Author: ISM Media Group

Ni’lin holds funeral for Arafat al Khawaja

29th December 2008 – Funeral for the 22 year old resident of Ni’lin village killed by Israeli army while protesting against Israeli massacres in Gaza.

After the Israeli attacks against Gaza strip, Ni’lin village has been continuously protesting in solidarity with the people in Gaza.


Photos courtesy of Activestills

During the demonstration on the 28th December, Israeli soldiers used live ammunition against the protesters, hitting three people from the village. 22 year old Arafat Khawaja, was killed after having been shot in the back. The two others were Mohammed Khawaja, 19, who was declared brain damaged yesterday afternoon after taking a bullet in the forehead and Mohamed Srour who was shot in the leg.

At around 10am a procession of vehicles followed the ambulance carrying the body of Arafat from Ramallah hospital. The procession arrived in Ni’lin at noon where there were around 40 soldiers waiting at the entrance.

Approximately 4,000 people walked through the town with the body, which was first brought to the house of his parents. After Arafat’s mother could see him for the last time, his body was carried to the mosque where prayers were held for him. Arafat was buried in a grave close to the medical clinic at around 2 pm.

Arafat Khawaja was from a family of six brothers and four sisters. He was in the third year of medicinal analytical science at the American University in Jenin. He was living there and just visited his family in Ni’lin during the holidays.

Many people from the surrounding villages and from Jenin came to attend the funeral which was followed by a demonstration in the main street of Ni’lin in front of the checkpoint at the entrance of the town.

Israeli soldiers started firing teargas at around 3pm and continued till 5pm. There were about 30 soldiers with two jeeps standing at the checkpoint, and 10 other soldiers were occupying the roof of one of the first houses of the village.

Vice President of the European Parliament, Luisa Morgantini visits Um Kamel and the Sheikh Jarah protest camp

29th December 2008

At around mid-day on the 29th December, in the neighbourhood of Sheikh Jarrah, Jerusalem, Luisa Morgantini, Vice-President of the European Parliament, led a delegation of fifty people to express solidarity with Um Kamel al-Kurd.

She also expressed her deep concern about the situation in Gaza to the people that were in the tent when she arrived.

From the protest tent in Sheikh Jarrah, a march in solidarity with the people in Gaza, with about 30 people participating, went towards the French consulate.

The protest was aimed at the French president, who is this periods president of the European Union.

The demonstration lasted for about one hour.

After some time, a representative from the consulate came out to meet the protesters and invited one spokeperson from the demonstration, who then delivered the group’s message for the French president to the spokesperson during a short meeting inside of the consulate.

Nadine Nashashibi, Palestinian protester: “I wanted to protest and adress what is going on here and in Gaza to the European community”.

“I wanted to protest and adress what is going on here and in Gaza to the European community”.

Adalah-NY: New Yorkers march to demand end of massacres in Gaza and boycott of Israel

To view the Adalah-NY website click here

New York, NY, December 29 – For the second day in a row, over a thousand New Yorkers marched through midtown Manhattan, chanting and carrying signs and Palestinian flags, to voice opposition and demand an end to Israel’s assault on Palestinians in the Gaza Strip. In the last three days, Israel’s bombing of Gaza has killed over 360 Palestinians. Reports indicate that at least 60 of those killed were women and children.


Photos by Adalah-NY

The Monday evening protest, which drew a diverse and noisy crowd of more than a thousand and substantial media, began at 5 PM with leafletting and chanting at Union Square and Herald Square. The energy grew during a symbolic funeral procession for Gaza’s dead from Herald Square to Bryant Park, as marchers carried aloft two stretchers covered in black shrouds and flags, similar to those used in Palestinian funeral processions. The march culminated with loud chanting at the Israeli Consulate at 8:30 PM. It comes on the heels of a Sunday afternoon Manhattan march that drew over two thousand protesters, and will be followed by a Tuesday evening protest at the Israeli Consulate beginning at 5 PM.

Rush hour pedestrians were handed thousands of flyers c alling for an end to the massacre in Gaz a and a boycott of Israel, and were greeted with chants, including:

“Obama. No more aid. Stop the funds for deadly raids;” and

“While you are shopping, bombs are dropping.”

