Minister of National Integration, Official Languages, Social Progress and Hindu Religious Affairs Mano Ganesan has raised concerns with Jaffna Security Forces Commander Maj. Gen. Dharshana Hettiarachchi regarding stepped-up security measures in the North following the Easter Sunday carnage.
Earlier, Vanni District MP and the leader of All Ceylon Makkal Congress (ACMC) Rishad Bathiudeen was accused of speaking to Army Commander Lt. Gen. Mahesh Senanayake regarding the arrest of a terrorist suspect in connection with the Easter attacks.
Minister Ganesan has told Maj. Gen. Hettiarachchi that some believed current situation was being used to impose restrictions on the Tamil people, according to a Facebook post in Tamil. Ganesan has claimed that he received complaints regarding checks and restrictions on public transport. The Colombo District MP queried whether there were far more checkpoints in place up North when compared with Southern districts.
The Jaffna Commander was quoted as having told Minister Ganesan that their concern was IS (Islamic State) shouldn’t move into North. The Jaffna Commander was further quoted as having said that as the situation was becoming better, he could reduce the number of checkpoints.
Countrywide deployment of the armed forces took place in the wake of the re-imposition of Emergency Regulations unanimously within days after the Easter Sunday carnage though the Tamil National Alliance (TNA) called for a division when it was to be extended in the last week of May 2019.
President Maithripala Sirisena, too, has inquired about current status of security arrangements in the northern region and the possibility of easing restrictions with Army headquarters.
The Island learns that the military was in the process of gradually decreasing security measures. Responding to a query, authoritative sources asserted that security measures were adopted in the Northern and Eastern districts on the basis of devastating attack on Zion church in Batticaloa. There had been still unconfirmed assertion the National Thowheed Jamaat (NTJ) planned to attack St. Theresa’s church in Kilinochchi, sources said. However, they hadn’t been able to verify, sources said, adding that the country couldn’t afford to lower its guard.
Sri Lanka remained largely an afterthought in the U.S. war on terrorism, perhaps because American policymakers did not believe the country to have a serious Islamic radicalization problem.
by Shamila Chaudhary -Friday, 7 June 2019
Arab traders in the seventh century A.D. traveled by sea to present-day Sri Lanka seeking spices and goods to sell along the oceanic Silk Road. Like other South Asian countries engaged in commerce with the Arab world, Sri Lanka over time became home to a small Muslim community tracing its ethnic and religious roots back to the Middle East. Throughout the country’s history, this community, though religiously distinct, kept cordial relations with other faith groups and avoided the sectarianism plaguing South Asia’s other Muslim communities—until now.
Today, ISIS stands ready to take advantage of growing fissures in Sri Lankan Muslim identity—and as the aftermath of the Easter attacks in Sri Lanka shows, neither the country’s leaders nor the international community is prepared to do something about it. Meanwhile, communal backlash against the Muslim community grows amid worsening political tensions. This week, all nine of the country’s Muslim ministers and two Muslim provincial governors resigned under pressure from Athuraliye Rathana, a prominent Buddhist monk and presidential adviser, who accused them of having links to the Easter attack militants.
After the September 11 attacks, the United States created new policies and tools of warfare to fight Islamic fundamentalism around the world. But Sri Lanka didn’t fall into that new theater of war, limiting the extent to which it could benefit and learn from American efforts to dismantle the public and private support networks for terrorism. For example, post-9/11 U.S. counterterrorism policies shaped important new global financial-tracking systems at the United Nations; supported critical revisions to counterterrorism laws and judicial reforms in Pakistan; and implemented de-radicalization initiatives across Europe that empowered governments to take a closer look at how terrorism could take root in countries. And while certain policies, such as the use of drones and the rendition program, proved limited in their long-term utility in fighting terrorism, the overall American effort to engage the international community on terrorism made everyone a lot smarter about real and potential threats.
Sri Lanka remained largely an afterthought in the U.S. war on terrorism, perhaps because American policymakers did not believe the country to have a serious Islamic radicalization problem. Outside of a small Department of Defense–administered program providing counterterrorism training for Sri Lankan defense and security officials since 2001, American investments in Sri Lankan stability have been dominated by a singular focus on the ethnic conflict between Sinhalese and Tamil citizens and the aftermath of a 27-year-long civil war between the two groups.
Rightly, the United States prioritized its foreign assistance to support the integration of Tamils marginalized by the civil war into the economic and political mainstream. But new communal tensions involving Sri Lankan Muslims and hard-line Sinhalese Buddhist groups portend serious consequences for the country’s already fragile ethnic relations, as a key strategy of ISIS is to exploit and manipulate such divisions.
While we know that ISIS inspired the Easter Day attackers, we don’t know the exact political demands or grievances that compelled them to violence. We do know that the attacks occur in parallel to a growing sense of isolation among Sri Lankan Muslims. Simultaneously, Sri Lankan leaders worry that religious identity now supersedes the ethnic cohesion they once observed in Sri Lanka’s faith communities. ISIS is ready to take advantage of such dynamics, and experiencing losses in Syria and Iraq, it has already expanded its strategy and reach outside of the Middle East into new theaters of war like Afghanistan, the United States, and now Sri Lanka. The return of South Asians who traveled to the Middle East to fight alongside ISIS has also triggered concern among regional governments that returnees will attempt to further the ISIS cause at home, a concern amplified by access to online networks promoting radical Islamic content.
