the Navy staff, the story that was spread around was that he was once again awarded a special scholarship. However, the committee appointed by the present government has discovered that the Navy had spent a sum of Rs 5,337,600.70 for Yoshitha's training course. It has not been reported that Yoshitha who arrived back in the country in October 2008, never went to the war fields in the North or the East. Once the war ended, on 11 November 2009 he left for Ukraine for a special officers' course.

The sum spent by the Navy on this was Rs 3, 773, 800.76. On 7 March 2009, Mahinda Rajapaksa at the Trincomalee Navy Camp presented Yoshitha with the award for the best Midshipman. He was presented with this award for the honourable service rendered by him to the Navy. He was also presented with the award, the Sword of Honour. The website of the Defence Ministry stated that, the arrival of Yoshitha's parents to give away this award which is presented to great heroes who dedicated themselves to saving the nation and the race, to their own son, was a discerning event. This award had been presented to Yoshitha Rajapaksa based on the instructions of the Commander of the Three Forces, Mahinda and the then Defence Secretary Gotabaya Rajapaksa, deriding the innocent members of the Navy in villages who sacrificed their lives in the war and who became disabled.

This is the biggest insult to the Navy made by politicians. However, the most unfortunate thing was that the media was scared to talk about it then.

If you put the devils at the wheel those can only drive government to hell

-Three devils of the administrative service named - Corruptions Watch

(Lanka-e-News -31.May.2016, 1.45PM) Following the outrageous appointment of most infamous notorious corrupt Anusha Pelpita as the additional secretary to the ministry of Home affairs of minister Vajira Abeywardena it has become necessary to center discussions in a direction in which hitherto the country did not focus. That is , the attention of the public has been attracted to the rule of most corrupt officers who are unconscionably and shamelessly carrying on their tasks without getting eradicated or uprooted via  good governance administration nor through Sakra rule. These are the infernal devils driving the government to hell !!

Although the base conduct and lawlessness of politicians may be tolerated on their lack of education , cursed birth and innate nature , the unscrupulous, treacherous and perfidious activities of so called government officers who have secured high government positions’ after passing competitive exams cannot be pardoned. These are officers who have passed degrees out of public funds only to become political pimps to serve the corrupt purposes and purses of evil politicos , when they should be truly and honestly serving  the public to whom they are deeply beholden.  Therefore they cannot be permitted to misuse public assets and resources under any circumstances , nor can they prostitute their official positions for political and personal gains.

This report aims at highlighting , though these administrative officers are wearing a ‘white band’ and are trying to show a clean slate they are truly most unscrupulous lackeys and lickspittles of self fattening politicos , and who have therefore transformed the past pristine pure dignified administrative civil service into an obnoxious corrupt service abounding with rascals and scoundrels. Hereunder are some striking examples that deserve to be brought within the government’s surveillance net…

Abeykoon Bandara the present secretary to the President- 

Under the previous Rajapakse corrupt despotic regime , he was a leading ‘bath gotta’ (self fattening opportunist).He was one of those culprits who was seen deeply sorrowing over the defeat of the Rajapakse regime after taking  lodging at the Temple Trees  on the day of last presidential elections until the following dawn. But  mysteriously and mischievously became the secretary to president Maithripala Sirisena on the following day.

This Abeykoon who is over 60 years old is best noted for his worst wasteful ways in  the administrative service  , and sadly does not have even a basic knowledge of English essential as an officer of the administrative service. The only (dis)qualification he has is , the friendship he had with M.K.D.S Gunawardena of the same village in  Kanthalai , Trincomalee who renounced his position to come out with president .

He is presently   carrying on the tasks which Gamini Senarath was discharging under ex president Mahinda Rajapakse. After appointing two most notorious corrupt crooks now under him , to   the Customs and Motor vehicles department (RMV), which are most infamous for bribe taking and corruption ,Abeykoon is weekly amassing huge sums of money through those officers , about which putrid activities the senior officers of the administrative service are well aware.

