Civilian Pawns


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Operation Grapes of Wrath




Human Rights, Human Security, and State Security


Book Description

This book provides innovative thinking from a variety of perspectives on the important human rights, human security, and national security policy issues of today—and how these issues intersect. The issue of human security comes into play in nearly every important policy debate in global politics, and the protection of human rights is now recognized as one of the main functions of any legitimate modern state. How can the international community best ensure that human rights are protected while simultaneously protecting state security? Who should intervene in cases of mass, gross violations, and when are military actions justified? This book seeks to address and explore these difficult and pressing questions by presenting the differing views of commentators from various ends of the spectrum. Human Rights, Human Security, and State Security: The Intersection consists of three volumes, with each focusing primarily on one of the three broad areas while also drawing connections between them. A powerful resource for policy makers and practitioners in national governments, members of international organizations, and scholars, the innovative thinking presented will give readers a deepened understanding of the various international issues and help them to formulate effective policies in today's complex international landscape.







Technology Enhanced Learning: Quality of Teaching and Educational Reform


Book Description

It is a great pleasure to share with you the Springer CCIS proceedings of the First International Conference on Reforming Education, Quality of Teaching and Technology-Enhanced Learning: Learning Technologies, Quality of Education, Educational Systems, Evaluation, Pedagogies––TECH-EDUCATION 2010, Which was a part of the World Summit on the Knowledge Society Conference Series. TECH-EDUCATION 2010 was a bold effort aiming to foster a debate on the global need in our times to invest in education. The topics of the conference dealt with six general pillars: Track 1. Quality of Education––A new Vision Track 2. Technology-Enhanced Learning––Learning Technologies––Personalization-E-learning Track 3. Educational Strategies Track 4. Collaborative/ Constructive/ Pedagogical/ Didactical Approaches Track 5. Formal/ Informal/ and Life–Long Learning Perspectives Track 6. Contribution of Education to Sustainable Development Within this general context the Program Committee of the conference invited contributions that fall in to the following list of topics. Track 1: Quality of the Education––A new Vision • Teaching Methodologies and Case Studies • Reforms in Degrees • The European Educational Space • Academic Curricula Designs • Quality of Teaching and Learning • Quality and Academic Assessment • The School / University of the Future • Challenges for Higher Education in the 21st Century • New Managerial Models for Education • Financing the New Model for Education of the 21st Century • The Quality Milestones for Education of the 21st Century • Evaluation in Academia • The Role of Teachers • International Collaborations for Joint Programs/Degrees • Industry–Academia Synergies • Research Laboratories Management




Pawns


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Deadly Metal Rain: The Legality of Flechette Weapons in International Law


Book Description

Taking the April 2003 rejection by Israel's Supreme Court of a petition to ban flechette use rounds in the densely populated Gaza Strip as its point of departure, this innovative and interdisciplinary book offers the only in-depth study on flechette weapons conducted to date. Its timeliness is demonstrated in the 2009 Goldstone Report’s call for an urgent UNGA discussion on such weapons’ future legality. The book's first part reviews flechette weapon development and use during the Vietnam War as well as the consequent efforts to ban them. It then turns to the Israeli case: the use in Lebanon, the Gaza Strip and the resulting Supreme Court petition. The book's third and main part dissects the prolonged debate over banning flechettes while resting on unique primary sources such as Israeli post mortem reports together with an ample legal and military-medical literature. The book thus provides one of the most comprehensive explorations available of the distinctions separating legal from illegal conventional weapons.




