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Newsletter : 9fax0929.txt
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>JN Sept. 29, 1999, Vol. 7, No. 180
Israel Admits Training Guards at Lebanese POW Prison
By Ross Dunn (VOA-Jerusalem)
Israel has acknowledged for the first time that it is directly involved with a notorious jail in southern Lebanon -- a jail that holds more than 100 Lebanese prisoners of war.
Israel admitted publicly that its secret police and military officers are training guards and giving financial support to the El Khiam prison in southern Lebanon.
The jail is used by Israel's ally, the South Lebanese Army, to imprison terrorist fighters from militant Islamic groups, particularly the Hizbullah or Party of God.
Hizbullah has been involved in an ongoing campaign to drive Israel and the S-L-A out of their self-declared security zone, established in 1985 to protect Israel's northern communities from cross-border attacks.
But Israel has never before acknowledged its involvement with the El Khiam prison. A researcher with Israel's human rights group B'tselem, Ezekiel Lein, told V-O-A the conditions at the jail are poor and 14 inmates who may have been tortured to death.
The admission that Israel is directly involved in the prison's operations came in a signed statement by the head of Israel's army operations, Major General Dan Halutz.
The statement was in response to a petition by Israel's Association for Civil Rights and the Moked, the Center for the Defense of the Individual, on behalf of four El Khiam prisoners.
The two groups have demanded that Israel's High Court order Israel to release the inmates immediately or allow representatives of the two human rights organizations to visit the jail.
Teacher Can't Stand to Look at a Student
By IsraelWire
The mother of an 8-year-old northern Israel resident says her daughter's teacher will not permit the little girl to remain in school due to her non-contagious chronic skin disease. "She cannot stand to look at my daughter's face."
The child has been diagnosed as having a non-contagious skin
disease but her mother acknowledges that her complexion is
offensive to some. The problem began when the girl entered first
grade last year. This year, the teacher will not permit the girl to
remain in the classroom for more than two hours daily.
"It is not acceptable at the end of the 20th century that a school
and a teacher be permitted to discriminate against a girl like they
are doing to my daughter," stated the mother.
The ministry of education has indicated officials are looking into
the case and will do whatever necessary to guarantee the girl
receives the hours of learning and any and all other assistance
that she is entitled to under the law.
Israel's Bedouin (Part One)
By Susan Sappir (VOA-Lakiya, Israel)
In just a few decades, the Bedouin tribes living in Israel's Negev desert have had to give up their ancient ways and adjust to modern life. Two or three decades ago, they looked just like the storybooks said they should -- long robes and headdresses, living in tents, and riding camels.
Today, camels have all but disappeared from the Negev landscape. Stone or cinderblock houses and shanties have sprung up, and men and women in Western or traditional clothing drive around in cars and pickup trucks.
The transition of these Bedouin from their ancient, nomadic lifestyle to modern ways has been traumatic. The move from camps to villages has broken down the old social structures that served the Bedouin for thousands of years.
A new generation of leaders is coming up and fighting for equal services and equal rights. Taleb Al-Sanah represents the country's 120,000 Bedouin in the Israeli parliament. His own life story reflects his people's journey. Al-Sanah grew up in a tent in a remote corner of the Negev. He is one of 22 children, born of his father's two wives. When he was 14 his tribe moved to a more centrally located settlement. Today Al-Sanah lives in a modern stone house in his village and has earned a reputation for his fiery rhetoric.
He blames Israel for trying to eradicate Bedouin culture and notes the government has forced the Bedouin off most of their former grazing land and into seven towns. He accuses Israel of persecuting the Bedouin by denying basic services to those who remain dispersed outside of those towns.
Poverty and hardship are the reality for most of the Bedouins, in or out of the towns. Their unemployment rate is the highest in the country at 35 percent. Their school dropout rate is 60 percent. Infant mortality is four times the national rate and their birth rate is one of the world's highest.
A group of young professionals in the community is working for change by encouraging more Bedouin men and women to get higher education. The El-Khwarizmi Association includes doctors, lawyers, engineers, teachers and social workers. The El-Khwarizmi activists believe investing in the education of women is the key to the future. And they have found teenage girls to be better students than males in every subject, including math.
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