[Peace-discuss] ADL statements, silences, and awards

[David Green]

This a a follow-up on last week's acquittal of Sami
Al-Arian, and Anti-Defamation League complicity in the
violation of his rights. 

Subsequent to Al-Arian's acquittal, the Center for
Constitutional Rights has sued Avi Dichter, head
Israeli spy, for the murder of 15 innocents in a
"targeted killing" in 2002.

Below is a brief article from the CCR website, as well
as an archieved article from the ADL website. It
concerns an award given by the ADL to George Tenet,
former head of the CIA, with a message from Dicther.
One wonders about Eleanor Roosevelt's view from the
grave regarding the largely murderous company that the
ADL's "democratic legacy" award has her keeping. Saul
Bellow, unfortunately, would be less disturbed.

__________________________________________

FORMER DIRECTOR OF ISRAEL’S GENERAL SECURITY SERVICE
SUED IN NEW YORK FOR DEATH AND INJURY OF OVER 165 IN
GAZA

Synopsis 

On December 8, 2005, the Center for Constitutional
Rights and the Palestinian Center for Human Rights
(PCHR) brought a class action lawsuit against Avi
Dichter, the former Director of Israel’s General
Security Service (GSS), on behalf of the Palestinians
who were killed or injured in a 2002 air strike in
Gaza.  The attack occurred just before midnight on
July 22, 2002, when the Israeli Defense Forces (IDF)
dropped a one-ton bomb on al-Daraj, a residential
neighborhood in Gaza City in the Occupied Palestinian
Territory.  
 
The attack killed seven adults and eight children,
including plaintiff Ra'ed Matar's wife and their three
young children and plaintiff Mahmoud Al Huweiti's wife
and two of their young sons.  It injured over 150
others, including plaintiff Marwan Zeino, whose spinal
vertebrae were crushed.  The attack was widely
condemned by the international community, including
the U.S. government, at the time. On July 23, 2002,
White House Press Secretary Ari Fleischer stated that
President Bush condemned this "deliberate attack
against a building in which civilians were known to be
located."   These attacks on civilians, however, are
ongoing, with the IDF carrying out regular air strikes
on residential neighborhoods in the Occupied
Palestinian Territory to this day.
 
The case charges Avi Dichter, then Director of
Israel's General Security Service (GSS), with war
crimes and other gross human rights violations for his
participation in the decision to drop the bomb on the
residential neighborhood, and charges that GSS
provided the necessary intelligence and final approval
to implement the attack.  Dichter was served papers in
New York at 10:30 pm on the night of December 7, 2005.
 He retired from the GSS earlier this year and has
been a fellow at the Brookings Institution in
Washington, D.C.
 
CCR Attorney Maria LaHood said, "Today's suit is part
of a critical international movement to hold
accountable those responsible for war crimes and other
human rights abuses abroad when their own governments
are unwilling to do so.  Intentional attacks on
civilians cannot be tolerated by the international
community."
 
Raji Sourani, Director of the Palestinian Centre for
Human Rights, said, "Justice must finally be delivered
to the Palestinian families in this lawsuit who have
suffered tremendously because of Avi Dichter's
decision to bomb the al-Daraj neighborhood.  These
families are representative of scores of other
Palestinians who have suffered and continue to suffer
as a result of Dichter's actions."
 
The Plaintiffs are represented by Jennifer Green and
Maria LaHood from the Center for Constitutional
Rights, the Palestinian Center for Human Rights, and
CCR Cooperating Counsel Judith Brown Chomsky and
Michael Poulshock.

________________________________

Former CIA Director George Tenet Presented With ADL'S
Highest Honor

Palm Beach, FL, February 11, 2005 
 Citing his career
accomplishments in intelligence, national security and
international affairs and his commitment to diversity
issues and anti-bias training in the workplace, the
Anti-Defamation League (ADL) presented former CIA
Director George J. Tenet with its highest honor, the
America's Democratic Legacy Award.  The honor was
conferred during the opening gala dinner of the
League's National Executive Committee Meeting,
February 10 - 12 in Palm Beach, Florida.
 
"All of us, as citizens of this great country, were
incredibly fortunate to have our national security and
intelligence operations in such skilled, knowledgeable
and capable hands," said Abraham H. Foxman, ADL
National Director.  "George Tenet is one of the most
warm, gracious men any of us have ever met, and while
I am not suggesting he conducted the CIA's vital
business in the full glare of the public spotlight, he
opened it up more than any director in its history or
that of its predecessor, the OSS."

