Author: ISM Media Group

Umm Salamona: Soldiers Get Rough With Protesters

On Friday afternoon August 17th over 150 Palestinian landowners and their families were accompanied by Israeli and international human rights activists to protest against the Apartheid wall in Umm Salamona and W’laga on the outskirts of Bethlehem.

The demonstration has become a weekly event as residents become more and more determined to draw attention to and prevent the annexation of their land for absorbtion into the Illegal Israeli Settlement of Efrat. The Apartheid wall is currently under construction in the area. Many hectares of olive groves, pine trees and other vegetation have already been destroyed by the Israeli Occupying Forces with significant amounts further set to be up-rooted. Consequently it will financially and culturally impoverish the local Palestinian communities in the area, taking away their means of economic survival and forcing them to change their way of life that they have undertaken for generations.

At the beginning of the demonstration locals hung up banners at the entrance to the site which bulldozers use daily. They clearly outlined the community’s opposition with slogans stating ‘Our land is the key issue,’ ‘We are nothing without land,’ while on the march they chanted ‘No to occupation,’ ‘No to house demolitions,’ ‘No to tree destruction.’

The local community-led non-violent action commenced with an address by a local community leader in Arabic and English about the history of the local area followed by prayers conducted on the roadside, observed at close quarters by over 25 Israeli soldiers.
There was a peaceful march towards the area, which is being leveled in order to make way for the building of the wall. Local Palestinians gave further speeches about the devastation that is taking place despite local opposition. Human Rights Activists initiated a non-violent direct action by building a stone barrier to stop the path of the bulldozers on the valley that faces the illegal Israeli settlement of Efrat.

The protestors proceeded uphill towards the Apartheid Wall but were blocked by Israeli soldiers and jeeps. After a non-violent attempt to get to the wall the soldiers stopped the march by aggressively pushing the activists and unsuccessfully attempting to arrest a number of Palestinians and Internationals. Demonstrators were violently grabbed and pushed to the ground, while one Irish activist was kicked in the head. Mainstream and independent media present were also deliberately pushed and obstructed from recording the soldier’s violent behavior.

The demonstrators maintained their nonviolence throughout the march and peacefully dispersed at about 2pm, confident that they manifested their dissent towards the annexation of Palestinian land by the Israeli State. A Spanish activist who attended the demonstration was arrested at a checkpoint as he left the area soon after the demonstration ended. Video evidence shows that he participated in a legal and nonviolent manner on the periphery of the protest.

Palestinians Prevented from Accessing Their Land Despite High Court Ruling

Report from Nablus region

Deir Al Hattab August 17th, 2007

Four international ISM human rights workers joined Palestinian activists and the local popular committee yesterday in Deir Al Hattab concerning the ongoing situation there.

Deir Al Hattab is a village of 13,000 dunums that has been able to reach only 5,000 since 1986 due to the grabbing of land from the settlement Elon Moreh done in collusion with the Israeli occupying forces. Elon Moreh is situated on two hilltops and between these hilltops is around 2,000 dunums of land they have decided to annex. In 1993 the Israeli High Court ruled that the Palestinian villagers who own the land must be allowed to access it. In response the military has declared all of it a closed military zone and prevents villagers from working or visiting their land.

The human rights workers were led around the village to see the land that was stolen, and were told about the recent developments. A few days previously, an Israeli activist from Ta’ayesh crossed the Israeli only road that runs through this land, around the settlement, and saw that on a thousand dunums, separate from the 2,000 already claimed by the settlement, settlers had planted 5,000 olive trees. This is an attempt to establish lies on the ground to prove that the land belongs to the settlement. Members of the local Popular Committee then pointed out 6 dunums close to the settlement, also separate from the 2,000 already annexed, that had been set on fire the day before. IOF soldiers allowed the Palestinian owner and a few members of his family in to his land to try to put out the fire but the damage was visible from the village. This is another tactic settlers use to harass and drive out Palestinian people from their land, and clear it for their own use.

