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Category: Asia Report

  • Damascus and Gaza prisoners: Syrians and Palestinians search for ‘disappeared’ loved ones

    Democracy Now!

    AMY GOODMAN: We begin today’s show in Syria, where tens of thousands of people gathered at the Great Mosque of Damascus for the first Friday prayers since longtime authoritarian President Bashar al-Assad was toppled by opposition fighters.

    DAMASCUS RESIDENT: [translated] Hopefully this Friday is the Friday of the greatest joy, a Friday of victory for our Muslim brothers. This is a blessed Friday.

    AMY GOODMAN: Syria’s new caretaker Prime Minister Mohammed al-Bashir was among those at the mosque. He’ll act as prime minister until March.

    This comes as the World Food Programme is appealing to donors to help it scale up relief operations for the approximately 2.8 million displaced and food-insecure Syrians across the country. That includes more than 1.1 million people who were forcibly displaced by fighting since late November.

    Israel’s Defence Minister has told his troops to prepare to spend the winter holding the demilitarized zone that separates Syria from the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights. Earlier today, Prime Minister Netanyahu toured the summit of Mount Haramun in the UN-designated buffer zone. Netanyahu said this week the Golan Heights would “forever be an inseparable part of the State of Israel”.

    On Thursday, UN Secretary-General António Guterres called for an urgent deescalation of airstrikes on Syria by Israeli forces, and their withdrawal from the UN buffer zone.

    In Ankara, US Secretary of State Antony Blinken met with Turkey’s Foreign Minister and the President, Recep Tayyip Erdoğan. Blinken said the US and Turkey would [work] to prevent a resurgence of the Islamic State group in Syria. Meanwhile, Erdoğan told Blinken that Turkey reserves the right to strike the US-backed Syrian Democratic Forces, led by the Kurdish People’s Protection Units (YPG), which Turkey considers “terrorist”.

    For more, we go to Damascus for the first time since the fall of longtime authoritarian President Bashar al-Assad, where we’re joined by the Associated Press investigative reporter Sarah El Deeb, who is based in the Middle East, a region she has covered for two decades.

    Sarah, welcome to Democracy Now! You are overlooking —

    SARAH EL DEEB: Thank you.

    AMY GOODMAN: — the square where tens of thousands of Syrians have gathered for the first Friday prayers since the fall of Assad. Describe the scene for us.


    Report from Damascus: Searching for loved ones in prisons and morgues.  Video: Democracy Now!

    SARAH EL DEEB: There is a lot of firsts here. It’s the first time they gather on Friday after Bashar al-Assad fled the country. It’s the first time everyone seems to be very happy. I think that’s the dominant sentiment, especially people who are in the square. There is ecstasy, tens of thousands of people. They are still chanting, “Down with Bashar al-Assad.”

    But what’s new is that it’s also visible that the sentiment is they’ve been, so far, happy with the new rulers, not outpour — there is no criticism, out — loud criticism of the new rulers yet. So, I’d say the dominant thing is that everyone is happy down there.

    AMY GOODMAN: Sarah El Deeb, you recently wrote an AP article headlined “Thousands scour Syria’s most horrific prison but find no sign of their loved ones.” On Tuesday, families of disappeared prisoners continued searching Sednaya prison for signs of their long-lost loved ones who were locked up under Assad’s brutal regime.

    HAYAT AL-TURKI: [translated] I will show you the photo of my missing brother. It’s been 14 years. This is his photo. I don’t know what he looks like, if I find him. I don’t know what he looks like, because I am seeing the photos of prisoners getting out. They are like skeletons.

    But this is his photo, if anyone has seen him, can know anything about him or can help us. He is one of thousands of prisoners who are missing. I am asking for everyone, not only my brother, uncle, cousin and relatives.”

    AMY GOODMAN: Talk about this mad search by Syrians across the country.

    SARAH EL DEEB: This is the other thing that’s been dominating our coverage and our reporting since we arrived here, the contrast between the relief, the sense of relief over the departure of Bashar al-Assad but then the sadness and the concern and the no answers for where the loved ones have gone.

    Thousands — also, tens of thousands of people have marched on Sednaya [prison]. It’s the counter to this scene, where people were looking for any sign of where their relatives have been. As you know really well, so many people have reported their relatives missing, tens of thousands, since the beginning of the revolt, but also before.

    I mean, I think this is a part of the feature of this government, is that there has been a lot of security crackdown. People were scared to speak, but they were — because there was a good reason for it. They were picked up at any expression of discontent or expression of opinion.

    So, where we were in Sednaya two, three days ago, it feels like one big day, I have to say. When we were in Sednaya, people were also describing what — anything, from the smallest expression of opinion, a violation of a traffic light. No answers.

    And they still don’t know where their loved ones are. I mean, I think we know quite a lot from research before arriving here about the notorious prison system in Syria. There’s secret prisons. There are security branches where people were being held. I think this is the first time we have an opportunity to go look at those facilities.

    What was surprising and shocking to the people, and also to a lot of us journalists, was that we couldn’t find any sign of these people. And the answers are — we’re still looking for them. But what was clear is that only a handful — I mean, not a handful — hundreds of people were found.

    Many of them were also found in morgues. There were apparent killings in the last hours before the regime departed. One of them was the prominent activist Mazen al-Hamada. We were at his funeral yesterday. He was found, and his family believes that — he was found killed, and his family believes his body was fresh, that he was killed only a few days earlier. So, I think the killing continued up until the last hour.

    AMY GOODMAN: I was wondering if you can tell us more about —

    SARAH EL DEEB: What was also — what was also —

    AMY GOODMAN: — more about Mazen. I mean, I wanted to play a clip of Mazen’s nephew, Yahya al-Hussein.

    YAHYA AL-HUSSEIN: [translated] In 2020, he was taken from the Netherlands to Germany through the Syrian Embassy there. And from there, they brought him to Syria with a fake passport.

    He arrived at the airport at around 2:30 a.m. and called my aunt to tell her that he arrived at the airport, and asked for money. When they reached out to him the next day, they were told that air intelligence had arrested him.

    AMY GOODMAN: That’s Mazen’s nephew, Yahya al-Hussein. Sarah, if you can explain? This was an activist who left Syria after he had been imprisoned and tortured — right? — more than a decade ago, but ultimately came back, apparently according to assurances that he would not be retaken. And now his body is found.

    SARAH EL DEEB: I think it’s — like you were saying, it’s very hard to explain. This is someone who was very outspoken and was working on documenting the torture and the killing in the secret prisons in Syria. So he was very well aware of his role and his position vis-à-vis the government. Yet he felt — it was hard to explain what Mazen’s decision was based on, but his family believes he was lured into Syria by some false promises of security and safety.

    His heart was in Syria. He left Syria, but he never — it never left him. He was working from wherever he was — he was in the Netherlands, he was in the US — I think, to expose these crimes. And I think this is — these are the words of his family: He was a witness on the crimes of the Assad government, and he was a martyr of the Assad government.

    One of the people that were at the funeral yesterday was telling us Mazen was a lesson. The Assad government was teaching all detainees a lesson through Mazen to keep them silent. I think it was just a testimony to how cruel this ruling regime, ruling system has been for the past 50 years.

    People would go back to his father’s rule also. But I think with the revolution, with the protests in 2011, all these crimes and all these detentions were just en masse. I think the estimates are anywhere between 150,000 and 80,000 detainees that no one can account for. That is on top of all the people that were killed in airstrikes and in opposition areas in crackdown on protest.

    So, it was surprising that at the last minute — it was surprising and yet not very surprising. When I asked the family, “Why did they do that?” they would look at me and, like, “Why are you asking this question? They do that. That’s what they did.” It was just difficult to understand how even at the last minute, and even for someone that they promised security, this was — this would be the end, emaciated and tortured and killed, unfortunately.

    AMY GOODMAN: Sarah, you spoke in Damascus to a US citizen, Travis Timmerman, who says he was imprisoned in Syria. This is a clip from an interview with Al Arabiya on Thursday in which he says he spent the last seven months in a prison cell in Damascus.

    TRAVIS TIMMERMAN: My name is Travis.

    REPORTER: Travis.

    TRAVIS TIMMERMAN: Yes.

    REPORTER: So, [speaking in Arabic]. Travis, Travis Timmerman.

    TRAVIS TIMMERMAN: That’s right.

    REPORTER: That’s right.

    TRAVIS TIMMERMAN: But just Travis. Just call me Travis.

    REPORTER: Call you Travis, OK. And where were you all this time?

    TRAVIS TIMMERMAN: I was imprisoned in Damascus for the last seven months. … I was imprisoned in a cell by myself. And in the early morning of this Monday, or the Monday of this week, they took a hammer, and they broke my door down. … Well, the armed men just wanted to get me out of my cell. And then, really, the man who I stuck with was a Syrian man named Ely. He was also a prisoner that was just freed. And he took me by the side, by the arm, really. And he and a young woman that lives in Damascus, us three, exited the prison together.

    AMY GOODMAN: Sarah El Deeb, your AP report on Timmerman is headlined “American pilgrim imprisoned in Assad’s Syria calls his release from prison a ‘blessing.’” What can you share about him after interviewing him?

    SARAH EL DEEB: I spent quite a bit of time with Travis last night. And I think his experience was very different from what I was just describing. He was taken, he was detained for crossing illegally into Syria. And I think his description of his experience was it was OK. He was not mistreated.

    He was fed well, I mean, especially when I compare it to what I heard from the Syrian prisoners in the secret prisons or in detention facilities. He would receive rice, potatoes, tomatoes. None of this was available to the Syrian detainees. He would go to the bathroom three times a day, although this was uncomfortable for him, because, of course, it was not whenever he wanted. But it was not something that other Syrian detainees would experience.

    His experience also was that he heard a lot of beating. I think that’s what he described it as: beating from nearby cells. They were mostly Syrian detainees. For him, that was an implicit threat of the use of violence against him, but he did not get any — he was not beaten or tortured.

    AMY GOODMAN: And, Sarah, if you could also —

    SARAH EL DEEB: He also said his release was a “blessing.” Yeah.

    AMY GOODMAN: If you could also talk about Austin Tice, the American freelance journalist? His family, his mother and father and brothers and sisters, seem to be repeatedly saying now that they believe he’s alive, held by the Syrian government, and they’re desperately looking for him or reaching out to people in Syria. What do you know?

    SARAH EL DEEB: What we know is that people thought Travis was Tice when they first saw him. They found him in a house in a village outside of Damascus. And I think that’s what triggered — we didn’t know that Travis was in a Syrian prison, so I think that’s what everyone was going to check. They thought that this was Tice.

    I think the search, the US administration, the family, they are looking and determined to look for Tice. The family believes that he was in Syrian government prison. He entered Syria in 2012. He is a journalist. But I think we have — his family seems to think that there were — he’s still in a Syrian government prison.

    But I think, so far, we have not had any sign of Tice from all those released. But, mind you, the scenes of release from prisons were chaotic, from multiple prisons at the same time. And we’re still, day by day, finding out about new releases and people who were set free on that Sunday morning.

    AMY GOODMAN: Finally, Sarah El Deeb, you’ve reported on the Middle East for decades. You just wrote a piece for AP titled “These Palestinians disappeared after encounters with Israeli troops in Gaza.” So, we’re pivoting here. So much attention is being paid to the families of Syrian prisoners who they are finally freeing.

    I want to turn to Gaza. Tell us about the Palestinians searching for their family members who went missing during raids and arrests by Israeli soldiers in the Gaza Strip. And talk about the lack of accountability for these appearances. You begin your piece with Reem Ajour’s quest to find her missing husband and daughter.

    SARAH EL DEEB: I talked to Reem Ajour for a long time. I mean, I think, like you said, this was a pivot, but the themes have been common across the Middle East, sadly. Reem Ajour last saw her family in March of 2024. Both her husband and her 5-year-old daughter were injured after an Israeli raid on their house during the chaotic scenes of the Israeli raids on the Shifa Hospital.

    They lived in the neighborhood. So, it was chaotic. They [Israeli military] entered their home, and they were shooting in the air, or they were shooting — they were shooting, and the family ended up wounded.

    But what was striking was that the Israeli soldiers made the mother leave the kid wounded in her house and forced her to leave to the south. I think this is not only Reem Ajour’s case. I think this is something we’ve seen quite a bit in Gaza. But the fact that this was a 5-year-old and the mom couldn’t take her with her was quite moving.

    And I think what her case kind of symbolises is that during these raids and during these detentions at checkpoints, families are separated, and we don’t have any way of knowing how the Israeli military is actually documenting these detentions, these raids.

    Where do they — how do they account for people who they detain and then they release briefly? The homes that they enter, can we find out what happened in these homes? We have no idea of holding — I think the Israeli court has also tried to get some information from the military, but so far very few cases have been resolved.

    And we’re talking about not only 500 or 600 people; we’re talking about tens of thousands who have been separated, their homes raided, during what is now 15 months of war in Gaza.

    AMY GOODMAN: Sarah El Deeb, we want to thank you for being with us, Associated Press investigative reporter based in the Middle East for two decades, now reporting from Damascus.

    Next up, today is the 75th day of a hunger strike by Laila Soueif. She’s the mother of prominent British Egyptian political prisoner Alaa Abd El-Fattah. She’s calling on British officials to pressure Egypt for the release of her son. We’ll speak to the Cairo University mathematics professor in London, where she’s been standing outside the Foreign Office. Back in 20 seconds.

    This article is republished from the Democracy Now! programme under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 United States Licence.

    This post was originally published on Asia Pacific Report.

  • RSF says global attacks on journalists ‘alarming’, Gaza ‘most dangerous’ and seeks ‘urgent action’

    Pacific Media Watch

    The global media freedom watchdog Reporters Without Borders (RSF) has revealed an “alarming intensification of attacks on journalists” in its 2024 annual roundup — especially in conflict zones such as Gaza.

    Gaza stands out as the “most dangerous” region in the world, with the highest number of journalists murdered in connection with their work in the past five years.

    Since October 2023, the Israeli military have killed more than 145 journalists, including at least 35 whose deaths were linked to their journalism, reports RSF.

    Also 550 journalists are currently imprisoned worldwide, a 7 percent increase from last year.

    “This violence — often perpetrated by governments and armed groups with total impunity — needs an immediate response,” says the report.

    “RSF calls for urgent action to protect journalists and journalism.”

    Asia second most dangerous
    Asia is the second most dangerous region for journalists due to the large number of journalists killed in Pakistan (seven) and the protests that rocked Bangladesh (five), says the report.

    “Journalists do not die, they are killed; they are not in prison, regimes lock them up; they do not disappear, they are kidnapped,” said RSF director-general Thibaut Bruttin.

    “These crimes — often orchestrated by governments and armed groups with total impunity — violate international law and too often go unpunished.

    “We need to get things moving, to remind ourselves as citizens that journalists are dying for us, to keep us informed. We must continue to count, name, condemn, investigate, and ensure that justice is served.

    “Fatalism should never win. Protecting those who inform us is protecting the truth.

    A third of the journalists killed in 2024 were slain by the Israeli armed forces.

    A record 54 journalists were killed, including 31 in conflict zones.

    In 2024, the Gaza Strip accounted for nearly 30 percent of journalists killed on the job, according to RSF’s latest information. They were killed by the Israeli army.

    More than 145 journalists have been killed in Palestine since October 2023, including at least 35 targeted in the line of duty.

    RSF continues to investigate these deaths to identify and condemn the deliberate targeting of media workers, and has filed four complaints with the International Criminal Court (ICC) for war crimes committed against journalists.

