Prof. Israel Charny, Ph.D. Gaza Fight is Humanly and Legally Just but Deserves Ceasefire If Hostages Freed The Times of Israel February 2, 2024 By Dr. Israel Charny A British sociologist-political scientist has just published a scathing article in the Journal of Genocide Research (JGR) accusing Israel of genocide in Gaza. The article, entitled “Inevitably Genocidal,” is even pointed in the direction of accusing Israel for instigating and welcoming Hamas’s brutal opening of the war by genocide of Israelis! This remarkable “scholarship” appears in an established journal in which the same author years ago identified Zionism from its original establishment as based on “an incipiently genocidal mentality towards Arab society.” At the same time, the author also evaded completely recognizing the inherent intent of Zionism to rescue Jews from repeated murder, abuse, and expulsions such as from Britain and Spain over the centuries which in later years culminated in the ultimate genocide of the Holocaust. Now the same author blames Israel for the whole war! He writes that Israel planned and wanted the mass killing of the Gazans that is currently taking place: He says: “Israel intended this destruction.” In his convoluted thinking, he posits that Israel in effect is responsible for goading Hamas into the dramatically cruel genocide it executed against Israel! He says it is “an irony that escaped most critics and reflected the field’s preoccupation with the one-sidedness of genocide. Gaza’s rulers not only launched their own genocidal assault; they also knowingly provoked Israel’s greater one. Hamas understood that its atrocities would incite Israel to its own campaign, which they must have calculated would cause global outrage that would ultimately constrain Israel.” The sociologist goes on to recognize Hamas’ basic apathy to the losses of its own people. He then reaches for a crazy inference that Israel sacrificed its own people as hostages to Hamas. For Hamas, thousands of Gazans were necessary sacrifices, just as loss of the hostages was for Israel. Some years ago, a study of articles in JGR showed that 59% of bona fide genocide scholars surveyed –along with a smaller number of students in a Holocaust genocide course in a university in the US who gave equivalent results– evaluated the JGR journal as purposely intent on minimizing the significance of the Holocaust, a known technique of genocide denial. A huge wave of protest followed against my research that demonstrated JGR’s Holocaust minimization. The protest criticized the study’s purported scientific inadequacy. But the results of the study had been collected and tabulated by an independent research organization. The results were plain and simple. In the months that followed, too late for inclusion in the study, JGR published a new article which claimed that the infamous Wannsee Conference of the Nazis on the Final Solution did not plan the extermination of the Jews!! What follows is a rejoinder to the current article, “Inescapably Genocidal.” The author of this rejoinder is a well-known genocide scholar who is a committed Jew and Zionist with an overriding commitment to peace and safety for ALL the people on our Earth. The author has requested that the British author not be named in order to avoid a focus on a personality or professional conflict with him which is entirely irrelevant to the seriousness of the issues. The following are FACTS that are not mentioned by the author of “Inescapably Genocidal.” FACT: Israel has never initiated bombings or missile attacks on Gaza except in response to bombings and missile attacks on Israel by Hamas, Islamic Jihad, and other Palestinian terrorists. FACT: The present war was initiated by a genocidal attack on October 7, 2023 that killed every Israeli in sight including babies, women, the elderly and infirm along with many unarmed non-combatant party-going teenagers and young people. That attack included mass rape and frightful torture and mutilation, as well as kidnapping of hundreds of Israeli hostages. Yet Israeli popular culture did NOT call for extermination of the Palestinians. FACT: The official charter of Hamas seeks to exterminate Jews and destroy the nation of Israel. This is declared intent to commit genocide. FACT: Hamas has placed weapon systems in the homes of civilians and in civilian institutions such as schools and hospitals in total disregard of the consequences for its people. FACT: Zionism was and is a response to stop the endless suffering of Jews from genocide. Zionism has never called for the eradication of Palestinians. The following are also my OPINIONS: 1. OPINION: I agree completely that every word by Israelis of intention to destroy the Palestinians in Gaza, in whole or in part, is deeply wrong and a profound insult to true Jewish and Zionist values. Such words may be understandable as emotional responses to the depraved slaughter of Israelis by Hamas on October 7. But I believe that Israel erred seriously long before the October 7 massacre in allowing extreme right-wing violence against Palestinian farmers without any legal consequences. OPINION: There is no question that the extent of bombing of Palestinians in Gaza is excessive. Such killing should not be tolerated by Israel both for its own sake and out of humanity towards the many Palestinian civilians who want to live non-violently. However, there is also no question that Israel’s fighting back against mass murder has also resulted in the deaths of thousands of Palestinian civilians. It has destroyed life-promoting institutions such as hospitals and schools that were turned into bases for attacks by Hamas. Given the tragic extent of killing, I believe that Israel should stop the war at the earliest possible time. But I would insist on prior release of the Israeli hostages whose kidnappings constitute crimes against humanity. OPINION: I propose a new legal conception of self-defense. Israel is fighting back legitimately in Self-Defense in Response and in Self-Defense against Future Genocidal Attacks that Employ Citizens as Human Shields. The Geneva Conventions specifically outlaw use of human shields and justify fighting back in response. Self-Defense does not include genocidal intent. A striking example of the application of this concept can be found following the Armenian Genocide. An Armenian, Soghomon Tehlirian, assassinated the key Turkish leader of the genocide, the Minister of the Interior, Talaat Pasha. Tehlirian was arrested and tried in Berlin. The facts of the murder were clear. Yet the court concluded that he was legally innocent. The extent of killings of civilians brought on by Hamas’s policies leads me to propose that Israel offer to cease all fighting following return of all Israeli hostages. At the same time, Israel should underscore its readiness to return to massive destruction of Gaza in response to any further bombings or invasions by Hamas. In conclusion, I pray for the earliest possible end to this war. I know that my opinions are uncomfortable for people who think in more clear-cut polarities of good and bad and black and white. My intention is to protect Israel and to also protect the lives of all human beings. ABOUT THE AUTHOR Prof. Israel Charny, Director, Institute on Holocaust & Genocide Jerusalem, was the co-founder of the International Association of Genocide Scholars, and editor in chief of the first Encyclopedia of Genocide. Prof. Charny, who lives in Moshav Shoresh outside of Jerusalem, is the author of the just published "Israel’s Failed Response to the Armenian Genocide: Denial, State Deception, Truth versus Politicization of History," available from the publisher, Academic Studies Press (Boston) or Eurospan Bookstore in London. https://blogs.timesofisrael.com/gaza-fight-is-humanly-and-legally-just-but-deserves-ceasefire-if-hostages-freed/ Copyright 2024 The Times of Israel