Sri Lanka lacks the legal basis to confront the growing ISIS threat. The country’s counterterrorism law, currently known as the Prevention of Terrorism Act, is designed to prosecute internal threats rather than foreign ones. And, as some advocacy groups state, the law exists to silence political opponents of the government. No doubt a by-product of the government’s civil war against the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam, the act does not address what happens to Sri Lankans who join foreign terrorist groups or advance foreign militant causes. As Sri Lankan Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe said after the Easter attacks, “We have no laws which enable us to take into custody people who join foreign terrorist groups. We can take those who are, who belong to terrorist groups operating in Sri Lanka.” A new version of the law titled the Counterterrorism Act has been introduced to address the bias against Tamils, but it has yet to pass and does not respond to threats posed by ISIS or other foreign groups.
Ironically, political infighting between Prime Minister Wickremesinghe and President Maithripala Sirisena prevented the government from taking action on intelligence shared by the Indians that alluded to the Easter attacks. The country’s domestic politics, moored to repeated bouts of constitutional crises and competition between inept leaders, are designed to deal with threats from within—not from the outside. Furthermore, there are other internal risks involved with pursuing stronger counterterrorism policies, especially in partnership with Sri Lankan military and law enforcement. Doing so could aggravate open wounds related to civil war and unresolved post-conflict questions, such as the role of the military in Sri Lankan society.
Fighting ISIS in Sri Lanka will be determined by how effectively the country’s political factions and institutions can find common ground on the issue of terrorism, but the international community also has a role to play. For the United States in particular, the Easter attacks present an opportunity to rethink the levels and focus of its foreign assistance to the country. Even though Sri Lanka is the third-largest recipient of U.S. assistance in South Asia, its levels are dwarfed by those of Pakistan and Afghanistan, which have received the lion’s share of U.S. funding since 2001.
Finally, the reach and appeal of ISIS in Sri Lanka point to a parallel need to expand focus of U.S. strategy in Sri Lanka, which largely remains centered on stabilizing communities affected by the civil war. Instead, Sri Lanka’s internal security environment should be viewed within the broader context of U.S. national security interests in South Asia, which have to do with ensuring the region is not used as a staging ground for foreign terrorist organizations.
To be clear, the ways the United States has pursued those interests need adjustment. The use of drones, electronic surveillance, and financial assets control may have succeeded in tactical accomplishments, such as taking out leadership targets for al-Qaeda and affiliates. But they failed to sufficiently address the root problems of terrorism, and threats persist. If left untethered to a broader national-security strategy, any American efforts to fight ISIS in Sri Lanka may simply repeat the missteps and failures of the global war on terrorism.
Shamila Chaudhary is senior adviser to the dean of the School of Advanced International Studies at Johns Hopkins University and is a senior South Asia fellow at New America.
Calls for update on Presidential Commission into Easter Sunday
Wants clarification on whether report will be presented to Parliament
Also insists interim report by Presidential Commission to look into corruption of present Govt. be tabled
By Ashwin Hemmathagama – Our Lobby Correspondent- Saturday, 8 June 2019
Opposition lawmaker Anura Kumara Dissanayake yesterday criticised the Government for its lack of transparency in not keeping Parliament informed on the progress of the Presidential Commission appointed to look into the Easter Sunday attacks, and requested clarification be given on whether the report will be tabled in Parliament. “Initially, it was held that the findings of the Committee will be made public within two weeks. In the meantime, it was also announced the Committee has collected statements from the former Secretary of Defence and the Inspector General of Police. It was reported in media the Committee has concluded finding evidence by May.
This Committee report is important to know the details of the incidents. In the absence, certain groups and individuals have started spreading false information,” he said.
According to MP Dissanayake, the special Presidential Commission commenced its work on 22 April and an interim report was handed to the President. “During the Sri Lanka Freedom Party meeting held recently at the BMICH, the President announced receiving the interim report of the Presidential Commission. When will be the report of the Special Investigations Commission be presented? Will it be presented in Parliament? What are the findings and the recommendations in the interim report? What are the steps taken based on the interim report? What are the steps the Government anticipates to stop the false information and to announce true information? Parliament has a right to know these details of this report, along with the findings and the recommendations. It is the responsibility of the Government to give a complete answer to the questions the Opposition raises,” charged MP Dissanayake.
Apart from the report of the special Presidential Commission appointed to investigate the Easter Sunday attack, MP Dissanayake requested a copy of the Presidential Commission appointed to investigate the frauds of the current Government by President Maithripala Sirisena.
In response, Lands and Parliamentary Reforms Minister and Chief Government Whip Gayantha Karunatileka, reading out the reply received from the Presidential Secretariat for the questions raised by MP Dissanayake, held the special Presidential Commission on the Easter Sunday attacks has concluded its investigations on 31 May, and the final report is now being prepared.