During the period when  Abeykoon functioned as the secretary of public administration a circular was issued by him naming  the government departments that are well and widely known for bribery and corruption as those deriving ‘benefits’ for the public service. Though in such a department an officer can function for a  maximum period of 5 years, Abeykoon was working in the Immigration and Emigration department  for 8 years. However after becoming  the secretary of  Public administration he issued a strict advisory code for other employees that he /she shall only work in a department for a maximum period of 5 years.

Customs Director General Chulananda Perera…

Chulananda Perera after working in the Immigration and Emigration department for about  12 long years , and as an assistant (close sidekick)   of Abeykoon ,he was transferred out. Being of the same corrupt  category of  Abeykoon ,,eyeing the corrupt RMV he crept into the transport ministry. Having failed there ,  he was targeting the post of Controller , Imports and Exports. Thereafter when  he failed in that attempt, he wormed his way into the presidential secretariat in order to grab the post of Director General Customs- reasons are too obvious!

His first attempt at the target was obstructed by the officers of the administrative service through the action taken by the prime minister(P.M.)

Subsequently Chulananda’s efforts made through Finance Miniser Ravi Karunanayake proved successful. In the first week of his appointment as the Director General , Customs, by  manipulating  a reduced appraisal on hundreds of Land cruisers  and levying  Rs.1.6  million per Land cruiser instead of Rs. 5 million as duty per vehicle engendered  a loss of many hundred millions of rupees to the country. These vehicles were released directly to the importers themselves.

Chulananda who lectures on ‘’positive thinking ’  uses that to  think only of  wealth and affluence however earned, chooses to serve only in Institutions of the government where tthere is a high tide of underhand cash transactions . His positive thinking is stinking so strong  that it is only leading to ‘country’s sinking’

RMV Commissioner Jagath Chandrasiri

Before Vajira Abeywardena appointed Pelpita as the additional secretary, during the time when Abeykoon was the secretary of the public administration , it was Jagath Chandraisri , a most corrupt officer in the administrative service , cum most bootlicking stooge of Abeykoon was the additional secretary .However , his greed is so enormous for filthy lucre that he  demoted himself to become a Motor vehicle Commissioner to swallow the RMV wholesale.

Under tthe previous Commissioners , the RMV was to some extent in a state of improvement .The present minister of administration Ranjith Madduma Bandara who was the minister of transport under the 100 days interim government after appointing Jagath Chandrasiri  the  rascal of an administrative officer , made the RMV a paradise for crooks ,brokers ,the  corrupt , and ravenous crows to the detriment of the country and nation.

The President , and the Prime Minister ….

If the government Institutions are to be restored to a state of good and proper administration , it will be best if these ghosts and apparitions which have possessed the Financial and administrative epicenters  are probed thoroughly  in order to investigate the assets they have acquired  and illicit earnings they have made via the public service 

'Corruptions Watch' 
Translated by Jeff

---------------------------
by     (2016-05-31 08:24:55)

Customs donate Rs.2mn worth Sandalwood to ADC





2016-05-31

Sri Lanka Customs today donated Rs.2 million worth of confiscated sandalwood logs to the Ayurvedic Drugs Corporation (ADC) for manufacturing medicine. 

Customs Director General W.A. Chulananda Perera told those gathered at the handing over ceremony that the Sandalwood logs weighing nearly 500 kilos was valued at two million rupees 

“The Sandalwood logs were among those seized last year at the Bandaranaike International Airport (BIA), the Harbour and other exit points by officers of the Customs Biodiversity Cultural and National Heritage Protection Branch,” Mr. Perera said. 

He said the donation coincides with World Environment Day in June. 