Demonstrators carry banners and flags as a flare burns during a protest in support of Palestinians in Gaza, amid the ongoing conflict between Israel and the Palestinian Islamist group Hamas, outside Al Kalouti mosque near the Israeli embassy in Amman, Jordan, March 27, 2024. REUTERS/Alaa Al-Sukhni AMMAN, March 27 (Reuters) - Jordanian anti-riot police beat and arrested dozens of demonstrators trying to march towards the heavily guarded Israeli embassy in the capital Amman, witnesses and residents said on Wednesday. More than two thousand protesters gathered late on Tuesday, the third day of demonstrations which have been marred with clashes, after baton wielding police pushed back hundreds of angry crowds seeking to storm the embassy compound in the affluent Rabae district of Amman. The Israeli embassy, where protesters gather daily, has long been a flashpoint of anti-Israel protests at times of escalation of violence between Palestinians and Israel. Many demonstrators chanted slogans in support of the militant Islamist Hamas. Jordanian authorities are alarmed that Israel's bombing campaign in Gaza could broaden the popularity of the Hamas movement among many Jordanians. "Oh Hamas...All of Jordan's people are behind you," the protesters chanted. Passions have run high among Jordanians, many of whom are of Palestinian origin, over the carnage in Gaza as Israel's relentless bombing campaign against Hamas has led to tens of thousands of civilian deaths, according to Gaza officials, and flattened many parts of the densely populated enclave. Jordan has seen some of the biggest outpourings of public anger in the region since the war was triggered when Hamas fighters crossed into southern Israel on Oct.7 , killing 1,200 people and capturing 253 hostages, according to Israeli tallies. Authorities in Jordan say peaceful protests are allowed but they would not tolerate any attempt by mobs who sought to exploit anger against Israel to create havoc or try to reach a border zone with the Israeli occupied West Bank or Israel. Amnesty International last month called on Jordanian authorities to end what it said was a sweeping crackdown that has seen hundreds of people arrested for expressing their support for Palestinians in Gaza or criticising Jordanian government polices towards Israel. Many demonstrators slam perceived inaction by authorities, saying their compatriots in Gaza were being left to face Israel's military might alone. Jordan's peace treaty with Israel is widely unpopular among many citizens who see normalisation as betraying the rights of their Palestinian compatriots. © 2024 Reuters. All rights reserved

U.S.Rewards AzerbaijanI Aggression with Climate Leadership Having conquered one Armenian community, Azerbaijan’s president Ilham Aliyev is now threatening another. A damaged icon painting is pictured on October 13, 2020 inside the Ghazanchetsots (Holy Saviour) Cathedral in the historic city of Shusha, some 15 kilometers from the disputed Nagorno-Karabakh province's capital Stepanakert, that was hit by a bomb during the fighting between Armenia and Azerbaijan over the breakaway region. (photo: Aris Messinis / Getty) Nina Shea National Catholic Register March 20, 2024 Commentaries Armenia may be the next European country to suffer military incursion and brutal conquest. If so, the Biden administration’s choice of Azerbaijan to lead one of the administration’s top foreign policy priorities, a high-level global climate conference, can share the blame. President Biden is emboldening Azerbaijan as its authoritarian government solidifies control over the Armenian Christian enclave of Nagorno Karabakh, which it seized only months ago in an unprovoked military invasion, and as it now threatens the Republic of Armenia. The State Department has given unconditional U.S. endorsement for Azerbaijan’s president Ilham Aliyev to lead COP29, the name of the climate negotiations next November. On Feb. 17, in Berlin, with Aliyev, by his side, Secretary of State Antony Blinken declared it is “important” that “Azerbaijan tak[e] on the leadership of COP,” and pledged America’s “strong support.” He made no mention of Aliyev having spent most of last year violating the rules-based international order and human rights norms without consequence. Mr. Blinken did not even manage to get Aliyev to sign a peace agreement with Armenia. The administration expressed relief that a stalemate over leadership had been overcome (it’s Europe’s turn to lead and Russia had blocked any European Union candidate). It may also be sympathetic to Aliyev’s preposterous claim that Azerbaijan invaded to protect Azeri eco-activists, demonstrating against gold mining in Nagorno Karabakh. No matter its rationale, the decision to gratuitously honor Aliyev on the global stage betrays America’s most fundamental foreign policy principles on national sovereignty, religious freedom and other human rights. A brief review of the facts is in order. In December 2022, Azerbaijan began a nine-month blockade of Nagorno Karabakh, with which it has had longstanding border disputes. Called Artsakh in Armenian, the territory for two millennia was home to a community of mostly Orthodox, Catholic and evangelical Armenians, and, for the last 30 years, existed as a de facto independent state within Turkic Muslim Azerbaijan. The blockade choked off Lachin Corridor, the only route to Armenia, the source of the enclave’s food and medicine. On Aug. 2, 2023, Luis Moreno Ocampo, former chief prosecutor of the International Criminal Court, issued a dire “expert opinion” about impending mass starvation due to the blockade, declaring it “an ongoing Genocide against 120,000 Armenians,” and warning, “Without immediate dramatic change, this group of Armenians will be destroyed in a few weeks.” On Sept. 19, Azerbaijan’s military invaded Nagorno Karabakh and seized it the next day. Russian peacekeepers protecting the corridor under a 2020 peace agreement (concluded after another Azerbaijan incursion) had abandoned their posts. When the corridor reopened on Sept. 24, some 100,000 Nagorno Karabakh