“The final report of the Special Presidential Commission will be presented to the President soon. Attorney General will give his recommendations on steps that are required based on the report. In order to disseminate true and reliable information, the Spokespersons of the Police and the three armed forces are talking to media on a daily basis to keep people informed,” he added. (AH)
Police and Judicial Medical Officers inspecting bone fragments.(Inset): Ampara Additional Magistrate Asanga Hettiarachchi at the scene. Pictures by Chandana Liyanaarachchi
The bodies of four persons including a child who were killed in the post-Easter bombing counter-terror operation in Sainthamaruthu, near Kalmunai, were exhumed at the Ampara cemetery before Ampara District Magistrate Asanga Hettiarachchi yesterday morning. They were exhumed for the purpose of obtaining fresh samples of body tissue as the samples kept at the Government Analyst’s Department had decayed.
Sixteen persons, including the parents and wives of National Thowheed Jama’ath Leader Zahran Hashim, died when a brother of Zahran blew himself up in the encounter with the Security Forces search party at the NTJ safe house in Sainthamarthu.
Their bodies were buried at the Ampara cemetery after the mosques refused the accept them for burial as they were involved in terrorist activities.
The Judicial Medical Officer of the Ampara Base Hospital said that arrangements would be made to send the bone fragments of all persons who died in the explosion to the Government Analyst as they may be required for further investigations.
Palestinian medics evacuate a critically injured protester during Great March of Return demonstrations in October 2018. Mohammed ZaanounActiveStills Maureen Clare Murphy - 5 June 2019
There were nearly 7,000 gunshot wounds among Gaza’s population of two million in the duration of a year.
Many of those injured have extensive and in some cases irreversible damage to their bones, neurovascular structures and soft tissue.
Among them, hundreds face amputations if they cannot access specialized tertiary treatment for their catastrophic wounds.
Three health workers have been killed and more than 700 others injured.
Thousands of elective surgeries were postponed as a health system already in crisis took in wave after wave of emergency casualties.
Cases of gender-based violence seen by service providers doubled as families struggled to cope with additional economic pressures and trauma.
These disturbing facts come from the World Health Organization’s review of trauma data related to the Great March of Return protests in Gaza which began in March 2018.
Sanitized
The data provided by WHO make for harrowing reading. But the report sanitizes the fact that this body-breaking and traumatizing violence is by Israeli policy and design.
Any effective treatment must correctly diagnose the cause and not just the symptoms.
In the year following the launch of the Great March of Return, more than 28,000 Palestinians in Gaza were injured and 277 killed, including 52 children, most of them slain during unarmed, mass protests along Gaza’s eastern and northern perimeter.
Despite the civilian nature of the protests, as was affirmed by a panel of UN investigators, WHO says the deaths and injuries happened “as a result of clashes with Israeli security forces.”
That is a gross mischaracterization of Israel’s use of force against peaceful and unarmed protesters, officially sanctioned by shoot-to-kill or maim orders against civilians who pose no plausible threat, even when they are children.
The killing of some 60 Palestinians during protests on 14 May 2018 was a massacre.
That day, Israeli occupation forces shot almost one person per minute during protests east of Gaza City between 9:30 in the morning and 5:30 in the afternoon, according to the UN commission of inquiry.
Some protesters attempted to breach the boundary fence, or threw stones or spent gas grenades fired by Israel back in the soldiers’ direction. But these were not confrontations between two armed groups as the use of “clashes” by WHO would suggest.
Doctors who treated those wounded that day said, as summarized in the UN commission report, “the injuries resembled those that would typically be seen during a war.”
Hospital doctors told investigators that “one horrific injury after another” arrived to their facilities, the patients presenting massive open wounds to their lower limbs, their “skin and underlying tissue … blown out with the force of the bullet.”
In their report, the UN investigators state that during the months of protests, nearly 1,600 people “were wounded by bullet or bone shrapnel that resulted from ricochets, bullet fragmentation and shots going through one body into another – clearly illustrating the danger of firing high-velocity live ammunition into a crowd of demonstrators.”
The staggering number of casualties is not “a result of clashes with Israeli security forces,” it’s the illegal use of lethal force against unprotected persons by an occupying power that desires the full capitulation of the population under its control.
“Serious human rights violations were committed which may amount to crimes against humanity,” the UN investigators say.
12 years of siege
WHO’s report does note that the protests take place in the context of a 12-year siege on Gaza, yet doesn’t explicitly state that the blockade is imposed by Israel.
Gaza’s health system was “already under-resourced and chronically challenged,” WHO states. Half of all medicines in Gaza had reached zero stock – less than a one-month supply – during the first month of Great March of Return protests.
A bitter political impasse among the Palestinian political leadership, resulting in staff at government-run hospitals receiving only a fraction of their salaries, has also “reduced the capacity of local institutions in Gaza to deliver basic services.”
“In 2018 alone, 84 doctors left Gaza,” WHO states.
And despite all this, as the report notes, thousands of volunteer medics in Gaza have kept the health system resilient and have saved lives.
Only two patients out of nearly 6,000 who were wounded by high-velocity bullets to the limbs during the protests bled to death, because of the presence of trained community volunteers.