    RSF condemns Israeli media ‘stranglehold’
    Last month, in a separate report while Israel’s war against Gaza, Lebanon and Syria rages on, RSF said Israel’s Communications Minister Shlomo Karhi was trying to “reshape” Israel’s media landscape.

    Between a law banning foreign media outlets that were “deemed dangerous”, a bill that would give the government a stranglehold on public television budgets, and the addition of a private pro-Netanyahu channel on terrestrial television exempt from licensing fees, the ultra-conservative minister is augmenting pro-government coverage of the news.

    RSF said it was “alarmed by these unprecedented attacks” against media independence and pluralism — two pillars of democracy — and called on the government to abandon these “reforms”.

    On November 24, two new proposals for measures targeting media critical of the authorities and the war in Gaza and Lebanon were approved by Netanyahu’s government.

    The Ministerial Committee for Legislation validated a proposed law providing for the privatisation of the public broadcaster Kan.

    On the same day, the Council of Ministers unanimously accepted a draft resolution by Communications Minister Shlomo Kahri from November 2023 seeking to cut public aid and revenue from the Government Advertising Agency to the independent and critical liberal newspaper Haaretz.

    ‘Al Jazeera’ ban tightened
    The so-called “Al-Jazeera law”, as it has been dubbed by the Israeli press, has been tightened.

    This exceptional measure was adopted in April 2024 for a four-month period and renewed in July.

    On November 20, Israeli MPs voted to extend the law’s duration to six months, and increased the law’s main provision — a broadcasting ban on any foreign media outlet deemed detrimental to national security by the security services — from 45 days to 60.

    “The free press in a country that describes itself as ‘the only democracy in the Middle East’ will be undermined,” said RSF’s editorial director Anne Bocandé.

    RSF called on Israel’s political authorities, starting with Minister Shlomo Karhi and Prime Minister Benyamin Netanyahu, to “act responsibly” and abandon these proposed reforms.

    Inside Israel, journalists critical of the government and the war have been facing pressure and intimidation for more than a year.

    This post was originally published on Asia Pacific Report.

  • UN overwhelmingly backs immediate Gaza ceasefire – but 3 Pacific nations vote against

    Asia Pacific Report

    The United Nations General Assembly has voted overwhelmingly to demand an immediate ceasefire in the Gaza Strip — but three of the isolated nine countries that voted against are Pacific island states, including Papua New Guinea.

    The assembly passed a resolution yesterday demanding an immediate, unconditional and permanent ceasefire in Gaza, which was adopted with 158 votes in favour from the 193-member assembly and nine votes against with 13 abstentions.

    Of the nine countries voting against, the three Pacific nations that sided with Israel and its relentless backer United States were joined by Nauru, Papua New Guinea and Tonga.

    The other countries that voted against were Argentina, Czechia, Hungary and Paraguay.

    Thirteen abstentions included Fiji, which had previously controversially voted with Israel, Micronesia, Palau. Supporters of the resolution in the Pacific region included Australia, New Zealand, and Timor-Leste.

    In a separate vote, 159 UNGA members voted in favour of a resolution affirming the body’s “full support” for the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East.

    UNRWA has been the target of diplomatic and financial attacks by Israel and its backers — which have baselessly accused the lifesaving organisation of being a “terrorist group” — and literal attacks by Israeli forces, who have killed more than 250 of the agency’s personnel.

    Nine UNGA members opposed the measure — including Nauru, Papua New Guinea and Tonga — while 11 others abstained. Security Council resolutions are legally binding, while General Assembly resolutions are not, and are also not subject to vetoes.

    The US has six times vetoed Security Council resolutions in favour of a ceasefire in the past 14 months.

    The UN votes yesterday took place amid sustained Israeli attacks on Gaza including a strike on a home sheltering forcibly displaced Palestinians in Deir al-Balah that killed at least 33 people, including children, local medical officials said.

    This followed earlier Israeli attacks, including the Monday night bombing of the al-Kahlout family home in Beit Hanoun that killed or wounded dozens of Palestinians and reportedly wiped the family from the civil registry.

    “We are witnessing a massive loss of life,” said Dr Hussam Abu Safiya, director of Kamal Adwan Hospital in Beit Lahia, reports Common Dreams.

    This post was originally published on Asia Pacific Report.

  • Fiji government accused over human rights violations, free speech curb

    By Apenisa Waqairadovu in Suva

    Fiji’s coalition government has come under scrutiny over allegations of human rights violations.

    Speaking at the commemoration of International Human Rights Day in Suva on Tuesday, the chair of the Coalition of NGOs, Shamima Ali, claimed that — like the previous FijiFirst administration — the coalition government has demonstrated a “lack of commitment to human rights”.

    Addressing more than 400 activists at the event, the Minister for Women, Children, and Social Protection Lynda Tabuya acknowledged the concerns raised by civil society organisations, assuring them that Sitiveni Rabuka’s government was committed to listening and addressing these issues.


    Ali criticises Fiji government over human rights         Video: FBC News

    The "Human rights for all" theme
    The “Human rights for all” theme at Fiji’s World Human Rights Day march in downtown Suva. Image: FBC News

    Shamima Ali claimed that freedom of expression was still being suppressed and the coalition had failed to address this.

    “We are also concerned that there continue to be government restrictions on freedom of expression and assembly through the arbitrary application of the Public Order Amendment Act, which should have been changed by now — two years into the new government that we all looked forward to,” she said.

    A "Girls wanna have fundamental human rights"
    A “Girls wanna have fundamental human rights” placard at the World Human Rights Day march in Suva. Image: FBC News

    Ali alleged that serious decisions in government were made unfairly, and women in leadership continued to be “undermined”.

    “Nepotism and cronyism remain rife with each successive government, with party supporters being given positions with no regard for merit, diversity, and representation,” she said.

    “Misogyny against certain women leaders is rampant, with wild sexism and online bullying.”

    An "Our rights, our future now" placard at Fiji's Human Rights Day rally.
    An “Our rights, our future now” placard at Fiji’s Human Rights Day rally. Image: FBC News

    Responding, Minister Tabuya acknowledged the concerns raised and called for dialogue to bring about the change needed.

    “I can sit here and be told everything that we are doing wrong in government,” Tabuya said.

    “I can take it, but I cannot assure that others in government will take it the same way as well. So I encourage you, with the kind of partnerships, to begin with dialogue and to build together because government cannot do it alone.”

    A "Stop fossil fuel production, consumption and distribution" placard at Fiji's World Human Rights Day march
    A “Stop fossil fuel production, consumption and distribution” placard at Fiji’s World Human Rights Day march . . . climate crisis is a major human rights issue in the Pacific. Image: FBC News

    The minister stressed that to address the many human rights violation concerns that had been raised, the government needed support from civil society organisations, traditional leaders, faith-based leaders, and a cross-sector approach to face these issues.

    Republished from FBC News with permission.

    This post was originally published on Asia Pacific Report.

  • Pacific police chiefs open Australian base for regional rapid deployment force

    By Stefan Armbruster of BenarNews

    Pacific police chiefs have formally opened the headquarters and training center for a new stand-by, mutual assistance force in Australia to support countries during civil unrest, natural disasters and major events.

    The Pacific Policing Initiative was declared operational just 17 months after chiefs agreed in 2023 on the need to create a multinational unit, with US$270 million (A$400 million) in funding from Australia.

    The PPI comes as Australia and its allies are locked in a geostrategic contest for influence in the region with China, including over security and policing.

    Riots in Solomon Islands and violence in Papua New Guinea, the region’s increased exposure to climate change impacts, escalating transnational crime and securing a higher standing internationally for the Pacific’s forces were key drivers.

    PNG police commissioner David Manning (center) flanked by Vanuatu Police Commissioner Robson Iavro (left), Australian Federal Police commissioner Reece Kershaw (2nd right) and Australian Attorney-General Mark Dreyfus at the PPI launch, pictured on Dec. 10, 2024. [Stefan Armbruster/BenarNews]
    PNG Police Commissioner David Manning (centre) flanked by Vanuatu Police Commissioner Robson Iavro (left), Australian Federal Police commissioner Reece Kershaw (second right) and Australian Attorney-General Mark Dreyfus at the PPI launch on Tuesday. Image: BenarNews/Stefan Armbruster

    At a flag-raising ceremony in Brisbane on Tuesday, Papua New Guinea’s Police Commissioner David Manning hailed the PPI’s funding as an “unprecedented investment” in the region.

    “The PPI provides a clear, effective, and agile mechanism to which we can support our Pacific family in times of need to uphold the law and maintain order in security,” said Manning, who chairs the PPI design steering committee.

    He said issues in deploying foreign police throughout the region still needed to be resolved but the 22 member nations and territories were “close to completing the guiding legal framework around Pacific Island countries to be able to tap into this.”

    The constitutional difficulties of deploying foreign police are well known to Manning after PNG’s highest court ruled two decades ago that a deployment of Australian Federal Police there was illegal.

    “That incident alone has taught us many lessons,” he said, adding changes had been made to the Constitution and relevant legislation to receive assistance and also to deploy to other countries lawfully.

    Manning said no deployments of the Pacific Support Group had currently been requested by Pacific nations.

    Impetus for the PPI was a secretive policing and security deal Beijing signed with Solomon Islands in 2022 that caused alarm in Washington and Canberra.

    Several other Pacific nations — including Tonga, Samoa and Kiribati — also have policing arrangements with China to provide training and equipment. On Monday, Vanuatu received police boats and vehicles valued at US$4 million from Beijing.

    “I wouldn’t say it locks China out, all I’m saying is that we now have an opportunity to determine what is best for the Pacific,” Manning said.

    “Our countries in the Pacific have different approaches in terms of their relationship with China. I’m not brave enough to speak on their behalf, but as for us, it is purely policing.”

    Samoan Police Minister Lefau Harry Schuster on Tuesday also announced his country would be hosting the PPI’s third “center of excellence”, specialising in forensics, alongside ones in PNG and Fiji.

    He said the PPI will use the Samoan Police Academy built by China and opened in June.

    “We wanted it to be used not just for Samoa, but to open up for use by the region,” Schuster said in Brisbane.

    Australian Federal Police Commissioner Reece Kershaw said the PPI “symbolises our commitment as part of the Pacific region” and enhances the Pacific’s standing internationally.

    “Asia represents Australia and the Pacific at the moment at Interpol,” he said. “We want to show leadership in the region and we want a bit more status and recognition from Interpol.”

    Kershaw said “crime in our region is becoming more complex”, including large seizures of drug shipments.

    “The fact is that we’re able to work together in a seamless way and combat, say, transnational, serious and organized crime as a serious threat in our region.”

    “At the same time, we’ve all got domestic issues and I think we’re learning faster and better about how to deal with domestic issues and international issues at the same time.”

    Police ministers and chiefs from across the Pacific attended the launch of the PPI’s Pinkenba Hub, pictured on Dec. 10, 2024. [Stefan Armbruster/BenarNews]
    Police ministers and chiefs from across the Pacific attended the launch of the PPI’s Pinkenba Hub on Tuesday. Image: BenarNews/Stefan Armbruster

    Asked about tackling community policing of issues like gender-based violence, he said it was all part of the “complex” mix.

    The Australian and Samoan facilities complete the three arms of the PPI consisting of the Pacific Support Group, three regional training centers and the co-ordination hub in Brisbane.

    The Pinkenba centre in Brisbane will provide training — including public order management, investigations, close personal protection — and has accommodation for 140 people.

    Training began in July, with 30 officers from 11 nations who were deployed to Samoa to help with security during the Commonwealth Heads of Government meeting in October, the largest event the country has ever hosted.

    Schuster expressed surprise about how quickly the PPI was established and thanked Australia and the region for their support.

    “This is one initiative I’m very happy that we didn’t quite do it the Pacific way. [The] Pacific way takes time, a long time, we talk and talk and talk,” he joked.

    “So I look forward to an approach like this in the future, so that we do things first and then open it later.”

    This article is republished from BenarNews with permission.

    This post was originally published on Asia Pacific Report.

  • PSNA condemns NZ welcome for ‘genocidal’ Israeli tourists while no humanitarian visas for Palestinians

    Asia Pacific Report

    A New Zealand advocacy group for Palestine has condemned the government for refusing to provide humanitarian visas for Palestinians with family in the country while welcoming a growing number of Israeli “visitors”.

    The Palestine Solidarity Network Aotearoa (PSNA) claims the visitors are likely to be “complicit” in Israel’s genocidal war crimes in the 14-month war on Gaza.

    According to PSNA, just-released official Statistics Department figures show the number of Israelis who entered Aotearoa this past November (621) is more than twice the number of Israelis who came into the country in November last year (230).

    The protest group said in a statement that “many if not most of these ‘tourists’ are actively serving in the Israeli Defence Force’s genocidal attacks on Gaza and Lebanon”.

    “The United Nations, the International Court of Justice, and most recently Amnesty International, have variously described the Israeli attack on Gaza as genocide,” said PSNA national chair John Minto.

    The New Zealand government had no idea how many Israeli “tourists” were doing military service, because they were not required to provide that information as they arrived, he added.

    “Genocide duty in the Israeli armed forces is compulsory for nearly all Israelis, so there will be a high proportion of active or reservist soldiers coming to Aotearoa with blood on their hands.”

    Urgent to deny entry
    Service in the IDF for 32 months is compulsory for nearly all Israeli men when they reach 18 and women are required to serve 24 months.

    Members of Israel’s ultra-orthodox community were included in the conscription from June after previously being exempt.

    After the initial period, Israelis must be available as reservists until age 40.

    PSNA’s John Minto said the New Zealand government must urgently deny entry to any Israelis who were serving or had served in the IDF.

    “Combat reservists are now on average serving four months in the IDF. So it’s not just a narrow younger age group.”

    According to Minto, the New Zealand government had a list of extremist Israeli settlers who it banned from entering Aotearoa — but he viewed this list as “hopelessly inadequate”.

    Obligation to prevent genocide
    “The International Court of Justice has obligated countries to prevent Israeli genocide and work to end Israeli occupation of Palestinian Territory,” Minto said.

    “When our border immigration officials are not required to even ask if an Israeli is serving in the military, or is an illegal settler, then our government is ignoring both of its obligations.

    “The soldiers perpetrating this genocide might pretend to be innocent thrill-seeking tourists when they visit here, but they are directly responsible for operating occupation, apartheid, genocide and ethnic cleansing.”

    This post was originally published on Asia Pacific Report.

  • Syria crisis: Fijian peacekeepers ‘secure and accounted for’ amid tensions

    RNZ Pacific

    Fijian peacekeepers in the Middle East “are secure and accounted for,” the country’s Defence and Veteran Affairs Minister Pio Tikoduadua confirmed today.

    Tikoduadua said Fiji had troops deployed in the Golan Heights under the UN Disengagement Observer Force (UNDOF) and the UN Truce Supervision Organisation (UNSTO).

    He said they remained safe amid the recent developments in Syria and the surrounding region.

    The minister said he had been briefed on the situation by the commander of the Joint Task Force Command and the country’s representatives in the Golan Heights.

    He said robust contingency plans were in place to safeguard troops should the security situation change.

    The security situation remained calm but tense, and there was no immediate threat to Fijian peacekeepers.

    “I wish to commend the bravery and professionalism of our troops serving in these challenging conditions,” he said.

    “Their dedication demonstrates Fiji’s long-standing commitment to international peacekeeping and security.”

