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AL-AWDA ACTION ALERT
CALL, FAX & EMAIL NOW!
DEMAND SHARON BE BROUGHT TO JUSTICE
For Immediate Release
2 December 2001
Al-Awda, the Palestine Right to Return Coalition (PRRC) calls on all people
of conscience to call, email, and/or fax the White House and State
Department today, to express concern about Israeli Prime Minister Ariel
Sharon's visit, and to demand that the United States cooperate fully in
bringing him to justice on charges of war crimes and crimes against
humanity before, during and after Israel's 1982 invasion and occupation of
Lebanon.
The United States actively supported indictments against former Yugoslav
president Slobodan Milosevic, even while he was in power, as well as the
international tribunal for Rwanda. Failing to apply standards of justice to
Sharon and protections for the victims of the crimes of which he is accused
would be evidence of a gross double-standard and a signal that the United
States is willing to tolerate atrocities against innocent civilians as long
as they are committed by the leaders of "friendly" states.
TALKING POINTS:
*The U.S. government should investigate and pursue evidence that Sharon is
responsible for war crimes and crimes against humanity. Such investigations
should review the evidence that Sharon as defense minister in 1982 directly
ordered the deliberate bombardment of residential neighborhoods of Beirut,
Sidon and other cities in Lebanon during the Israeli invasion, killing
thousands of Lebanese and Palestinian civilians; directly ordered the siege
of west Beirut, deliberately depriving civilian residents of food, water,
safe passage and access to medical care; and that Sharon and other Israeli
officers and officials were responsible for arming, training and protecting
the perpetrators of the massacres of Palestinian and Lebanese refugees in
Sabra and Shatila camps in September 1982, including providing protection
and illumination so that the butchers could carry out their work more
easily.
*These charges, if proven, would constitute grave breaches of the Fourth
Geneva Convention, war crimes, and crimes against humanity.
* The United States should help to assure that Sharon is brought to justice,
under the laws of an international tribunal.
*As prime minister, Sharon has ordered measures which further violate the
Fourth Geneva Convention including blockades which have reduced the
Palestinian civilian population in the occupied territories to extreme
poverty and in some areas near starvation, and resulted in deaths due to
deliberate deprivation of access to medical care.
*Three decades earlier, as a young military officer, Sharon led an
Israeli elite commando force, Unit 101, which carried out brutal raids
against Palestinians. The massacre in the West Bank village of Qibya, on
October 14, 1953, was perhaps the most notorious. According to Israeli
historian Avi Shlaim, Sharon's unit blew up 45 homes in the village,
killing 69 civilians, two-thirds of them women and children.
*Sharon has appointed to his government at least one minister who openly
espouses such crimes against humanity as forcing the entire Palestinian
population of the occupied territories and other areas to leave.
* The High Contracting Parties to the Geneva Conventions, including the
United States, are required to hold those who violate the Convention
accountable. Hence, bringing Sharon to justice is an urgent necessity.
Failure to do so would send a signal that the United States condones war
crimes and protects accused war criminals.
CALL, FAX, AND EMAIL YOUR LETTERS TO:
* President George W. Bush
The White House
1600 Pennsylvania Avenue NW
Washington, DC 20500
Phone: 1-202-456-1414
Fax: 1-202-456-2461
E-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
* Secretary of State Colin Powell
Phone: 1-202-647-4000/ Bureau of Near East Affairs: 1-202-647-5150
Fax: 1-202-261-8577
E-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Letters may be faxed online via http://www.tpc.int/sendfax.html
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Demand a Freeze to Terrorist Assets!
STOP US AID TO ISRAEL
Sign the petition letter online at:
http://al-awda.org/terminate_aid_petition.htm
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Al-Awda, Palestine Right to Return Coalition
P.O. Box 1172
Orange, CT 06477
Fax: (717) 832-1123
E-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
WWW: http://al-awda.org
Press Room: http://al-awda.org/pressroom.htm
Al-Awda, The Palestine Right to Return Coalition is the largest network of
grassroots activists dedicated to Palestinian human rights
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