all your saints pray to sinners

If you're watching this pre recorded report, then Al Jazeera has been banned in the territory of Israel. [...] Let me just take you through some of the definitions within the law: they have banned our website including anything that has the option of entering or accessing the website, even passwords that are needed, [...] whether it's stored on Israeli servers or outside of Israel. The website is now inaccessible. They're also banning any device used for providing content, that includes my mobile phone. If I use that to do any kind of news gathering, then the Israelis can simply confiscate it. Our internet access provider, the guy that simply hosts aljazeera.net is also in danger of being fined if they host the website. The Al Jazeera TV channel is completely banned. Transmission by any kind of content provider is also banned. And holding offices or operating them in the territory by the channel [is banned].

ALT

View on Twitter

Israeli organ-trafficking network busted in Turkiye

Israel has long been at the center of international organ trafficking networks and has stolen organs from dead Palestinians

The Cradle

Police in the Turkish city of Adana detained 11 suspects, five Israeli and two Syrian, on allegations of organ trafficking, the Daily Sabah reported on 5 May. The Provincial Directorate of Security's Anti-Smuggling and Border Gates Branch began investigating after examining the passports of seven individuals who arrived in Adana from Israel about a month ago by plane for the purpose of health tourism. The two Syrian nationals, ages 20 and 21, were found to have fake passports. Further investigation revealed that Syrian nationals had each agreed to sell one of their own kidneys to two of the Israeli nationals, ages 68 and 28, for kidney transplants in Adana. During searches at the suspects' residences, $65,000 and numerous fake passports were seized. Israel has long been at the center of what Bloomberg described in 2011 as a “sprawling global black market in organs where brokers use deception, violence, and coercion to buy kidneys from impoverished people, mainly in underdeveloped countries, and then sell them to critically ill patients in more-affluent nations.” The financial newspaper added, “Many of the black-market kidneys harvested by these gangs are destined for people who live in Israel.” The organ-trafficking network extends from former Soviet Republics such as Azerbaijan, Belarus, Ukraine, and Moldova to Brazil, the Philippines, South Africa, and beyond, the Bloomberg investigation showed. Accusations of Israeli involvement in organ trafficking also apply to the occupied Palestinian territories. In 2009, Sweden's largest daily newspaper, Aftonbladet, reported testimony that the Israeli army was kidnapping and murdering Palestinians to harvest their organs. The report quotes Palestinian claims that young men from the occupied West Bank and Gaza Strip had been seized by the Israeli army, and their bodies returned to the families with missing organs. "'Our sons are used as involuntary organ donors,' relatives of Khaled from Nablus said to me, as did the mother of Raed from Jenin as well as the uncles of Machmod and Nafes from Gaza, who all had disappeared for a few days and returned by night, dead and autopsied," wrote Donald Bostrom, the author of the report.Bostrom also cites an incident of alleged organ theft during the the first Palestinian intifada in 1992. He says that the Israeli army abducted a young man known for throwing stones at Israeli troops in the Nablus area. The young man was shot in the chest, both legs, and the stomach before being taken to a military helicopter, which transported him to an unknown location. Five nights later, Bostrom said, the young man's body was returned, wrapped in green hospital sheets. Israel’s Channel 2 TV reported that in the 1990s, specialists at Abu Kabir Forensic Medicine Institute harvested skin, corneas, heart valves, and bones from the bodies of Israeli soldiers, Israeli citizens, Palestinians, and foreign workers without permission from relatives. The Israeli military confirmed that the practice took place, but claimed, "This activity ended a decade ago and does not happen any longer." Israel’s assault on Gaza since 7 October has provided further opportunities for the theft and harvesting of Palestinians’ organs. On 30 January, WAFA news agency reported that the Israeli army returned the bodies of 100 Palestinian civilians it had stolen from hospitals and cemeteries in various areas in Gaza. According to medical sources, inspection of some of the bodies showed that organs were missing from some of them. On 18 January, the Times of Israel reported that the Israeli army confirmed reports that its soldiers dug up graves in a Gaza cemetery, claiming its soldiers were trying to “confirm that the bodies of hostages were not buried there.”

ALT

View on Twitter

Fearful Netanyahu scrambles to prevent ICC arrest warrant: Report

An Israeli analyst said that the US is engaged in Israel’s efforts to block the ICC from issuing a warrant against the premier

The Cradle

The US is involved in a diplomatic effort to prevent the International Criminal Court (ICC) from issuing an arrest warrant against Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, according to Hebrew media reports. Haaretz analyst Amos Harel said on 28 April that Washington is “already” engaged in efforts to block the ICC warrant against Netanyahu. The prime minister is reportedly in a state of extreme anxiety over the matter. Israeli journalist Ben Caspit wrote that Netanyahu is “under unusual stress” over the possibility of an arrest warrant being issued against him by the UN tribunal at the Hague, adding that he is leading a “nonstop push over the telephone” to prevent it. Both Washington and Tel Aviv are not among the 124 states that signed the ICC Rome Statute of 1998, which established genocide as one of four major international crimes, along with war crimes, crimes against humanity, and crimes of aggression. Hebrew newspaper Maariv newspaper also reported that Netanyahu is fearful of the prospect of an ICC warrant against him. Sources close to the matter told the newspaper that Netanyahu has made an extensive number of phone calls to international leaders and officials, particularly US President Joe Biden, in an attempt to prevent the issuance of an arrest warrant against him and that the Israeli prime minister is indirectly trying to pressure Biden to act against the ICC. “Netanyahu realizes that the international arrest warrant could make him subject to prosecution and detainment, so he attempts to thwart its issuance daily,” the sources said. The sources also did not rule out the possibility that the recent shift in the Israeli position regarding a prisoner exchange and ceasefire deal, which now appears to be in favor of an agreement, is part of efforts to avoid the ICC warrant.