    He further assured the families of Fijian peacekeepers that the government was committed to the safety and wellbeing of its personnel.

    This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.

    This post was originally published on Asia Pacific Report.

  • RSF condemns assassination of Cambodian environmental journalist

    Pacific Media Watch

    The Paris-based global media freedom watchdog Reporters Without Borders has condemned the assassination of Cambodian investigative environmental journalist Chhoeung Chheng who has died from his wounds.

    He was shot by an illegal logger last week while investigating unlawful deforestation in the country’s northwest.

    Reporters Without Borders (RSF) has urged the Cambodian government make sure this crime does not go unpunished, and to take concrete measures to protect journalists.

    On 7 December 2024, journalist Chhoeung Chheng died in a hospital in Siem Reap, a city in northeastern Cambodia, from wounds suffered during an attack two days prior, RSF said in a statement.

    The 63-year-old reporter, who worked for the online media Kampuchea Aphivath, had been shot in the abdomen while reporting on illegal logging in the Boeung Per nature reserve.

    The Siem Reap regional government announced the arrest of a suspect the day after the attack, reports RSF.

    Local media report that the suspect admitted to shooting the journalist after being photographed twice while transporting illegally logged timber.

    “This murder is appalling and demands a strong response. We call on Cambodian authorities to ensure that all parties responsible for the attack are severely punished,” Cédric Alviani, RSF’s Asia-Pacific bureau director in Taipei.

    “We also urge the Cambodian government to take concrete actions to end violence against journalists.”

    Journalists face violence
    Journalists covering illegal deforestation in Cambodia face frequent violence. In 2014, reporter Taing Try was shot dead while investigating links between security forces and the timber trade in the country’s south, reports RSF.

    Press freedom in Cambodia has been steadily deteriorating since 2017, when former Prime Minister Hun Sen cracked down on independent media, forcing prominent outlets such as Voice of Democracy to shut down. The government revoked the outlet’s licence in February 2023.

    One year into his rule, Prime Minister Hun Manet appears to be perpetuating the media crackdown started by his father, Hun Sen, reports RSF.

    According to a recent CamboJA report, cases of legal harassment against journalists — particularly those covering environmental issues — are on the rise in Cambodia.

    Having fallen nine places in two years, Cambodia is now ranked 151st out of 180 countries in RSF’s 2024 World Press Freedom Index, placing it in the category of nations where threats to press freedom are deemed “very serious”.

    Pacific Media Watch collaborates with Reporters Without Borders.

    This post was originally published on Asia Pacific Report.

  • US officials talked about merits of removing $10m bounty on Syrian rebel leader

    By Sean Mathews

    American officials have discussed the merits of removing a $10m bounty on Hay’at Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) leader Abu Mohammad al-Jolani, whose rebel group swept into Damascus and toppled the government of Bashar al-Assad on Sunday, a senior Arab official briefed by the Americans told Middle East Eye.

    Ahmed al-Sharaa, commonly known as Jolani, has been designated as a terrorist by the United States since 2013, while his organisation, HTS, was proscribed by the Trump administration in 2018 when a $10 million bounty was placed on his head.

    For years, HTS lobbied to be delisted, but its pleas largely fell on deaf years with the group relegated to governing just a sliver of northwest Syria.

    But the lightning blitz by the rebels, which saw Assad’s iron-grip rule end in spectacular fashion on Sunday, has since forced Washington to rethink how it engages with the former al-Qaeda affiliate.

    The senior Arab official, who requested anonymity due to sensitivities surrounding the talks, told MEE that the discussions had divided officials in the Biden administration.

    Meanwhile, when asked about the discussions, one Trump transition official disparaged the Biden administration.

    Jolani, 42, gave a rousing victory speech in Damascus’ iconic Umayyad Mosque on Sunday and is widely expected to play a key role in Syria’s transition after 54 years of Assad family rule.

    “Today, Syria is being purified,” Jolani told a crowd of supporters in Damascus, adding that “this victory is born from the people who have languished in prison, and the mujahideen (fighters) broke their chains”.

    He said that under Assad, Syria had become a place for “Iranian ambitions, where sectarianism was rife,” in reference to Assad’s allies Iran and its Lebanese proxy Hezbollah.

    ‘Saying the right things now’
    Speaking several hours after the fall of Damascus, US President Joe Biden called the rebel takeover a “fundamental act of justice,” but cautioned it was “a moment of risk and uncertainty” for the Middle East.

    “We will remain vigilant,” Biden said. “Make no mistake, some of the rebel groups that took down Assad have their own grim record of terrorism and human rights abuses,” adding that the groups are “saying the right things now.”

    “But as they take on greater responsibility, we will assess not just their words, but their actions,” Biden said.

    Later, a senior Biden administration official, when asked about contact with HTS leaders, said Washington was in contact with Syrian groups of all kinds.

    The official, who was not authorised to publicly discuss the situation and spoke on condition of anonymity, also said the US was focused on ensuring chemical weapons in Assad’s military arsenal were secured.

    Meanwhile, The New York Times reported that US intelligence agencies were in the process of evaluating Jolani, who it said had launched a “charm offensive” aimed at allaying concerns over his past affiliations.

    Jolani was born to a family originally from the occupied Golan Heights and fought in the Iraq insurgency and served five years in an American-run prison in Iraq, before returning to Syria as the emissary of Islamic State founder Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi.

    ‘Charm offensive can be misleading’
    “A charm offensive might mean that people are turning over a new leaf and they think differently than they used to so you should hear them out. On the other hand, you should be cautious because charm offensives can sometimes be misleading,” the US official said.

    “We have to think about it. We have to watch their behaviour and we need to do some indirect messaging and see what comes of that,” the official added.

    But, US President-elect Donald Trump, who will be entering office in just five weeks, has left few doubts where he stood on the conflict, saying Washington “should have nothing to do with it [Syria].”

    In a social media post on Saturday, Trump wrote that Assad “lost” because “Russia and Iran are in a weakened state right now, one because of Ukraine and a bad economy, the other because of Israel and its fighting success”.

    Trump used Assad’s fall as an opportunity to call for an end to the war in Ukraine, without mentioning the Syrian opposition or the Syrian allies of the US.

    Jordan lobbies for Syrian Free Army
    Assad’s ousting has seen Nato-ally Turkey cement its status as the main outside power in Syria at the expense of a bruised and battered Iran and Russia.

    But the US holds vast amounts of territory in Syria via its allies, who joined a race to replace the Assad regime as its soldiers abandoned villages and cities en masse.

    The US backs rebels operating out of the al-Tanf desert outpost on the tri-border area of Jordan, Iraq and Syria.

    The Syrian Free Army (SFA) went on the offensive as Assad’s regime collapsed taking control of the city of Palmyra.

    The SFA works closely with the US and its financing is mainly run out of Jordan. The SFA also enjoys close ties to Jordanian intelligence.

    A former Arab security official told MEE that Jordan’s King Abdullah II met with senior US officials in Washington DC last week and lobbied for continued support for the Syrian Free Army.

    However, maintaining stability in post-Assad Syria will be key for Jordan as it looks to send back hundreds of thousands of refugees and ensure a power vacuum does not lead to more captagon crossing its border, the former official said.

    900 US troops embedded with Kurds
    In northeastern Syria, the US has roughly 900 troops embedded with the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF).

    Arab tribes linked to the SDF swept across the Euphrates River on Friday to take a wide swath of strategic towns, including Deir Ezzor and al-Bukamal. The latter is Syria’s strategic border crossing with Iraq.

    The US support for the SDF is a sore point in its ties to Turkey, which views the SDF as an extension of the outlawed Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK).

    The PKK has waged a decades-long guerrilla war in southern Turkey and is labelled a terrorist organisation by the US and the European Union.

    Turkey’s concerns about the PKK led it to launch an invasion of Syria in 2016, with the aim of depriving Kurdish fighters of a quasi-state along its border. Two more military forays followed in 2018 and 2019.

    The SDF is already being squeezed in the north with Turkish-backed rebels called the Syrian National Army entering the strategic city of Manbij.

    During Syria’s more than decade long war, the US slapped sanctions on Assad’s government, enabled Israel to launch strikes on Iran inside Syria, and backed opposition groups that hold sway over around one-third of the country.

    Republished from Middle East Eye under Creative Commons.

    This post was originally published on Asia Pacific Report.

  • PNG’s Parkop tells exiled Papuans ‘don’t lose hope – keep up the freedom struggle’

    Asia Pacific Report

    Governor Powes Parkop of Papua New Guinea’s capital Port Moresby has appealed to West Papuans living in his country to carry on the self-determination struggle for future generations and to not lose hope.

    Parkop, a staunch supporter of the West Papua cause, reminded Papuans at their Independence Day last Sunday of the struggles of their ancestors, reports Inside PNG.

    “PNG will celebrate 50 years of Independence next year but this is only so for half of the island — the other half is still missing, we are losing our land, we are losing our resources.

    “If we are not careful, we are going to lose our future too.”

    The National Capital District governor was guest speaker for the celebration among Port Moresby residents of West Papuan descent with the theme “Celebrating and preserving our culture through food and the arts”.

    About 12,000 West Papuan refugees and exiles live in PNG and Parkop has West Papuan ancestry through his grandparents.

    The Independence Day celebration began with everyone participating in the national anthem — “Hai Tanaku Papua” (“My Land, Papua”).

    Song and dance
    Other activities included song and dance, and a dialogue with the young and older generations to share ideas on a way forward.

    Some stalls were also set up selling West Papuan cuisine, arts and crafts.

    West Papuan children dancers.
    West Papuan children ready to dance with the Morning Star flag of West Papuan independence – banned in Indonesia. Image: Inside PNG

    Governor Parkop said: “We must be proud of our identity, our culture, our land, our heritage and most importantly we have to challenge ourselves, redefine our journey and our future.

    “That’s the most important responsibility we have.”’

    West Papua was a Dutch colony in the 9th century and by the 1950s the Netherlands began to prepare for withdrawal.

    On 1 December 1961, West Papuans held a congress to discuss independence.

    The national flag, the Morning Star, was raised for the first time on that day.

    Encouraged to keep culture
    Governor Parkop described the West Papua cause as “a tragedy”.

    This is due to the fact that following the declaration of Independence in 1961, Indonesia laid claim over the island a year later in 1962.

    This led to the United Nations-sponsored treaty known as the New York Agreement.

    Indonesia was appointed temporary administrator without consultation or the consent of West Papuans.

    In 1969 the so-called Act of Free Choice enabled West Papuans to decide their destiny but again only 1026 West Papuans had to make that choice under the barrel of the gun.

    To this day, Melanesian West Papua remains under Indonesian rule.

    Governor Parkop encouraged the West Papuan people to preserve their culture and heritage and to breakaway from the colonial mindset, colonial laws and ideas that hindered progress to freedom for West Papua.

    Republished with permission from Inside PNG.

    Morning Star flag
    West Papuans in Port Moresby proudly display their Morning Star flag of independence — banned by Indonesia. Image: Inside PNG

    This post was originally published on Asia Pacific Report.

  • Amnesty International doubles down on Israeli Gaza ‘genocide, atrocities’ report at NZ rally

    Asia Pacific Report

    Amnesty International officials at a rally in Auckland today doubled down on their global report this week accusing Israel of genocide and called on Aotearoa New Zealand to take more action over the atrocities in the besieged enclave of Gaza.

    The global human rights movement’s 296-page fully documented report says Israel has “unleashed hell and destruction on Palestinians in Gaza brazenly, continuously and with total impunity”.

    The allegations have enraged the Tel Aviv government and stirred the unaffiliated Israeli chapter of Amnesty International to distance itself from the “genocide” allegation while admitting “serious crimes are being committed in Gaza, that must be investigated”.

    Speaking at the weekly rally in Te Komititanga Square in the heart of Auckland today, Amnesty International Aotearoa’s people power manager Margaret Taylor said the report was “irrefutable”.

    “Israel has committed and is — this very minute — committing genocide against Palestinians in the occupied Gaza Strip,” she said and was supported with loud shouts of “shame, shame!”

    Al Jazeera reports that 50 people were killed in the latest Israeli attacks on central Gaza’s Nuseirat refugee camp — in which the death toll included six children and five women — and the Indonesian Hospital in northern Gaza’s Beit Lahiya district.

    The report examines in detail Israel’s violations in Gaza over nine months between 7 October 2023 and early July 2024.

    ‘Firsthand accounts, satellite photography’
    “Amnesty International interviewed hundreds of people with firsthand accounts. We analysed photos and video footage of the devastation, the remains of weaponry, corroborated with satellite photography, and we reviewed a huge range of data sets, repirts and statements by UN agencies, humanitarian organisations, human rights groups, and senior Israeli government officials and military leaders,” said Taylor.

    “As I said before, this is irrefutable.”

    The Amnesty International delegation at today's justice and ceasefire rally for Palestine
    The Amnesty International delegation at today’s justice and ceasefire rally for Palestine in downtown Auckland. Image: David Robie/Asia Pacific Report

    Noting that the “atrocity crimes” against Israelis by Hamas on 7 October 2023, which triggered the current war — although brutal repression against the Palestinians has been extensively reported since the Nakba in 1948 — “do not justify genocide”.

    The publication of the report has been welcomed around the world by many humanitarian and human rights groups but condemned by Israel and criticised by its main backer, the United States.

    In a statement, the Israeli Foreign Minister claimed: “The deplorable and fanatical organisation Amnesty International has produced a fabricated report that is entirely false and based on lies.”

    A "thousands of children are dying" placard
    A “thousands of children are dying” placard at today’s Palestine rally in Auckland. Image: David Robie/Asia Pacific Report

    Last month, the international Criminal Court (ICC) issued arrest warrants for Israel Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and former Foreign Minister Yoav Gallant for alleged war crimes and crimes against humanity.

    The International Court of Justice (ICJ) is also investigating Israel over “plausible genocide” in a case brought by South Africa and supported by at least 18 other countries.

    Israel’s actions had brought Gaza’s population to the “brink of collapse”, said the Amnesty International report.

    “Its brutal military offensive had killed more than 42,000 Palestinians [now more than 44,000], including over 13,300 children, and injured over 97,000 more, by 7 October 2024, many of them in direct or deliberately indiscriminate attacks, often wiping out entire multigenerational families.

    “It has caused unprecedented destruction, which experts say occurred at a level and speed not seen in any other conflict in the 21st century, levelling entire cities and destroying critical infrastructure, agricultural land and cultural and religious sites.

    “It thereby rendered large swathes of Gaza uninhabitable.”

    A "flag-masked" child at today's Palestine rally in Auckland
    A “flag-masked” child at today’s Palestine rally in Auckland. Image: David Robie/Asia Pacific Report

    NZ needs to take action
    Taylor told the rally that New Zealand needed to take more action over the genocide, such as:

    • Publicly recognise that Israeli authorities are committing the crime of genocide and commit to strong and sustained international action;
    • Ban imports from illegal settlements as well as investment in companies connected to maintaining the occupation; and
    • Do everything possible to facilitate Palestinian people seeking refuge to come to Aotearoa New Zealand and receive support.

    In RNZ’s Checkpoint programme on Thursday, Amnesty International Aotearoa’s advocacy and movement building director Lisa Woods said the organisation had worked to establish the intent behind Israel’s acts in Gaza, adding that they meet the definition of genocide.

    The series of air strikes analysed in the report had hit civilian homes in densely populated urban areas.

    “No evidence was found that any of these strikes were directed at a military objective,” she said.

