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Amnesty Finds Evidence Confirming Atrocities in Jenin & Elsewhere
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Amnesty
International Secretary General Irene Khan views destruction in
Jenin.
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By Ayesha Ahmad, IOL Washington Correspondent
WASHINGTON,
May 2 (IslamOnline) - An Amnesty International delegate returning from
Israel and the Occupied Territories on Wednesday, May 1, said his
organization found evidence confirming reports of human rights
violations by Israeli occupation soldiers in the West Bank refugee
camp of Jenin and elsewhere.
"Jenin
was really a confirmation what we have known already," said Kamal
Samari, a senior press officer who accompanied Amnesty's secretary
general Irene Khan on this weekend's delegation.
Although
Khan, Samari and other delegates have returned, teams of investigators
remain in the region.
Samari
said that Amnesty found confirmation of "vast… and extensive
demolition of part of the camp… we called it ground zero because
houses were really flattened."
Since
March 29, Israel has continued a massive military offensive in
Palestinian territories in defiance of calls from the United Nations
and the United States - its strongest ally - to withdraw and to cease
further incursions.
"We
have told the Israelis to refrain from further incursions," a
senior U.S. State Department official said Wednesday.
Jenin
has become a kind of catchword for the bloody incursions that continue
unabated; on April 19, the UN Security Council passed resolution 1405,
reaffirming previous resolutions calling for Israeli withdrawal from
Palestinian territories and welcoming the initiative taken by UN
Secretary-General Kofi Annan in trying to establish a fact-finding
mission to Jenin.
But
Annan announced Wednesday that he would be disbanding the mission,
after repeated rejections and delays by Israeli authorities, who
initially accepted the idea but then insisted that the team was
unfairly biased towards Palestinians because of the humanitarian focus
of some of its members.
"It
is in the interests of the Israeli government to have a UN fact
finding mission if, as they have claimed, they have nothing to
hide," Samari told IslamOnline, saying that people would only
become more suspicious if no one was allowed to investigate.
A
senior State Department official speaking on condition of anonymity
echoed this sentiment, saying that the U.S. had always told Israel it
was in Israel's interests to allow a fact-finding mission to enter
Jenin.
"We're
still interested in trying to make sure there is an objective
assessment of the facts in Jenin," the official said. "We do
think it's important for the facts to come out."
He
added, however, that the U.S. had no backup plans in case the UN
mission was canceled, as it has been now.
Samari
said that the Amnesty delegation spoke with witnesses and relatives of
victims in Jenin who "explained to us the circumstances where
they have lost their loved ones."
"We
had confirmation from the hospital that yes, there was denial of
access to medical assistance. We have also confirmation for what was
always known - that there was a denial of humanitarian
assistance."
Earlier
this week, U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell claimed that he had
not found any evidence of a "massacre" in Jenin.
Palestinians say that hundreds had been massacred in that one camp
alone, while Israelis denied the accusation, claiming that only
"dozens" had been killed, most of whom were resistance
fighters.
State
Department spokesman Richard Boucher reiterated the Secretary's
position Wednesday, saying that, "We don't have indications of
that [a massacre] but as the Secretary said, we do think it's
important to determine the facts about the recent events."
In
reporting his own experience, Samari said that Amnesty never used the
word "massacre" because there is no international legal
definition of the word.
"People
who would like to play with words here are trying to either exaggerate
the facts or deny the facts, and those are wrong," he said.
"We are talking about facts here. There were gross human rights
violations, including war crimes according to the Geneva Convention.
What we know is that we have evidence of gross human rights
violations."
He
said that only an international inquiry could determine the numbers
accurately.
Samari
stressed, however, that Jenin was not the only place where human
rights violations occurred.
"There
are also many other forgotten human rights violations elsewhere, in
Nablus, in Tulkarem. Yes, it was a scenery of devastation," he
said.
"People
are talking only about Jenin... yesterday there was an incursion in
Hebron," he said, adding that Amnesty already had a team of
investigators there as well.
"Thousands
of people have been detained and don't have any contact with their
lawyers," he added, explaining that the Israeli army had
acknowledged having about 2,500 Palestinians under arbitrary
detention.
"People
are focused on Jenin events, but there are many other human rights
violations that are forgotten."
Samari
told IslamOnline that the delegation also visited Israeli victims of
Palestinian attacks in Tel Aviv on Monday, saying that Amnesty
"never made any distinction between victims… There is no
justification for killing of innocent civilians, be they Palestinian
or Israeli."
"We
met with Israeli citizens, representatives of civil society, we heard
how the Israelis are living in fear and concern," he said.
"We
also heard from the Palestinians, how they feel frustration and they
feel the impact of the occupation on them. We always had said and
repeated that there will be no military solution to this kind of
conflict.
"But any
sustainable peace should be built on respect of human rights of all,
and human rights must be the agenda."
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