residents fled to Armenia practically overnight, leaving behind their ancestral homeland, property and livelihoods. They also left the churches of their baptism and marriages, with some sites dating from the Middle Ages and containing graves and relics from the time of the apostles and from 301, when St. Gregory the Illuminator converted Armenia into the first Christian country. Religion is undeniably a factor in Aliyev’s aggression. On Jan. 31, at the International Religious Freedom Summit in Washington, I spoke with Artak Beglaryan, the former Minister of State of Nagorno Karabakh. As to why the population left when Azerbaijan assured its safety, he answered that Aliyev’s taking them to the brink of starvation was starkly reminiscent of the early stages of Turkey’s ethno-religious genocide against their people. Starvation was one of the main “weapons of genocide” of an estimated one million ethnic Armenians in 1915, as Moreno Ocampo noted. The Nagorno Karabakh community felt compelled to run for their lives. Beglaryan also shared photos of Nagorno Karabakh churches hit by Azerbaijan’s guided munitions, and others vandalized, looted or damaged with their domes and bell towers torn down. Thousands of stone crosses marking graves have been destroyed. Azerbaijan’s Cultural Minister boasted of filing off Armenian inscriptions from church walls, according to the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom. Azerbaijan is erasing all traces of Armenian Christianity from Nagorno Karabakh. Having conquered one Armenian community, Aliyev is now threatening another. In 2020, he began demanding a new trade route through Armenia’s southern Syunik territory. According to Radio Free Europe: “He called the route Zangezur Corridor (using an alternative name for Syunik) and said Armenians would have no jurisdiction over it. Aliyev followed up with a thinly veiled threat to seize the land for the corridor by force if Armenia didn’t comply.” Last month, a border incident in Syunik that killed four Armenian soldiers caused fears, including among American officials, that Aliyev may be preparing to escalate with a full-scale military offensive. He has begun calling Armenian territory “Western Azerbaijan.” On Feb. 23, Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan announced that, because Russia "hasn’t fulfilled its security obligations," Armenia is “freezing” its two-decade military alliance in the Moscow-led Collective Security Treaty Organization. Armenia now desperately seeks to realign with the West. Defense policy analysts at RAND advise that the United States won’t be willing to secure Armenian borders but it could help by providing arms. Large Armenian-American grassroots organizations are supporting legislation to end Azerbaijan’s U.S. military aid. Both proposals face uphill battles in Washington, given competing strategic demands, including the need for Azerbaijan’s oil and strategic airbases. Before diplomats leave for Baku next November, President Biden should demand that Azerbaijan’s president sign a permanent peace agreement with Armenia and block his taking the lead at COP if he refuses. This could delay climate negotiations but neither they, nor American interests, would be helped by having at their helm a rogue dictator unwilling to negotiate peace and all too willing to erase the Armenian Christian presence. Nina Shea is the director of Hudson Institute’s Center for Religious Freedom. Copyright © 2024 EWTN News, Inc. All rights reserved. EIN 27-4581132

USCIRF Raises Alarm Over India’s Exclusionary Citizenship Amendment Act During Congressional Hearing Mar 25, 2024 Washington, DC –The United States Commission on International Religious Freedom (USCIRF) raised the alarm on the Indian government’s notification of the Citizenship Amendment Rules (CAR) in a move to begin implementing the Citizenship (Amendment) Act (CAA). Last week, USCIRF Commissioner Stephen Schneck testified at a Tom Lantos Human Rights Commission hearing on this matter. “The problematic CAA establishes a religious requirement for asylum seekers in India fleeing neighboring countries. While it provides a fast-track to citizenship for Hindus, Parsis, Sikhs, Buddhists, Jains and Christians, the law explicitly excludes Muslims. If the law were truly aimed at protecting persecuted religious minorities, it would include Rohingya Muslims from Burma, Ahmadiyya Muslims from Pakistan, or Hazara Shi’a from Afghanistan, among others. No one should be denied citizenship based on religion or belief,” said USCIRF Commissioner Stephen Schneck. “USCIRF urges members of Congress to continue to publicly call out religious freedom issues in India, and to include religious freedom in discussions with government counterparts and importantly, during congressional delegations.” The newly announced rules confirm that those seeking Indian citizenship must prove they arrived in the country from Pakistan, Bangladesh, or Afghanistan before December 31, 2014, excluding those fleeing more recent acts of persecution. The announcement comes as the Indian government moves to deport refugees from Burma in the aftermath of the 2021 military coup. It also does not include citizenship for those fleeing non-Muslim majority nations, such as Tamil refugees from Sri Lanka and Uyghur and other Turkic Muslims from China. The CAA was initially passed in 2019; however, the Indian government delayed its implementation following large-scale, months-long protests across the country. The protests provoked a harsh and deadly crackdown by Indian police forces, including mass arrest of human rights activists from all faiths. “As the State Department recently noted, respect for religious freedom and equal treatment under the law for all communities are fundamental democratic principles,” said USCIRF Commissioner David Curry. “More than four years after the CAA’s introduction, student activists like Umar Khalid, Sharjeel Imam, Meeran Haider, and many others still languish in jail under the Unlawful Activities Prevention Act for peacefully protesting. USCIRF urges the U.S. government to work with Indian authorities to release the human rights activists arbitrarily detained that advocated for religious minorities.” In its 2023 Annual Report, USCIRF recommended the U.S. Department of State designate India as a Country of Particular Concern for its systematic, ongoing, and egregious violations of religious freedom. In September 2023, USCIRF held a hearing on religious freedom in India and how the U.S. government can work with the Indian government to address violations. USCIRF previously published a factsheet on the CAA and its implications. The U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom (USCIRF) is an independent, bipartisan federal government entity established by the U.S. Congress to monitor, analyze and report on religious freedom abroad. USCIRF makes foreign policy recommendations to the President, the Secretary of State and Congress intended to deter religious persecution and promote freedom of religion or belief. To interview a Commissioner, please contact USCIRF at Media@USCIRF.gov. © 2024 United States Commission on International Religious Freedom