    “The report found that the way these attacks were conducted is that they were conducted in ways that were designed to cause a very high number of fatalities and injuries among the civilian population.”

    Today’s Palestine rally also devoted part of its activities to preparing a series of on-the-spot submissions to the Treaty Principles Bill amid many “Kill the bill” tee-shirts, banners and placards.

    A "Kill the Bill" tee-shirt
    A “Kill the Bill” tee-shirt referring to the controversial Treaty Principles Bill widely regarded as a fundamental attack on Aotearoa New Zealand’s foundational 1840 Treaty of Waitangi at today’s Palestine rally in Auckland. Image: David Robie/Asia Pacific Report

    This post was originally published on Asia Pacific Report.

  • Israeli extremism has a new best friend in the White House

    COMMENTARY: By Antony Loewenstein

    The incoming Trump administration will bring a dangerous brew of Christian nationalism and anti-Palestinian racism

    Things can always get worse. Much worse.

    The Biden/Harris administration has bank-rolled and funded Israel’s mass slaughter in Gaza, the sight of the highest number of child amputees per capita in the world.

    Israeli soldiers wilfully post their crimes online for all the globe to see. Palestinian journalists are being deliberately targeted by Israel in an unprecedented way.

    Every day brings new horrors in Gaza, Lebanon and beyond. And that’s not ignoring the catastrophes in Syria, Sudan and Myanmar.

    But we can’t despair or disengage. It can be hard with an incoming Trump White House stuffed with radicals, evangelicals and bigots but now is not the time to do so.

    We must keep on reporting, investigating, sharing, talking and raising public awareness of the real threats that surround us every day (from the climate crisis to nuclear war) and finding ways to solve them.

    Always find hope.

    New global project
    Here’s some breaking news. I’ve said nothing about this publicly. Until now.

    I’ve spent much of the year working on a documentary film series inspired by my best-selling book, The Palestine Laboratory. I’ve travelled to seven countries over many months, filming under the radar due to the sensitivity of the material.

    I can’t say much more at this stage except that it’s nearly completed and will be released soon on a major global broadcaster.

    The photo at the top of the page is me in a clip from the series in an undisclosed location (after I’d completed a voice-over recording session.)

    Stay tuned for more. This work will be ground-breaking.

    My recent work has largely focused on the worsening disaster in the Middle East and I’ve spoken to media outlets including CNN, Al Jazeera English, Sky News and others.

    You can see these on my website and YouTube channel.

    I’m an independent journalist without any institutional backing. If you’re able to support me financially, by donating money to continue this work, I’d hugely appreciate it.

    You can find donating options in the menu bar at the top of my website and via Substack.

    This post was originally published on Asia Pacific Report.

  • Israel has ‘unleashed hell and destruction’ in Gaza genocide, says Amnesty investigation

    Asia Pacific Report

    Amnesty International’s research has found sufficient basis to conclude that Israel has committed and is continuing to commit genocide against Palestinians in the occupied Gaza Strip, the organisation has revealed in a landmark new investigative report.

    The 294-page report documents how, during its military offensive launched in the wake of the deadly Hamas-led attacks in southern Israel on 7 October 2023, Israel has “unleashed hell and destruction on Palestinians in Gaza brazenly, continuously and with total impunity”.

    This 14-month military offensive was launched in the wake of the deadly Hamas-led attacks in southern Israel on 7 October 2023.

    An Amnesty International statement made along with releasing the investigation says that the Aotearoa New Zealand government “can and should take action”, for example:

    • Publicly recognise that Israeli authorities are committing the crime of genocide and commit to strong and sustained international action;
    • Ban imports from illegal settlements as well as investment in companies connected to maintaining the occupation; and
    • Do everything possible to facilitate Palestinian people seeking refuge to come to Aotearoa New Zealand and receive support.

    Lisa Woods, advocacy and movement building director at Amnesty International Aotearoa New Zealand, said: “This research and report demonstrate that Israel has carried out acts prohibited under the Genocide Convention, with the specific intent to destroy Palestinians in Gaza.

    “It’s not enough to say ‘never again’. The New Zealand government has to publicly call this what it is — genocide.

    “We’re asking the Prime Minister and Foreign Minister to show leadership. New Zealand has a responsibility to act.”

    Ban illegal settlement products
    Woods said that in addition to acknowledging that this was genocide, the New Zealand government must ban products from the illegal Israeli settlements in the Occupied Palestinian Territory — “and open the doors to Palestinians who are desperately seeking refuge.”

    Agnès Callamard, secretary-general of Amnesty International, said about the new report:

    "You feel like you are subhuman" - the Amnesty International genocide report
    “You feel like you are subhuman” – the Amnesty International genocide report. Image: AI screenshot APR

    “These acts include killings, causing serious bodily or mental harm and deliberately inflicting on Palestinians in Gaza conditions of life calculated to bring about their physical destruction.

    “Month after month, Israel has treated Palestinians in Gaza as a subhuman group unworthy of human rights and dignity, demonstrating its intent to physically destroy them.

    “Our damning findings must serve as a wake-up call to the international community: this is genocide. It must stop now.”

    Callamard said that states that continued to transfer arms to Israel at this time must know they are “violating their obligation to prevent genocide and are at risk of becoming complicit in genocide”.

    She said that all states with influence over Israel, particularly key arms suppliers like the US and Germany — but also other EU member states, the UK and others — must act now to bring Israel’s atrocities against Palestinians in Gaza to an immediate end.

    Population facing starvation
    Over the past two months the crisis has grown particularly acute in the North Gaza governorate, where a besieged population is facing starvation, displacement and annihilation amid relentless bombardment and suffocating restrictions on life-saving humanitarian aid, Callamard said.

    “Our research reveals that, for months, Israel has persisted in committing genocidal acts, fully aware of the irreparable harm it was inflicting on Palestinians in Gaza,” she said.

    “It continued to do so in defiance of countless warnings about the catastrophic humanitarian situation and of legally binding decisions from the International Court of Justice (ICJ) ordering Israel to take immediate measures to enable the provision of humanitarian assistance to civilians in Gaza.

    “Israel has repeatedly argued that its actions in Gaza are lawful and can be justified by its military goal to eradicate Hamas. But genocidal intent can co-exist alongside military goals and does not need to be Israel’s sole intent.”

    Amnesty International said in its statement that it had examined Israel’s acts in Gaza closely and in their totality, taking into account their recurrence and simultaneous occurrence, and both their immediate impact and their cumulative and mutually reinforcing consequences.

    The organisation considered the scale and severity of the casualties and destruction over time. It also analysed public statements by officials, finding that prohibited acts were often announced or called for in the first place by high-level officials in charge of the war efforts.

    “Taking into account  the pre-existing context of dispossession, apartheid and unlawful military occupation in which these acts have been committed, we could find only one reasonable conclusion: Israel’s intent is the physical destruction of Palestinians in Gaza, whether in parallel with, or as a means to achieve, its military goal of destroying Hamas,” Callamard said.

    Atrocities ‘can never justify Israel’s genocide’
    “The atrocity crimes committed on 7 October 2023 by Hamas and other armed groups against Israelis and victims of other nationalities, including deliberate mass killings and hostage-taking, can never justify Israel’s genocide against Palestinians in Gaza.”

    According to the statement, international jurisprudence recognises that the perpetrator does not need to succeed in their attempts to destroy the protected group, either in whole or in part, for genocide to have been committed.

    The commission of prohibited acts with the intent to destroy the group, as such, was sufficient.

    The report examines in detail Israel’s violations in Gaza over nine months between 7 October 2023 and early July 2024.

    Amnesty International interviewed 212 people, including Palestinian victims and witnesses, local authorities in Gaza, healthcare workers, conducted fieldwork and analysed an extensive range of visual and digital evidence, including satellite imagery.

    It also analysed statements by senior Israeli government and military officials, and official Israeli bodies.

    On multiple occasions, the organisation shared its findings with the Israeli authorities but had received no substantive response at the time of publication.

    Unprecedented scale and magnitude
    The organisation said Israel’s actions following Hamas’s deadly attacks on 7 October 2023 had brought Gaza’s population to the brink of collapse.

    Its brutal military offensive had killed more than [44,000] Palestinians, including more than 13,300 children, and wounded or injured more than 97,000 others by 7 October 2024, many of them in direct or deliberately indiscriminate attacks, often wiping out entire multigenerational families.

    Israel had caused unprecedented destruction, which experts say occurred at a level and speed not seen in any other conflict in the 21st century, levelling entire cities and destroying critical infrastructure, agricultural land and cultural and religious sites, Amnesty International said.

    It thereby rendered large swathes of Gaza uninhabitable.

    This post was originally published on Asia Pacific Report.

  • Nelson City Council joins NZ local bodies voting to sanction Israel

    Asia Pacific Report

    New Zealand’s Palestine Solidarity Network Aotearoa (PSNA) has congratulated the Nelson City Council on its vote today to boycott companies which trade with illegal Israeli settlements in Palestinian territories.

    The city council (pop. 58,000) — New Zealand’s 15th-largest city — became the latest local body to change its procurement policy to exclude companies identified by the UN Human Rights Council as being complicit in the building and maintenance of illegal Israeli settlements on Palestinian land.

    “Nelson City Council is taking action while our national government is looking the other way”, PSNA chair John Minto said in a statement.

    “It is [Prime Minister] Christopher Luxon who should be ending all New Zealand dealings with companies involved in the illegal Israeli settlements.

    “Instead, our government is cowardly complicit with Israeli war crimes.”

    It is a war crime to move citizens onto land illegally occupied as Israel is doing.

    Nelson City Council joins Environment Canterbury and the Christchurch City Council — New Zealand’s second largest city — which both adopted this policy earlier this year.  Other local bodies are believed to be following.

    “We also congratulate local Palestine solidarity activists in Nelson who have organised and battled so well for this historic win today. They are the heroes behind this decision,”minto said.

    Minto said following the move by Nelson city representatives, “we are renewing our call for the government to act”.

    He again called for the government to:

    • Ban all imports from the illegal Israeli settlements;
    • Direct the Superfund, Accident Compensation Corporation (ACC) and Kiwisaver providers to end their investments in all Israeli companies and other companies supporting the illegal Israeli settlements; and
    • Direct New Zealand government agencies to end procurement of goods or services from all Israeli companies and other companies supporting the illegal Israeli settlements.


    This content originally appeared on Asia Pacific Report and was authored by APR editor.

    This post was originally published on Radio Free.

  • Northern Marianas leaders meet Taiwan President Lai Ching-te in Guam

    By Mark Rabago, RNZ Pacific Commonwealth of the Northern Marianas correspondent

    Northern Marianas Governor Arnold Palacios and Senator Celina Babauta have travelled to Guam to attend a luncheon with Taiwan President Lai Ching-te.

    Taiwan is officially known as the Republic of China (Taiwan). China claims Taiwan as its own territory, with no right to state-to-state ties, a position Taiwan strongly disputes.

    Palacios welcomed the opportunity to meet Lai and said this could pave the way for improved relations with the East Asian country.

    “This meeting is an opportunity for the CNMI to foster relations with allies in the region.”

    When asked if meeting the President would upset the People’s Republic of China, which considers Taiwan a rogue state and part of its territory, Palacios said: “As far as being in the crosshairs of China, we already are in many ways.”

    Worldwide, a dozen countries maintain formal diplomatic ties with Taipei.

    In January, Nauru cut ties with Taiwan and shifted its diplomatic allegiance to Beijing.

    Reconnecting bonds
    Babauta, meanwhile, said she was deeply humbled and honoured to be invited to have lunch with Lai and Chia-Ching Hsu, Lai’s Minister of the Overseas Community Affairs Council.

    “I am looking forward to connecting and discussing opportunities to strengthen the bond between our two regions and explore how we can create new avenues for our mutual benefit and prosperity, particularly by leveraging our Jones Act waiver,” she said.

    “We must turn our economy around. This is an opportunity I could not pass up on.”

    Babauta said she asked Lai if she could also make a stopover to the CNMI, but his busy schedule precluded that.

    “I am assured that he will plan a visit to the CNMI in the near future.”

    The luncheon, which is part of Taiwan’s “Smart and Sustainable Development for a Prosperous Austronesian Region” program, will be held at the Grand Ballroom, Hyatt Regency Guam at noon Thursday and is expected to also have Guam Governor Lou Leon Guerrero and other island leaders.

    Lai has previously visited Hawai’i as part of his US tour, one that has elicited the ire of the government of the People’s Republic of China.

    Summit ends dramatically
    Earlier this year, the Pacific Islands Forum leaders’ summit ended dramatically when China demanded the conference communiqué be changed to eliminate a reference to Taiwan.

    The document had made a reference to the Forum reaffirming its relations to Taiwan, which has been a development partner since 1992.

    But the Chinese Ambassador to the Pacific Qian Bo was furious and the document was rewritten.

    Reports say China’s Foreign Ministry has “strongly condemned” US support for Lai’s visit to the US, and had lodged a complaint with the United States.

    It earlier also denounced a newly announced US weapons sale to Taiwan.

    This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.


    This content originally appeared on Asia Pacific Report and was authored by APR editor.

    This post was originally published on Radio Free.

  • This year, Arab-American political power came to the fore over Gaza

    ANALYSIS: By Rami G Khouri

    One of the major political developments in the United States that has got little attention in the wake of the Democrats’ astounding loss in the November 5 elections is the success of Arab American political organising.

    A new generation of political activists has emerged that has earned representation in unprecedented numbers and impact for the 3.5-million-strong Arab-American community in elected and appointed political offices.

    It also put Arab Americans on the electoral map for the first time by launching the Uncommitted movement during the Democratic primaries and making a foreign policy issue — Israel’s genocide in Gaza — a national moral issue.

    The Democratic Party underestimated the power of this new generation and the intensity of citizen anger, which cost it dearly in the election.

    What happened in the Arab American community is a vintage all-American tale. They, like other communities, started their pursuit of political impact as a low-profile immigrant group who became dynamic citizens after political developments threatened their wellbeing and motivated them to take action.

    Arab American mobilisation traces its beginnings to small-scale participation in Jesse Jackson’s 1984 and 1988 presidential campaigns for the Democratic Party. Jackson was the first serious presidential candidate to include Arab Americans as Democratic Party convention delegates, part of his Rainbow Coalition of:

    “the white, the Hispanic, the Black, the Arab, the Jew, the woman, the Native American, the small farmer, the businessperson, the environmentalist, the peace activist, the young, the old, the lesbian, the gay, and the disabled [who] make up the American quilt”.

    His campaign gave momentum to voter registration drives within the Arab American community, which continued in the following three decades.

    Impact on outcomes
    By 2020, nearly 90 percent of Arab Americans were registered to vote. By 2024, the Arab American voter block — in its expansive coalition with other groups — had grown large enough to impact on outcomes in critical swing states, especially Michigan and Pennsylvania.

    The attacks of 9/11 and the subsequent backlash motivated Arab Americans even more to engage in meaningful politics. Many members of the community refused to live in fear, trying to avoid the intimidation and smears that had long kept their parents and grandparents subdued and quiescent politically.

    As Omar Kurdi, founder of Arab Americans of Cleveland, told me, “We were no longer silent because we saw the dangers to us of being quiet and politically inactive. We refused to live in fear of politics.

    “Since then, we have been proud, confident, and active in public. We no longer accept crumbs, but want our share of the pie, and we understand now how we can work for that.”

    As a result, over the past two decades, Arab Americans have entered the public sphere and politics at all levels: from local, city, and county positions to state and federal ones.