A trauma referral pathway, from first-aid at the point of injury to hospital and postoperative and rehabilitative care, saved hundreds of lives, according to WHO.
Three life-saving medics, two of them volunteers, were amongst those killed during the protests.
Yet Israel’s responsibility for their deaths is obscured in WHO’s report.
WHO states that “there was a surge in violent incidents involving health care” during the year of protests, with 446 incidents in Gaza in 2018 versus 24 reported the previous year.
In addition to the health workers killed, 730 were injured and more than 100 ambulances and other health vehicles were damaged.
But the report doesn’t identify the party responsible: Israel.
Contrast this with the unequivocal findings of the UN investigators, who state:
“Based on numerous interviews with victims and witnesses and corroboration of video footage in a number of instances, the Commission found reasonable grounds to believe that Israeli snipers intentionally shot health workers, despite seeing that they were clearly marked as such.”
Like the deaths and injuries of protesters, the killing and maiming of medical workers is a direct result of Israel’s open fire orders – not the “result of clashes.”
In New York Times interview, Mohammed Shtayyeh says Palestinian Authority may be bankrupt by next month Mohammed Shtayyeh says PA is facing economic crisis (AFP/File photo)
The new Palestinian prime minister warned that the Palestinian Authority is on the brink of collapse as Israel continues to withhold Palestinian tax revenues.
In an interview with the New York Times published on Wednesday, Mohammed Shtayyeh said the PA may go into bankruptcy by July or August as a result of an Israeli law that allows it to halt the tax-revenue transfers.
"We are in a collapsing situation," Shtayyeh told the newspaper.
The PA funds a large portion of the jobs in the occupied West Bank, including the Palestinian police and security forces.
Abbas says no compromise on Israeli tax funds as Palestinians suffer under austerity cuts
Shtayyeh told the Times that the dire economic situation may force the PA to furlough its police officers, a decision that would affect the ongoing security coordination between the Palestinian body and Israel.
Under previous agreements, Israel agreed to subcontract internal security matters to the PA in areas of the occupied Palestinian territories under its limited control.
"It's a very hot summer. At every level," Shtayyeh said in the interview. "I hope we will not reach that point."
In February, Israel enacted a law that allows it to withhold some tax revenues to the Palestinian government.
Currently, Israel is holding around $138m of the $2.5bn in annual tax revenues it collects on behalf of the PA.
But the Palestinian government has refused to accept any tax revenues not paid in full, resulting in the loss of half the PA's annual budget.
Israel has justified its decision to withhold the tax revenues by saying that the money is going to support and encourage terrorism. Palestinians have rejected that accusation.
In his interview with the Times, Shtayyeh also said that accepting the reduced tax payment would be tantamount to agreeing to Israel's view that those imprisoned or killed by Israeli forces are "terrorists".
If the Israelis want the PA to collapse, "let them push it to collapse", Shtayyeh told the newspaper. "We will not dissolve the authority. But they can push it to collapse."
PA under pressure
The PA has also been under increased pressure as a result of US President Donald Trump's funding cuts to the Palestinians.
The Trump administration has sought to use the cuts as leverage to get Palestinians on board ahead of the unveiling of its so-called "deal of the century".
While details of that proposal to solve the Israeli-Palestinian conflict have yet to be released, Trump administration officials have promised it will bring economic prosperity to Palestinians.
Meanwhile, the PA has struggled to cope with its ongoing financial crisis.
It has already been forced to cut salaries, resulting in tens of thousands of West Bank civil servants and police officers receiving only half of their expected incomes, the Times reported.
Amid those frustrations, the PA has come under fire after the Associated Press reported that the Palestinian cabinet gave itself a 67 percent salary hike in 2017.
Citing documents leaked on social media and unidentified Palestinian officials, AP said the salary hike amounted to bonuses worth tens of thousands of dollars for cabinet members.
The news agency reported that Shtayyeh has suspended the pay raises, bringing the issue to President Mahmoud Abbas to investigate.
While the investigation is ongoing, ministers will only receive half their salaries, according to government spokesman Ibrahim Milhim, as reported by AP.
DNA analysis reveals hardy group genetically distinct from Eurasians and East Asians The archaeological site near the Yana River in Siberia where two 31,000-year-old milk teeth were found. Photograph: Elena Pavlova/Nature
It was cold, remote and involved picking fights with woolly mammoths – but it seems ancient Siberia 30,000 years ago was home to a hardy and previously unknown group of humans. Scientists say the discovery could help solve longstanding mysteries about the ancestors of native North Americans.
While it is commonly believed the ancestors of native North Americans arrived from Eurasia via a now submerged land bridge called Beringia, exactly which groups crossed and gave rise to native North American populations has been difficult to unpick.
Now scientists say they might have found some answers to the conundrums.
Writing in the journal Nature, Eske Willerslev and colleagues reveal how they drew on existing data from modern populations as well as analysing ancient DNA from the remains of 34 individuals obtained from sites around north-eastern Siberia, dating from more than 31,000 years ago up to 600 years ago.
The key remains were fragments of two tiny human milk teeth, shed by males, found at a place in Russia called Yana Rhinoceros Horn Site. First excavated in 2001, the site offers the earliest direct evidence of humans in north-eastern Siberia, with finds also including bone items and stone tools. Indirect evidence of human populations in north-eastern Siberia goes back to more than 40,000 years ago.