Sri Lanka Ayurvedic Drugs Corporation Chairman Lal Samarasinghe said the Corporation manufactured drugs for local use and often found it difficult to obtain the proper raw materials. “This important donation of sandalwood will help the Ayurvedic Drug Corporation to continue manufacturing medicinal drugs without delay,” he said. (Chaturanga Pradeep) 

Anusha Palpita removed from Home Ministry post

May 31, 2016
The Public Services Commission (PSC) has decided to remove Anusha Palpita from the post of additional secretary to the Ministry of Home Affairs, effective immediately. 

The Secretary of the commission, Gamini Seneviratne, stated that according to the Establishment Code a person with an ongoing case with regard to allegations of criminal act, bribery or corruption cannot hold a position in the public service. 

The Ministry of Public Administration had informed the Public Service Commission (PSC) last Friday regarding the matter and the commission met today to reach a decision.

Accordingly, steps were taken to suspend Mr Palpita pending the findings of the court case. 

 The move comes amidst an outcry from several civil society groups against the decision to appoint him to the ministry despite indictments filed against Palpita at the Colombo High Court over misappropriating funds for the distribution of Sil Cloth during the previous administration. 

 Home Affairs Minister Vajira Abeywardena had insisted that Mr. Palpita was appointed by the PSC and was transferred by the Public Administration and Management Ministry to the Home Affairs Ministry during the recent floods.  

 Palpita and former presidential secretary Lalith Weeratunga were charged in a case filed alleging that the TRC had spent Rs.600 million to distribute Sil Cloth to the people as part of the former president Mahinda Rajapaksa’s election campaign. 

  Peoples’ Action For Free and Fair Elections (PAFFREL), Transparency International Sri Lanka (TISL) and Campaign for Free and Fair Elections (CaFFE) were among several organizations who deplored the appointment of Palpita as Additional Secretary. 

 Mr Palpita worked with several state organizations including the Customs Department and the Auditor General’s Department prior to his stint as Director General of the Government Information Department and later Director General of the Telecommunications Regulatory Commission (TRC).  

Police snatch the posters belong to the environmentalists

May 31, 2016

Members of the Environment and Nature studies allege that the poster printed combating serious impacts of human lives caused due to irregular environment development their organization sticking was snatched away by the Walasmulla police.

The organization started a poster campaign around the country on the 29th night to raise public awareness of the environment destruction. Officers of the Walasmulla police who visited the place environmentalists who were sticking these posters has threatened the environmentalists and kept them under custody for half an hour.

The police who released the environmentalists later have detained the posters by force. The police has not given a specific answer when questioned why the posters were detained but instead threatened the environmentalists and has demanded ransom. The environment and nature study centre vehemently condemns the irresponsible act of the Walasmulla police who threatened the environmentalists ho voluntarily campaign for the protection and the destruction of the environment.

No anticipatory bail for Elephant rogue judge ! Nothing to bar him from being arrested – Magistrate

-First time in SL’s history a judge hid to evade law !

(Lanka-e-News -31.May.2016, 11.30PM)  The notorious robber judge Thilina Gamage better known as Elephant rogue  who is a disgrace to the judiciary including himself , and is now evading arrest after kicking the laws into the dustbin filed  an anticipatory bail application  in  the Gangodawila magistrate court yesterday (30) . The magistrate Kanishka Wijeratne while postponing the hearing to Thursday said , there is no bar to the arrest of Thilina.

Prior to hearing the case , the magistrate inquired from the Attorney General’s (AG) department counsel whether there is any objection to his hearing this case. Lanka  e news over a period of time had been reporting that since Kanishka is a bosom pal of rogue Thilina , the former hearing this case can be influenced  by  vested interests , and can be an issue .

The State counsel representing the AG stated it is not his objection that matters , rather it is for the magistrate to   decide whether he should hear or withdraw from the case. Subsequently , Kanishka himself heard the case.

When  he inquired whether a re presentation must be made in this case , the AG’s department explained  anticipatory bail application is not being taken up , and the trial alone shall be heard. The AG’s department pinpointed , in a Public property case , anticipatory bail cannot be granted.