End Interference in Minority Religious Sites, Practices A Hindu worshipper celebrating the festival of Shivaratri in the Sri Lankan capital, Colombo, on March 8, 2024.  © 2024 Thilina Kaluthotage/NurPhoto via AP Photo By Meenakshi Ganguly Deputy Asia Director Human Rights Watch Eight Tamil Hindu worshippers arrested by Sri Lankan police while engaging in festival rituals last week were detained for more than 10 days and allegedly abused. A magistrate released them on March 19. In recent years, Sri Lankan government authorities and nationalist Sinhala Buddhist monks have been targeting Hindu as well as Muslim religious sites in the country’s north and east in violation of the right to freedom of religion and belief, among other basic rights. The eight were arrested at the Veddukkunaari temple near Vavuniya, a Hindu shrine that Buddhist monks, backed by the government’s Department of Archaeology, say is an ancient Buddhist site. It is one of numerous temple sites in northeastern Sri Lanka claimed by nationalist Buddhist monks, frequently with the support of government agencies and the security forces. The Vavuniya magistrates court had earlier ruled that the rituals for the festival of Shivaratri, the principal festival day of the god Shiva, could go ahead at Veddukkunaari. However, on the evening of March 8, police arrived and assaulted worshippers, including an opposition member of parliament. Rights activists told Human Rights Watch the detainees said they were beaten in custody, for which the court requested a medical report, and their families denied access to them for the first three days. On March 19, the authorities’ allegations were dismissed at their third court appearance. Hindu worshippers consider the Veddukkunaari site to be an ancient Hindu shrine. The Archaeology Department had claimed that the worshippers damaged antiquities, while the police contended that arrests were made because small ritual fires posed a hazard. Similar Hindu rituals have been conducted at Veddukkunaari for many years. Buddhist monks, accompanied by soldiers, had gone to the site in February and said that a shivalingam, a typically stone cylindrical symbol worshiped by Hindus as a representation of Shiva, had recently been installed. Hindu symbols and idols there were damaged and destroyed in 2023, while the military and archaeological officials have been attempting to block Hindu worshipers from the site since at least 2018. The Sri Lankan government should publicly direct the Department of Archaeology to end its discriminatory interference in Hindu sites and order the police and other security forces to uphold the rights of Hindus and other minority communities. © 2024 Human Rights Watch

Libya Country Report March 2024 By Brooklyn Quallen, Genocide Watch Credit: U.S. Naval Intelligence From 1969 to 2011, Libya was ruled by the dictator Muammar Gaddafi. Gaddafi pursued genocidal Arabization policies, persecuting ethnic and religious minorities to create a homogeneous Arab nation. Anti-Gaddafi protestors were detained, tortured, and executed. Gaddafi supported terrorists worldwide. 2011 saw the Arab Spring sweep through Libya. A civil war between Gaddafi’s forces and rebels ensued. A UN Resolution froze Gaddafi’s assets. Gaddafi threatened a genocidal massacre in Benghazi. A second UN resolution imposed a no-fly zone over Libya and authorized member states to use "all necessary measures" to prevent attacks on civilians. NATO defended intervention as “the responsibility to protect.” NATO bombed Libyan military installations. In October 2011, Gaddafi was captured and killed. Libya has never recovered from the 2011 First Civil War and remains politically unstable. NATO failed to complete its “humanitarian intervention” by providing security and resources to rebuild Libya. In the aftermath of the First Civil War, two governments emerged. The Government of National Unity (GNU) is the UN-recognized entity based in Tripoli that controls the northwest. The Libyan National Army (LNA), led by former Gaddafi general Khalifa Haftar, started a Second Civil War in 2014 by attacking the GNU in Tripoli. Qatar and Turkey backed the GNU. Egypt and the UAE conducted airstrikes in support of Haftar’s LNA. Israel sold the LNA weapons and provided it with training. Russia’s Wagner mercenaries fought with the LNA. Since a 2020 ceasefire agreement, the Government of National Stability (GNS) backed by Haftar’s LNA has taken control of eastern Libya. In the south, tribal groups and militias act with impunity. Both Libyan governments and militias have committed war crimes and crimes against humanity. Despite a UN roadmap for GNU elections in 2021, due to rivalries within the GNU on how the vote would take place and who would be eligible to run, the GNU disbanded its electoral commission. In February 2023, the legislative bodies of the GNU and GNS created a joint committee that came to a tentative agreement on draft laws for elections. But no elections have been held. Even if elections were held, they would not currently be free or fair. Haftar’s LNA has already shown it will intimidate voters. A 2020 ceasefire between the GNU and GNS has prevented a resurgence of full civil war. But in 2022, armed clashes in the capital killed at least 36 people. On Aug. 14-15, 2023, at least 55 people were killed in Tripoli in a battle between rival military factions. Religious minority groups in Libya are at risk of arrest, imprisonment, and torture. In GNU-controlled areas, religious minorities face execution under Article 291 of the Penal Code, which makes renouncing Islam in word or deed punishable by death. A Christian convert was arrested and sentenced to death in 2022. Six more were arrested in April 2023 and face the death penalty if convicted. Article 207 prescribes the death penalty for those convicted of promoting theories aimed at changing the fundamental principles of the constitution or social structure. This law can be used to prosecute political opposition leaders. Due to the insecurity that civilians face in the continuing civil conflict, as well as discriminatory policies enforced by the two Libyan governments aimed at religious and other minorities, Genocide Watch recognizes Libya as being at Stage 3: Discrimination, Stage 5: Organization, Stage 6: Polarization, and Stage 8: Persecution. Genocide Watch recommends: The GNU and LNA should reaffirm their 2020 ceasefire and form one functioning government. Militias should be disarmed and demobilized. A trained police force should be created. With UN mediation, the rival governments should agree and hold free and fair elections. Libya must repeal Penal Code articles 291 and 207 that target minorities and opposition leaders. Libya must abolish the death penalty and commute all death sentences.

