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Zionism – Fetaures

Discrimination not culture keeps families in poverty

Israel’s Arab Women Workers Need Not Apply

By Jonnathan Cook

(source: thenational)

Israel’s finance minister was accused last week of trying to deflect attention from discriminatory policies keeping many of the country’s Arab families in poverty by blaming their economic troubles on what he described as Arab society’s opposition to women working.

A recent report from Israel’s National Insurance Institute showed that half of all Arab families in Israel are classified as poor compared with just 14 per cent of Jewish families.

Yuval Steinitz, the finance minister, told a conference on employment discrimination this month that the failure of Arab women to participate in the workforce was damaging Israel’s economy. Eighteen per cent of Arab women work, and only half of them full time, compared with at least 55 per cent of Jewish women.

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Israeli officers get slap on wrist for white phosphorus use in Gaza

By Sheera Frenkel in Jerusalem

(source: The Times)

phosphorous

UN officials say that the use of white phosphorus caused millions of dollars in damage and could have led to a ‘great loss of life’

Israel has reprimanded two senior army officers who were responsible for firing white phosphorus artillery shells at a UN compound during last year’s offensive in Gaza.

In the first admission of any wrongdoing the Israeli military found that Brigadier-General Eyal Eisenberg and Colonel Ilan Malka were guilty “of exceeding their authority in a manner that jeopardised the lives of others”.

The Israeli report was in response to a damning UN investigation into the Gaza war, which concluded that both Israel and Hamas, the Palestinian group, had committed war crimes and possible crimes against humanity and which called on both sides to investigate the conduct of their forces.

An Israeli defence official said that its internal investigation could lead to further disciplinary action against soldiers involved in the 22-day offensive. The two officers disciplined yesterday were served a mild reprimand and had a “note” placed in their personal files noting their involvement. One defence official described the punishment as a “slap on the wrist.”

Read More »Israeli officers get slap on wrist for white phosphorus use in Gaza