Mr. Foxman noted that under his leadership at the CIA,
Mr. Tenet selected the League's A WORLD OF DIFFERENCE
Institute® to help the agency's supervisors and field
agents to work with an increasingly diverse staff.

"Receiving this award is an incredibly big deal, it is
right up there with receiving the Presidential Medal
of Freedom," Mr. Tenet said in accepting the ADL
honor.  "What you do every day in fighting prejudice,
bigotry and anti-Semitism – you should be proud of
yourselves.  The things that you do as an organization
governments don't often do because they don't have the
courage to say to people, 'You all have prejudice in
your hearts and souls, and you've got to do something
to get rid of it.'"

In a videotaped greeting from Israel, Avi Dichter,
Director of the Shin Bet, Israel's internal security
service, offered his personal congratulations and
wished Mr. Tenet well. "You are certainly worthy of
this honor," said Mr. Dichter.  "I have learned to
appreciate you as the head of an intelligence
organization at a time of difficulty for both the
United States and Israel.  Thank you, George, for your
great contribution to the world's intelligence
community."

ADL's America's Democratic Legacy Award, its highest
honor, was established more than 50 years ago to
recognize "those precious few individuals who have
helped make our nation a place where freedom, equality
and democracy are cherished rights forever."  

Previous award recipients include former U.S.
Presidents Ronald Reagan, Lyndon Johnson, John F.
Kennedy, Dwight Eisenhower and Harry S. Truman; as
well as Eleanor Roosevelt, Adlai Stevenson, Justice
Earl Warren, Saul Bellow, Henry Kissinger, Lee
Iacocca, Walter Annenberg, Dwayne Andreas and Cardinal
John O'Connor.  The award has also been presented to
distinguished institutions including Harvard
University, The New York Times and the Columbia
Broadcasting System.

________________________________


This article and yesterday's acquittal bookend the
time that Sami al-Arian has spent in prison--assuming
he is to be released shortly.> 

ADL Commends Law Enforcement For Arrests Of
> Suspected Terrorist
> Supporters
> 
> Miami, FL, February 20, 2003 ... The Anti-Defamation
> League (ADL)
> commended federal law enforcement for taking steps
> to root out terrorism
> with today's arrests of several men suspected of
> aiding and abetting
> international terrorist groups, including that of a
> tenured Florida
> professor previously accused of having ties to Hamas
> and Islamic Jihad.
> Sami Al-Arian, a Palestinian college professor at
> the University of
> South Florida, was arrested on a federal indictment
> in Tampa. 
> 
> ________________________________
> 
> Backgrounder: Sami Al-Arian
> <http://dev.adl.org/Terror/terrorism_al-arian.asp> 
> 
> ________________________________
> 
> "We are gratified that the federal authorities have
> taken this decisive
> step in countering alleged fundraising and material
> support activities
> for terrorist organizations including Hamas and
> Islamic Jihad," said
> Arthur Teitelbaum, ADL Southern Area Director.
> "Al-Arian's arrest is
> particularly significant, as this is an individual
> who has long been
> suspected of having close ties with leaders of
> terrorist groups."
> 
> "Al-Arian claims his arrest is 'all about
> politics,'" Mr. Teitelbaum
> said. "Well, it is about politics. It's his support
> for the politics of
> violence and terror."
> 
> In 1991, Al-Arian founded the World and Islam
> Studies Enterprise (WISE),
> a think-tank that was under contract with the
> University of South
> Florida, where Al-Arian is a tenured professor in
> engineering and
> computer science. He also was a founder of Islamic
> Committee for
> Palestine, a nonprofit group that once hosted
> conferences where speakers
> expressed support for Palestinian Islamic Jihad.
> 
> The former director of WISE, Ramadan Abdullah
> Shallah, disappeared in
> 1995 and later resurfaced in Damascus, Syria as the
> head of Islamic
> Jihad, a group designated as an international
> sponsor of terrorism by
> the U.S. State Department.
> > 
> Read more online on our web site at 
> http://www.adl.org/PresRele/TerrorismIntl_93/4233_93
>  
> The Anti-Defamation League, founded in 1913, is the
> world's leading
> organization fighting anti-Semitism through programs
> and services that
> counteract hatred, prejudice and bigotry.



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