Civilians Under Assault


Book Description

Assessment of Hezbollah's rocket attacks -- Assessment of Hezbollah's wartime statements -- International humanitarian law and asymmetrical conflicts -- Israel's obligations to take precautions against the effects of attacks -- A note on Israeli censorship. -- Recommendations. -- Legal standards applicable to the conflict -- Applicable International Law -- Protections for civilians and civilian objects. -- Hezbollah's arsenal -- Types and accuracy of rockets used -- Hezbollah intelligence -- Suppliers of Hezbollah's weapons -- Hezbollah's use of cluster munitions. -- Case Studies -- Akko -- Arab al-Aramshe -- Haifa : July 16 attack kills eight workers in railroad hangar -- July 17 attack nearly destroys 3-story apartment building -- August 6 attack kills three elderly persons -- Targeting the port area. -- Karmiel, Majd al-Krum, and Deir al-Assad -- Kiryat Shmona -- HaKrayot -- Ma'alot-Tarshiha and Me'ilia -- Mazra : mental hospital hit -- Mghar -- Nahariya -- Nahariya Hospital -- Nazareth -- Kibbutz Saar -- Safed (Tzfat). -- Hezbollah's justifications for attacks on civilian areas. -- Israel's obligations to take precautions against the effects of attacks -- Protection of civilians during wartime and the Principle of non-discrimination. -- Historical background to the 2006 Conflict. -- Acknowledgements -- Appendix.




A High Price


Book Description

The product of painstaking research and countless interviews, A High Price offers a nuanced, definitive historical account of Israel's bold but often failed efforts to fight terrorist groups. Beginning with the violent border disputes that emerged after Israel's founding in 1948, Daniel Byman charts the rise of Yasir Arafat's Fatah and leftist groups such as the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine--organizations that ushered in the era of international terrorism epitomized by the 1972 hostage-taking at the Munich Olympics. Byman reveals how Israel fought these groups and others, such as Hamas, in the decades that follow, with particular attention to the grinding and painful struggle during the second intifada. Israel's debacles in Lebanon against groups like the Lebanese Hizballah are examined in-depth, as is the country's problematic response to Jewish terrorist groups that have struck at Arabs and Israelis seeking peace. In surveying Israel's response to terror, the author points to the coups of shadowy Israeli intelligence services, the much-emulated use of defensive measures such as sky marshals on airplanes, and the role of controversial techniques such as targeted killings and the security barrier that separates Israel from Palestinian areas. Equally instructive are the shortcomings that have undermined Israel's counterterrorism goals, including a disregard for long-term planning and a failure to recognize the long-term political repercussions of counterterrorism tactics.




Why They Died


Book Description

The conflict between Israel and Hezbollah in July 2006 had a devastating effect on civilians in Lebanon. Israeli attacks killed at least at 1,109 Lebanese, the vast majority of them civilians. The strikes also injured 4, 399 people and displaced an estimated one million. This report presents the most extensive investigation to date that anyone has conducted into the circumtances surrounding these civilian deaths. Human Rights Watch visited more than 50 Lebanese villages, interviewed over 355 witnesses, and investigated 94 separate incidents of Israeli attacks. These attacks claimed the lives of 510 civilians, as well as 51 Hezbollah combatants--almost half of the Lebanese death in the conflict.




Israel's Long War with Hezbollah


Book Description

The ongoing conflict between Israel and the Lebanese militant group Hezbollah is now in its fourth decade and shows no signs of ending. Raphael D. Marcus examines this conflict since the formation of Hezbollah during Israel’s occupation of Lebanon in the early 1980s. He critically evaluates events including Israel’s long counterguerrilla campaign throughout the 1990s, the Israeli withdrawal in 2000, the 2006 summer war, and concludes with an assessment of current tensions on the border between Israel and Lebanon related to the Syrian civil war. Israel’s Long War with Hezbollah is both the first complete military history of this decades-long conflict and an analysis of military innovation and adaptation. The book is based on unique fieldwork in Israel and Lebanon, extensive research into Hebrew and Arabic primary sources, and dozens of interviews Marcus conducted with Israeli defense officials, high-ranking military officers of the Israel Defense Forces (IDF), United Nations personnel, a Hezbollah official, and Western diplomats. As an expert on organizational learning, Marcus analyzes ongoing processes of strategic and operational innovation and adaptation by both the IDF and Hezbollah throughout the long guerrilla conflict. His conclusions illuminate the dynamics of the ongoing conflict and illustrate the complexity of military adaptation under fire. With Hezbollah playing an ongoing role in the civil war in Syria and the simmering hostilities on the Israel-Lebanon border, students, scholars, diplomats, and military practitioners with an interest in Middle Eastern security issues, Israeli military history, and military innovation and adaptation can ill afford to neglect this book.