❶ After 325 days, Israel returns body of slain Palestinian Bahaa Elayyan to his family
❷ Israel shuts down Palestinian radio station amid escalation in press violations
. . . ❷― (ᴀ)   Israeli violations against journalists in occupied territory increase by 17% in first half of 2016
❸ Israeli forces detain 10 Palestinians, including journalist, in West Bank night raids

• Background from Washington Report on Middle East Affairs. “. . . discourse . . .  itself actually functions to shield Israeli society from the criticism that it deserves.” 

❹ POETRY by Mourid Barghouti
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❶ AFTER  325  DAYS,  ISRAEL  RETURNS  BODY  OF  SLAIN  PALESTINIAN  BAHAA  ELAYYAN  TO  HIS  FAMILY
Ma’an News Agency
Sept. 1, 2016
Israeli authorities returned the body of Palestinian Bahaa Elayyan on Thursday at dawn, allowing his family — which has been leading the movement advocating for Israel to release slain Palestinians’ bodies — to bury him 325 days after his death.
___Elayyan, a 22-year-old resident of the East Jerusalem neighborhood of Jabal al-Mukabbir, was killed alongside another Palestinian after they attacked an Israeli bus with on Oct. 13, killing three Israelis with knives and a gun.
___His body was buried at the al-Mujahidin cemetery near the Old City of Jerusalem, in accordance with stipulations from Israeli police, which has allowed the release of bodies of slain Palestinians from East Jerusalem accused of “terrorism” on the condition that they no longer have funerals in their neighborhoods or villages, but would instead be buried in cemeteries chosen by the police.    MORE . . .   

❷ ISRAELI  VIOLATIONS  AGAINST  JOURNALISTS  IN  OCCUPIED  TERRITORY  INCREASE  BY  17%  IN  FIRST  HALF  OF  2016
Ma’an News Agency
Aug. 28, 2016
A Palestinian press freedoms watchdog on Saturday said Israeli violations against media freedoms in the occupied Palestinian territory had continued to rise at a rapid pace over the first half of 2016.
___The increase came even after the group reported an “unprecedented” increase in violations throughout 2015 — “the highest ever to be monitored in Palestine” since the group started monitoring violations against media freedoms more than a decade ago.   ___The Palestinian Center for Development and Media Freedoms, known as MADA, recorded a 17 percent escalation of violations by Israeli authorities during the first half of 2016.     MORE . . .

. . . ❷― (ᴀ) “JOURNALISTS  SUPPORT”  CALLS  TO  STOP  ISRAELI  AGGRESSION  AGAINST  JOURNALISTS
Alray-Palestinian Media Agency
Aug. 31, 2016
The Journalists support committee called upon the international institutions concerned with the rights of journalists to put pressure on the Israeli occupation to stop its aggression against the Palestinian journalists.
___The Committee called in a statement issued on Wednesday, for the release of journalists and media workers in the radio without charge attributed to them, and with the guarantee of freedom of opinion and expression as guaranteed to them in accordance with international laws.
___Earlier this morning, the Israeli occupation forces arrested at dawn the entire crew of Al-Sanabel Radio in the southern city of Hebron south of the West Bank, after the closing and confiscating of its entire contents.      MORE . . .   

❸ ISRAELI  FORCES  DETAIN  10  PALESTINIANS,  INCLUDING  JOURNALIST,  IN  WEST  BANK  NIGHT  RAIDS
Ma’an News Agency
Sept. 1, 2016
Israeli forces detained at least 10 Palestinians, including a journalist, in Wednesday night raids across the occupied West Bank, Israeli and Palestinian sources said.
___The Palestinian Prisoner’s Society (PPS) reported on Thursday that four Palestinians were detained in the southern West Bank district of Hebron, including journalist and former prisoner Osama Shaheen.    MORE . . .

• Elrahim, Amira Abd. “Lack of Security for Palestinians.” Palestine-Israel Journal of Politics, Economics & Culture 21.2 (2015): 28-35.  FULL ARTICLE

Unfortunately, the biased international media has always tried to exonerate Israel as an ethnic supremacist state from its guilt regarding ethnic cleansing. Many political analysts, activists and others fear being portrayed as anti-Semites. Conservative discourse surrounding anti-Semitism itself actually functions to shield Israeli society from the criticism that it deserves. This was obvious in the news coverage of the stabbing attacks in some of the international media channels. In the headlines, “stabbings” were presented as the root of the problem which justifies deadly responses and the murder of Palestinians. In this way, the responses were portrayed as responses to an external factor, which is the violence against Israelis. As a result, Israel was portrayed as a victim, changing victims into criminals, and criminals into victims.
___At the same time, social media by contrast threatens to damage the public image of Israel. It played a big role in removing the mask of the Israeli image through its ability to bypass the propaganda war of international media channels. The image of Israeli society has had barbarous periods before, but not like this one, in which every stabber or anyone who threatens with a knife, school scissors or a ruler is executed, even after he has thrown down his “weapon,” while the killer becomes the hero of the nation.
___The goal of this unilateral war is, on one hand, to force Palestinians to give up all their national demands in their homeland and, on the other hand, add privileges to the Israelis. Israel has chosen occupation over peace and has used negotiations as a smokescreen to advance its colonial project.

“NORMAL  JOURNEY,”  BY  MOURID  BARGHOUTI

I have not seen any horrors,
I have not seen a dragon in the land,
I have not seen the Kraken* in the sea,
nor a witch or a policeman
at the outset of my day.
Pirates have not overtaken mu desires,
thieves have not broken down the door of my life,
my absence has not been long,
it only took me one lifetime.

How come you saw scars
on my face, sorrow in my eyes,
and bruises in my bones and in my heart?
These are only illusions.
I have not seen any horrors,
everything was extremely normal.
Don’t worry,
your son is still in his grave, murdered,
and he’s fine.

From Barghouti, Mourid. MIDNIGHT AND OTHER POEMS. Trans. Radwa Ashour. Todmorden, UK: Arc Publications, 2008. Available from Barnes and Noble.

*a legendary sea monster of large proportions