The lawyer for Thilina  Gamage made a request to grant his client an opportunity to surrender to court. The magistrate in reply said , since there is an order given by court already to appear before the CID , Thilina can make his appearance there. The CID said , he is in hiding and he is  to be arrested.

The magistrate who did not grant anticipatory bail postponed the hearing in respect of the application while stating  there is nothing to  bar the arrest of  Thilina.

Meanwhile , against the unlawful and disgraceful actions of Thilina Gamage , a wave of bitter resentment and anger   is spreading among the legal fraternity . It is their view , it is most deplorable that a judge himself had stooped to this lowliest level to undermine  the sacrosanct legal maxim ‘ everyone is equal before the law.’ H e has insulted the whole judicial sphere , they pointed out.

This shameless robber judge Thilina Vincent Sulochana Gamage alias Thilina Gamage  the Elephant robber was ordered to be present at the CID on the 25 th of May, but he went into hiding on the 24 th night . This was the first time in SL’s history a judge pulled the wool over the eyes of the law and went into hiding . It is 7 days as at today since he hid. 

Based on reports reaching  Lanka e news inside information division , there  had been many cases heard in courts against Thilina Gamage in the past , but using the name Sulochana Vincent  he had suppressed the cases. Judges and lawyers have helped him in those instances, it is learnt . Details of these lawlessness  shall be revealed shortly. 

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by     (2016-05-31 22:21:18)

Five underworld figures arrested over Dematagoda shooting

2016-06-01
Five underworld gangsters, who wanted for the shootout in Dematagoda where Chaminda Jayanath alias Dematagoda Chaminda was shot and injured in a prison bus, were arrested with latest firearms and ammunitions. 

Dematagoda Chaminda, who is an accused in the killing of Bharatha Lakshman Premachandra, was shot at Maligawatte by two unidentified men, when he was being brought back to the Welikada Prison from the Colombo High Court in a Prisons bus on March 02. 

Police said the Terrorist Investigation Division (TID) arrested the suspects who were residents of Gampola, Negombo, Kochchikade and Naula.

 The suspects were arrested following a tipoff from underworld figure Sanka Shirantha alias Bloemendhal Sanka. 
The TID recovered a T56 weapon, two 9mm pistols, a sniper weapon and more than 2,500 rounds of ammunition.(Darshana Sanjeewa) 

Basil’s houses have other owners?

May 31, 2016

The FCID has found that the ownership of many houses and other constructions made by Basil Rajapaksa during the previous regime had later been transferred to other persons. This was revealed by architect Muditha Jayakody, who had designed the plans for the buildings, during investigations into a complaint with regard to a racket to launder black money of the Rajapaksas.

Jayakody has the ownership of a palatial house located in a 16-acre coconut plantation at Malwana in Gampaha. Basil Rajapaksa has borne full cost of its construction, while his wife had laid the foundation stone, and his daughter has done the interior decorations, the architect has revealed. Its ownership had been transferred to him from the then owner Tiru Nadesan by force, Jayakody has claimed.

 

In addition to this house, Jayakody has designed a palatial house at Browns Hill in Matara, Gampaha party office owned by D.A. Rajapaksa Foundation and other buildings, and instead of paying for them, Rajapaksas had handed over to him several major government projects without calling for tenders. Among them are the designing and the construction of the Army headquarters at Pelawatte in Battaramulla and the Army College at Slave Island.

 

There have been accusations that the Rajapaksas had seized land on a mass scale during their regime and they are now being transferred to friends or sold at low prices, reports also say.

Methodists keep investing in Israel’s war crimes

Construction in the Israeli settlement of Beitar Illit, built on land expropriated from the village of Wadi Fukin near the West Bank city of Bethlehem, September 2014.Ahmad Al-BazzActiveStills

Ryan Rodrick Beiler-31 May 2016

America’s largest faith-based pension fund has invested in a number of firms seeking to profit from Israeli war crimes over the past four years.

