(1) Israeli Forces Kill Dozens In Gaza As US Embassy Opens In Jerusalem
(2) Israeli forces kill dozens in Gaza protests as anger mounts over US embassy move to Jerusalem
(3) Al-Quaeda leader Zawahiri calls for Jihad on eve of US embassy move to Jerusalem
(4) Israeli forces kill at least 52 Palestinians protesting in Gaza as US moves embassy to Jerusalem
(1) Israeli Forces Kill Dozens In Gaza As US Embassy Opens In Jerusalem
by Nidal al-Mughrabi AND Jeffrey Heller
Writing by Jeffrey Heller; Editing by Angus MacSwan
05/14/18 AT 10:59 AM
Reuters
GAZA/JERUSALEM - Israeli troops killed dozens of Palestinians who were taking part in mass protests on the Gaza border on Monday as the United States opened its embassy to Israel in Jerusalem.
The U.S. move fulfilled a pledge by President Donald Trump, who has recognized the holy city as the Israeli capital, but it has fired Palestinian anger and drawn criticism from many foreign governments as a set back to peace efforts.
“Today we open the United States Embassy in Jerusalem, Israel,” U.S. Ambassador to Israel David Friedman said at the inaugural ceremony, attended by a U.S. delegation from Washington and Israeli leaders.
Trump, in a tweet, called it “A great day for Israel”.
On the Gaza border, at least 41 Palestinians were killed by Israeli gunfire in the latest in a round of protests dubbed the “Great March of Return”, health officials said.
It was the highest Palestinian death toll in a single day since a series of protests began at the border with Israel on March 30, and since the 2014 Gaza war.
The health officials said 900 Palestinians were wounded, about 450 of them by live bullets.
Tens of thousands had streamed to the coastal enclave’s land border, some approaching the Israeli fence - a line Israeli leaders said Palestinians would not be allowed to breach. Clouds of black smoke from tyres set alight by demonstrators rose in the air.
Demonstrators, some armed with slingshots, hurled stones at the Israeli security forces, who fired volleys of tear gas and intense rounds of gunfire.
“Today is the big day when we will cross the fence and tell Israel and the world we will not accept being occupied forever,” said Gaza science teacher Ali, who declined to give his last name.
Trump’s recognition of contested Jerusalem as Israel’s capital in December outraged Palestinians, who said the United States could no longer serve as an honest broker in any peace process with Israel.
Palestinians seek East Jerusalem as the capital of a state they want to establish in the occupied West Bank and the Gaza Strip.
Israel regards all of the city, including the eastern sector it captured in the 1967 Middle East war and annexed, as its “eternal and indivisible capital” in a move that has not won international recognition.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, in lockstep with Trump over fulfilling a long-standing U.S. promise to move the embassy to the holy city and over Washington’s withdrawal from the Iran nuclear deal last week, hailed the move.
“What a moving day for the people of Israel and the State of Israel,” Netanyahu said.
(2) Israeli forces kill dozens in Gaza protests as anger mounts over US embassy move to Jerusalem
http://www.abc.net.au/news/2018-05-14/israeli-forces-kill-protesters-in-gaza-as-anger-mounts/9760132
Israeli forces have killed dozens of Palestinians along the Gaza border, health officials say, with angry protesters streaming to the frontier to protest against the United States opening its embassy in Jerusalem.
At least 41 people had died as of 12:30am on Tuesday (AEST) and more than 1000 people had been injured in the fighting, about 450 of them by live bullets.
It is the highest Palestinian death toll in a single day since a series of protests dubbed the Great March of Return began at the border with Israel on March 30, and since the 2014 Gaza war.
Senior White House adviser, and the US President's daughter, Ivanka Trump, officially opened the relocated embassy.
"On behalf of the 45th President of the United States of America, we welcome you officially, and for the first time, to the embassy of the United States here in Jerusalem, the capital of Israel," she said.
The decision to move the U.S. embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem has been opposed by many in the international community who fear recognition of Jerusalem as Israel's capital jeopardises prospects for a two-state solution.
It came as protests intensified on the 70th anniversary of Israel's founding, with loudspeakers on Gaza mosques urging Palestinians to join a "great march of return".