Lawmakers in the West African country voted to advance a bill repealing a 2015 ban. If it passes the final round of voting, Gambia will become the first nation to roll back protections against the practice. Protesters outside the National Assembly in the capital of Gambia on Monday hold signs asking legislators not to repeal the law banning female genital cutting.Credit...Malick Njie/Reuters By Ruth Maclean Reporting from Dakar, Senegal Gambian lawmakers have voted to advance a measure revoking a ban on female genital cutting by removing legal protections for millions of girls, raising fears that other countries could follow suit. Of the 47 members of the Gambia National Assembly present on Monday, 42 voted to send a bill to overturn the ban onward to a committee for consideration before a final vote. Human rights experts, lawyers and women’s and girls’ rights campaigners say that overturning the ban would undo decades of work to end female genital cutting, a centuries-old ritual tied up in ideas of sexual purity, obedience and control. If the bill passes the final stages, the small West African nation of Gambia will become the first nation globally to roll back protections against cutting. Government committees will be able to propose amendments before it comes back to Parliament for a final reading in about three months — but analysts say that it has now passed the key stage: Its proponents will gain momentum and it will probably become law. Gambia banned cutting in 2015 but did not enforce the ban until last year, when three practitioners were given hefty fines. An influential imam in the Muslim-majority country took up the cause and has been leading calls to repeal the ban, claiming that cutting — which in Gambia usually involves removing the clitoris and labia minora of girls between the ages of 10 and 15 — is a religious obligation and important culturally. Anti-cutting campaigners gathered outside Parliament in Banjul, Gambia’s capital, on Monday morning, but police set up barricades and prevented many from getting inside — while allowing in the religious leaders who advocate cutting and their supporters, according to Fatou Baldeh, one of Gambia’s leading opponents of genital cutting. “It was very sad to witness the whole debate, and men trying to justify why this would continue,” Ms. Baldeh said after the vote. She said she feared that if the men leading the charge — whom she described as extremists — succeeded, they would next try to roll back other laws, like one banning child marriage. Inside Parliament, lawmakers — all of them men — traded arguments. “If people are being arrested for practicing F.G.M., then that means they are being deprived of their right to practice religion,” one member of parliament, Lamin Ceesay, said, according to Parliament Watch, a project that promotes parliamentary transparency and accountability. “Let’s protect our women,” another, Gibbi Mballow, said. “I am a father, and I can’t support such a bill.” He added, “Religion says we should not harm women.” Demonstrators who support repealing the ban on female genital cutting rallied in Banjul on Monday as parliament debated the issue. Credit...Malick Njie/Reuters Cutting takes different forms and is most common in Africa, though it is also widespread in parts of Asia and the Middle East. Internationally recognized as a gross violation of human rights, it frequently leads to serious health issues, like infections, hemorrhages and severe pain, and it is a leading cause of death in the countries where it is practiced. Worldwide, genital cutting is increasing despite campaigns to stop it — mainly because of population growth in the countries where it is common. More than 230 million women and girls have undergone it, according to UNICEF — an increase of 30 million people since the last time the agency made an estimate, in 2016. Four lawmakers voted against advancing the bill and one abstained on Monday. Only five of Gambia’s 58 lawmakers are women, meaning men are spearheading a discussion on a practice that is forced on young girls. “They have no say,” said Emmanuel Joof, head of Gambia’s National Human Rights Commission. Repealing the ban will pose “serious, life-threatening consequences for the health and well-being of Gambia’s women and girls,” said Geeta Rao Gupta, the U.S. ambassador at large for global women’s issues. From 1994 until 2016, Gambia was led by one of the region’s most notorious dictators, Yahya Jammeh, who, a truth commission found in 2021, had people tortured and killed by a hit squad, raped women and threw many people in jail for no reason. He called those fighting to end female genital mutilation, often known by its acronym, F.G.M., “enemies of Islam.” As president, Yahya Jammeh, shown in 2016, banned female genital cutting after previously supporting it.Credit...Jerome Delay/Associated Press So it came as a shock to many Gambian opponents of cutting when, in 2015, Mr. Jammeh banned the practice — something many observers attributed to the influence of his Moroccan wife. The new law was hailed as a watershed moment in Gambia, where three-quarters of women and girls are cut. But the law was not enforced, and this emboldened pro-cutting imams who are “hellbent on having a theocratic state” to try to repeal it, according to Mr. Joof. Clerics in the Muslim world disagree on whether cutting is Islamic, but it is not in the Quran. The most vocal of the Gambian imams, Abdoulie Fatty, has argued that “circumcision makes you cleaner” and has said the husbands of women who have not been cut suffer because they cannot meet their wives’ sexual appetites. Many Gambians accused Mr. Fatty of being a hypocrite, pointing out that when Mr. Jammeh banned cutting, Mr. Fatty was the presidential imam but apparently said nothing. At the bill’s first reading two weeks ago, Mr. Fatty bused in a group of young women to chant pro-cutting slogans outside Parliament. Their faces veiled — which is unusual in Gambia — they sang and waved pink posters that read: “Female circumcision is our religious beliefs.” Ms. Baldeh, the opponent of genital cutting, was 8 years old when she was pinned down and cut. But when she first heard the term “female genital mutilation,” when she was studying for a master’s degree in sexual and reproductive health, she didn’t recognize it as something she had been through, because she saw it as part of her culture, not something violent that harmed women. Her own grandmother, a traditional birth attendant, was involved in cutting. After reading and speaking to other women, though, Ms. Baldeh realized what she had been subjected to and started speaking out against cutting — first by trying to change her own family members’ minds. She became one of the most prominent voices speaking out against cutting in Gambia. Cutting could be ended within a generation, if there were the will to do it, Ms. Baldeh said. “If you don’t cut a girl, she’s