Like many other religious organizations, the 12 million-strong United Methodist Church has formally criticized Israel’s oppression of the Palestinians. At a 2012 policy-making conference, the UMC appealed for a global boycott of goods produced in the settlements which Israel is building in the occupied West Bank in violation of international law.

The church’s own pension board, however, has failed to respect the spirit of that call. Since 2012, it has invested in a number of companies that are active in Israeli settlements.

At the beginning of this year, the pension board held investments in 23 Israeli companies.

They include the supermarket chains Rami Levy and Shufersal, the telecommunications firm Bezeq and the fuel distributor Delek. All of these firms have opened outlets in or provided services to Israel’s settlements in the West Bank.

The board has also invested in the Strauss Group, a firm that has given financial support to the Israeli military.

And it has bought shares in a number of weapons-makers — such as France’s Dassault, which is engaged in joint activities with the Israeli arms industry.

“Awkward position”

Such investments appear inconsistent with the UMC’s stated policy of avoiding investments that could assist human rights violations.

The Electronic Intifada has compared the pension board’s current investments with those held in 2012. Many of the Israeli companies that appear in the 2016 list of holdings do not appear in the 2012 list, indicating that many of those investments have been made within that period.

The Electronic Intifada asked the pension board to explain why it has continued investing in Israeli firms active in the West Bank. No comment was received from the board by the time of publication.

Susanne Hoder, a Methodist active in the Palestine solidarity movement, told The Electronic Intifada that “the church finds itself in the very awkward position of owning stock in companies in the illegal settlements after we’ve called on all nations to boycott products from companies in the illegal settlements.”

The construction and expansion of Israel’s settlements in the West Bank breach the Fourth Geneva Convention, which forbids an occupying power from moving its civilian population into the territory that it occupies. As such, Israel’s settlement activities amount to war crimes.

Several resolutions urging divestment from corporations involved in the Israeli occupation were proposed ahead of a recent Methodist conference in Portland, Oregon. Those resolutions encountered stiff opposition from an internal church finance committee. As a result, some of the resolutions did not go to a general vote.

The position of the financial committee was at odds with previous decisions taken by the church. The church had already taken steps in the recent past to divest from some Israeli companies.

Last year, the church’s pension board announced that it had excluded Elbit, a leading supplier of drones to the Israeli military, and several Israeli banks from its investment portfolio.

Hoder argued that the December decision by the pension board was “unprecedented in the fact that it dealt with banks that fund the occupation as opposed to specific companies that profit from it.”

Those companies were excluded from the board’s portfolio after the pension board commissioned a screening of its investments to identify firms implicated in human rights abuses.

Palestine solidarity activists were hoping to build on that achievement by having a more explicit commitment to divestment from firms aiding Israel’s human rights abuses approved by the Portland conference.

Pressure

Palestine solidarity campaigners say that the church has come under intense pressure from pro-Israel lobby groups to back away from its efforts to cut ties with occupation-linked firms.

Delegates attending the Portland conference reported having received personal phone calls from Israeli consular staff in various US cities. International delegates received similar pressure from Israeli diplomats in their home countries.

“We know they [the pro-Israel lobby] have a large fund set aside for defeating anything related to divestment and boycott,” said Hoder. “And we feel that they made use of that.”

Hoder is a co-chair of the United Methodist Kairos Response. That group was formed to support a 2009 call by Palestinian Christians for a boycott of Israel, a document known as the Kairos Palestine statement.

After various pleas to support boycott and divestment measures were issued by Methodist groupings in different parts of the US ahead of the Portland conference, it became apparent that a finance committee wished to reject them, Hoder said.

Several members of the pension board sit on that committee. Other members of the committee were known to be sympathetic towards Israel. Activists told The Electronic Intifada that at least one member argued that it was inflammatory to use the terms “Palestine” or “occupied territories.”

Just days before the conference, presidential contender Hillary Clinton released a letter slamming the Palestinian call for boycott, divestment and sanctions against Israel. Addressed to the leaders of major Israel lobby organizations, it did not directly mention the Methodist Church.

