Ni\’lin youth show solidarity with political prisoners
Ni’lin villagers once again held a Friday demonstration against the illegal Apartheid Wall and in commemoration of Prisoner’s Day. Around 150 villagers, supported by Israeli and international solidarity activists, gathered after the prayer at the local clinic. Several demonstrators wore shirts urging solidarity with the thousands of Palestinian political prisoners in Israeli jails. Israeli forces stationed in the fields in the outskirts of the village started firing tear gas at the clinic even before the prayer was finished. The nonviolent demonstrators sought cover in the village from the gas, and retreated back towards the town center. However, Israeli soldiers also stationed themselves on the main street of the village. These soldiers started firing tear gas and live ammunition at the villagers gathered in the village center. Some of the village youth responded to this use of weaponry by throwing stones.
During the following hours, one male resident was hit by a fragment from a live bullet in his chest and 11 people needed medical treatment after inhaling large amounts of tear gas. Israeli forces also placed snipers on several roofs in the village, from which they shot at demonstrators near Ni’lin’s main street. Soldiers also attacked the Palestinian medical team inside the village and shot large amounts of tear gas at an ambulance.
At this Friday demonstration, the Israeli army once again shot extended range high velocity tear gas canisters. This is the same type of canister that was used to kill Basem Abu Rahme at a nonviolent demonstration in Bil’in on the same day. On the 13 March, American solidarity activist Tristan Anderson was critically injured after being shot in the head with a high velocity tear gas canister. Tristan is still listed in critical condition in a Tel Aviv hospital after undergoing three separate brain surgeries.
Around 400 residents of Nablus held a demonstration in the city center to mark Prisoners’ Day in recognition of all former and current political prisoners held in Israeli jails. Leaders of several political parties and prisoner associations gave speeches praising the steadfastness of the approximately 10,000 prisoners currently held in Israeli prisons and detention facilities. Demonstrators also carried pictures of loved ones in prison and symbolically chained their hands to emphasize the large number of Palestinian detainees.
Palestinian girl holds a picture of an imprisoned loved one
Nablus residents demonstrate for political prisoners
A woman holds a picture of a jailed family member
Demonstrations were held in several cities and villages throughout the West Bank and Gaza commemorating Prisoner’s Day, which falls on the 17th of April. There are currently nearly 3,500 prisoners from the Nablus area in Israeli prisons. Hundreds of Nablus residents are being held as adminstrative detention cases, without charges or trial. Many of these prisoners are held in inhuman conditions. Dozens of cases of torture in Israeli prisons have been documented by Palestinian, Israeli and international human rights groups. Arrests in the Nablus region by Israeli forces are continuing on an almost daily basis. On the 14th of April, eight youth were arbitrarily seized by the Israeli military in Madama village, southwest of Nablus.
A member of the al-Ghawe family stands beside a poster inside his threatened house in the Sheikh Jarrah neighborhood.
7 April 2009
“We are like the roots of a tree. The Israelis may cut us in places, but we will never die. We will not be transplanted from Jerusalem. I will not leave this house,” Maher Hanun tells a crowded room of Palestinian community members supported by Israeli and international solidarity activists. Hanun is one of 51 residents of the Sheikh Jarrah neighborhood in occupied East Jerusalem living in two housing units that are facing imminent eviction by Israeli authorities.
The mood is tense as more than 25 individuals pack into a small room in Hanun’s house to plan how to fight the house evictions. Palestinian residents, organized under the Sheikh Jarrah Committee, have invited solidarity activists to come and support their struggle. Internationals from more than 10 countries and Israelis sit in chairs and on the floor as Hanun tells them his story. After his speech, they divide themselves into groups to cover the two threatened housing units. Both the families and the activists gathered in support are determined to stay inside the houses as long as possible when the police arrive to carry out the evictions.
The people living in these housing units, belonging to the al-Ghawe and Hanun families, are due to be forcibly removed from their homes this week, as the papers from the Israeli court they were served with are valid between 15 and 22 March. The courts have justified these evictions by saying that the land that the houses are built on is disputed. Yet, the houses were built under a joint construction project by the United Nations agency for Palestine refugees (UNRWA) and the Jordanian government in 1956, 11 years before Israel occupied East Jerusalem. The houses were given to the families, both made refugees in 1948 after Palestinians living in what became the state of Israel were expelled and dispossessed during what Palestinians call the Nakba, or catastrophe.
Now these families are threatened with another Nakba. Israeli settlers that have moved into Sheikh Jarrah have falsified documents claiming ownership of the land. The Hanun and al-Ghawe families have presented their legitimate documents and an Israeli judge has not yet ruled on the legality of these papers. Yet the eviction orders are still proceeding, even though no official decision has been reached as to whom the Israeli courts recognize as the true owners.
Both the Hanun and al-Ghawe families were forcibly evicted once before in 2002, after which they lived in tents for four months within sight of their former homes. This traumatic experience stands out as a vivid memory even for the children of the families. As they brace themselves to be evicted for the second time, the distress and apprehension in both households is clearly noticeable. Family members have spent many sleepless nights waiting for the police, never knowing exactly which night they will come. Women in the al-Ghawe residence often recount how their small children were thrown from a second floor window by police when they were evicted the last time.