not going to cut her future daughters,” she said. On March 4, Ms. Baldeh was at the White House with Secretary of State Antony J. Blinken and Jill Biden, the first lady, receiving an International Women of Courage award for her work against cutting. But that same day Gambian lawmakers were listening to the first reading of the bill to overturn the cutting ban — one that would unravel the legal gains Ms. Baldeh and other opponents of cutting had made. Fatou Baldeh, a leading opponent in Gambia of female genital cutting, being honored this month at the White House, flanked by Jill Biden and Secretary of State Antony J. Blinken.Credit...Nathan Howard/Getty Images She and other observers said that most Gambian lawmakers did not necessarily believe in cutting but were in favor of the bill because they were afraid of losing their parliamentary seats. “The saddest part is the silence from the government,” she said. This silence extends even to the ministry charged with protecting women and children, which is headed by Fatou Kinteh, who previously was the United Nations Population Fund’s coordinator in Gambia for gender-based violence and female genital mutilation. Reached by phone on Saturday, Ms. Kinteh refused to comment on a possible overturn of the cutting ban, saying she would call back later. She never did. Ms. Baldeh said the imams’ recent rhetoric in support of cutting had spread to many Gambian men, who have unleashed a torrent of online abuse on women who speak out against the practice, undermining what had been a flourishing movement to increase women’s and girls’ rights in Gambia. But she said the online abuse would not derail their efforts. “If this law gets repealed, we know they’re coming for more,” Ms. Baldeh said. “So we will fight it to the end.” © 2024 The New York Times Company

Rohingya refugees fleeing from Myanmar to Bangladesh 2017 credit:Fred Dufour/AFP/Getty Images TWO YEARS SINCE THE US ROHINGYA GENOCIDE DETERMINATION Congressional briefing hosted by Campaign for a New Myanmar, Emgage, International Campaign for the Rohingya, and Genocide Watch Date: Thursday, March 28th, 2024 Time: 1.30pm - 2.30pm EDT Location: Rayburn House Office Building (Room 2075) This month marks the second anniversary of the US Rohingya genocide determination issued in the wake of the Myanmar military coup of 2/1/21. This briefing will focus on the current situation of the Rohingya inside and outside Burma and how the US government is playing its part to solve the crisis. PROGRAM Welcome and Opening Remarks (5 minutes) Iman Awad, Emgage Simon Billenness, International Campaign for the Rohingya Kristiana Kuqi, Campaign for a New Myanmar Panel 1: The Situation of the Rohingya (Two-Prong) (25 mins) Refugees in Bangladesh and other countries People still in Burma/Rakhine State Introductions: Lucky Karim, International Campaign for the Rohingya Lucky Karim Yasmin Ullah Reza Uddin Panel 2: Solutions (15 mins) Sanctions Humanitarian relief Legal Introductions: Kristiana Kuqi, Campaign for a New Myanmar Panel 1 speakers Dan Sullivan, Refugees International Carolyn Nash - Amnesty International USA Dr. Gregory Stanton, Genocide Watch Simon Billenness - International Campaign for the Rohingya Panel 3: The US Government Response (15 mins) Introductions: Iman Awad, Emgage US Administration officials and Members of Congress - invited Sponsoring Organizations: Action Corps, Campaign for a New Myanmar, Emgage, Insight Myanmar, International Campaign for the Rohingya, Genocide Watch, Refugees International, US Campaign for Burma, and 21 Wilberforce.

A man sits next to coffins containing the remains of people from the Yazidi minority, who were killed in Islamic State attacks in 2014, after they were exhumed from a mass grave, in Mosul, Iraq June 20, 2023. REUTERS/Khalid Al-Mousily/File Photo BAGHDAD, March 20 (Reuters) - A United Nations mission set up to help Iraq investigate alleged Islamic State genocide and war crimes is being forced to shut prematurely before it can finish its probes, following a souring of its relationship with the Iraqi government. The removal of the U.N. mission set up in 2017 comes nearly a decade after the extremist group rampaged across Syria and Iraq and at a time when many of the Islamic State's victims still live displaced in camps and long for justice. "Is the work done? Not yet, this is pretty clear," Christian Ritscher, head of the UN Investigative Team to Promote Accountability for Crimes Committed by Daesh (UNITAD), told Reuters in an interview. "We need more time... If you look at an end-date of September 2024, we will not achieve a completion of all investigative lines," nor other projects such as creating a central archive for millions of pieces of evidence, he said. Ritscher was speaking at length about the closure for the first time since the U.N. Security Council in September renewed the agency's mandate for only one final year at Iraq's request. UNITAD's international backers and donors had expected its work would continue for several more years. Critics of Iraq's decision to end the mission say it will hamper efforts to hold more members of IS accountable after UNITAD contributed to at least three convictions on charges of genocide and other international crimes in Germany and Portugal. They also say it casts doubt on Iraq's commitment to holding IS members accountable for such crimes at home, at a time when the vast majority of convictions in Iraq are made for simple membership of a terrorist organization, rather than specific crimes such as sexual abuse or slavery. From Iraq's perspective, UNITAD was no longer needed and had not successfully cooperated with Iraqi authorities, Farhad Alaaldin, foreign affairs adviser to the prime minister, told Reuters. "In our view, the mission has ended and we appreciate the work that has been done and it's time to move on," he said, noting the mission "didn't respond to repeated requests for sharing evidence" and must now do so before it ends. 