But the target was obvious.

Clinton repeated well-worn Israel lobby talking points, accusing the BDS movement of being “counterproductive” and “harmful to Israelis and Palestinians alike.”

“Hillary Clinton’s letter was only one of the indications that any Methodist was being lobbied on BDS issues,” Jonathan Kuttab, a human rights lawyer who followed the Portland conference, told The Electronic Intifada.

Although the Portland conference was something of a setback, Palestine solidarity activists in the church believe they can build on the progress they have already made.

While the vote on boycott and divestment was blocked, the conference did approve a resolution saying that Methodists should “seriously consider using nonviolent economic means when appropriate and effective” to support struggles by indigenous peoples around the world. It also opposes all efforts by governments to suppress the use of such means.

That statement could potentially be useful in fighting the attacks on the BDS movement by Israel and its allies.

Other resolutions approved by the conference focus on Israel’s unjust policies regarding water access and land rights. One highlights the destruction of fruit trees by Israeli forces in the West Bank village of Wadi Fukin.

Many participants in the conference recognized that Palestinians are victims of colonialism. Japanese Americans who had survived the internment camps of the Second World War, Native American and African activists drew parallels between Israel’s treatment of the Palestinians and the ethnic cleansing inflicted on other indigenous peoples.

“We had indigenous people from many parts of the world who were drawing parallels between their own experiences of colonialism and dispossession and the experience of the Palestinians today,” said Hoder.

Alex Awad, a Palestinian who spent more than 20 years as a UMC missionary, said, “We did not get all that we wanted or hoped for. But we are very thankful and encouraged for the powerful resolutions that came out of the conference in support for Palestinian rights.”

“The positive side is that United Methodists have been educated through the process,” Awad added. “While United Methodists are agonizing over these issues, other churches are not willing even to discuss them.”

Additional reporting by David Cronin.

Ryan Rodrick Beiler is a freelance photojournalist and member of the ActiveStills collective who lives in Oslo, Norway.

A Palestinian teen killed an Israeli mom. Now their families struggle with why.

The husband and son of Dafna Meir, 38, mourn as they stand beside her body during her funeral in Jerusalem in January. (Ronen Zvulun/Reuters)

By William Booth and Ruth Eglash-May 31

OTNIEL, West Bank — Natan Meir sat on the couch, his teenage daughter curled beside him, wrapped in a blanket, though the day was warm. He said the nights were the most difficult. He and his six children, each with their memories. They cannot sleep.

Meir pointed toward the kitchen, a few steps away. This is where his wife, Dafna, died on the floor. She fought hard, he explained. She was a tiny woman. She was stabbed to death in January by
a 15-year-old Palestinian who sneaked

into the Jewish settlement from a village a mile away.

[Israeli mother of 6 killed in attack]

Alongside the Israeli ambassador, Meir went to the United Nations in April to tell his story. He delivered a letter to Secretary General Ban Ki-moon calling for “endless patience and endless love.” He said peace with the Palestinians could take “hundreds of years.”

He said no one at the Security Council would look him in the eye.

“Politics is bullshit ,” Meir said.

Meir is a Jewish settler living deep in the Israeli-occupied West Bank, on land the Palestinians want for a state. He knows the international community does not like where he lives. He said he took solace from the fact that he is friends with some Arab neighbors.

He said one came and offered to kill his wife’s assailant.

One came and just wept.

“We will have peace when we have it in our hearts,” Meir said.

He wore a loaded pistol on his right hip as he said this.

News coverage of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict tracks well the day-to-day violence, but after the funerals, the families recede to their corners to carry on with their lives.

The husband and daughters of Dafna Meir, 38, mourn during her funeral in January. (Ronen Zvulun/Reuters)

This is a small window; this is what carrying on looks like.

In the Palestinian village a mile away lives Badir Adais, the father of the teen who killed Dafna Meir.