While it had previously been thought that these remains might be from the ancestors of native North Americans, the DNA data suggests otherwise.
“What we see here is a much more complex story than what we believed was the case,” said Willerslev, director of the Lundbeck Foundation Centre for Geogenetics at the University of Copenhagen.
The results reveal these individuals were part of a previously unknown yet widespread group, dubbed the Ancient North Siberians by the team, who were genetically distinct from both Western Eurasians and East Asians. The researchers say they split off from the former 38,000 years ago – in other words, very shortly after Western Eurasians and East Asians themselves became genetically distinct.
“They were living as big game hunters of woolly mammoth and woolly rhinoceros,” said Willerslev.
But, crucially, this population does not appear to be the direct ancestor of Native Americans.
Instead, analysis of the collection of genomes suggests the population that became the ancestors of native North Americans was the result of liaisons about 20,000 years ago between East Asians, who travelled north, and a group distantly related to the Ancient Northern Siberians. The East Asians also mixed with other descendants of Ancient Northern Siberians to give rise to another group, who the team dub the Ancient Paleo Siberians, who went on to supplant the existing group.
“[Ancestors of] Native Americans are not the first people in north-eastern Siberia as most people, if not everybody thought,” said Willerslev, adding that DNA recovered in north-eastern Siberia from what is believed to be an Ancient Paleo Siberian was crucial to the work. “This is the first evidence we have, real evidence, of something very close genetically to Native Americans,” he said.
The team add that one possibility is that the mixing involving the East Asians occurred in southern Beringia – one of the areas that could have offered respite from harshening conditions at the time.
They Ancient Paleo Siberians were themselves supplanted by another band of East Asians heading north about 10,000 years ago that gave rise to a group dubbed the “Neo-Siberians”. “The vast majority of the genetic makeup of present day Siberians comes from this last push,” said Willerslev. “This is also the reason you don’t have any very close connection between contemporary Siberians and Native Americans.”
John Hoffecker from the University of Colorado Boulder, who was not involved in the study, welcomed the research, saying a striking feature of the study is that humans were faring well in north-eastern Siberia, even in very difficult conditions, 30,000 years ago – with the genetic data from the teeth suggesting the males belonged to a population of about 500 people.
“That’s a pretty healthy population,” he said. “We had no idea 30 years ago that we had this robust healthy hunter-gatherer population thriving up in the high Arctic 30,000 years ago – it is amazing.”
Hoffecker added the presence of the group suggests it was the ice sheets in North America, not hostile conditions in Beringia, that kept people from reaching the Americas sooner.
Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Pakistani Prime Minister Imran Khan may come face to face at the Shanghai Cooperation Organization summit this month. China—one of the organization’s co-founders—is keen to ease tensions between the countries and lower the risk of war on its borders. If it can broker a successful Khan-Modi meeting, an unprecedented period of stability could follow.
Modi, who was recently reelected in a landslide victory, begins his second term in a unique position. Having built his brand of Hindu nationalism around a muscular defense of national security, Modi may be in a better position than any previous Indian leader to de-escalate with Pakistan.
On Feb. 26, Modi essentially upended South Asian politics when he sent a squadron of Indian warplanes to drop four bombs near the small Pakistani town of Balakot. The move upset the uneasy equilibrium that had kept the two countries at peace for years. Given the dangers of miscalculation between the two nuclear powers in the fog of war, India and Pakistan had for many years refrained from any military engagement—until Balakot.
In the end, rather than escalating, the incident ended with both countries claiming victory at home: India, for having authorized the strikes, which satisfied Modi’s base, and Pakistan for having downed an Indian plane and then handed back the pilot who was captured. Whether a willingness to use military force is the new normal—and whether it is any more dangerous than the old normal—depends on how Modi presents himself during his second term. If he does want to make peace, he may find a more willing Pakistan than ever before.
Pakistan’s army chief, Gen. Qamar Javed Bajwa, has a track record as a bridge builder with India. In 2018, he established a back channel with India that helped secure a massive reduction in cease-fire violations along the Line of Control between the two countries. Bajwa has also been instrumental in pushing for a visa-free corridor for Indian Sikh pilgrims to access a holy site in Kartarpur, Pakistan. Analysts believe that Bajwa also supported Khan’s decision to return to India Abhinandan Varthaman, the pilot who was taken prisoner after an aerial dogfight that followed India’s Balakot strike.
To top it all off, Bajwa can engage with India without fearing accusations from an increasingly bellicose military of being weak. He has heeded calls from within the rank and file to clamp down on free speech criticizing the military. And, under him, the military also backed the jailing of former Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif and proceedings against former President Asif Ali Zardari—giving him credibility within the ranks.
When it comes to improving ties with India, Bajwa and Khan appear to have the backing of Pakistan’s most steadfast ally, China, which had previously seemed ambivalent about peace between the two countries.