'HIGHLY POLITICAL' But that transfer of information appears uncertain. UNITAD was set up to help Iraq hold IS members accountable for international crimes - genocide, war crimes and crimes against humanity - but Iraq has not passed legislation for that to happen in-country, leaving UNITAD "in a waiting position," Ritscher said. Additionally, UNITAD was reluctant to share evidence it gathered with Iraqi authorities because of Iraq's use of the death penalty, which goes against UN policy, according to six people familiar with the mission's work. Ritscher said safeguards and assurances over the death penalty could have been put in place but the issue had not yet been discussed with Iraqi authorities, as the primary discussion was on the need for legislation on international crimes. These factors put UNITAD in the awkward position of gathering evidence, including hundreds of witness testimonies, in Iraq but mainly using that evidence in legal processes abroad, in a mismatch that festered for years. Reuters spoke to nine diplomats and international officials and four Iraqi sources to piece together this account of how UNITAD's mission came to be curbed and the consequences it may have for accountability efforts. Apart from the baked-in mismatch between the mission's goals and Iraq's expectations, six people said that under Ritscher, a seasoned German prosecutor, UNITAD had not properly invested in the politics of dealing with Iraqi authorities, harming the relationship. "Death penalty was always a main issue with UNITAD. It's mandate was far-fetched but many hoped it could work," a senior international diplomat said, referring to the incompatibility between goals and expectations. "Added to that, the current leadership did not have the political skills to reach out. That doesn't work here in Iraq. Everything is highly political here." In response to that comment, a UNITAD spokesperson said the mission had absolute clarity from the beginning that it existed under the request of Iraq, and was always convinced the Iraqi judiciary was its main partner. The spokesperson noted UNITAD's production of joint case files with the Iraqi judiciary for trials abroad, as well as capacity-building for judges and cooperation on the exhumation of 70 mass graves and dignified burials for IS victims. LOST HOPE For many IS victims who distrust Iraq's government and saw UNITAD's presence as a reassuring sign of the international community's support, the end of the mission has come as a blow. These include members of Iraq's Yazidi community, a religious minority Islamic State saw as devil worshippers and subjected to mass killings, sexual violence and enslavement. "Its very hard to see them leave us like this in the middle of the road," said Zina, a Yazidi enslaved by IS at the age of 16 and held in captivity for three years. She spoke via phone from a displacement camp near her native Sinjar in northwestern Iraq to which she cannot return amid concerns over security and lack of government compensation. She asked Reuters to withhold her full name due to the sensitivity of what was discussed. Zina said she was physically and sexually abused in captivity and true justice would require the family that enslaved her be tried for those crimes, rather than convicted of simple membership of a terrorist group. "We wanted UNITAD to give us the chance to achieve even a little bit of justice in Iraq but, as I see it, the world failed us," she said, referring to UNITAD's impending closure. Alaaldin said the government respected the critical views of citizens and was more supportive of Iraq's minority communities than previous administrations. Ritscher said he understood victims' concerns but "I do not share the very negative assumptions about Iraq's judiciary." With the mission set to end by mid-September, a burning question currently under negotiation between Iraq and the world body is what happens to the mass of evidence UNITAD gathered. On the one hand, some diplomats, activists and victims are concerned it could be misused by Iraq, including in trials with little due process that might result in death sentences. On the other, much of the evidence could be critical to holding IS members accountable for specific international crimes. "What we aimed to achieve is a proper completion. We want to ensure that this work is not lost or will simply go into a dead archive somewhere in the basement of a UN building," Ritscher said, though there is not yet clarity on the matter. Razaw Salihy, Iraq researcher at Amnesty International, noted flaws in the Iraqi justice system "that have landed thousands of men and boys on death row via confessions extracted under torture, duress and other kinds of ill treatment." Iraq denies obtaining confessions through coercion. She said Iraq should reform its judiciary and pass a law on international crimes but noted political will might be lacking among a ruling coalition that includes armed groups. "It could be a Pandora's box. A working mechanism to hold members of IS accountable could also very easily be used to hold members of Iraqi security forces and armed groups accountable," she said. © 2024 Reuters. All rights reserved

Revelers gather to take part in the Kurdish celebration of Nowruz, the New Year of the Persian calendar, in Istanbul, Turkey, March 17, 2024. Some 50 people, including an AFP journalist, were detained on the sidelines of the event. Copyright: @AFP ISTANBUL — Around 50 people including an AFP journalist were detained by police Sunday in Istanbul on the sidelines of the Kurdish New Year celebrations, witnesses said. AFP video journalist Eylul Yasar was preparing to film the celebrations of the Kurdish New Year when she was arrested at a checkpoint, journalists and lawyers at the scene reported. She was released after being handcuffed and held by police for more than six hours, along with another 14 people locked up in the same van. Yasar said she had been arrested and taken away in a police van after objecting to an "intrusive" and "brutal" body search. She and the others being held in her van were insulted by police, she said, who called them "pig droppings, terrorists, traitors." Two journalists from the Bianet news site who were filming the arrests said they were beaten and thrown to the ground by police. A statement from Agence France-Presse said: "AFP deplores the detention of our journalist Eylul Yasar who was just doing her job. "While it welcomes her release, AFP calls on the Turkish authorities to respect the rights of journalists and to treat them with respect." Erol Onderoglu, correspondent with media rights group Reporters Without Borders (RSF) in Turkey, denounced Yasar's "arbitrary arrest, which prevented her from doing her job." He had earlier said that around 50 people who came to attend the celebrations, which normally include traditional dances and a large bonfire, were also arrested at the site. An AFP photographer said the bonfire had been canceled. Many Kurds, who make up about a fifth of Turkey's estimated 85 million people, say they face significant discrimination in the country. The former leading figure of the main pro-Kurdish party, Selahattin Demirtas, was imprisoned in 2016 for "terrorist propaganda," while more than a hundred mayors of Kurdish localities saw elections canceled in the last municipal vote in 2019. Turkey has repeatedly insisted that it does not discriminate against Kurds as a minority but rather opposes the Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK), an organization banned by Ankara and its Western allies as a terrorist organization. According to the RSF, Turkey last year ranked in 164th place out of 180 countries on its index of press freedom. That marks a drop of 16 places from 2022. @2024 VOA