We witnessed all of this from afar. Settlers and nearby military camps won’t even allow Palestinians to see the damage closely, much less visit the land they own. Behind the settlement the local villagers pointed out a building on another hilltop, a 700 year old holy site of Sheikh Billal, used as a signal tower in case of an attack on Nablus, that was closed to Palestinians and had a military camp next to it. The popular committee stood there surrounded by their stolen land, which they were unable to access, and said they would like to organize a campaign against this injustice, with media and legal work, and demonstrations, not just one, but many, weekly, to protest the theft of their land, and the arrogant defiance by the IOF of their own High Court rulings.

They called on international activists and Israeli activists, people from all walks of life that wished to protest injustice to come and witness what was happening around them.

People are being organized with more definite details to come.

Settlers Take Land, Soldiers Do Nothing

In the area of Susya in Hebron, an illegal settler sets out to farm crops on land owned by local Palestinians. Soldiers refuse to act, even after human rights workers explain that Palestinians have documents which prove the land is theirs, and have gone to the police already about this matter.

Kiryat Arba settlers throw party on privately owned Palestinian land

At 1:40pm a group of international human rights workers received a call from a Palestinian man, Anan Jabouri, who lives on land he owns directly next to Kiryat Arba settlement. Jabouri told a local Palestinian resident, and member of ISM, that a large group of Israeli settlers had set up a tent on his land and were gathering underneath it. He requested that internationals come to his home in order to ensure the settlers would not become violent, and also to potentially make them leave his land since they had no permission to be there.

In fact the Israeli settlers surrounding the Jabouri home have caused many problems for this family in the past, including constructing a tent which they claim to be a “synagogue” despite the Israeli army and Israeli courts having declared the tent illegal multiple times. This tent is located on the Jabouri family’s land and has caused frequent tension between the settlers and the Palestinian land owners.

It was next to this area that the settlers had set up a tarp/awning for multiple people to stand under.

When the human rights workers arrived at the area, at about 2:15pm, they approached a gathering of Israeli settlers around a band playing music, which was taking place on the Jabouri land, and blocking them from working there. A group of Israeli soldiers and Border Police were also present, and any attempt to walk across the land, or in the vicinity of the gathering, resulted in them blocking passage.

The human rights workers attempted, with members of the Jabouri family, to approach the gathering and pressure the soldiers to remove the settlers from the land. The soldiers told Anan Jabouri that the settlers would be finished in about half an hour and would then be forced to leave.

However, the Israeli settler gathering continued for over an hour longer, despite the Jabouri family’s, and human rights workers’, attempt to encourage the soldiers to make the settlers leave the area. In fact when the group of internationals and Jabouri family members, joined by three members of CPT, tried to work on the land, the army kept telling them to stop.

Finally when the settlers decided to leave the area there were many tense moments. The settlers approached Anan Jabouri and tried to make him leave, and also attempted to pressure the soldiers to make him leave the area. Despite this, the majority of the settlers did leave the land, which allowed the human rights workers and the Palestinian family to start working it.

However, the efforts to work all of the land were thwarted by continued presence of about ten settlers which consisted of seven young girls and three adults. This is because the army and police blocked the area around where the settlers were present. This meant in reality a quarter of the land was out of bounds for working.

After this the family managed to bring out sheep and horses to graze the land. This continued peacefully until the son of Anan Jabouri rode the horse outside of the land onto the road. When he returned to the land leading the horse he was met by an army commander who attempted to stop the horse from being led back up onto the grazing point. The son of Anan Jabouri argued with the army commander for a while until the horse eventually broke free from its reigns and ran up the hill. The army commander at this point wanted to arrest Jabouri’s son attempting to put him in the back of the army jeep. This was met by intervention by the human rights workers, who stood in front of the jeep, trying to stop an arrest which seemed to have no reason. The result was that the Israeli police intervened and gave everyone an ultimatum stating that every Palestinian and international must leave the land or the son of Anan Jabouri would be arrested. Anan Jabouri in fear of his son being arrested agreed to leave his land, and his son was released.