    Elected officials say they succeeded because their constituents knew and trusted them. Candidates who won state and national congressional seats — like Rashida Tlaib in Michigan — inspired hundreds of younger Arab Americans to enter the political fray.

    Successful experiences in city politics educated newcomers on how they could impact decision-making, improve their own lives, and serve the entire community. They mastered locally the basics of politics, one Ohio activist told me, “like lobbying, bringing pressure, protesting, educating the public, achieving consensus, and creating coalitions based on shared values, problems, and goals”.

    Coalesced into Uncommitted movement
    All of this momentum, built up over the years, coalesced into the Uncommitted movement in 2024. As the Biden administration unconditionally supported Israel to carry out genocidal violence in Palestine and Lebanon, Arab-American activists moved to use their newfound leverage as voters in electoral politics.

    They joined like-minded social justice activists from other groups that mainstream political parties had long taken for granted — including Muslim Americans, Blacks, Hispanics, youth, progressive Jews, churches, and unions — and sent a strong message during the primaries that they would not support Biden’s re-election bid unless he changed his position on Gaza.

    The campaign hoped that tens of thousands of voters in the primaries would send the Democrats a big message by voting “uncommitted”, but in fact, hundreds of thousands of Democrats did so across half a dozen critical states.

    These numbers were enough to send 30 Uncommitted delegates to the Democratic National Convention in August, where they could lobby their colleagues to shape the party’s national platform.

    One activist involved in the process told me they convinced 320 of the other 5,000 delegates to support their demand for a party commitment to a Gaza ceasefire and arms embargo on Israel — not enough to change the party position, but enough to prove that working from inside the political system over time could move things in a better direction.

    Intergenerational support and motivation were big factors in the success of the Uncommitted movement. Arab American Institute Executive Director Maya Berry, who has been involved in such activities for three decades, told me that Arab Americans were always in political positions, but in small numbers, so they had little impact.

    However, they learned how the system works and provided valuable insights when the time came this year to act. She mentioned Abbas Alawiyeh as an example, who co-chairs the Uncommitted National Movement and worked as a congressional staffer for many years.

    Defeat hotly debated
    The Uncommitted movement’s precise contribution to the Democratic Party’s defeat is hotly debated right now. One activist told me the movement “placed Arab Americans at the centre of Democratic Party politics, led the progressives, helped Harris lose in swing states, and nationally brought attention to Gaza, divestment, and moral issues in ways we had never been able to do previously.”

    All this occurs in uncharted territory, with no clarity if Arab Americans can influence both the Democratic and Republican parties who might now compete for their vote.

    One Arab-American activist in his 30s added, “We are liberated from the Democrats who took us for granted, and we Arab Americans are now a swing vote officially.”

    Other activists I spoke to thought the election experience could set the stage for a larger movement to counter the pro-Israel lobby AIPAC, though that would require conquering the next hurdle of establishing Political Action Committees (PACs) and raising substantial funds.

    That is a future possibility.

    For now, it is important to recognise that a national-level Arab-American political effort has been born from the fires and devastation of the US-Israeli genocide in Palestine and Lebanon. Whether it can improve the wellbeing of Arab Americans and all Americans will be revealed in the years ahead.

    Dr Rami G Khouri is a distinguished fellow at the American University of Beirut and a nonresident senior fellow at the Arab Center Washington. He is a journalist and book author with 50 years of experience covering the Middle East. This article was first published by Al Jazeera.

    This post was originally published on Asia Pacific Report.

  • Luxon says Israeli PM would be arrested if he visits New Zealand

    Asia Pacific Report

    Prime Minister Christopher Luxon has told a media conference Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu would be arrested if he entered New Zealand

    “We support the ICC [the International Criminal Court],” Luxon said yesterday.

    “We believe in the international rules-based system, we support the ICC, and we would be obligated to do so.”

    The NZ prime minister’s comments followed the ICC announcing arrest warrants for Netanyahu and Israel’s former defence minister Yoav Gallant on allegations of war crimes and crimes against humanity in the 13-month war on the besieged Gaza Strip that has killed more than 44,000 people — mostly women and children.

    Netanyahu and Gallant are now fugitives from global justice after the ICC issued the arrest warrants against them.

    Although Israel — and the US — does not recognise the authority of the ICC, the highest international criminal court, and Netanyahu and Gallant will not turn themselves in, the pair’s world has got a lot smaller.

    The Rome Statute, the treaty that established the ICC, includes 124 state parties across six continents.

    Legally bound
    Under the statute, countries that are part of the ICC are legally bound to enforce its arrest warrants, according to international human rights lawyer Jonathan Kuttab.

    “The law operates on the basis of a presumption that people will obey it. That’s how all laws are created,” Kuttab told Al Jazeera.

    “You expect everybody to respect the law. Those who don’t respect the law are themselves violating the law.”

    He added that there were early signs that countries would not ignore the court’s decision.

    Many of Israel’s allies — including several European Union countries — have committed to enforcing the arrest warrants.

    The ICC was set up in 2002 to prosecute war crimes, crimes against humanity, genocide and the crime of aggression when member states are unwilling or unable to do so themselves. It is based in The Hague in the Netherlands.

    The case at the ICC is separate from another legal battle Israel is waging at the top UN court, the International Court of Justice, in which South Africa accuses Israel of genocide, an allegation Israeli leaders deny.

    Here is a list of the countries where Netanyahu and Gallant could be detained after the ICC’s decision.

    A total of 124 countries are state parties to the Rome Statute
    A total of 124 countries are state parties to the Rome Statute, which founded the International Criminal Court. They include 29 nations from the Americas: Antigua and Barbuda, Argentina, Barbados, Belize, Bolivia, Brazil, Canada, Colombia, Costa Rica, Dominica, Dominican Republic, Ecuador, El Salvador, Grenada, Guatemala, Guyana, Honduras, Mexico, Panama, Paraguay, Peru, Saint Kitts and Nevis, Saint Lucia, Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, Suriname, Trinidad and Tobago, Uruguay, and Venezuela. Map: CC AJ Lab

    This post was originally published on Asia Pacific Report.

  • Wenda calls for West Papuan unity in the face of Jakarta’s renewed ‘colonial grip’

    Asia Pacific Report

    An exiled West Papuan leader has called for unity among his people in the face of a renewed “colonial grip” of Indonesia’s new president.

    President Prabowo Subianto, who took office last month, “is a deep concern for all West Papuans”, said Benny Wenda of the United Liberation Movement for West Papua (ULMWP).

    Speaking at the Oxford Green Fair yesterday — Morning Star flag-raising day — ULMWP’s interim president said Prabowo had already “sent thousands of additional troops to West Papua” and restarted the illegal settlement programme that had marginalised Papuans and made them a minority in their own land.

    “He is continuing to destroy our land to create the biggest deforestation project in the history of the world. This network of sugarcane and rice plantations is as big as Wales.

    “But we cannot panic. The threat from [President] Prabowo shows that unity and direction is more important than ever.

    Indonesia doesn’t fear a divided movement. They do fear the ULMWP, because they know we are the most serious and direct challenge to their colonial grip.”

    Here is the text of the speech that Wenda gave while opening the Oxford Green Fair at Oxford Town Hall:

    Wenda’s speech
    December 1st is the day the West Papuan nation was born.

    On this day 63 years ago, the New Guinea Council raised the Morning Star across West Papua for the first time.

    We sang our national anthem and announced our Parliament, in a ceremony recognised by Australia, the UK, France, and the Netherlands, our former coloniser. But our new state was quickly stolen from us by Indonesian colonialism.

    ULMWP's Benny Wenda speaking on West Papua while opening the Oxford Green Fair
    ULMWP’s Benny Wenda speaking on West Papua while opening the Oxford Green Fair on flag-raising day in the United Kingdom. Image: ULMWP

    This day is important to all West Papuans. While we remember all those we have lost in the struggle, we also celebrate our continued resistance to Indonesian colonialism.

    On this day in 2020, we announced the formation of the Provisional Government of West Papua. Since then, we have built up our strength on the ground. We now have a constitution, a cabinet, a Green State Vision, and seven executives representing the seven customary regions of West Papua.

    Most importantly, we have a people’s mandate. The 2023 ULMWP Congress was first ever democratic election in the history. Over 5000 West Papuans gathered in Jayapura to choose their leaders and take ownership of their movement. This was a huge sacrifice for those on the ground. But it was necessary to show that we are implementing democracy before we have achieved independence.

    The outcome of this historic event was the clarification and confirmation of our roadmap by the people. Our three agendas have been endorsed by Congress: full membership of the MSG [Melanesian Spearhead Group], a UN High Commissioner for Human Rights visit to West Papua, and a resolution at the UN General Assembly. Through our Congress, we place the West Papuan struggle directly in the hands of the people. Whenever our moment comes, the ULMWP will be ready to seize it.

    Differing views
    I want to remind the world that internal division is an inevitable part of any revolution. No national struggle has avoided it. In any democratic country or movement, there will be differing views and approaches.

    But the ULMWP and our constitution is the only way to achieve our goal of liberation. We are demonstrating to Indonesia that we are not separatists, bending this way and that way: we are a government-in-waiting representing the unified will of our people. Through the provisional government we are reclaiming our sovereignty. And as a government, we are ready to engage with the world. We are ready to engage with Indonesia as full members of the Melanesian Spearhead Group, and we believe we will achieve this crucial goal in 2024.

    The importance of unity is also reflected in the ULMWP’s approach to West Papuan history. As enshrined in our constitution, the ULMWP recognises all previous declarations as legitimate and historic moments in our struggle. This does not just include 1961, but also the OPM Independence Declaration 1971, the 14-star declaration of West Melanesia in 1988, the Papuan People’s Congress in 2000, and the Third West Papuan Congress in 2011.

    All these announcements represent an absolute rejection of Indonesian colonialism. The spirit of Merdeka is in all of them.

    The new Indonesian President, Prabowo Subianto, is a deep concern for all West Papuans. He has already sent thousands of additional troops to West Papua and restarted the illegal settlement programme that has marginalised us and made us a minority in our own land. He is continuing to destroy our land to create the biggest deforestation project in the history of the world. This network of sugarcane and rice plantations is as big as Wales.

    But we cannot panic. The threat from Prabowo shows that unity and direction is more important than ever. Indonesia doesn’t fear a divided movement. They do fear the ULMWP, because they know we are the most serious and direct challenge to their colonial grip.

    I therefore call on all West Papuans, whether in the cities, the bush, the refugee camps or in exile, to unite behind the ULMWP Provisional Government. We work towards this agenda at every opportunity. We continue to pressure on United Nations and the international community to review the fraudulent ‘Act of No Choice’, and to uphold my people’s legal and moral right to choose our own destiny.

    I also call on all our solidarity groups to respect our Congress and our people’s mandate. The democratic right of the people of West Papua needs to be acknowledged.

    What does amnesty mean?
    Prabowo has also mentioned an amnesty for West Papuan political prisoners. What does this amnesty mean? Does amnesty mean I can return to West Papua and lead the struggle from inside? All West Papuans support independence; all West Papuans want to raise the Morning Star; all West Papuans want to be free from colonial rule.

    But pro-independence actions of any kind are illegal in West Papua. If we raise our flag or talk about self-determination, we are beaten, arrested or jailed. The whole world saw what happened to Defianus Kogoya in April. He was tortured, stabbed, and kicked in a barrel full of bloody water. If the offer of amnesty is real, it must involve releasing all West Papuan political prisoners. It must involve allowing us to peacefully struggle for our freedom without the threat of imprisonment.

    Despite Prabowo’s election, this has been a year of progress for our struggle. The Pacific Islands Forum reaffirmed their call for a UN Human Rights Visit to West Papua. This is not just our demand – more than 100 nations have now insisted on this important visit. We have built vital new links across the world, including through our ULMWP delegation at the UN General Assembly.

    Through the creation of the West Papua People’s Liberation Front (GR-PWP), our struggle on the ground has reached new heights. Thank you and congratulations to the GR-PWP Administration for your work.

    Thank you also to the KNPB and the Alliance of Papuan Students, you are vital elements in our fight for self-determination and are acknowledged in our Congress resolutions. You carry the spirit of Merdeka with you.

    I invite all solidarity organisations, including Indonesian solidarity, around the world to preserve our unity by respecting our constitution and Congress. To Indonesian settlers living in our ancestral land, please respect our struggle for self-determination. I also ask that all our military wings unite under the constitution and respect the democratic Congress resolutions.

    I invite all West Papuans – living in the bush, in exile, in refugee camps, in the cities or villages – to unite behind your constitution. We are stronger together.

    Thank you to Vanuatu
    A special thank you to Vanuatu government and people, who are our most consistent and strongest supporters. Thank you to Fiji, Kanaky, PNG, Solomon Islands, and to Pacific Islands Forum and MSG for reaffirming your support for a UN visit. Thank you to the International Lawyers for West Papua and the International Parliamentarians for West Papua.

    I hope you will continue to support the West Papuan struggle for self-determination. This is a moral obligation for all Pacific people. Thank you to all religious leaders, and particularly the Pacific Council of Churches and the West Papua Council of Churches, for your consistent support and prayers.

    Thank you to all the solidarity groups in the Pacific who are tirelessly supporting the campaign, and in Europe, Australia, Africa, and the Caribbean.

    I also give thanks to the West Papua Legislative Council, Buchtar Tabuni and Bazoka Logo, to the Judicative Council and to Prime Minister Edison Waromi. Your work to build our capacity on the ground is incredible and essential to all our achievements. You have pushed forwards all our recent milestones, our Congress, our constitution, government, cabinet, and vision.

    Together, we are proving to the world and to Indonesia that we are ready to govern our own affairs.

    To the people of West Papua, stay strong and determined. Independence is coming. One day soon we will walk our mountains and rivers without fear of Indonesian soldiers. The Morning Star will fly freely alongside other independent countries of the Pacific.

    Until then, stay focused and have courage. The struggle is long but we will win. Your ancestors are with you.

  • ‘Lone Soldiers’ – new Australian IDF recruits due to arrive in Israel in January

    Despite it being illegal in Australia to recruit soldiers for foreign armies, the Israeli Defence Forces (IDF) recruiters are hard at work enticing young Australians to join Israel’s army. Michael West Media investigates.

    INVESTIGATION: By Yaakov Aharon

    The Israeli war machine is in hyperdrive, and it needs new bodies to throw into the fire. In July, The Department of Home Affairs stated that there were only four Australians who had booked flights to Israel and whom it suspected of intending to join the Israel Defence Forces (IDF).

    The Australian Border Force intervened with three of the four but clarified that they did not “necessarily prevent them from leaving”.

    MWM understands a batch of Australian recruits is due to arrive in Israel in January, and this is not the first batch of recruits to receive assistance as IDF soldiers through this Australian programme.

    Many countries encourage certain categories of immigrants and discourage others. However, Israel doesn’t just want Palestinians out and Jews in — they want Jews of fighting age, who will be conscripted shortly after arrival.

    The IDF’s “Lone Soldiers” are soldiers who do not have parents living in Israel. Usually, this means 18-year-old immigrants with basic Hebrew who may never have spent longer than a school camp away from home.

    There are a range of Israeli government programmes, charities, and community centres that support the Lone Soldiers’ integration into society prior to basic training.

    The most robust of these programs is Garin Tzabar, where there are only 90 days between hugging mum and dad goodbye at Sydney Airport and the drill sergeant belting orders in a foreign language.