Black smoke from tyres burned by demonstrators rose into the air at the border.
"Today is the big day when we will cross the fence and tell Israel and the world we will not accept being occupied forever," said Gaza science teacher Ali, who declined to give his last name.
"Many may get martyred today, so many, but the world will hear our message. Occupation must end."
Among the Palestinians killed on Monday were a 14-year-old boy and a man in a wheelchair.
The man in the wheelchair had been pictured on social media using a slingshot.
The latest casualties raised the Palestinian death toll to 84 since the protests began on March 30. No Israeli casualties have been reported.
The killings have drawn international criticism, but the United States, which has angered the Palestinians and Arab powers by relocating its embassy to Jerusalem from Tel Aviv, has echoed Israel in accusing Gaza's ruling Hamas movement of instigating violence, an allegation it denies.
Later in the day, Israeli leaders and a US delegation including Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin and President Donald Trump's daughter and son-in-law, Ivanka Trump and Jared Kushner, are due to attend the opening of the embassy.
"What a moving day for the people of Israel and the State of Israel," Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said.
Jason Greenblatt, Mr Trump's Middle East peace envoy, said on Twitter that "taking the long-overdue step of moving our Embassy is not a departure from our strong commitment to facilitate a lasting peace deal. Rather, it is a necessary condition for it."
But Palestinian Prime Minister Rami Hamdallah said Mr Trump's recognition of Jerusalem as Israel's capital in December and the relocation of the embassy were "blatant violations of international law".
The Palestinians, who want their own future state with its capital in East Jerusalem, have been outraged by Mr Trump's shift from previous administrations' preference for keeping the US embassy in Tel Aviv pending progress in peace efforts.
Those talks have been frozen since 2014.
Other international powers have been worried the US move would inflame Palestinian unrest in the occupied West Bank, which Israel captured along with East Jerusalem in the 1967 Middle East war.
Israeli Opposition Leader Isaac Herzog said he was adamantly supportive of a two-state solution, namely the creation of a Palestinian state side-by-side with Israel.
"A demilitarised state where we enjoy full peace and security — and security is a must," he said.
"Our security interest must be met under such a deal.
"Right now it looks far away, but I think the Palestinian political system, which is right now bust, has to pick up its act and move forward."
Israel's military dropped leaflets into the enclave on Monday, warning Palestinians "not to serve as a tool of Hamas" or approach or damage Israel's frontier fence.
But thousands of Palestinians massed at five locations along the line.
The reality of a two-state solution
The two peoples with the most at stake simply cannot negotiate to make it happen. At least their leaders can't, writes the ABC's Phil Williams.
Of the people wounded by Israeli gunfire, four were journalists, officials said.
The Israeli military says its troops are defending the border and firing in accordance with the rules of engagement.
"We are prepared to face the Hamas threats to disrupt the [embassy] festivities," Israeli Defence Minister Avigdor Lieberman tweeted.
"My recommendation to the residents of Gaza: Don't be blinded by [Hamas's Gaza leader, Yehya Al-] Sinwar, who is sending your children to sacrifice their lives without any utility.
"We will defend our citizens with all measures and will not allow the fence to be crossed."
The protests are scheduled to culminate on Tuesday, the day Palestinians mourn as the "Nakba" or "Catastrophe" when, in 1948, hundreds of thousands of them were driven out of their homes or fled the fighting around Israel's creation.
"Choosing a tragic day in Palestinian history (to open the Jerusalem embassy) shows great insensibility and disrespect for the core principles of the peace process," Mr Hamdallah wrote.
Most countries say the status of Jerusalem — a sacred city to Jews, Muslims and Christians — should be determined in a final peace settlement and that moving their embassies now would prejudge any such deal.
Reuters/ABC
(3) Al-Quaeda leader Zawahiri calls for Jihad on eve of US embassy move to Jerusalem
Zawahiri calls for jihad on eve of US embassy move to Jerusalem
AFP May 13, 2018
Al-Qaeda leader Ayman al-Zawahiri on Sunday said America's decision to shift its Israeli embassy to Jerusalem was evidence that negotiations and "appeasement" have failed Palestinians as he urged Muslims carry out jihad against the United States.
