Day: 31 August 2022

The Presidency today warned any harm resulting from Israeli brutal measures against Palestinian prisoners in Israeli custody would implode the situation.

The Presidency stated in a press statement that any harm to the prisoners resulting from the Israeli Prison Service (IPS) brutal measures would explode the situation not only inside prisons, but also outside them, while reiterating that such measures contravene all international humanitarian instruments and norms, particularly the Fourth Geneva Convention.

It held the Israeli government fully responsible for the lives of all prisoners while adding that the Palestinian leadership and people stand by the prisoners in their battle to defend their dignity at a time when Israel continues its disregard for international law by its intransigent position of choosing to crackdown on the prisoners.

It said that President Mahmoud Abbas was closely following up on the prisoners’ suffering and would keep their issue high on the agenda while noting that he would demand the world during his upcoming UNGA speech to assume its responsibilities, especially that Israel was persisting in its intransigence and arrogance, and continues its unilateral policies of raids, colonial settlement construction, encroachments upon holy sites, home demolitions and extrajudicial killings, among others.

The statement concluded by hailing the prisoners as heroes and symbols of the Palestinian people and taking pride in their steadfastness.

Source: Palestinian News & Info Agency (WAFA)

Google employees have protested their company’s $1.2 billion contract with the Israeli government and military called Project Nimbus, which aims to silence and profile pro-Palestine voices in the high-tech company and around the world.

“Google’s Project Nimbus will be an ugly moment in Google’s history and shameful and embarrassing engagement,” said one employee who preferred to remain anonymous in fear of retaliation.

“I have found Google’s Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion program to be a whitewash, it’s more of a tool for censorship and control than for truly supporting employees,” said another.

One Jewish employee of Google, Ariel Koren, said she has decided to quit Google, where she worked for over seven years, due to retaliation against her for protesting Project Nimbus

“My name is Ariel Koren. I am a Jewish Google worker who has worked at Google for over seven years. I feel so grateful to over 700 Googlers (alongside 25,000 people externally) who recently signed a petition calling on Google to rescind its act of retaliation against me for protesting Google’s Project Nimbus—a $1.2 billion contract between Google, Amazon, and the Israeli government and military,” wrote Koren.

“I have consistently witnessed that instead of supporting diverse employees looking to make Google a more ethical company, Google systematically silences Palestinian, Jewish, Arab, and Muslim voices concerned about Google’s complicity in violations of Palestinian human rights — to the point of formally retaliating against workers and creating an environment of fear. In my experience, silencing dialogue and dissent in this way has helped Google protect its business interests with the Israeli military and government. I encourage Googlers to read up on Project Nimbus and to take action at go/Drop-Nimbus,” she wrote.

In May 2021, right in the middle of the Israeli military violence against Gaza, Google quietly announced its most important support of Israel’s violence: Project Nimbus, a $1.2 billion cloud computing contract between Google, Amazon, and the Israeli government and military. While details are intentionally scarce, the agreement says Google will help construct data centers and provide cloud infrastructure to several Israeli government agencies, including Israel’s military, and the Israel Land Authority, which is the agency responsible for stealing more Palestinians’ land for illegal Israeli settlements.

What is worse, the contract explicitly prevents Google from shutting down its services in the future, including in the event of employee protest. The contract explicitly makes the company powerless to stop its services regardless of whether Israel uses the technology to aid human rights violations.

Documents reported on by The Intercept show that through Project Nimbus, Google will provide advanced AI tools to Israel. The Nimbus training documents emphasize “the ‘faces, facial landmarks, emotions’-detection capabilities of Google’s Cloud Vision API,” and in one Nimbus training webinar, a Google engineer confirmed for an Israeli customer that it would be possible to “process data through Nimbus in order to determine if someone is lying”.

It is clear that the tools provided through Nimbus have the potential to expand Israel’s pattern of surveillance, racial profiling, and other forms of tech-assisted human rights violations despite the world’s largest search engine knowledge that it is contracting with a military actively carrying out war crimes and upholding apartheid, while workers have no say in how the technology provided is used.

Source: Palestinian News & Info Agency (WAFA)

Prime Minister Mohammad Shtayyeh stressed the need for the United States to fulfill its promises with regard to Palestine and to support Palestine’s admission to the United Nations as a full member state.

This came during a meeting this evening at Shtayyeh’s office in Ramallah with United States envoy Hady Amr, during which Shtayyeh reiterated the need for an American political will to support the Palestinian side, and the implementation of US pledges, particularly the reopening of the US consulate in Jerusalem in order to protect the two-state solution.

The prime minister stressed that the Palestinian people and leadership are facing considerable pressure; on the one hand Israel’s escalation of its unprecedented repressive measures, including the incursions into al-Aqsa mosque, arrests, extrajudicial killings, and appropriation of land, and the lack of a political horizon and the difficult financial situation on the other.

“We seek to revive the political file again by requesting to become a full state membership at the UN in light of the absence of political initiatives to resolve the Palestinian issue,” said Shtayyeh, calling on the US to not disrupt these efforts and to recognize the State of Palestine.

The premier briefed the US envoy on the progress in implementing the financial and administrative reform agenda, and steps taken in various fields to reduce expenditures and face the financial crisis.

He also briefed the US envoy on the financial challenges caused by the illegal Israeli deductions of Palestinian tax revenues and the decline in international assistance.

They further discussed ways of making the upcoming Ad Hoc Liaison Committee (AHLC) meeting a success.

Source: Palestinian News & Info Agency (WAFA)

Palestinian detainee in Israeli jails, Khalil Awawda, suspended tonight his 172-day hunger strike after reaching an agreement with Israel to set a ceiling for his administrative detention and to be released on October 2, according to the Detainees and Ex-Detainees Affairs Commission.

Awawda, whose detention was suspended last week but not entirely ended which prompted him to reject it and continue with his hunger strike, will remain in hospital to recover after suffering serious deterioration on his health, according to the Palestinian Prisoner Society.

Awawda, a father of four girls, and detained since December 27 of last year after which he was slammed with administrative detention for six months, resumed his hunger strike on July 2 after suspending it earlier after 111 days of strike based on promises to release him before the occupation authority has reneged on its promise and renewed his administrative detention for four more months.

Over the years, Israel has placed thousands of Palestinians in administrative detention for prolonged periods of time, without trying them, without informing them of the charges against them, and without allowing them or their counsel to examine the evidence.

Source: Palestinian News & Info Agency (WAFA)

Israeli police tonight suppressed a sit-in in the city of Ramla in Israel held in condemnation of Israel’s policy of administrative detention as well as in support of Palestinian administrative detainee, Khalil Awawda, who has been on a hunger strike for 172 days demanding his release.

Israeli police attacked protesters and detained two people, according to the Arab 48 website.

Lawyers and human rights defenders participated in the sit-in, which was held in front of Assaf Harofeh Hospital in Tel Aviv, where Palestinian prisoner Khalil Awawdeh is being treated due to a severe deterioration on his health.

Palestinian administrative detainee Khalil Awawdeh is suffering from an acute case of dyspnea and severe problems in all his vitals due to his continued hunger strike. His time is rapidly running out, Euro-Med Monitor said in a statement today.

Awawdeh’s health condition has become more critical than ever as he has been on hunger strike since 3 March (more than 170 days) in protest of the Israeli authorities’ refusal to release him.

Source: Palestinian News & Info Agency (WAFA)