Israel denies diamond charges
Israel refuted accusations by a United Nations panel that it was involved in the blood diamond trade. The panel said Israel was involved in the illegal export and sale of diamonds from the Ivory Coast. It also said the United Arab Emirates, Lebanon, Guinea and Liberia were not enforcing a UN embargo on buying the diamonds mined in the West African nation. A blood diamond refers to a diamond mined in a war zone and sold to finance an insurgency or warlord, usually in Africa. Civil wars in Angola, Sierra Leone and Liberia were financed largely by an underground diamond trade. “Israel has never dealt in diamond trade with the Ivory Coast,” Israel’s diamond controller, Shmuel Mordechai said. “We are shocked by these false accusations and completely refute them.”
Israel refutes water charges
Israel has refuted accusations in an Amnesty International report claiming the Palestinians don’t have access to an adequate supply of water. The Israel-Palestinian water policy is based on an interim agreement between the two parties, Israel said. “Israel has fulfilled all its obligations under the water agreement regarding the supply of additional quantities of water to the Palestinians, and has even extensively surpassed the obligatory quantity,” according to a statement by the Foreign Ministry. “The Palestinians, on the other hand, have significantly violated their commitments under the water agreement, specifically regarding important issues such as illegal drilling and handling of sewage.” The Amnesty report accuses Israel of denying the Palestinians the right to access adequate water by maintaining total control over the shared water resources and pursuing discriminatory policies. Israel’s Foreign Ministry questioned the motivation of the human rights organization in releasing the report. “The authors of the report chose to ignore Israeli data, papers and reports, although they contain verifiable facts presented with total transparency,” the ministry said. “This questionable approach, which consists of systematically disregarding Israeli material while relying exclusively on Palestinian allegations, raises doubts as to the real intentions of the report’s authors and of the organization itself.”
Palestinians file Gaza war claims
Some 1,500 notices of future civil lawsuits against the Israel Defence Forces over damages caused during the Gaza war have been filed in Israel. The claims by Palestinians in Gaza add up to tens of millions of dollars and deal with property and physical damage, as well as loss of earning capacity, Ynet reported. The Israeli and overseas lawyers filing the notices say they’ll them in Israeli courts.
Gaydamak sentenced to jail
A French court sentenced Israeli-Russian billionaire Arcady Gaydamak to six years in prison for illegal arms dealing. Gaydamak, a businessman who owns the Israeli soccer team Beitar Jerusalem, was sentenced for being involved in deals in the 1990s. A French and Israeli citizen, he left Israel for Moscow 10 months ago. France and Israel have an extradition treaty; Russia and France do not. Gaydamak and a partner formed a company to sell $791 million worth of illegal arms, including tanks, helicopters and a warship to Angola. The operation involved some 40 suspects, including French government officials and public figures.
New olim descendants of Chinese Jews
A group of descendants from an ancient Chinese Jewish community moved to Israel. The seven young adults, all descendants of the Jewish community of Kaifeng, arrived last week in Israel on one-year entry permits. They will study Hebrew at a kibbutz ulpan and then undergo conversion to Judaism, according to Michael Freund, founder of the Shavei Israel organization, which brought the group to Israel. “This is a historic event,” Freund said. “Kaifeng’s Jewish descendants are a living link between China and the Jewish people, and it is very moving to see the remnants of this community returning to their roots.” An estimated 1,000 Jewish descendants live in Kaifeng.
– files from JTA