External resources relating to Who profits?

As a child growing up in the remote highlands of West Papua, we often heard stories from the elders about how our ancestors' spirits lived in the mountains and forests. How they would cry if they saw what is happening today. Illegal logging is rife, and the world's largest gold and copper mine, Freeport, has caused permanent environmental devastation to our sacred lands that is visible from space.

Earlier this week, Indonesian security forces opened fire on striking workers at the Freeport mine. It left one person dead and several others wounded, leading Sam Zarifi, Amnesty International's Asia Pacific director, to say that "Indonesian police have not learned how to deal with protesters without resorting to excessive, and even lethal, force". Rough justice is nothing new to my people. Journalists are not permitted entry to Papua but raw footage from Papuans' mobile phones regularly documents Papuans suffering brutality at the hands of Indonesian security services...

In the early hours of Saturday, March 12, Yemeni security forces under the direction of Yemen’s Central Security Service (CSS) (which is commanded by Yahya Salih and is home to the U.S. funded and trained “counter-terror unit”) stormed the anti-government protesters’ camp near Sana’a University. The ensuing battle between the protesters and state security forces resulted in over 100 injured and two dead protesters. The violence continued across Yemen on Sunday with more injured protesters and one death reported in the southern port city of Aden...

Palestinians in the Israeli-occupied West Bank village of Bil’in had no cause to ring in the New Year as tragedy struck the Abu Rahmah family for the fourth time in three years.

After inhaling tear gas fired by the Israeli military at a December 31 demonstration, 36-year-old villager Jawaher Abu Rahmah died the next day from cardiac arrest. Rather than admit wrongdoing, the Israeli military briefed behind closed doors friendly bloggers who then shamefully blamed her death on cancer, or failing that, on an “honor killing.”

Previously, Jawaher’s 29-year-old brother Bassem was killed by the Israeli military in April 2009 when he was hit in the chest with a high-velocity tear gas canister...

The report, Preach What You Practice: The Separation of Military and Police Roles in the Americas, from the Washington Office on Latin America (WOLA) provides a background briefing on key distinctions between military and police functions. It calls on the Obama Administration to change direction, and stop encouraging the military forces of other countries to take on roles that would be illegal for the U.S. Armed Forces to carry out at home. The authors, a team of WOLA’s regional security experts, set out specific steps to be taken by both United States and countries in the region.

Israeli military exports to South America have been on the rise in the recent years. Brazil is gearing up to become the gateway for Israeli military technology and companies. Israel continues to be a top supplier of the Colombian military. Ecuador, while not having extensive military ties with Israel, has recently purchased drone aircraft. Chile, already a buyer of Israeli arms, also has expressed interest in similar drone technology.

It is the goal of this report to analyze these trends, both in light of recent events and also as they relate to the history of Israeli involvement in South America. We will highlight that it is impossible for South America’s democratic governments to reconcile protection of human rights - whether at home or abroad - with military ties and arms trade with Israel.

Any military ties with Israel support the state’s policies of occupation, apartheid and ethnic cleansing, policies whose sustainability depends on Israeli military capacities and the profits deriving from its military industry,  and adversely affect the Palestinians and their struggle. Israel has developed an indigenous military industry that produces much of the equipment used by its military.  International buyers help ensure the survival of the Israeli military industry.

Commencing with the quantitative attributes of the industry, the chapter will first show that private policing armament in Israel has significantly raised the number of firearms circulating through the streets and homes, distinctly accelerating small-arms proliferation.  It will also outline the scope and dimensions of the private policing industry active in Israel...  The following two sections of the chapter then go on to describe how the spread and growth of private policing have deepened Israeli militarization in unprecedented ways...  Finally, addressing the strongly gendered implications of these developments, I will trace ways in which the process of militarization, enhanced by the private policing industry in Israel and the accelerated proliferation of the arms it sanctions, has intensified exsiting gender disrimination and violence against women.

The story of the Amungme and Kamoro peoples and U.S. mining corporation Freeport McMoRan Copper & Gold ("Freeport") offers one of the best-documented examples of how local communities have experienced and resisted the seizure of their traditional lands by government-backed multinational mining enterprises...

As part of the collective punishment policy adopted by the Israeli forces against the Palestinian civilians accused of carrying out attacks against Israeli soldiers or/and settlers, on Thursday dawn, 17 August 2017, Israeli forces demolished a house belonging to ‘Adel Hasan Ahmed ‘Ankoush in Deir Abu Mesh’al village, northwest of Ramallah.  ‘Ankoush was killed by the Israeli forces on 16 June 2017. The Palestinian Center for Human Rights (PCHR) accordingly condemns this new crime, which is added to the series of Israeli crimes committed in the occupied Palestinian territory (oPt).  PCHR also emphasizes that the crime is part of the Israeli forces’ collective punishment policy against innocent Palestinians in violation of Article 33 of the Fourth Geneva Convention that prohibits collective penalties and reprisals against protected persons and their property. PCHR calls upon the international community to offer protection to the civilians in the oPt and ensure the application of the aforementioned convention.

The legal cases against Tahoe Resources are being carried out in a larger context of opposition to the Escobal mine. The violence, repression, and criminalization community leaders continue to face is not limited to what transpired on April 27, 2013...

The militarization of police units has been a longstanding policy in Latin America well before it received attention from the U.S. media. U.S. bilateral assistance to countries in Latin America has encouraged the adoption of military equipment and military training for local police forces.   While the U.S. prohibits the armed forces from assisting police forces at home, the practice of technology transfer and military training in-country has been a cornerstone of U.S. policy in Latin America and the Caribbean for years. The logic is that crime and violence have overwhelmed local police forces—weak and corrupt to begin with—and therefore the armed forces are necessary for the state to provide security.   But that comes with huge risks...