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→ 19 May 2021
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Green Party’s motion to declare Palestine a state fails in Parliament | Stuff

Green Party MP Golriz Ghahraman

The Green Party motion asking MPs to recognise Palestine as a state has failed in the House, with National and ACT MPs objecting to the effort.

Green Party MP Golriz Ghahraman​ on Wednesday afternoon sought leave of the House to debate a motion asking MPs to recognise “the state of Palestine among our community of nations”.

New Zealand does not recognise Palestine as a state but supports a two-state solution to the conflict, which would mean the creation of a Palestinian state.

National Party foreign affairs spokesman Gerry Brownlee told Stuff on Wednesday morning that, while the party supported a two-state solution, it would not support the motion.

“We have followed that two-state concept since it was first proposed in 1993 and there have been many attempts to get it together but it has not yet been achieved, and I think to leap ahead of the negotiations by recognising Palestine as a state is pretty much an act of bad faith,” Brownlee said.

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→ 24 February 2021
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ICC declares jurisdiction over [alleged] crimes in Palestine | The Jurist

The International Criminal Court (ICC) ruled Friday that it has jurisdiction over crimes committed in Palestine. The ICC was established in 2002 and prosecutes genocide, crimes against humanity, and war crimes committed around the world. In 2018, Palestine referred possible crimes to the ICC Prosecutor for investigation. In 2020, the Prosecutor sought a ruling of jurisdiction from the Pre-Trial Chamber.

According to Article 12 of the Rome Statute, which governs the ICC, the court may exercise jurisdiction over a crime if “the State on the territory of which the conduct in question occurred” is a party to the Statute or otherwise accepts the jurisdiction of the court. Israel argued that Palestine cannot give jurisdiction to the ICC because Palestine is not a sovereign state with jurisdiction over its own territory and nationals.

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Read the full decision

Read Judge Peter Kovac’s dissenting opinion

Q&A Discussion on the decision

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→ 10 November 2020
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Distorted picture of complex Palestine conflict | Stuff

Dr Sheree Trotter

John Minto has wasted no time in attempting to lecture the incoming Minister of Foreign Affairs, MP Nanaia Mahuta, on what he thinks she should be doing in the Middle East and in urging his followers to bombard her with emails.

He has no compunction in spouting a distorted picture of what is a complex conflict.

Minto fails to mention that the so-called ‘Great March of Return’ consisted of a series of violent riots, organised, coordinated and directed by Hamas, an internationally designated terrorist organisation that is in an armed conflict with Israel.

A case study undertaken by the Geneva Academy of International Humanitarian Law and Human Rights found that:

The mass violent events that took place in the area of the security barrier were “unusual in their scope and in the intensity of the threat that they posed”. Tens of thousands of people participated. Under the cover of the riots, grenade and explosive devices were hurled towards the Israel Defence Forces troops, live ammunition was fired at the soldiers and explosive devices were hurled towards Israeli territory, in addition to the flying of incendiary kites intended to harm towns and residents of Israel near the Gaza periphery.

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→ 3 July 2020
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No peace until Jewish presence accepted | Stuff

Mahmoud Abbas has refused to allow elections since 2006

In 2018 I visited Ramallah with two colleagues. In an unanticipated conversation on a street very near Yasser Arafat’s tomb, a friendly and engaging Palestinian lawyer explained to us that their leaders were like gangs, they were corrupt and ‘monopolise the money’. He complained that they do not care about human rights but are only interested in blaming Israel. In this Palestinian’s view, Israel was not the problem – but rather the corrupt and self-serving Palestinian leadership.

It is not uncommon to view the Israel-Palestinian conflict as a power battle, with Israel as the dominant power and the Palestinians as the victims. However, this type of analysis ignores realities on the ground and twists historical facts to suit a political agenda.

A more useful exercise, which might bring real change for Palestinians, would be to consider the power relations within Palestinian society. Why have there been no elections in the Palestinian Territories since 2006? Why does Gaza’s Hamas devote untold resources to terrorism rather than building a state? Where do the millions of dollars of international aid go?

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→ 24 January 2020
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BBC slammed for linking Israel’s treatment of Palestinians to Holocaust complex | JTA

Orla Guerin, BBC

British Jews protested what they perceived to be a BBC reporter’s claim that the Holocaust has distorted Israelis’ perception of reality and the occupation of Palestinian land.

The rebuke Thursday by the Board of Deputies of British Jews, the Campaign Against Antisemitism and the editor in chief of the Jewish Chronicle was over Orla Guerin’s report Wednesday on the commemoration of the 75th anniversary of the Auschwitz Nazi death camp’s liberation.

Against the background of soldiers visiting the Yad Vashem Holocaust museum in Jerusalem, Guerin, who has faced numerous allegations of anti-Israel bias, including by Israel’s government, said: “The State of Israel is now a regional power. For decades it has occupied Palestinian territories. But some here will always see their nation through the prism of persecution and survival.”

