Nobel Peace Laureate Calls for Israel War Crime Tribunal

  On January 4, 2009, Nobel Peace Prize laureate, Mairead Maguire, wrote in a letter to UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-Moon: "The UN must help uphold Human rights and Justice for Palestinian People, by seriously considering establishing an International Criminal Tribunal for Israel (ICTI) in order that Israeli Gov. be held accountable for war crimes."

An International Criminal Tribunal for Israel can be established by the UN General Assembly as a ‘subsidiary organ' under article 22 of the UN Charter. Article 22 of the UN Charter states the UN General Assembly may establish such subsidiary organs as it deems necessary for the performance of its functions. The purpose of the ICTI would be to investigate and prosecute suspected Israeli war criminals for offenses against the Palestinian people.

Mairead Maguire was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 1976 for her work with Catholics and Protestants in troubled Northern Ireland. In Rome 2004 she adressed the Nobel Peace Prize Laureates 5th World Summit. She declared: "I believe that War is State Terrorism by another name."

Mairead Maguire is no stranger to Israeli army crimes against Palestine and world citizen civil rights when in 2007 she was struck by a rubber-covered steel bullet in occupied Bilin while participating in a completely non-violent protest against the Israeli 'separation wall' that blockades the West Bank Palestinian population.

She described that terrifying moment to journalist Amy Goodman: "We walked along to try to walk up toward the separation wall, and it was a totally nonviolent protest. And we were viciously attacked by the Israeli military. They threw gas canisters into the peace walkers, and they also fired rubber-covered steel bullets. As I tried to move back and helping a French lady, I was shot in the leg with a rubber-covered steel bullet, and the young Israeli soldier who shot me was only twenty meters from me. I was stunned by it, and then later on, after having some treatment by the ambulance medics, I went back down to the front line with the peace activists, and we were again showered with gas. I was overcome and had a severe nosebleed and had to be taken by stretcher to the ambulance and treated." AP reported November 2008 that soon after this incident Ms. Maguire called for the suspension of Israel from the UN.

To scoop the War-on-Gaza supporters, here she is in a media event being given a commemorative plate for her peace work on behalf of the Palestinian voters by Hamas Prime Minister Haniyeh upon her arrival in Gaza along with 27 non-violent protesters on the 'Free Gaza' boat. This photo opportunity is of course no automatic endorsement of any Hamas policy concerning rockets fired from besieged Gaza on Israeli civilian targets by Hamas or its factions.

Mairead Maguire's current peace activism does not spare any oppression by any government. On January 6, 2009 she called upon The Iranian Ambassador in Dublin to uphold the human rights of her Sister Laureate, Dr. Shirin Ebadi, the first Muslim woman to win the Nobel Peace Prize, in Iran.

Producer/Director Ana Nogueira's video interview with Mairead Maguire from Archive.org DemocracyNow collection.