The war on Saddam has claimed another victim, reports STEPHEN LEWIS...

IT may not have made the headlines like the victims of the bombing of Baghdad, but there has already been another casualty of the second Gulf war.

Last week, as war began, York-based overseas development agency International Service made the reluctant decision to suspend its programme in Palestine.

The ten volunteers the charity had in the country were doing vital work - everything from helping run rehabilitation centres for children injured in the Palestinian 'troubles' to working for human rights and rural development.

Now, for the time being at least, that has been put on hold.

The returned volunteers are not pleased. And any suggestion that the war in Iraq is a moral one aimed at overthrowing a brutal dictator doesn't wash with Vicki Metcalfe.

For more than a year Vicki - in York this week for debriefing at International Service headquarters in Gillygate - has been working as a volunteer legal officer with the Palestinian Centre for Human Rights in Gaza.

In Palestine, human rights don't count for much, she says. It is not just the wilful and unlawful killing of civilians, destruction of homes and property, or unlawful detention and torture.

It is the curfews and travel restrictions, too, which make it impossible for many Palestinians to move around or find work.

The result is poverty and destitution.

It was Vicky who, last autumn, took York MP Hugh Bayley to visit the site of a house in Gaza City where the Hamas leader, Salah Shehada, was assassinated. He was killed, the MP reported, by a missile fired by an Israeli air force pilot in an American-built jet.

It wasn't just the terrorist who died, according to Mr Bayley. His family and 12 other men, women and children in neighbouring apartments were also killed.

Part of Vicki's job was seeking damages for the victims' families.

The 27-year-old, who has a Masters Degree in International Human Rights Law, was also involved in collecting evidence of other human rights violations, developing cases for prosecution both in Israeli courts and internationally, and making representations to the UN.

Not all the human rights violations taking place in Palestine are committed by the Israelis, she concedes.

The Palestinian authorities, sometimes under pressure from the US and Israeli governments to crack down on terrorists, has also been guilty of arbitrary and unlawful arrests and detentions.

But most of the violations are carried out by the Israelis - which makes her angry when President George W Bush talks about a moral justification for war.

"It seems strange that the US, UK and Australia seem so concerned about human rights in Iraq, but have completely failed to take any action against other countries, including Israel, which has maintained an illegal occupation of the West Bank and Gaza for 36 years," she says.

Fellow returned volunteer Ross Georgeson, a 37-year-old arts educator from Edinburgh, is equally unhappy at being forced to leave his Palestinian friends and colleagues behind.

For nearly four years Ross has been working with disabled children and adults in Palestine - many of them injured as a result of the violence - using art and therapy to help with their rehabilitation.

Leaving was a wrench. "All I can do is try to continue the projects I've got as best I can over the internet and by email and telephone - and then just hope we can go back as soon as possible," he says.

The decision to pull out of Palestine was not easy, admits International Service's chief executive Jane Carter.

It was made following instructions from the Foreign Office and Clare Short's International Development Department, which provide most of the charity's funding.

The official line is that unpredictability in the region and the "increased risk of terrorist activity" make Palestine a dangerous place for foreign development workers.

And the security and safety of its workers is paramount, Jane says.

So, following the FO instructions, all ten International Service development workers in the country were told to leave. Seven did so: three disobeyed and elected to remain behind.

Their contracts with International Service were terminated.

"When the situation calms down, we will discuss the possibility of rehiring them," says Jane .

The aim now is to monitor the situation and return to Palestine as soon as possible.

Until then, the vital work Vicky, Ross and others were doing will remain just another casualty of the war with Saddam.

Updated: 10:31 Thursday, March 27, 2003