In a five-minute video entitled "Tel Aviv is Also a Land of Muslims," the Egyptian doctor who took charge of the global terror group after its founder Osama bin Laden was killed in 2011 referred to the Palestinian Authority as the "sellers of Palestine" while urging followers to take up arms.
US President Donald Trump "was clear and explicit, and he revealed the true face of the modern Crusade, where standing down and appeasement does not work with them, bu t only resistance through the call and jihad," Zawahiri said, according to a transcript provided by the SITE monitoring agency.
He added that Bin Laden had declared the US "the first enemy of the Muslims, and swore that it will not dream of security until it is lived in reality in Palestine, and until all the armies of disbelief leave the land of Muhammad."
He argued that Islamic countries had failed to act in Muslims' interests by entering into the United Nations, which recognizes Israel, and submitting to Security Council and General Assembly resolutions instead of sharia (Islamic law).
Israelis were basking in national pride and pro-American fervor Sunday as tens of thousands marched in Jerusalem, a day ahead of the controversial US embassy move from Tel Aviv to the disputed city. Palestinians readied for their own protests on Monday over the embassy's inauguration, including another mass demonstration in the Gaza Strip near the border with Israel.
The embassy move will take place on the 70th anniversary of Israel's founding, while the following day Palestinians will mark the Nakba, or "catastrophe", commemorating the more than 700,000 Palestinians who fled or were expelled in the 1948 war surrounding Israel's creation.
Top US officials have meanwhile insisted they could still push forward the troubled peace process despite outrage across the Arab world.
Asked in an interview with Fox News Sunday about whether there was any life left in the peace process, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo responded by saying "the peace process is most decidedly not dead."
"We're hard at work on it. We hope we can achieve a successful outcome there as well," said Pompeo whose first two weeks in office have been largely consumed with arranging a summit between Trump and North Korean leader Kim Jong Un.
(4) Israeli forces kill at least 52 Palestinians protesting in Gaza as US moves embassy to Jerusalem
https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2018/04/gaza-protest-latest-updates-180406092506561.html
May 14, 2018
At least 52 Palestinians were killed on Monday in Gaza and more than 2400 others wounded as the Israeli army fired live ammunition, tear gas and firebombs at protesters assembled along several points near the fence with Israel.
The demonstrations, which coincided with protests against the opening of the US embassy in Jerusalem, are part of a weeks-long protest calling for the right of return for Palestinian refugees to the areas they were forcibly expelled from in 1948.
Since the protests began on March 30, Israeli forces have killed at least 90 Palestinians in the coastal enclave and wounded close to 10,500 people.
The protest comes ahead of the annual commemorations of the Nakba, or "catastrophe", when the state of Israel was established on May 15, 1948, in a violent campaign that led to the expulsion of hundreds of thousands of Palestinians from their villages.
Latest updates as of Monday, May 14:
Palestinian UN ambassador calls for emergency Security Council meeting
Riyad Mansour, the Palestinian Authority's UN ambassador, has condemned Israeli strikes on unarmed Palestinians in Gaza.
Speaking at a press conference in New York, Mansour described America's decision to open its embassy in Jerusalem as "very tragic."
"We will use all of our available rights in the security council to see it shouldering its responsibility to condemn this massacre and bring those responsible to justice," said Mansour.
"Very tragic that they (America) are celebrating illegal action while Israel is injuring and killing thousands of Palestinians."
"Tragic day for Palestinians and shame on those who ignore the pain and suffering of the Palestinian people."
Calls for blood donations
The Palestinian Ministry of Health has put out a call on Twitter for people in Gaza to head to donation centres to donate their blood.
There has been an increasing need for blood as 52 Palestinians have been killed and 2400 others injued across Gaza so far.
Death toll reaches 52
Palestinian health officials say 52 people have been killed and 2400 others have been wounded so far.
Of those killed, the ministry of health says at least six are below 18, including one female. Of those wounded, at least 200 are below the age of 18; seventy-eight are women and 11 are journalists.
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