New Delhi welcomed the addition of Masood Azhar, the founder of the terrorist group Jaish-e-Mohammed, to the United Nations’ terrorist sanctions list this May as the biggest proof of a change in China’s outlook. On four previous occasions, the United States, India, and other Western allies had attempted to have Azhar listed, only to have China stand in their way. Increased tensions after Balakot may have pushed all sides to make enough compromises to come to a working agreement.
China has long preached the need for Pakistan to expand trade ties with India. But under Chinese President Xi Jinping, those calls have taken on new weight as Beijing attempts its own reset with New Delhi. A summit between Xi and Modi last year cemented a friendlier outlook. And bilateral trade between India and China has grown dramatically, from less than $3 billion in 2001 to nearly $90 billion last year.
Historically, Pakistani leaders have ignored a lot of international signaling. But they usually pay attention to Beijing. Bajwa has been especially responsive, shuttling off to Beijing last September when one of Khan’s ministers publicly complained about Pakistan’s debt to China related to the Belt and Road Initiative.
Of course, just because Bajwa, Khan, and Xi are aligned doesn’t mean that Modi will be, too. After all, since Balakot didn’t escalate into all-out nuclear war, Modi may believe that such strikes could be used again to great domestic and strategic effect. Yet the downside risk of military operations will not be lost on Modi or his inner circle, either. India’s aged military hardware has been a sore point for Indian strategists for decades, and Pakistan’s ability to shoot down an Indian plane strengthens their arguments about India’s preparedness. And perhaps most importantly, as someone with a proven readiness to go to war, Modi can now sell himself domestically as having the upper hand in any negotiations with Pakistan.
Any political violence that India can plausibly link to Pakistan will not only scuttle the chance for dialogue between Khan and Modi—it will also ramp up the pressure for an even more spectacular response than Balakot. Pakistan appears to be attempting to head off any problems by cracking down on individuals associated with some key terrorist organizations, but these groups have proved resilient in the past, especially given the limitations of Pakistan’s efforts to control them.
The United States and other Western nations may also spoil any progress. After the Balakot strike, instead of the traditional finger-wagging at both countries, a host of Western powers essentially endorsed India’s action as a legitimate way to respond to what it considers to be terrorist attacks on its soldiers. Merits of their approach aside, if Western powers continue to signal unqualified support for India, they risk encouraging more such behavior.
But for now, there are reasons to be optimistic. Bajwa’s de-escalation along the Line of Control in the first half of 2018 required a partner willing and able to meet Pakistan halfway, which means that Modi had to have signed off. Despite some reservations, Modi also agreed to the Kartarpur corridor for Sikh worship. And, most of all, he tried to ease tensions with Pakistan after the return of the captured Indian pilot after Balakot.
Those hopeful for regional stability know that peaceful coexistence between Pakistan and India benefits not only those two countries, but the entire region as well. It is not common for the United States and China to want the same thing. But they do in South Asia, and they can push Modi and Khan toward cooperation. The Shanghai Cooperation Organization meeting is a good place to start.
Along with Theresa May, the Defence Secretary Penny Mordaunt was also in Portsmouth, and we spoke to her earlier about some of the tensions of our time.
The so-called D-Day Proclamation, signed earlier by 16 countries, pledged to “resolve international tensions peacefully”. Along with Theresa May, the Defence Secretary Penny Mordaunt was also in Portsmouth, and we spoke to her earlier about some of the tensions of our time.
We began by asking her about the comments from the Russian foreign minister, who wrote recently that it was the Soviet Union which “broke the backbone” of the Nazi forces. Why wasn’t Russia represented here today?
On 17 May, a 5-year-old child died from cancer in a hospital in Gaza.
She died with her family around her. But she didn’t know that.
In fact, she had spent most of the past month alone in hospitals in Jerusalem, separated from her parents and other relatives by the Israeli permit system that controls the movement of Palestinians in the occupied West Bank and Gaza.
Only when treatment failed and she was no longer conscious was she sent back to her family in Gaza.
Aisha Lulu of the Bureij Refugee Camp in Gaza had been diagnosed with brain cancer in April. She had been having headaches and vomiting attacks since March and doctors found a brain tumor on 7 April.
With no specialist doctors in Gaza and in view of her age, Aisha was granted a permit by the Israeli military authorities to allow her to attend al-Makassed, a Palestinian hospital in East Jerusalem in the occupied West Bank.
But neither of her parents were allowed to accompany her. In fact, not one of her relatives was cleared by the Israeli military to take the child to hospital.
“It is an hour-and-a-half drive from Gaza to Jerusalem,” said her mother, Muna, 27. “My heart broke every day my daughter was away.”
Muna was angry. She was angry at her child’s tumor. She was angry that there was nowhere near her that could treat her. And she was particularly angry at the Israeli military that let Aisha suffer alone.
“Why does Israel treat us like this? We are not affiliated to any political faction, we are just normal people.”
Relatives barred
Aisha’s funeral was held on the evening of the day she died.
Her father, Wissam, 37, held her in his arms, weeping. Muna collapsed. The whole neighborhood felt their pain.
Aisha had been treated in Jerusalem from 17 April until 13 May. By the time she died, Aisha had spent almost exactly a month away from her family.
