The EU’s Self-Defeating Aid Policy towards Palestine. CEPS Policy Brief No. 343/May 2016

Motivated by the dual aims of strengthening the Middle East Peace Process and contributing to Palestinian state-building, the European Union and its member states have been the biggest donors of financial assistance to the Palestinians. This CEPS Policy Brief finds, however, that these efforts have not achieved the desired change, as the EU failed to develop a coherent strategy to address Israel’s violations of international humanitarian law and it has accepted practices that undermine its political objectives. Hence, the author, Brigitte Herremans, argues that the aid has not contributed to a strong Palestinian government that can contribute to the security of both Palestinian and Israeli civilians. She calls upon the EU and its member states to take more measures to ensure that aid is received by people in need and that illegal practices on the part of Israel do not hamper its effectiveness

Palestinian Unity Government: EU should find ways to cooperate. Egmont Security Policy Brief No. 25, May 2011

Hamas and Fatah, along with other Palestinian factions and parties, signed a unity agreement on the 27th of April, with the aim of ending a four-year-long political division of the occupied Palestinian territory (oPt) between the West Bank and the Gaza Strip. The announcement of the deal came as a surprise as the reconciliation efforts stalled mid-2009, when Hamas refused to sign an agreement brokered by Egypt. The agreement, involving 13 Palestinian factions and the Palestinian Liberation Organization (PLO), is a result of popular pressure and a first step to restore the democratic deficit in the oPt. It also presents the international community with a new opportunity to change the status quo. Delivery of development aid to the Gaza Strip could become far less constrained. Dealing with a technocratic unity government could also be an opportunity to push Hamas to become a responsible political player and respect international humanitarian law (IHL)

Breaking the Justice Impasse in Syria

After the start of the 2011 uprising, Syrian and international justice actors embraced the transitional justice paradigm to support the hoped-for transition. However, the transformation of the uprising to a civil war altered the mobilisation for justice, shifting the main focus from democratic reforms and the redress of past harm to the recognition of, and accountability for, ongoing injustices. Notwithstanding the impossibility of implementing a model version of transitional justice, Syrian and international justice actors have continued to use transitional justice concepts and initiatives to mobilise for justice. In this presentation, I demonstrate how this endeavour has generated important innovations in the domain of documentation, criminal accountability and truth-seeking

Breaking the Justice Impasse in Syria

After the start of the 2011 uprising, Syrian and international justice actors embraced the transitional justice paradigm to support the hoped-for transition. However, the transformation of the uprising to a civil war altered the mobilisation for justice, shifting the main focus from democratic reforms and the redress of past harm to the recognition of, and accountability for, ongoing injustices. Notwithstanding the impossibility of implementing a model version of transitional justice, Syrian and international justice actors have continued to use transitional justice concepts and initiatives to mobilise for justice. In this presentation, I demonstrate how this endeavour has generated important innovations in the domain of documentation, criminal accountability and truth-seeking

Syrian Victim and Survivor Groups at Forefront of Justice Efforts

Syrian victim and survivor groups have been increasingly active in informal transitional justice processes. They assert their political agency and demonstrate that survivors and victims are the key stakeholders in justice initiatives. This episode zooms in on the origin of victims’ activism and some main break-throughs

Memory : securing the past and imagining the future (Podcast)

Memory and narratives play a crucial role in transitional justice. What do we remember of past violence, and how do we narrate those memories? In which ways can such narratives, in all their complexity, help us to better understand violence? Literature is one place where we often find narratives of violence, but also in transitional justice narratives are everywhere. In this podcast episode, we talk to Lyndsey Stonebridge, Professor of Humanities and Human Rights at Birmingham University. In her book ‘The Judicial imagination: writing after Nuremberg’ she touches upon issues such as what it means to tell a story, how we listen, and how to make sure that victims’ voices are adequately captured

Truth-seeking and the Potential of Arts

Syrian NGOs and victim groups are increasingly turning to transitional justice initiatives such as truth-seeking, to address pressing justice needs. Truth-seeking is particularly relevant in the Syrian context because of the ongoing impunity but also because of the memory of past atrocities such as the Hama massacre in 1982. In the absence of an official truth-seeking mechanism, informal truth practices are of paramount importance

Legal opportunities and challenges (Podcast with Stephan Parmentier and Rudina Jasini)

Victim participation is receiving increasing attention in transitional justice. In the pilot episode, it became clear that there is potentially tremendous value in victim participation, but that there are also many pitfalls. Before we dive into the murkiest questions facing us in practice, we take a step back and ask two of the legal experts affiliated to Justice Visions, Stephan Parmentier and Rudina Jasini, what is even possible – legally speaking – in terms of victim participation: what formal restrictions are there, and how do these affect the avenues and modalities of victim participation and the justice process itself. We also reflect with them on some of the experiences of practitioners, like Sangeetha Yogendran, in this regard

Spotlight on Syria : Justice for survivors of sexual and gender-based violence in Syria (Podcast)

Since the start of the uprising in 2011, sexual and gender-based violence (SGBV) has been perpetrated by various parties to the Syrian conflict, mainly the Assad regime, rebel groups and the Islamic State. Perpetrators resorted to this kind of violence to instill fear, weaken political opposition, punish and deter civilians and further sectarianism. As the UN Commission of Inquiry emphasizes in its report ‘I lost my dignity’, the suffering induced by these practices impacts Syrians from all backgrounds. Women and girls, however, have been disproportionally affected and victimised, irrespective of perpetrator or geographical area. And justice for survivors of SGBV is an uphill battle. In this episode, we talk to Mona Zeineddin, of the Syrian NGO Women Now for Development, about the prosecution of SGBV. Mona is part of the campaign ‘A Syrian Road to Justice’ that Women Now For Development launched together with four other feminist organizations, to support the first criminal complaint on SGBV that was filed in Germany. The complaint pertains to sexual and gender-based crimes committed in Syrian government-run detention centres. As their recent report ‘Surviving freedom’ demonstrates, the suffering of victims often continues upon release as they are exposed to discrimination and stigmatization. ‘There’s a lot of hesitance from witnesses or survivors to talk about these sorts of crimes’, elucidates Mona. The relentless efforts of activists, NGOs, and international bodies have put SGBV higher on the agenda, raising awareness about the obstacles to justice and the need to address the physical, psychological and socio-economic harm that survivors have endured and continue to endure. Mona emphasizes that these joint efforts will eventually lead to transformation. ‘This is a structural issue and it’s not binary in the sense that men are not affected also by the patriarchy, by toxic masculinity, by militarism. It affects both genders, albeit differently, of course.

Victimization (Podcast)

When talking about victim participation in transitional justice processes, we need to better understand the notions of victim, victimhood, and victimization, as well as the related phenomena of retraumatization and tertiary victimization. In this episode, we talk to scholars, practitioners, and artists to arrive at a more responsive and empowering understanding