    Garin Tzabar
    The Garin Tzabar website. Image: MWM

    Garin Tzabar
    In 2004, Prime Minister Ariel Sharon asked Minister for Aliyah [Immigration] and Integration, Tzipi Livni, to significantly increase the number of people in the Garin Tzabar programme.

    The IDF website states that Garin Tzabar “is a unique project, a collaborative venture of the Meitav Unit in the IDF, the Scout movement, the security-social wing of the Ministry of Defense and the Ministry of Immigration and Absorption, which began in 1991”. (Translated from Hebrew via Google Translate.)

    The Meitav Unit is divided into many different branches, most of which are responsible for overseeing new recruits.

    However, the pride of the Meitav Unit is the branch dedicated to recruiting all the unique population groups that are not subject to the draft (eg. Ultra-Orthodox Jews). This branch is then divided into three further Departments.

    In a 2020 interview, the Head of Meitav’s Tzabar Department, Lieutenant Noam Delgo, referred to herself as someone who “recruits olim chadishim (new immigrants).” She stated:

    “Our main job in the army is to help Garin Tzabar members to recruit . . .  The best thing about Garin Tzabar is the mashakyot (commanders). Every time you wake up in the morning you have two amazing soldiers — really intelligent — with pretty high skills, just managing your whole life, teaching you Hebrew, helping you with all the bureaucratic systems in Israel, getting profiles, seeing doctors and getting those documents, and finishing the whole process.”

    The Garin Tzabar programme specifically advertises for Australian recruits.

    The contact point for Australian recruits is Shoval Magal, the executive director of Garin Tzabar Australia. The registered address is a building shared by the NSW Jewish Board of Deputies and the Zionist Council of NSW, the community’s peak bodies in the state.

    A post from April 2020 on the IDF website states:

    “Until three months ago, Tali [REDACTED], from Sydney, Australia, and Moises [REDACTED], from Mexico City, were ordinary teenagers. But on December 25, they arrived at their new family here in Israel — the “Garin Tzabar” family, and in a moment, they will become soldiers. In a special project, we accompanied them from the day of admission (to the program) until just before the recruitment.“ (Translated from Hebrew via Google Translate).

    Michael Manhaim was the executive director of Garin Tzabar Australia from 2018 to 2023. He wrote an article, “Becoming a Lone Soldier”,’ for the 2021 annual newsletter of Betar Australia, a Zionist youth group for children. In the article, Manhaim writes:

    “The programme starts with the unique preparation process in Australia.

    . . . It only takes one step; you just need to choose which foot will lead the way. We will be there for the rest.”

    A criminal activity
    MWM is not alleging that any of the parties mentioned in this article have broken the law. It is not a crime if a person chooses to join a foreign army.

    However, S119.7 of the Commonwealth Criminal Code Act 1995 states:

    A person commits an offence if the person recruits, in Australia, another person to serve in any capacity in or with an armed force in a foreign country.

    It is a further offence to facilitate or promote recruitment for a foreign army and to publish recruitment materials. This includes advertising information relating to how a person may serve in a foreign army.

    The maximum penalty for each offence is 10 years.

    Rawan Arraf, executive director of the Australian Centre for International Justice, said:

    “Unless there has been a specific declaration stating it is not an offence to recruit for the Israel Defence Force, recruitment to a foreign armed force is a criminal offence under Australian law, and the Australian Federal Police should be investigating anyone allegedly involved in recruitment for a foreign armed force.”

    Army needing ‘new flesh’
    If the IDF are to keep the war on Gaza going, they need to fill old suits of body armour with new grunts.

    Reports indicate the death toll within IDF’s ranks is unprecedented — a suicide epidemic is claiming further lives on the home front, and reservists are refusing in droves to return to active duty.

    In October, Israeli opposition leader Yair Lapid accused Bibi Netanyahu of obscuring the facts of Israel’s casualty rate. Any national security story published in Israel must first be approved by the intelligence unit at the Military Censor.

    “11,000 soldiers were injured and 890 others killed,” Lapid said, without warning and live on air. There are limits to how much we accept the alternative facts”.

    In November 2023, Shoval Magal shared a photo in which she is posing alongside six young Australians, saying, “The participants are eager to have Aliya (immigrate) to Israel, start the programme and join the army”.

    These six recruits are the attendees of just one of several seminars that Magal has organised in Melbourne for the summer 2023 cycle, having also organised separate events across cities in Australia.

    Magal’s June 2024 newsletter said she was “in the advanced stages of the preparation phase in Australia for the August 2024 Garin”. Most recently, in October 2024, she was “getting ready for Garin Tzabar’s 2024 December cycle.”

    Magal’s newsletter for Israeli Scouts in Australia
    Magal’s newsletter for Israeli Scouts in Australia ‘Aliyah Events – November 2024’. Image: MWM

    There are five “Aliyah (Immigration) Events” in Sydney, Melbourne and Perth. The sponsoring organisations are Garin Tzabar, the Israeli Ministry for Aliyah (Immigration) and Integration, and a who’s who of the Jewish-Australian community.

    The star speaker at each event is Alon Katz, an Australian who joined Garin Tzabar in 2018 and is today a reserve IDF soldier. The second speaker, Colonel Golan Vach, was the subject of two Electronic Intifada investigations alleging that he had invented the 40 burned babies lie on October 7 to create a motive for Israel’s onslaught in Gaza.

    If any Australian signed the papers to become an IDF recruit at these events, is someone liable for the offence of recruiting them to a foreign army?

    MWM reached out for comment to Garin Tzabar Australia and the Zionist Federation of Australia to clarify whether the IDF is recruiting in Australia but did not receive a reply.

    Yaakov Aharon is a Jewish-Australian journalist living in Wollongong. He enjoys long walks on Wollongong Beach, unimpeded by Port Kembla smoke fumes and AUKUS submarines. First published by Michael West Media and republished with permission.


    This content originally appeared on Asia Pacific Report and was authored by APR editor.

    This post was originally published on Radio Free.

  • Civil society groups call on Pacific leaders to ‘take responsibility’ over Papua injustices

    Asia Pacific Report

    Twenty five Pacific civil society organisations and solidarity movements have called on Pacific leaders of their “longstanding responsibility” to West Papua, and to urgently address the “ongoing gross human rights abuses” by Indonesia.

    The organisations — including the Pacific Conference of Churches (PCC), Fiji Council of Social Services (FCOSS). Pacific Network on Globalisation (PANG), Fiji Women’s Crisis Centre (FWCC) and Vanuatu Human Rights Coalition — issued a statement marking 1 December 2024.

    This date commemorates 63 years since the Morning Star flag was first
    raised in West Papua to signify the territory’s sovereignty.

    The organisations condemned the “false narrative Indonesia has peddled of itself as a morally upright, peace-loving, and benevolent friend of the Melanesian people and of the Pacific”.

    Jakarta had “infiltrated our governments and institutional perceptions”.

    The statement also said:

    Yet Indonesia’s annexation of the territory, military occupation, and violent oppression, gross human rights violations on West Papuans continue to be ignored internationally and unfortunately by most Pacific leaders.

    The deepening relations between Pacific states and Jakarta reflect how far the false
    narrative Indonesia has peddled of itself as a morally upright, peace-loving, and benevolent
    friend of the Melanesian people and of the Pacific, has infiltrated our governments and
    institutional perceptions.

    The corresponding dilution of our leaders’ voice, individually and collectively, is indicative of political and economic complicity, staining the Pacific’s anti-colonial legacy, and is an attack
    on the core values of our regional solidarity.

    The Pacific has a legacy of holding colonial powers in our region to account. The Pacific
    Islands Forum (PIF) Leaders communiques in 2015, 2017, and 2019 are reflective of this,
    deploring the violence and human rights violations in West Papua, calling on Indonesia to
    allow independent human rights assessment in the territory, and to address the root causes of conflict through peaceful means.

    In 2023, PIF Leaders appointed Fiji and Papua New Guinea (PNG) Prime Ministers, [Sitiveni] Rabuka and [James] Marape respectively to facilitate such constructive engagement with Indonesia.

    As PIF envoys, both Prime Ministers visited Indonesia in 2023 on separate occasions, yet
    they have failed to address these concerns. Is this to be interpreted as regional political
    expediency or economic self-interest?

    Today, torture, discrimination, extrajudicial killings, unlawful arrests, and detention of West
    Papuans continue to be rife. Approximately 70,000 Papuans remain displaced due to military operations.

    Between January and September this year, human rights violations resulted in a total of over 1300 victims across various categories. The most significant violations were arbitrary detention, with 331 victims in 20 cases, and freedom of assembly, which affected at least 388 victims in 21 cases. Other violations included ill-treatment (98 victims), torture (23
    victims), and killings (15 victims), along with freedom of expression violations impacting 31
    victims.

    Additionally, cultural rights violations affected dozens of individuals, while intimidation cases resulted in 15 victims. Disappearances accounted for 2 victims, and right
    to health violations impacted dozens.

    This surge in human rights abuses highlights a concerning trend, with arbitrary detention and freedom of assembly violations standing out as the most widespread and devastating.

    The commemoration of the Morning Star flag-raising this 1st of December is a solemn
    reminder of the region’s unfinished duty of care to the West Papuan people and their
    struggle for human rights, including the right to self-determination.

    Clearly, Pacific leaders, including the Special Envoys, must fulfill their responsibility to a
    region of genuine peace and solidarity, and thereby rectify their unconscionable response
    thus far.

    They must do justice to the 63 years of resilient resistance by the West Papuan
    people under violent, even deadly repression.

    We call on leaders, especially the Prime Ministers of Fiji and PNG, not to succumb to Indonesia’s chequebook diplomacy and other soft-power overtures now evident in education, the arts, culture, food and agriculture, security, and even health sectors.

    We remind our Pacific leaders of their responsibility to 63 years of injustice by Indonesia, and the resilience of the West Papuan people against this oppression to this day.

    In solidarity with the people of West Papua, we demand that our leaders:

    1. Honour the resolutions of the Melanesian Spearhead Group (MSG) and PIF, which call
      for a peaceful resolution to the West Papua conflict and the recognition of the rights
      of West Papuans;
    2. Take immediate and concrete action to review, and if necessary, sanction Indonesia’s
      status as a dialogue partner in the PIF, associate member of the MSG, and as a party
      to other privileged bilateral and multilateral arrangements in our Pacific region on the
      basis of its human rights record in West Papua;
    3. Stand firm against Indonesia’s colonial intrusion into the Pacific through its
      cheque-book and other diplomatic overtures, ensuring that the sovereignty and rights
      of the people of West Papua are not sacrificed for political or economic gain; and
    4. PIF must take immediate action to establish a Regional Human Rights Commission
      or task force, support independent investigations into human rights violations in West
      Papua, and ensure accountability for all abuses.

    This post was originally published on Asia Pacific Report.

  • West Papua: Once was Papuan Independence Day, now facing ‘ecocide’, transmigration

    On Papuan Independence Day, the focus is on discussing protests against Indonesia’s transmigration programme, environmental destruction, militarisation, and the struggle for self-determination. Te Aniwaniwa Paterson reports.

    By Te Aniwaniwa Paterson of Te Ao Māori News

    On 1 December 1961, West Papua’s national flag, known as the Morning Star, was raised for the first time as a declaration of West Papua’s independence from the Netherlands.

    Sixty-three years later, West Papua is claimed by and occupied by Indonesia, which has banned the flag, which still carries aspirations for self-determination and liberation.

    The flag continues to be raised globally on December 1 each year on what is still called “Papuan Independence Day”.

    Region-wide protests
    Protests have been building in West Papua since the new Indonesian President Prabowo Subianto announced the revival of the Transmigration Programme to West Papua.

    This was declared a day after he came to power on October 21 and confirmed fears from West Papuans about Prabowo’s rise to power.

    This is because Prabowo is a former general known for a trail of allegations of war crimes and human rights abuses in West Papua and East Timor to his name.

    Transmigration’s role
    The transmigration programme began before Indonesia gained independence from the Dutch colonial government, intended to reduce “overcrowding” in Java and to provide a workforce for plantations in Sumatra.

    After independence ended and under Indonesian rule, the programme expanded and in 1969 transmigration to West Papua was started.

    This was also the year of the controversial “Act of Free Choice” where a small group of Papuans were coerced by Indonesia into a unanimous vote against their independence.

    In 2001 the state-backed transmigration programme ended but, by then, over three-quarters of a million Indonesians had been relocated to West Papua. Although the official transmigration stopped, migration of Indonesians continued via agriculture and development projects.

    Indonesia has also said transmigration helps with cultural exchange to unite the West Papuans so they are one nation — “Indonesian”.

    West Papuan human rights activist Rosa Moiwend said in the 1980s that Indonesians used the language of “humanising West Papuans” through erasing their indigenous identity.

    “It’s a racist kind of thing because they think West Papuans were not fully human,” Moiwend said.

    Pathway to environmental destruction
    Papuans believe this was to dilute the Indigenous Melanesian population, and to secure the control of their natural resources, to conduct mining, oil and gas extraction and deforestation.

    This is because in the past the transmigration programme was tied to agricultural settlements where, following the deforestation of conservation forests, Indonesian migrants worked on agricultural projects such as rice fields and palm oil plantations.

    Octo Mote is the vice-president of the United Liberation Movement for West Papua (ULMWP). Earlier this year Te Ao Māori News interviewed Mote on the “ecocide and genocide” and the history of how Indonesia gained power over West Papua.

    The ecology in West Papua was being damaged by mining, deforestation, and oil and gas extraction, he said. Mote said Indonesia wanted to “wipe them from the land and control their natural resources”.

    He emphasised that defending West Papua meant defending the world, because New Guinea had the third-largest rainforest after the Amazon and Congo and was crucial for climate change mitigation as they sequester and store carbon.

    Concerns grow over militarisation
    Moiwend said the other concern right now was the National Strategic Project which developed projects to focus on Indonesian self-sufficiency in food and energy.

    Merauke Integrated Food and Energy Estate (MIFEE) started in 2011, so isn’t a new project, but it has failed to deliver many times and was described by Global Atlas of Environmental Justice as a “textbook land grab”.

    The mega-project includes the deforestation of a million hectares for rice fields and an additional 600,000 hectares for sugar cane plantations that will be used to make bioethanol.

    The project is managed by the Ministry of Defense and the Ministry of Agriculture, and the private company, Jhonlin Group, owned by Haji Andi Syamsuddin Arsyad. Ironically, given the project has been promoted to address climate issues, Arsyad is a coal magnate, a primary industry responsible for man-made climate change.

    Recently, the Indonesian government announced the deployment of five military battalions to the project site.

    Conservation news website Mongabay reported that the villages in the project site had a population of 3000 people whereas a battalion consisted of usually 1000 soldiers, which meant there would be more soldiers than locals and the villagers said it felt as if their home would be turned into a “war zone”.

    Merauke is where Moiwend’s village is and many of her cousins and family are protesting and, although there haven’t been any incidents yet, with increased militarisation she feared for the lives of her family as the Indonesian military had killed civilians in the past.

    Destruction of spiritual ancestors
    The destruction of the environment was also the killing of their dema (spiritual ancestors), she said.

    The dema represented and protected different components of nature, with a dema for fish, the sago palm, and the coconut tree.

    Traditionally when planting taro, kumara or yam, they chanted and sang for the dema of those plants to ensure an abundant harvest.

    Moiwend said they connected to their identity through calling on the name of the dema that was their totem.

    She said her totem was the coconut and when she needed healing she would find a coconut tree, drink coconut water, and call to the dema for help.