No permits could be obtained. The parents tried. The family tried. Aisha’s uncles and aunts tried. Even her 75-year-old grandmother, Rifqa, applied for a permit from the Israeli military to accompany the child.
Wissam said he and his brother, Hussam called in as many contacts as they had in the Palestinian Authority to see if any of them could help pressure the Israeli side.
It was to no avail. Hussam even convinced a number of unrelated people to apply for a permit. Every attempt was rebuffed.
Eventually, however, Hussam found a friend of the family, Halima Edais, from Beach refugee camp in Gaza City, for whom a permit was obtained in order that she accompany Aisha.
On 17 April, the family put Aisha in car with Edais and watched her drive away.
“I was looking at her and crying,” remembered Wissam. “I couldn’t believe how cruel it was, to let a child that young go alone without her family.”
Muna told her crying child before she left that she would have to endure without her family for a while in order to come back and play with her three siblings again.
It didn’t help much. When Aisha arrived in Jerusalem, the first thing she did was call her family crying, her father said.
Israel’s military operates a permit regime to control the movement of Palestinians under occupation that is regularly in violation of international humanitarian law.
UN officials have singled out Israel’s permit system for Palestinains seeking medical attention for special opprobrium.
2017 saw the lowest rate of permits granted to Palestinians in Gaza since the World Health Organization began collecting such data in 2008. The organization reported that 54 patients from Gaza – most of whom had cancer – died as they waited for permits to be issued during 2017.
While the situation for patients has slightly eased since then, relatives and others also seeking permission to travel with a patient remain at the mercy of an Israeli system that not only has severe restrictions on the books, but which seems to be decided at the discretion of individuals.
Thus, according to Hussein Hamad, a researcher with the human rights organization al-Mezan, Israel might consider permits for men over the age of 45 and women over the age of 40.
But age is no guarantor. According to Hamad, the Israeli military authorities at the Erez checkpoint – which separates Gaza and Israel – have been denying permits on spurious grounds such as relatives’ alleged affiliations to political parties, in particular Hamas, over the past two years.
Those accompanying patients must be close relatives, parents or siblings, and may find that they become subject to Israeli questioning with a view to turning them into informants for Israel.
“The Israeli side procrastinates when responding to patients’ or their proposed companions’ applications,” said Hamad. “Aisha was among the unfortunate children who suffered both from her affliction and from the occupation. Her rights to life and medical treatment were violated, and the rights of her mother were violated when Muna wasn’t allowed to accompany her.”
2018 data from al-Mezan show that of more than 25,500 Palestinians from Gaza who applied for a permit to leave for medical reasons, some 15,800 were approved, just under 2,000 were refused while nearly 8,000 did not receive any decision.
According to al-Mezan data, the Israeli military apprehended one patient and four companions last year in violation of the Fourth Geneva Convention that prohibits the detention of any civilian except under “imperative” security reasons.
Nine people died in 2018 after being denied permits to leave Gaza and seek medical attention elsewhere, according to al-Mezan.
The last days
Aisha’s condition deteriorated after surgery on 20 April. Doctors told her parents that she was traumatized and didn’t want to talk or eat. They asked that the family send a relative for the girls’ comfort.
Again the family tried, this time through the PA. They sought that Aisha’s aunt Ghada be allowed to join her.
Again it was fruitless. They never even got a reply.
Aisha’s mother, Muna, sifts through her daughter’s books on a bed that still holds the child’s toys. “My heart broke every day my daughter was away.”
Mohammed Al-Hajjar
Meanwhile, in Jerusalem, Aisha was sent from the Makkased hospital, where she had surgery to the Augusta Victoria in the hope that chemotherapy would help her. However, there, doctors decided against giving her chemotherapy because they felt it was a hopeless case.
As her condition deteriorated, doctors gave up. She was sent back to Gaza.
Aisha was admitted to al-Rantisi hospital on 13 May. Doctors informed the parents that there was nothing they could do.
Her father, Wissam, could hardly recognize her. She had lost weight. She was pale and very, very weak.
Muna said Aisha did not respond. Not to her. Not to anyone.
Aisha died four days after returning to Gaza. One day later the Israeli military released a statement denying it had prevented the family from leaving. Instead, the Israeli authorities claimed, the parents chose for Aisha to leave with a friend of the family rather than accompany her.
The statement also alleged that Aisha had returned to Gaza two weeks before she died, rather than four days.
The Electronic Intifada called al-Rantisi hospital, which confirmed that Aisha had been admitted on 13 May, as the family says.
Wassim dismisses the Israeli statement as an outright lie designed only for image purposes in the international media.
“Neither I nor her mother would leave our child alone to be treated somewhere far from us. This [statement] is a lie.”
“I sat beside her and prayed after she came back to Gaza,” Muna, her mother, said. “I can’t believe I was not allowed to be with her [for treatment]. I can’t believe how cruel.”
A group of former EU ministers recently published a letter in The Guardian warning that the situation in Israel and Palestine is “sliding into a one-state reality of unequal rights” as they called for adherence to the two-state solution within the framework of the Oslo Accords.
Although clearly an attempt to challenge the further deterioration of Palestinian rights, particularly in light of what appeared to be Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s re-election, the letter obscures the fact that the one-state reality is already here, and provides complicit cover for the worsening situation in the West Bank.