[Israelis are calling attacks a ‘new kind of Palestinian terrorism’]

Adais sat in his driveway, drawing deeply on a cigarette, looking out at his garden. There were yellow roses in May bloom. Someone was watering the flowers, though his home is slated for demolition by the Israeli army, an act designed to deter future attacks, but one that Palestinians denounce as collective punishment.

“Do you want me to say that I am sorry for what happened?” Adais said. “This is a tragedy for all of us.”

Asked how he would explain his son Mourad’s decision to take a knife from his mother’s kitchen, cross the valley and attack someone else’s mother, Adais shook his head. He could not.

“He did not come from that kind of family,” Adais said. “He wasn’t a violent boy.”

When Meir heard this later, he said calmly, “I believe him.”

Meir said, “The whole thing took 20 seconds, no more. He ran into the kitchen, they fought. He stabbed my wife. She struggled to keep the knife inside her, so he couldn’t use it against the children.”

Meir said, “He didn’t act with confidence, with training. He came in a cowardly way. He was afraid. The minute he saw my daughter and heard her scream, he ran away.”

He said his wife was stabbed three times in the body, once in the head. Meir said, “I apologize for the raw details.”

For the past eight months, young Palestinians from the West Bank — mostly men, but some women, too — have been attacking Israeli soldiers and civilians with knives, guns, cars and bombs.

The killings have been incredibly intimate — face-to-face at a time when modern warfare is increasingly prosecuted at great distances, by smart bombs and remotely piloted drones.

[Palestinians struggle to define Palestinians who attack Israelis]

In all, some 30 Israelis have died in the wave of violence, along with two American visitors. Almost 200 Palestinians have been killed by Israeli forces — most during attacks or attempted attacks, others in violent demonstrations.

The killings have slowed since March, but they continue.

On May 23, a 17-year-old girl, Sawsan Mansur, was shot dead by Israeli forces at a checkpoint north of Jerusalem after she approached soldiers with a knife, according to police.

The motivation for the spasm of violence has been debated but remains obscure.

Palestinian officials blame the almost 50-year occupation — the frustration and humiliation of checkpoints, land seizures, raids, military tribunals and the building of the Jewish settlements, communities like Otniel that the international community describes as illegal, though Israel disputes this. Revenge is another motive; funerals beget funerals, the Palestinians say. Some young attackers may also seek a “pure” death at Israeli hands — “suicide by martyrdom.”

[What drives the Palestinians who attack Jews with kitchen knives?]

Many Israelis say that Arabs just want to kill Jews, that the violence is ancient, decoupled from politics. Israeli politicians blame Palestinian incitement. Israeli intelligence analysts say the assailants are “lone wolves” whose motives are varied — driven by personal problems, Palestinian nationalism and hopelessness.

What caused Mourad Adais to cross the valley to Otniel?

His father said that Mourad was “young and dumb,” that he “must have flipped out” watching the video clips aired over and over on news channels showing Israeli soldiers shooting young Palestinians holding knives at checkpoints.

In his living room in Otniel, Meir pointed toward the metal railing along the stairwell, at the woodwork, the cabinets, tiles.

“Arabs built this house,” he said. Most of the Jewish settlements have been built by Palestinian laborers, who need the work and the better wages offered by the settlers.

Meir worked as a security coordinator at the settlement for several years. “I checked hundreds of Palestinians every day. I treated them very well,” he said.

He said he made friends with his Palestinian neighbors. One friend is distantly related to the killer’s family.

Did this man come to visit after his wife’s death? “He did. He said, ‘I am ashamed.’ I told him, ‘You are a good person, he was a bad person. Why are you ashamed?’ ’’

What did they talk about? “He said a few words, but mostly he cried. Me and him sitting here, we just cried.”

Meir has not spoken much in public. His wife’s death was one of the most shocking for Israelis — because Dafna Meir was a mother of six killed in her kitchen in a well-defended Jewish settlement deep in the West Bank.

Her funeral was attended by thousands, including political leaders.