    There were places where the dema lived that humans were not meant to enter but many sacred forests had been deforested.

    She said the Indonesians had destroyed their food sources, their connection to their spirituality as well destroying their humanity.

    “Anim Ha means the great human being,” she said, “to become a great human being you have to have a certain quality of life, and one quality of life is the connection to your dema, your spiritual realm.”

    Te Aniwaniwa Paterson is a digital producer for Te Ao Māori News. Republished with permission.

    Raising the West Papuan Morning Star flag in Tamaki Makaurau in 2023
    Raising the West Papuan Morning Star flag in Tāmaki Makaurau in 2023. Image: Te Ao Māori News

    This post was originally published on Asia Pacific Report.

  • Protesters condemn Fiji ‘complicity, silence’ over Israel’s Gaza genocide

    Asia Pacific Report

    A Fiji solidarity group for the Palestinians has accused the Rabuka-led coalition government of “complicity” in Israel’s genocide and relentless war in Gaza that has killed more than 44,000 people — mostly women and children — over the past year.

    The Fijians4Palestine have called on the Fiji government to “uphold the principles of peace, justice, and human rights that our nation cherishes”.

    “We urge our leaders to use their diplomatic channels to advocate for a peaceful resolution to the conflict, to support international efforts in providing humanitarian aid to the affected regions, and to publicly express solidarity with the Palestinian people, reflecting the sentiments of many Fijians,” the movement said in a statement  marking the UN International Day of Solidarity with the Palestinian People.

    The group said it was “ashamed that the Fiji government continues to vote for the genocide and occupation of Palestinians”.

    It said that it expected the Fiji government to enforce arrest warrants issued by the International Criminal Court (ICC) for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Israel’s former defence minister Yoav Gallant for alleged war crimes and crimes against humanity in the Gaza Strip.

    The Fijians4Palestine group’s statement said:

    It has been over one year since Israel began its genocide against Palestinians in Gaza.

    Over the past year, Israeli attacks have killed more than 44,000 Palestinians living in Gaza, equal to 1 out of every 55 people living there.

    At least 16,756 children have been killed, the highest number of children recorded in a single year of conflict over the past two decades. More than 17,000 children have lost one or both parents.

    At least 97,303 people are injured in Gaza — equal to one in 23 people.

    According to the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees, every day 10 children lose one or both legs, with operations and amputations conducted with little or no anaesthesia due to Israel’s ongoing siege.

    In addition to the killed and injured, more than 10,000 people are feared buried under the rubble.

    A Fiji protester with a "Your silence kills" placard
    A Fiji protester with a “Your silence kills” placard rebuking the Fiji government for its stance on Israeli’s war on Gaza. Image: FWCC

    With few tools to remove rubble and rescue those trapped beneath concrete, volunteers and civil defence workers rely on their bare hands.

    We, the #Fijians4Palestine Solidarity Network join the global voices demanding a permanent ceasefire and an end to the violence. We express our unwavering solidarity with the Palestinian people.

    The Palestinian struggle is not just a regional issue; it is a testament to the resilience of a people who, despite facing impossible odds, continue to fight for their right to exist, freedom, and dignity. Their struggle resonates with all who believe in justice, equality, and the fundamental rights of every human being.

    Families torn apart
    The images of destruction, the stories of families torn apart, and the cries of children caught in the crossfire are heart-wrenching. These are not mere statistics or distant news stories; these are real people with hopes, dreams, and aspirations, much like us.

    As Fijians, we have always prided ourselves on our commitment to peace, unity, and humanity. Our rich cultural heritage and shared values teach us the importance of standing up for what is right, even when it is not popular or convenient.

    Today, we stand in solidarity with the Palestinian people, not out of political allegiance but out of a shared belief in humanity, justice, and the inalienable human rights of every individual.

    We unequivocally condemn the State of Israel for its actions that amount to war crimes, genocide, and apartheid against the Palestinian people. The deliberate targeting of civilians, the disproportionate use of force, and the destruction of essential infrastructure, including hospitals and schools, are in clear violation of international humanitarian law.

    The intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnic, racial, or religious group is evident. The continuous displacement of Palestinians, the destruction of their homes, and the systematic erasure of their history and culture are indicative of genocidal intent.

    The State of Israel’s policies in the West Bank and Gaza Strip, characterised by racial segregation, discrimination, and domination, amount to apartheid as defined under international law.

    Oppressive regime
    The construction of settlements, the separation wall, and the system of checkpoints are manifestations of this oppressive regime. Palestinians are subjected to different laws, regulations, and treatments based on their ethnicity, clearly violating the principle of equality.

    We call upon the Fiji government to uphold the principles of peace, justice, and human rights that our nation cherishes. We urge our leaders to use their diplomatic channels to advocate for a peaceful resolution to the conflict, to support international efforts in providing humanitarian aid to the affected regions, and to publicly express solidarity with the Palestinian people, reflecting the sentiments of many Fijians.

    We are ashamed that the Fiji government continues to vote for the genocide and occupation of Palestinians. We expect our government to enforce arrest warrants issued by the International Criminal Court for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Israel’s former defence minister Yoav Gallant for alleged war crimes and crimes against humanity in the Gaza Strip.

    The silence of the Fiji government is complicity, and history will not forgive their inaction.

    Our solidarity with the Palestinian people is a testament to our shared humanity. We believe in a world where diversity, is treated with dignity and respect. We dream of a future where children in Gaza can play without fear, where families can live without the shadow of war, and where the Palestinian people can finally enjoy the peace and freedom they so rightly deserve.

    There can be no peace without justice, and we stand in unity with all people and territories struggling for self-determination and freedom from occupation.

    The Pacific cannot be an Ocean of Peace without freedom and self determination in Palestine, West Papua, Kanaky and all oppressed territories.

    This post was originally published on Asia Pacific Report.

  • Gallery: Palestinian musicians, poets and solidarity partners in vibrant celebration

    Asia Pacific Report

    Palestinian diaspora poets, singers and musicians gathered today with solidarity partners from Aotearoa New Zealand, African nations — including South Africa — in a vibrant celebration.

    The celebration marked the UN International Day of Solidarity with the Palestinian People and similar events have been happening around New Zealand today, across the world and over the weekend.

    Images by David Robie of Asia Pacific Report.

    UN International Day of Solidarity with the Palestinian People
    1 of 15
    1 UN Palestinian Solidarity Day at Fickling Cultural Centre. Image: David Robie /APR
    2. UN Solidarity Day . . . Palestinian introductions. Image: David Robie/APR
    3. UN Solidarity Day . . . more introductions. Image: David Robie/APR
    4. UN Solidarity Day . . . support from Africa. Image: David Robie/APR
    5. UN Solidarity Day . . . Angi Taulua from Tonga. Image: David Robie/APR
    6. UN Solidarity Day . . . South Africa and Palestine’s destiny intertwined. Image: David Robie/APR
    7. UN Solidarity Day . . . South Africa and the Bo-Kaap murals for Palestine. Image: David Robie/APR
    8. UN Solidarity Day . . . ethnicities ensemble. Image: David Robie/APR
    9. UN Solidarity Day . . . message from a midwifery researcher. Image: David Robie/APR
    10. UN Solidarity Day . . . an attentive audience. Image: David Robie/APR
    11. UN Solidarity Day . . . beautiful singing. Image: David Robie/APR
    12. UN Solidarity Day . . . Maher Nazzal, Janfrie Wakim and part of the audience. Image: David Robie/APR
    13. UN Solidarity Day . . . Kia Ora Gaza’s Roger Fowler sings “Palestine”.
    14. UN Solidarity Day . . . Bo-Kaap “Murals for Gaza” in Cape Town, South Africa. Image: David Robie/APR
    15. UN Solidarity Day . . . Bo-Kaap – “Peace for Palestine”. Image: David Robie/APR


    This content originally appeared on Asia Pacific Report and was authored by APR editor.

    This post was originally published on Radio Free.

  • Open letter plea by NZ community broadcaster for end to Israel’s ‘sadistic cruelty’ in Gaza

    Pacific Media Watch

    A community broadcaster in Aotearoa New Zealand has appealed for an end to the “sadistic cruelty” and the “out in the open genocide” by Israel in Gaza and the occupied Palestine territories.

    In an open letter, Lois Griffiths, co-presenter of the environmental, social justice and current affairs programme Earthwise on Plains FM, has criticised the “injustices imposed by colonialism” and has cited Bethlehem Lutheran pastor Munther Isaac in saying “Gaza today has become the moral compass of the world”.

    Her letter is published by Asia Pacific Report to mark the UN International Day of Solidarity with the Palestinian People.

    The open letter by Griffiths says:

    K Gurunathan’s article “Sparks fly as political tinder of Māori anger builds” (The Press and The Post, November 25) argues that the injustices imposed by colonialism, including the “systematic confiscation of Māori land”, leading to poverty and cultural alienation are factors behind the anger expressed by the recent Hīkoi.

    We need to learn Aotearoa New Zealand history.

    One needs to learn history in order to understand the present.

    But we need to learn world history too.

    Coincidentally, I am in the middle of reading Israeli journalist Gideon Levy’s most recent book The Killing of Gaza: reports on a catastrophe.

    Levy has been there many times, reporting first hand about the sadistic cruelty imposed on its people, a cruelty that began in 1948.

    He explains that Hamas promotes armed resistance as a last resort. Any other approach has been ignored

    The Israeli regime is being accused now of war crimes. But war crimes have been going on for decades.

    But it sickens me to even think of what is happening now. It is genocide, genocide out in the open.

    In the words of Bethlehem Lutheran pastor Munther Isaac: “Gaza today has become the moral compass of the world.”

    This post was originally published on Asia Pacific Report.

  • Lack of Gaza aid, Israeli impunity puts Palestinians at risk over failed bombs

    Asia Pacific Report

    An aid agency is warning that a lack of aid reaching Gaza is forcing Palestinians to search through destroyed buildings for basic necessities, putting them at risk of death or injury from unexploded bombs.

    “Civilians in Gaza are caught in a relentless cycle of destruction, displacement, and despair,” said the Danish Refugee Council in a new report.

    “Decades of occupation, blockade, and siege have been compounded by the catastrophic use of explosive weapons in one of the world’s most densely populated areas.

    “The human cost is staggering with more than 44,000 people killed, 90 percent of the population displaced, and essential infrastructure obliterated.”

    The report said that civilians were left grappling with “unimaginable risks” from widespread destruction to the deadly legacy of explosive ordinance (EO) contamination.

    “Nearly everyone in Gaza has felt the devastating impact. Homes reduced to rubble, schools and hospitals targeted, and basic services like water and healthcare brought to a standstill,” the report said.

    “Families face a grim reality, uprooted an average of six times, often returning to areas that have seen active fighting which are likely riddled with explosive ordnance.

    War remnants ‘mistaken for toys’
    “Children, tragically, are among the most vulnerable, mistaking deadly remnants of war for toys.”

    This report has exposed the far-reaching consequences of the use of explosive weapons in populated areas in Gaza, “revealing a dire reality for a population trapped in danger”.

    It underscores the devastating toll of impunity and disregard for international humanitarian law, which continues to result in immense suffering of civilians.

    This post was originally published on Asia Pacific Report.

  • COP29: Carbon credit trading scheme criticised as ‘get out of jail free card’

    By Kate Green , RNZ News reporter

    A new carbon credit trading deal reached in the final hours of COP29 in Baku, Azerbaijan, has been criticised as a free pass for countries to slack off on efforts to reduce emissions at home.

    The deal, sealed at the annual UN climate talks nearly a decade after it was first put forward, will allow countries to buy carbon credits from others to bring down their own balance sheet.

    New Zealand had set its targets under the Paris Agreement on the assumption that it would be able to meet some of it through international cooperation — “so getting this up and running is really important”, Compass Climate head Christina Hood said.

    COP29 BAKU, 11-22 November 2024
    COP29 BAKU, 11-22 November 2024

    “It’s a tool, it’s neither good nor bad, but there’s going to have to be a lot of scrutiny on whether the government is taking a high-ambition, high-integrity path, or just trying to do the minimum possible.”

    The plan had taken nine years to go through because countries determined to do it right had been holding out for a process with the right checks and balances in place, she said.

    As it stood, countries would have to report yearly to the UN on their trading activities, but it was up to society and other countries to scrutinise behaviour.

    Cindy Baxter, a COP veteran who has been at all but seven of the conferences, said it was in-line with the way Aotearoa New Zealand wanted to go about reducing its emissions.

    ‘We’re not alone, but . . .’
    “We’re not alone, Switzerland is similar and Japan as well, but certainly New Zealand is aiming to meet by far the largest proportion of our climate target, [out of] anywhere in the OECD, through carbon trading.”

    The new scheme fell under Article six of the Paris Agreement, and a statement from COP29 said it was expected to reduce the cost of implementing countries’ national climate plans by up to US$250 billion (NZ$428.5b) per year.

    COP29 president Mukhtar Babayev said “climate change is a transnational challenge and Article six will enable transnational solutions. Because the atmosphere does not care where emissions savings are made.”

    But Baxter said there was not enough transparency in the scheme, and plenty of loopholes. One of the issues was ensuring projects resulting in carbon credits continued to reduce emissions after the credits were traded.

    “For example, if you’re trying to save some mangroves in Fiji, you give Fiji a whole bunch of money and say this is going to offset this amount of carbon, but what if those mangroves are destroyed by a drought, or a great big cyclone?”

    Countries should be cutting emissions at home, she said.

    “And that is something New Zealand is not very good at doing, has a really bad reputation for doing. We’ve either planted trees, or now we’re trying to throw money at offset.”

    Greenpeace spokesperson Amanda Larsson said she, too, was concerned it would take the onus off big polluters to make reductions at home, calling it a “get out of jail free card”.

    ‘Lot of junk credits’
    “Ultimately, we really need to see significant cuts in climate pollution,” she said. “And there’s no such thing as high-integrity voluntary carbon markets, and a history of a lot of junk credits being sold.”

    Countries with the means to make meaningful change at home should not be relying on other countries stepping up, she said

    The Green Party foreign affairs spokesperson Teanau Tuiono said there was strong potential in the proposal, but it was “imperative to ensure the framework is robust, and protects the rights of indigenous peoples at the same time as incentivising carbon sequestration”.

    It should be a wake-up call to change New Zealand’s over-reliance on risky pine plantations and instead support permanent native afforestation, he said.

    “This proposal emphasises how solving the climate crisis requires global collaboration on the most difficult issues. That requires building trust and confidence, by meeting commitments countries make to each other.

    “Backing out of these by, for instance, restarting oil and gas exploration directly against the wishes of our Pacific relatives, is not the way do to that.”

    Conference overall ‘disappointing and frustrating’
    Baxter said it had been “very difficult being forced to have another COP in a petro-state”, where the host state did not have much to gain by making big progress.

    “What that means is that there is not that impetus to bang heads together and get really strong agreement,” she said.

    But the blame could not be placed entirely on the leadership.

    “The COP process is set up to work if governments bring their A-games, and they don’t,” she said.

    “People should be bringing their really strong new climate targets [and] very few are doing that.”

    Another deal was clinched in overtime of the two-week conference, promising US$300 billion (NZ$514 billion) each year by 2035 for developing nations to tackle climate emissions.

    This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.

    This post was originally published on Asia Pacific Report.

  • Six Israeli soldiers die by suicide – thousands get mental health treatment, says report

    Asia Pacific Report

    At least six Israeli soldiers have taken their own lives in recent months, the major Israeli daily Yedioth Ahronoth has revealed, citing severe psychological distress caused by prolonged wars in the Gaza Strip and southern Lebanon as the primary cause, Anadolu Agency reports.