Two weeks before the 9 April elections, US President Donald Trump boosted Netanyahu by formally recognising Israel’s illegal annexation of the Golan Heights, Syrian land it has occupied since the 1967 war.
Violating international law
With one signature, the US rewarded Israel’s lengthy violation of international law, laying the groundwork for its annexation of the rest of the West Bank (East Jerusalem was occupied in 1967). A few days before the election, Netanyahu vowedto begin the annexation process. This was not a rogue statement: most Likud members who ran for re-election are behind it. In this context, it is easy to envisage Trump giving his seal of approval to this move as well.
Annexation would mean a series of legislative measures extending Israeli sovereignty over settlements in the West Bank, leading to the consolidation of Bantustan-like entities for Palestinians. Rather than one sweeping move, annexation will continue to be a gradual process, turning Israel’s de facto control into de jure control.
Calling Israel what it is – a single apartheid state – opens a new box of tools to tackle the power imbalance
This process began more than 50 years ago, in 1967, when Israel gained complete control over all of historic Palestine’s borders – land, sea and air – giving it effective control over the movement of people and goods. Even when Palestinian Authority (PA) President Mahmoud Abbas wants to leave the West Bank, he must obtain Israel’s permission.
While the PA has control over the Palestinian population in Area A (less than a fifth of the West Bank), broader control of land and resources by Israel is absolute, and these are diverted for the benefit and use of Israeli Jews.
On both sides of the Green Line, Israel limits Palestinians to as little land as possible. This has been seen through the gerrymandering of borders in Jerusalem; the expulsion of Bedouin communities, such as Khan al-Ahmar; and the appropriation of huge swathes of Palestinian land in the Galilee and the Naqab, in present-day Israel.
Segregating populations
Meanwhile, the Israeli practice of segregating populations is becoming more apparent, though the legal mechanisms that divide Jews from non-Jews are decades old. The passing of the nation-state law last year outraged many progressives, as it seemingly enshrined Jewish supremacy through its declaration that Jews alone have the right to self-determination in the land.
Yet, the law only reiterated what already exists in Israeli legislation, particularly in its Basic Laws, which function as the state’s constitution. While Palestinian citizens of Israel are permitted bits of nominal political space, Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza, and Syrians in the Golan, have no say over the administration that governs them.
Israeli guards patrol the Qalandia checkpoint in the occupied West Bank on 10 May (AFP)
The Oslo process has allowed Israel to gradually disempower the Palestinian people through these practices. Though Oslo was supposed to lead to the establishment of a Palestinian state in the West Bank and Gaza, its parameters allowed for Israeli dominance, and Palestinians unwittingly signed a capitulation agreement.
The international community’s consistent embrace of Oslo and its narrative has provided complicit cover for the Israeli regime and the prioritisation of the two-state solution over basic Palestinian rights. Even in the face of the one-state reality, and a quarter-century after the signing of the accords, the narrative continues to be spouted in a futile attempt at resuscitation, as evidenced by the recent Guardian letter.
This reiteration of a failed framework, with little to no action on the ground and no consequences for Israel, has placed Palestinians in a position of historic vulnerability as we approach a potentially monumental period of negotiations.
An affront to justice
Trump adviser Jared Kushner has stated that the “deal of the century” will be released after Ramadan, which could mean imminently, although Netanyahu's failure to form a government and the snap elections may provide an excuse for a further delay. The PA, without knowing the deal’s contents, has already rejected it.
In light of the US decisions on the Golan and on moving the US embassy to Jerusalem, along with its attack on Palestinian refugees through the de-funding of the UN agency that serves them, it is clear that any “deal” will be an affront to international law, justice and equality.
A single democratic state offers the best path forward for Palestinians and Israelis
The deal will provide a litmus test for states around the world to demonstrate their commitment to international law and justice. The response can no longer be a reiteration of the Oslo framework.
In the face of escalating Israeli aggression and Israel’s US-supported abandonment of the two-state solution, the international community must put forward a new narrative that acknowledges the one-state reality.
This acknowledgement does not mean turning from international law or giving up on Palestinian aspirations for political sovereignty. Rather, it accepts the fact of absolute Israeli control.
The outgoing French ambassador to the US recently described Israel as an apartheid state, and although he backpedalled after arousing the ire of Israel’s supporters, it was an important admission. It is now more imperative than ever for others to follow suit and to state the reality on the ground.
Indeed, calling Israel what it is – a single apartheid state – opens a new box of tools to tackle the power imbalance at hand, and to at last allow space for the realisation of Palestinian rights.
The views expressed in this article belong to the author and do not necessarily reflect the editorial policy of Middle East Eye.
Minister of National Integration, Official Languages, Social Progress and Hindu Religious Affairs Mano Ganesan has raised concerns with Jaffna Security Forces Commander Maj. Gen. Dharshana Hettiarachchi regarding stepped-up security measures in the North following the Easter Sunday carnage.
Palestinian medics evacuate a critically injured protester during Great March of Return demonstrations in October 2018. 
Mohammed Shtayyeh says PA is facing economic crisis (AFP/File photo)