M23 militia in Kibumba, DRC, 2022. © Moses Sawasawa/AP Democratic Republic of the Congo Country Report March 2024 By Sera Mishra, Genocide Watch There have been 6 million conflict-related deaths in the DRC since 1998. The eastern provinces of Nord-Kivu, Sud-Kivu, Ituri, and Tanganyika, and the southern provinces of Kasaï-Oriental, Kasaï Central, Kasaï, and Mai-Ndombe had genocidal massacres in 2023. 6.7 million Congolese are internally displaced. 400,000 women are raped each year in DRC, the highest rate of sexual violence in the world. In the First and Second Congo Wars (1996-97, 1998-2003), from one to five million civilians died. 100 armed militias continue to commit atrocities in eastern DRC. The M23 militia, supported by Rwanda, launched a new offensive in 2022, and is the most active non-state militia. The Allied Democratic Forces (ADF), claiming allegiance to the Islamic State, killed 1000 civilians in eastern DRC and Uganda in 2023. Mass killing, kidnapping of children, mass rape, and torture by militias and government forces, and ethnic conflict plague the DRC. The corrupt DRC government is unable to bring peace or law and order. Since 2003, the world’s largest UN peacekeeping force, MONUSCO, has also been unable to stop atrocities despite having up to 21,000 troops in DRC at a cost of over ten billion dollars. Demonstrations in Goma in 2022 demanded that MONUSCO leave the DRC. MONUSCO will leave DRC by the end of 2024. In the elections of 2018 and 2023, Félix Tshisekedi was elected President. Before 2018, DRC had never before had a peaceful political transition. Tshisekedi vows to end corruption but he has failed to do so. Tens of thousands of Congolese are informally employed by multinational corporations that own cobalt, coltan, and copper mines. The mines have child labor, life-threatening work conditions, exposure to toxic substances, and a lack of any safety precautions. Local mai mai militias, Hutu genocidists from Rwanda (Interahamwe), and the Congolese army have driven over 100,000 Congolese Tutsis (Banyamulenge) off their land in eastern DRC into refugee camps in Rwanda. The Banyamulenge have been systematically displaced and killed in a ‘slow genocide.’ Congolese nationalists try to justify this genocide as revenge for past Tutsi domination, using the same racist, indigenous citizens vs. foreign invaders ideology that drove the Rwandan genocide. In February 2024, a Lendu militia, the Cooperative for the Development of the Congo (CODECO) massacred dozens of Hema people, a targeted Tutsi minority in Northern Ituri province. Batwa communities residing in or near the Kahuzi-Biega National Park in South Kivu have been persecuted by park guards and Congolese army soldiers. Congolese Tutsis (the Banyamulenge and Hema) and the Batwa people are targets of slow genocides in the DRC. Women, children, the LGBTQ+ community, people in displaced person camps, and civil society activists and organizations are persecuted. The Democratic Republic of the Congo is at Stage 3: Discrimination, Stage 4: Dehumanization, Stage 5: Organization, Stage 6: Polarization, Stage 8: Persecution, and Stage 9: Extermination. Genocide Watch recommends: ●      MONUSCO must not withdraw from eastern DRC, where it is the only non-DRC security force. ●      MONUSCO should adopt effective strategies to hunt down and defeat genocidal militias. ●      Rwanda must withdraw all its troops from the DRC and end its support for M23. ●      The DRC must enforce its laws against hate speech and incitements to genocide. ●      The DRC should arrest and prosecute leaders who incite genocide and crimes against humanity.

Jihadist militia murdered 197 Christians at Christmas 2023 in Plateau state Nigeria Genocide Emergency January 2024 Since 2000, 62,000 Christians in Nigeria have been victims of genocide perpetrated by Islamist extremist groups Boko Haram, Islamic State West Africa Province (ISWAP), and organized Fulani jihadists. The International Committee on Nigeria calls this genocide the “Silent Slaughter.” 34,000 moderate Muslims have also been murdered by Islamist extremist groups since 2000. Leah Sharibu, one of 110 school girls who were abducted by ISWAP militants in 2018, is still in captivity because she refuses to renounce her Catholic faith. In June 2022,  more than 50 parishioners at St. Francis Xavier Church in Owo were massacred. The Nigerian government blamed the massacre on ISWAP. Locals pointed to Fulani militias. Aid to the Church in Need reports that in 2022, four Catholic priests were killed in Nigeria, and 23 priests were kidnapped. In April 2023 , the International Society for Civil Liberties and Rule of Law (Intersociety) reported that since 2000, 18,000 Christian churches and 2,200 Christian schools have been deliberately set on fire. Nigerian church set on fire by Islamist jihadists During the Christmas holiday in December 2023, over 140 Nigerian Christians were massacred in Plateau State in coordinated attacks by Fulani militias. Beginning on December 23, Fulani militias targeted 26 Christian farming villages across Plateau State. Many villagers sought refuge in the bush to escape the assailants and are still missing, indicating a death toll over 200. In a speech delivered on January 11 in the British House of Lords, Lord David Alton urged the UK government to prioritize and promptly address the ongoing persecution of Christians in Nigeria. Emeka Umeagbalasi, the director of Intersociety, alleges that the Nigerian government is complicit in this forced displacement and genocide of Christian farmers by Fulani herders. Due to systematic massacres of both Christians and moderate Muslims, and the government’s failure to stop the genocide, Genocide Watch considers Nigeria to be at Stage 5: Organization, Stage 6: Polarization, Stage 7: Preparation, Stage 8: Persecution, Stage 9: Extermination and Stage 10: Denial. Genocide Watch Recommends: The UN Human Rights Council and the Nigerian government should establish a Commission of Inquiry to investigate attacks on civilians and report to the Nigerian government and the UN Human Rights Council. The Nigerian Army and police should establish a Strike Force, trained by international counter-terrorism experts, to investigate and arrest leaders of Boko Haram, ISWAP, and Fulani jihadists. Nigerian religious leaders should establish a network of monitors to provide early warnings of attacks. The U.S. State Department should stop its denial of this genocide in Nigeria. The Assistant Secretary of State for African Affairs, the US Ambassador to Nigeria, and the Legal Advisor on Africa should be reassigned to other posts. The US should appoint a Special Envoy to Nigeria to directly advise President Biden and bypass State Department genocide deniers. Nigeria should be again designated a Country of Particular Concern. US and European churches should be informed about this genocide of Christians. They should pressure their governments to take forceful action to help the Nigerian government stop this genocide.