    The investigation suggests that the actual number of suicides may be higher, as the Israeli military has yet to release official figures, despite a promise to disclose them by the end of the year.

    The report highlights a broader mental health crisis within the Israeli army.

    Regional tension has escalated due to Israel’s brutal offensive on the Gaza Strip, which has killed more than 44,000 people, mostly women and children, since a Hamas attack last year.

    Thousands of soldiers have sought help from military mental health clinics or field psychologists, with approximately a third of those affected showing symptoms of post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD).

    According to the investigation, the number of soldiers suffering psychological trauma may exceed those with physical injuries from the war.

    The daily cites experts as saying the full extent of this mental health crisis will become clear once military operations are completed and troops return to normal life.

    About 1700 soldiers treated
    In March, Lucian Tatsa-Laur, head of the Israeli military’s Mental Health Department, told another Israeli newspaper, Haaretz, that approximately 1700 soldiers had received psychological treatment.

    Since October 7 last year, reports Anadolu, Israeli military is alleged to have wiped out families in Gaza, pulverised neighbourhoods, dug up mass graves, destroyed cemeteries, bombed shops and businesses, flattened hospitals and morgues, ran tanks and bulldozers on dead bodies, tortured jailed Palestinians with dogs and electricity, subjected detainees to mock executions, and even raped many Palestinians.

    Exhibiting sadistic behaviour during the genocide, Israeli soldiers have taunted Palestinian prisoners by claiming they were playing football with their children’s heads in Gaza.

    Israeli troops have live streamed hundreds of videos of soldiers looting Palestinian homes, destroying children’s beds, setting homes on fire and laughing, wearing undergarments of displaced Palestinians and stealing children’s toys.

    In their mission to “erase” Palestine, Israeli troops have killed a record number of babies, medics, athletes, and journalists — unprecedented in any war in this century.

    But, said the news agency, now it’s coming with a cost.

    Australia bars former minister
    Meanwhile, former Israeli Justice Minister Ayelet Shaked has been banned from entering Australia over fears of “incitement”.

    Shaked, a former MP for the far-right Yamina party, was scheduled to appear at a conference hosted by the pro-Israel Australia Israel and Jewish Affairs Council (AIJAC).

    However, the Australian Department of Home Affairs told the former minister on Thursday that she had been denied a visa to travel to the country under the Migration Act.

    The act allows the government to deny entry to individuals likely to “vilify Australians” or “incite discord” within the local community.

    Speaking to Israeli media, Shaked claimed that her ban was due to her vocal opposition to a Palestinian state, reports Middle East Eye.

    She has also previously called for the removal of “all two million” Palestinians from Gaza.

    This post was originally published on Asia Pacific Report.

  • ICC arrest warrants for Israeli leaders ‘wake up call’ for NZ, says Minto

    Asia Pacific Report

    A national New Zealand solidarity movement for Palestine has welcomed the International Criminal Court’s move to issue arrest warrants for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and former Israeli Defence Minister Yoav Gallant, saying it is a “wake up call” for the coalition government.

    “The warrants mean for the first time Israeli leaders face accountability for war crimes which have been live-streamed on social media for the past 13 months” said national chair John Minto of the Palestine Solidarity Network Aotearoa (PSNA).

    “We are waiting for our government to announce it will arrest Netanyahu and Gallant immediately if they set foot in Aotearoa New Zealand.”

    Many countries among the 124 members of the ICC have been quick to declare that they would honour the arrest obligations, among them Canada, France and Italy. Also the European Union’s foreign policy chief said all EU countries should abide by the ruling.

    “These decisions are binding on all states party to the Rome Statute, which includes all EU member states,” said Joseph Borrell.

    Both Israel and its key backer, United States, refuse to recognise the ICC jurisdiction.

    PSNA’s Minto said in a statement today: “It’s a breath of fresh air from the stultifying refusal of New Zealand and other Western governments to act against the perpetrators of industrial-scale slaughter of Palestinian civilians.

    “This ICC decision is a wake-up call for our government which can no longer stay silent.

    “New Zealand has been a staunch ally of the US/Israel throughout the past 13 months when it should have been a staunch defender of international law.

    “Unbelievably, our government still refuses to call for an immediate, permanent ceasefire and while it has condemned every act of Palestinian resistance, it has refused to condemn any of the egregious Israeli war crimes which are the subject of the arrest warrants.”

    In response to the ICC decision, New Zealand should immediately end support for Israel to continue its war crimes such as:

    • Suspend all satellite launches by Rocket lab for BlackSky Technology, Capella Space, and HawkEye 360. These companies provide imaging data used by Israeli for its targeting of civilian infrastructure in Gaza and Lebanon.
    • Suspend and independently investigate the export of crystal oscillators from Rakon Industries which end up in bombs used for war crimes in Gaza and Lebanon, and
    • Impose sanctions against Israel — they are also essential and the ICC decision can be the trigger.

    “New Zealand needs to act as we did when the ICC issued arrest warrants against Russian leader Vladimir Putin for the invasion of Ukraine” said Minto.

    “New Zealand imposed immediate and wide-ranging sanctions against Russia and must follow through with Israel.”

    This post was originally published on Asia Pacific Report.

  • Sanders praises arrest warrants for Israeli leaders and warns against ‘further barbarism’ over Gaza

    Asia Pacific Report

    Independent US Senator Bernie Sanders says he supports the International Criminal Court’s arrest warrants for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, former Defence Minister Yoav Gallant, and Hamas military commander Mohammed Deif, saying “all launched indiscriminate attacks against civilians and caused unimaginable human suffering”.

    “If the world does not uphold international law, we will descend into further barbarism,” he said in a post on X, alongside a longer statement.

    “I agree with the ICC,” Sanders added.

    His statement mirrored global reaction in favour of the ICC indictments in contrast to most US and Israeli politicians who condemned the global legal move to see accountability for the repeated and continuous Israeli atrocities in the besieged enclave Gaza.

    On Wednesday, Sanders sought to block US supplies of offensive weapons to Israel but his draft law was heavily defeated.

    The defendants are now internationally wanted suspects and ICC member states are under legal obligation to arrest them. Neither the US nor Israel recognise ICC jurisdiction.

    The court said it had issued arrest warrants for Netanyahu and Gallant for “crimes against humanity and war crimes committed from at least 8 October until at least 20 May, 2024” and which related to the use of starvation and the deliberate targeting of medical facilities.

    ‘Important precedent’
    Dr Francis Boyle, a professor of international law at the University of Illinois, called the ICC’s latest move a “very important precedent”.

    “In my opinion, if the ICC had prosecuted Israeli leaders after Operation Cast Lead . . .  maybe all of this could have been avoided, if prosecutions were initiated 15 years ago,” Boyle told Al Jazeera.

    Boyle said the Biden administration is guilty of “aiding and abetting Israeli war crimes, crimes against humanity, and outright genocide against the Palestinians”.

    He said this was a “far more serious genocide against the Palestinians in Gaza than was inflicted on the Bosnians,” referring to the timeframes of each genocide in comparison with the number of people killed.

    Israel is now “extending this to Lebanon, and it does appear the [occupied] West Bank is next in its sights,” Boyle said.

    “It’s a very serious situation.

    Israel ‘never respected rule of law’

    An international human rights lawyer, Michael Mansfield, described Israel is an “unjust state that has never respected the rule of law”.

    Israel was trying to “deflect responsibility” and its objective had been to destroy Gaza and make it “uninhabitable”, he said.

    Netanyahu would not end the war in Gaza, he said, until this objective was met.

    “If he ends the war, he is in trouble. He’s in trouble if he leaves the country … and if he stays in Israel . . . he’s awaiting prosecution there,” Mansfield said.

    The issuing of the ICC warrants “makes a difference to world opinion, because I don’t think that the regime in Israel have recognised the extent in which they are being isolated — morally isolated”, he said.

    This post was originally published on Asia Pacific Report.

  • ‘Wanted’ for war crimes over Gaza: Israel’s Netanyahu, Gallant face ICC arrest warrants

    Democracy Now!

    NERMEEN SHAIKH: In The Hague, the International Criminal Court has issued arrest warrants for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and former Defence Minister Yoav Gallant for crimes against humanity and war crimes committed during Israel’s assault on Gaza.

    In a statement, the ICC said the Israeli leaders had, “intentionally and knowingly deprived the civilian population in Gaza of objects indispensable to their survival, including food, water, and medicine and medical supplies, as well as fuel and electricity.”

    The ICC also issued an arrest warrant for Hamas military commander Mohammed Deif, although Israel’s military claims it killed Deif in a July airstrike.

    The ICC arrest warrants come a week after a UN special committee found Israel’s actions in Gaza since October 2023 are, “consistent with genocide,” including using starvation as a weapon of war and recklessly inflicting civilian casualties.

    AMY GOODMAN: In related news, on Wednesday, the United States vetoed a Gaza ceasefire resolution at the UN Security Council for the fourth time, and the US Senate rejected a resolution brought by Senator Bernie Sanders that sought to block the sale of US tank rounds, bomb kits and other lethal weapons to Israel. Nineteen senators supported blocking the arms.

    For more on all of this, we’re joined by Akbar Shahid Ahmed, senior diplomatic correspondent for HuffPost. His latest piece is “Exclusive: White House Says Democrats Who Oppose Weapons to Israel Are Aiding Hamas.”

    Ahmed, thank you so much for being with us. As you write your book on the Biden administration in Gaza called Crossing the Red Line, clearly the ICC has ruled that today by issuing arrest warrants for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, as well as the former Defence Minister Yoav Gallant.

    Can you talk about the significance of this move?

    AKBAR SHAHID AHMED: Yeah, Amy. This is just an absolutely huge development, and it’s significant for a number of reasons. It’s significant because the ICC has come out and amplified and affirmed the allegations of crimes against humanity, of war crimes. This is one more international body.

    These are . . . international charges with a great deal of respect. This is a court that most of the world is a member of. And they’re coming out and saying, “Look, we think there are reasonable grounds to believe that these major international red lines have been crossed by the Israelis.”

    What’s really important to remember is that this isn’t just a decision about Israel. By extension, it fundamentally is a decision about the United States, which has been the ultimate enabler of Israel’s offensives in Gaza and Lebanon, which are under consideration by the ICC.

    And even in this ICC statement today, they point out that in the situations where Israel has addressed concerns over what it describes as starvation as a method of warfare — right? — depriving civilians, Palestinians, of food, water and medical equipment, Israel has really only done so in an extremely arbitrary and, what the ICC judges call, conditional way in response to the US. So, fundamentally, Amy, what we’re seeing is the ICC is saying yet again that Israel and the US, as its major enabler and backer, are in the dark and will continue to be in the dark for years to come.

    This kind of adds to a broader picture in which there are now ICC warrants for the sitting Israeli prime minister and former Defence Minister Yoav Gallant, who remains a significant politician in Israel. Simultaneously, there’s the genocide case at the ICJ, the International Court of Justice, which is ongoing and will be ongoing for years to come.

    And there’s the Geneva Conventions conference underway next year regarding kind of similar issues — right? — violations of international law, laws of war and the Israeli grave abuses that are alleged. So, the US and Israel will be kind of on trial on the international stage for years to come.


    ‘Wanted for war crimes in Gaza.’        Video: Democracy Now!

    NERMEEN SHAIKH: So, Akbar, would you say that this move is mostly a symbolic one? Because, as you pointed out, of course, most countries are members of the International Criminal Court, but in this instance, perhaps most importantly, neither Israel nor the US are.

    AKBAR SHAHID AHMED: Right, Nermeen. And that’s something that the ICC judges did get into today — right? — because Israel said, “Look, the International Criminal Court doesn’t have jurisdiction over us.” That said, the state of Palestine is a member of the court, and that’s why this becomes a relevant and interesting thing, because you’ve seen European nations recognise Palestine as a state. You’ve seen Palestine join the United Nations General Assembly over just last year.

    So, yes, while the US and Israel continue to reject international scrutiny by the ICC, by the ICJ, of Israel’s conduct in Gaza and the occupied West Bank and Lebanon, there’s a growing international push to kind of challenge that, right?

    And I think you will see the Biden administration and the incoming Trump administration assertively push back against the ICC. The Trump administration did actually target the ICC directly when President Trump was last in office, threatening to put sanctions on ICC officials. And we also know from reporting that the Israelis have spied on and threatened the ICC themselves, according to reporting by The Guardian. So, yes, there will be increased pressure.

    But I think we’re really in a place that no one thought we would be even a few months ago, right? I think even the prospect of the ICC prosecutor successfully getting these warrants issued, it was initially thought that would be quite quick. It’s taken a long time. The fact that judges were able to issue those warrants suggests that even though it’s an uphill battle to get this international scrutiny, there’s a real determination and clear will.

    And we’ve seen a lot of states turn around and say over 13 months, right? Since the October 7 attack by Hamas within Israel that did spark this current round of fighting, there have been calls to say, “We don’t want this to escalate,” right?

    The US’s allies, Western countries have said, “We want to resolve this. We don’t want you on trial. Can the US and Israel please change course?” And what you’ve seen is a defiance from Tel Aviv and from Washington to say, “Actually, no, we’re continuing these wars.”

    So, that does take it to a different forum to kind of change the policy.

    NERMEEN SHAIKH: And, Akbar, could you also — while we’re looking at the way in which international organisations, multilateral ones, are responding to this, what about the latest vote at the Security Council and the fact that the US blocked it for the fourth time, a ceasefire vote?

    AKBAR SHAHID AHMED: It’s really striking at this point — right? — to see the Biden administration totally alone. And you see how this develops over the course of the war. Initially, the US was able to get Britain, even France, kind of abstaining, standing with them.

    And now, 13 months in, where conduct hasn’t changed, and you still have daily strikes that are killing dozens, sometimes over a hundred civilians, you have a mounting death toll of mostly women and children, the US is totally alone, where it’s shielding Israel on the world stage diplomatically.

    And this is really important to see in the context of the Biden administration as an outlier even among American presidents and administrations. When President Barack Obama was in office, after he was in the lame-duck period that Biden is in now, he actually did abstain at the UN Security Council and said, “You know what? Go ahead and pass a resolution that Israel doesn’t like,” because tacitly the US acknowledged there was a basis, there were credible grounds for that resolution, which in that instance was about Israeli settlement activity.

    Here, what you’re seeing from the Biden administration, even in their dying days — right? — two months to go, there’s an obstinacy, a defiance, and a real commitment to shielding Israel, even if they are totally alone against now their closest allies — Britain, France and everyone else on the Security Council.

    So, I think the context of that veto kind of presages whatever may come in the next two months in terms of the Biden administration allowing any UN scrutiny of the wars.

    AMY GOODMAN: Akbar, I want to play Palestine’s envoy to the United Nations, Majed Bamya, speaking yesterday.

    MAJED BAMYA: There is no right to mass killing of civilians. There is no right to starve an entire civilian population. There is no right to forcibly displace a people. And there is no right to annexation. This is what Israel is doing in Gaza. …

    Maybe for some, we have the wrong nationality, the wrong faith, the wrong skin color. But we are humans! And we should be treated as such. Is there a UN Charter for Israel that is different from the charter we all have? Tell us. Is there an international law for them, an international law for us? Do they have the right to kill, and the only right we have is to die?

    Republished under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 United States Licence.

    This post was originally published on Asia Pacific Report.