In addition to the al-Ghawe and Hanun families, 25 other households are also threatened with eviction in Sheikh Jarrah, though official orders have not yet been issued by Israeli courts. In November 2008, the al-Kurd family was evicted from their home in the middle of the night despite widespread public support and diplomatic pressure from American and European diplomats on the Israelis to halt the eviction order. The al-Kurd family has erected a protest tent in the middle of Sheikh Jarrah from where they continue to demand the right to return to their homes. The Israeli police have destroyed the tent five times on the grounds that it is an “illegal structure” even though it is built on private Palestinian property.
Now, with the threat of removal again hanging over their heads, community members of Sheikh Jarrah are organizing. “Stop ethnic cleansing” is their main message to the Israeli authorities and the broader international community. These words can be seen on posters hung in the windows of neighborhood shops, on large banners over the entrances to the al-Ghawe and Hanun residences, as well as the T-shirts that organizers have distributed in the community.
This past week has seen a buzz of activity in the neighborhood. The Sheikh Jarrah Committee, supported by the Coalition for Jerusalem, the International Solidarity Movement, and other human rights organizations, have utilized a myriad of tactics to fight the eviction orders. Throughout the week, dignitaries from foreign nations, journalists, consular representatives from numerous European countries, and even Knesset members have all visited the homes and the protest tent to express their support for the residents of Sheikh Jarrah. The committee has held press conferences, demonstrations outside of court hearings and drafted statements condemning the orders.
The community also attempted to host an event as part of the Jerusalem Capital of Arab Culture festival at the protest tent on 23 March. Israeli authorities have banned the festival in occupied East Jerusalem, yet organizers have continued to defy the ban in order to celebrate Jerusalem’s rich Palestinian heritage. Sheikh Jarrah residents also gathered to protest the impending house evictions in addition to the increased repression of Palestinian communities in East Jerusalem. Police violently prevented Sheikh Jarrah residents from praying in front of the tent in conjunction with the festival. Participants were badly beaten and eight people were arrested. The following week, another resident was arrested by police inside the tent for refusing to take down a Palestinian flag hanging inside.
The Sheikh Jarrah Committee members view their struggle against eviction as part of a larger struggle against Palestinian dispossession from East Jerusalem. The nearby neighborhoods of Silwan, Beit Hanina and Shufat refugee camp are also facing large-scale house demolitions and evictions. In the al-Bustaan neighborhood of Silwan alone, 88 houses are slated for demolition. Al-Bustaan residents have erected a protest tent similar to the one in Sheikh Jarrah, and this model of resistance seems to be spreading.
For now, the families and supporting activists wait for the police to come each night. They take shifts to make sure someone is up in each house to alarm the community when the Israeli authorities arrive. Some of the family members have removed all of their furniture in anticipation of the coming raids, but they continue to sleep on mats in the floor. The message is clear: they will not go quietly in the face of this injustice.
6th of April 2009 at 7am: Israeli Naval forces abducted eight Palestinian fishermen (including two minors) from the Salateen area in the north of the Gaza Strip.
Additionally, the fishermen’s four hassakas (small fishing boats) have been taken by the Israeli Navy.According to eyewitnesses, the fishermen were only about 100 meters from the coast at the time of their abduction.
Initial information received regarding the fishermen’s details are as follows:
-Esshaq Mohammed Zayed, 45
-Rassam Mohammed Zayed, 25
-Hafez Assad Al Sultan, 25
-Ahmed Assad Al Sultan, 17
-Safwat Zayed Zayed, 35
-Nashaat Zayed Zayed, 10
-Hammada Joma Zayed, 22
-Joma Mollok Zayed, 50
During the last month the Israeli Navy has escalated its attacks against Gazan fishermen by injuring at least three of them, abducting a further 24 fishermen, and stealing 10 hassakas and oneshansula fishing boat.
Last week dozens of Salateen fishermen, joined by the Director of the General Syndicate of Marine Fishers, Palestinian activists from the Beit Hanoun Local Initiative and International Solidarity Movement activists, demonstrated against the Israeli attacks, demanding the release of the stolen boats.
Early in the morning of Saturday the 4th of April, two Palestinian resistance fighters (Mohamed Hamayda 23, Jammel Gofa, 26) were wounded near the Green Line, east of Jabaliya.Ambulances from the Palestinian Red Crescent Society made a first attempt to reach the two injured Palestinians shortly after 7am, when, according to medical sources, they were still alive. But the paramedics were prevented from accomplishing their humanitarianmission because of heavy Israeli shelling. Firing against civilians and ambulances and preventing injured people from accessing medical treatment are serious violations of international humanitarian law.
Finally, after 11am, the ambulance was allowed to approach the area. It was almost 12pmwhen the ambulance returned with the dead bodies of the two fighters.
According to medical sources, when the fighters were found, their weapons and some personal belongings were missing and they had a lot of injuries by gunfire, something that indicates that Israeli troops may have reached them .Many Palestinians are suspicious that they might have been extra judicially executed while they were lying injured, but still alive.Although this for the moment is just an assumption, if it did in fact happen it would be just another example of severe violations of international law on the part of Israeli forces.