Meir said that his wife loved their house. It lies at the edge of Otniel, on a pretty hilltop with views of olive groves, ancient terraces, fields of grape and cherry, and little Palestinian villages. It looks like a place out of a travel magazine if you airbrushed away the military bases and the armed guards at the gate.

“We moved here right after we were married. We stood outside looking at it. It was smaller then, almost a cabin. This was 19 years ago. She said to me, ‘This is the first time in my life I have a home.’ ”

He explained: “Dafna came from nowhere, a really broken family, violent, and since she was 8 years old, she lived in children’s homes, orphanages, a kibbutz for kids. She was very alone.”

He works as a psychotherapist treating men with addiction to pornography. She counseled women in fertility issues — how to get pregnant, and how not to.

They raised four children, then adopted two brothers, one with special needs. He witnessed the attack, along with the couple’s 17-year-old daughter, Renana.

The father of Dafna Meir’s killer works in construction; he had been to the Otniel settlement only once, briefly, to do a job.

For the past 20 years, Badir Adais has had a permit to work in Israel, but he said his son had never been to Israel, never set foot in a settlement until the day of the killing, had probably never spoken more than a few words to a Jew in his entire life.

Adais said that his family is not political, that his children have not been arrested for throwing stones at soldiers. They do not have Internet in the house; his son did not own a smartphone. “We live far from the world,” Adais said.

[Tourism is the new front in Israeli settlers’ battle for legitimacy]

A day after Meir was killed, the Israeli army and border police came to the family house. The commander asked Adais if he knew why the army was there. He said no.

Adais said the officer, who spoke fluent Arabic, snatched his work permit. “He handcuffed Mourad. He said your son did this and this and this at the settlement. The commander said, ‘I will make you a beggar. I will destroy your house. I will send you to Gaza.’ ”

Mourad turned 16 in prison. His lawyer told Adais that his son signed a confession. He will get life in prison.

“I saw him at the court two weeks ago. I told him, you have to forget about us, don’t worry about us. You have to face what is happening. Forget us, forget the house. You are inside, we are outside. I told my son, ‘You will spend your life in prison, prepare yourself.’ ”

At Dafna Meir’s funeral, her daughter Renana, racked by tears, apologized to her mother for not being able to save her.

Today, Renana prepares for her final exams and graduation from high school. “I am trying to get used to a new life, learning how to build my life without my mother. I am learning to be by myself.”

Sufian Taha in Yatta, West Bank, contributed to this report.

Syria conflict: Chief opposition negotiator resigns

Mohammed Alloush accused Syria's government of "continuous aggressions" against the Syrian people

A truce between rebel and government forces is frequently violated

30 May 2016

The chief negotiator of Syria's main opposition umbrella group, Mohammed Alloush, has resigned over what he called the failure of peace talks.

Mr Alloush, from the High Negotiations Committee (HNC), said the talks had not brought a political deal or eased the plight of Syrians in besieged areas.

The HNC suspended its involvement in the UN-brokered "proximity" negotiations with a Syrian government delegation in Geneva in April.

No date has been set for a resumption.

"The three rounds of talks were unsuccessful because of the stubbornness of the regime and its continued bombardments and aggressions against the Syrian people," Mr Alloush said.

Syria: A different country after five years of war

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Who is Bashar al-Assad?

Further departures fears

The Saudi-backed HNC has for months expressed its frustration about the progress of the Geneva talks.

It has been angered by the lack of humanitarian aid reaching besieged areas, the slow release of political detainees and the absence of movement towards a political transition in Syria without President Bashar al-Assad.

A nationwide truce between rebel and government forces brokered by the US and Russia is officially still in place, but is frequently violated.

Mr Alloush's resignation could prompt further departures.

Reports say another member of the HNC has signalled he too may quit.

More than 250,000 Syrians have been killed and about 11 million people have been forced from their homes during the civil war, which began with an uprising against Mr Assad five years ago.