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→ 22 November 2019
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NZFOI welcomes US announcement on Israeli Settlements

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

22 November 2019 CHRISTCHURCH, NEW ZEALAND — NZ Friends of Israel welcomes the US announcement on Monday November 18, that acknowledges that Israel’s settlements in Judea and Samaria (also known as the West Bank) are not illegal.

Most international law opinions that suggest otherwise are based on a misapplication of the Fourth Geneva Convention which was never written with the Middle Eastern situation in mind.  The original convention expected that the land of a sovereign state was being occupied by another sovereign state. 

This is not the case with the lands of the Middle East.  Following the fall of the Ottoman Empire and the end of the Second World War, there was no legitimate sovereign over the disputed lands. 

The US announcement affirms the fact that Jews have always been indigenous to the region and are not foreign colonizers. 

With the resurgence of anti-Semitism in many countries of the world, the foresight and wisdom of the League of Nations in mandating the establishment of a Jewish homeland, is unfortunately being vindicated. 

NZ Friends of Israel (www.nzfoi.org, contact@nzfoi.org, ph 027 433 9745) is a registered charity that fights racial prejudice and intolerance by raising awareness of Jewish history and culture.

ENDS

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→ 14 February 2019
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Benny Morris on Why He’s Written His Last Word on the Israel-Arab Conflict | Haaretz

Benny Morris

After 30 years, he’s giving up. “This is the last book I will write about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict,” declares historian Benny Morris, sitting on the balcony of his home, overlooking distant lush hilltops covered with cypresses and pines. A pioneer in researching the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and one of the most prominent Israeli historians of his generation, he has had his fill of the exhausting and bloody cycle that he has documented for the past three decades. “The decades of studying the conflict, which led to nine books, left me with a feeling of deep despair. I’ve done all I can,” he says. “I’ve written enough about a conflict that has no solution, mainly due to the Palestinians’ consistent rejection of a solution of two states for two peoples.”

This weary feeling about the bitter encounter between the two sparring peoples is given profound expression in the new Hebrew edition of his book, “One State, Two States: Resolving the Israel/Palestine Conflict” (first published in English in 2009). In the book, Morris describes for what he says is the last time another chapter in the history of relations between Israel and the Palestinians. Given the circumstances, he concludes his research with an incisive political essay that could be read as an indictment. “It’s a historical essay that has a political purpose and a political explanation,” he admits. “My aim is to open readers’ eyes to the truth. The objective is to expose the goals of the Palestinian national movement to extinguish the Jewish national project and to inherit all of Palestine for the Arabs and Islam.”

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→ 21 November 2018
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Israeli PM Netanyahu buying himself time | NZ Herald

Benjamin Netanyahu

In another twist in a roller-coaster week for Israeli politics, a key ally of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has decided not to quit as had been expected, allowing the right-wing Government to limp along and possibly avoid new elections.

Even in the best of times, Israeli politics is polarised and fractious, but the events of the past few days have been particularly fraught.

The turmoil was sparked by an intense bout of fighting with militants in the Gaza Strip last week and capped by an ultimatum from Education Minister Naftali Bennett. It is still unclear whether the Government will survive even the next few days, let alone finish its term a year from now.

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→ 21 November 2018
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Israel steps up boycott fight after Airbnb settlement ban | NZ Herald

KFAR ADUMIM, West Bank (AP) — Israel is threatening vacation rental company Airbnb with high taxes and legal repercussions over its decision to remove listings from Jewish West Bank settlements.

The threats step up Israel’s fight against a global movement advocating for boycotts over the country’s treatment of the Palestinians.

Israeli Tourism Minister Yariv Levin says Tuesday that Israel will seek to impose “very high taxes” on the company in order to restrict its operations in the country. He also says Israel will encourage hosts in settlements to sue the company to make it “pay” for its decision.

Airbnb’s decision on Monday sparked outrage among Israeli officials and settler leaders, but was welcomed by Palestinian officials and human rights groups that had long pressured the company to end its contentious West Bank settlement listings.

Source

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→ 8 October 2018
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3 Palestinians, including teenager, killed in Gaza protest | NZ Herald

GAZA CITY, Gaza Strip (AP) — Israeli forces shot dead three Palestinians, including a 13-year-old boy, as thousands of people protested Friday along the fence dividing the Gaza Strip and Israel, Gaza’s Health Ministry said.

The ministry said the boy was struck in the chest, a 24-year-old man was shot in the back and another man, 28, succumbed to his wounds at hospital.

It added that 126 protesters were wounded by live fire.

Responding to calls by Hamas, the Islamic militant group that rules Gaza, thousands of Palestinians thronged five areas along the fence, burning tires, throwing rocks and chanting slogans against a stifling Israeli-Egyptian blockade on the territory.

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