Is Ireland facilitating possible genocide at Shannon?

international | crime and justice | news report

Saturday January 10, 2009 19:35

by Shannonwatch

4 Hercules C 130 US military aircraft refuelled at Shannon over the past 48 hours

Israel has been using a huge amount of munitions and explosives in its assault on Gaza. War crimes have been committed during this assault in which over 800 Palestinian people have been killed including as many as 250 children. Over the past 48 hours four Hercules military aircraft landed and were refuelled at Shannon airport. Their destination is not yet known, but in recent times only about four military aircraft were refuelled at Shannon per month. The possibility exists that Israel is being resupplies with munitions expended in its murderous attacks on Palestinians by aircraft transiting through Ireland and Irish airspace with the permission of the Irish Government.

US Hercules,

Given that almost six millions Jewish people were killed in the genocide committed in German death camps, known as the Holocaust.
I might seem outrageous to now accuse the Jewish Israeli Government of genocide against the Palestinian people. However, an examination of the Genocide Convention 1948 reveals that Israel may well be in serious breach of several aspects of the Genocide Convention in its treatment of and attacks on the Palestinian people since 1948, and in particular in its most recent attacks on Gaza.

Israel is one of the 142 countries that have ratified the Genocide Convention 1948. Given the horrific Jewish experiences of the Holocaust Israel should be one of the strongest supporters of the Genocide Convention, and should be exemplary in its compliance and enforcement of this convention. Yet a study of the behaviour of the state of Israel since its foundation in 1948 shows that the treatment of the Palestinian people by the Israeli state has been in breach of the spirit and in some cases the letter of international laws on genocide. The full title of the convention is: Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide. Its first two articles are:
Article I: The Contracting Parties confirm that genocide, whether committed in time of peace or in time of war, is a crime under international law which they undertake to prevent and to punish.
Article II: In the present Convention, genocide means any of the following acts committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious groups, as such:
a. Killing members of the group;
b. Causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of the group.
c. Deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life calculated to bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part;
d. Imposing measures intended to prevent births within the group;
e. Forcibly transferring children of the group to another group.

Israel has been in very serious breach of Article II especially, including in the following respects:
1. The virtual ethnic cleansing of hundreds of thousands of Palestinians from their lands and homes in 1948, and is subsequent conflicts, and by other means including restrictive planning, purchase, and destruction of property including farm land and crops.
2. The deliberate targeting of religious buildings particularly Mosques.
3. The killing of large numbers of the Palestinian group in a very disproportionate manner (approximately 100:1) contrary to Article II a.
4. Causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of the group, contrary to Article II b.
5. Deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life calculated to bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part, contrary to Article II c.
In recent years prominent national leaders and others from several countries, including, Serbia, Bosnia, Croatia, Rwanda and Liberia, have been brought before international courts for crimes against humanity. The leaders of Israel should be no exception, and if any Palestinian leaders have been involved in crimes against humanity, they should also face trial before international courts.

Given the above legal situation, it behoves the Irish Government and the Irish people to ensure that Ireland and its territory and airspace are in no way being used to facilitate or be complicit in war crimes that may amout to acts of genocide.