Riham Barghouti from Adalah-NY explained, “New Yorkers are out in the street because they’re angry that the US government is providing Israel with the planes as well as the hundreds of tons of bombs that Israel is dropping on 1.5 million impoverished Palestinians who are packed together in the world’s largest open-air prison. Silence in the face of such crimes is complicity. That’s why people worldwide are stepping up the non-violent campaign of boycott, divestment and sanctions to pressure Israel to halt its human rights violations. With our government here in the US refusing act, it’s up to us as citizens to mobilize to hold Israel accountable.”

The assault follows nearly three years of a tightening Israeli=2 0blockade on the Gaza Strip which began, with US support, after Hamas emerged victorious in democratic Palestinian elections in January, 2006. More recently, Israel has almost totally sealed off Gaza to the outside world, preventing shipm ents of food, fuel and medical supplies from reaching Gaza’s civilian population, resulting in skyrocketing levels of unemployment, poverty and hunger. Israel has also conducted frequent assassinations and aerial attacks on Gaza, killing approximately 1500 Gazans since 2006 alone. Israel’s siege of Gaza’s civilian population and assaults against Gaza’s residents constitute grave breaches of international law, including the Fourth Geneva Convention. Some observers believe Israel’s attacks were timed to coincide with the holiday season, when most people turn their attention away from world events.

The flyers distributed to passersby provided information on Israel’s attacks and called for support for the growing international campaign of Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) a gainst Israel – similar to th e worldwide campaign that helped end Apartheid in South Africa – in order to hold Israel accountable for its crimes. Over the last year, Adalah-NY has carried out a successful boycott campaign against Israeli diamond mogul, settlement-builder and New York real estate developer Lev Leviev.

Israeli helicopters and navy continue to fire on Gaza’s port

The shelling of Gaza’s port continued on the evening of December 30th, as Israeli Apache helicopters began firing rockets on the area and Naval vessels continued their ongoing shelling.

Eva Bartlett, a Canadian human rights worker, heard and witnessed the attack from a building 150 meters away. She reports that the first explosion began at 9:18 pm. For the next half hour, the Naval ships and Apache helicopters continued firing intermittently. At 9:57, the intensity of the attack increased and more than 15 shells and rockets were fired in quick succession, with the Apaches specifically targeting the landing dock and the breakwater. Eyewitnesses in the area report that a Port Authority office and a boat anchored in the port were destroyed. The rockets and shelling continued into the night, while Israeli drones could also be heard circling overhead.

Gaza city port, the only port for the whole of the Gaza strip, houses a large number of Palestinian fishing boats on its piers. Many of these boats have also undoubtedly been damaged in the heavy shelling, further destabilizing the already fragile fishing industry upon which Gazans have been heavily reliant since Israel imposed its blockade on the strip in June 2007. The extent of the damage, however, is at this time indeterminable, as the continued presence of the warships in the harbor makes any assessment impossible.

This is the second time that Gaza’s port has been destroyed by Israeli bombing since construction began in 1999. Israeli Navy warships previously bombed the port in 2002, under the pretext that it could be utilized for arms smuggling. Repairs on the port were agreed upon in negotiations between Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon and Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas in 2005, after illegal Israeli settlements were withdrawn from Gaza, with the hope that an open sea port would not only provide a much-needed boost to Gaza’s economy, but would also function as an important symbol of Palestinian independence.

The Palestinian dream for the port – an independent harbour that would enable Gazan’s to freely import and export, creating jobs and freedom from Israel’s control of all Gazan borders – was, however, never realized. Whilst the port was repaired, Israel’s illegal control of Gazan waters continued unabated; illegally preventing Gazan boats, including fishermen, from venturing farther than 6 miles from shore, maintaining the imprisonment of Gaza. This oft-denied Israeli policy was exemplified most recently on Monday 29th December, when the Israeli Navy attacked the Free Gaza boat, “The Dignity”, in international waters as it attempted to carry 3 tonnes of desperately-needed medical aid into Gaza’s now-ruined port.

The destruction of the port has rendered humanitarian missions such as these even more difficult. Should further boats manage break the Israeli blockade, there is now nowhere left to unload

One Palestinian arrested as Sheikh Jarrah demonstrates for Gaza

28th December 2008 – East Jerusalem

Update: On the 29th of December, Naser Jamjoum, (42), one of the participants in the non-violent demonstration 28th December was arrested after having participated in the last two demonstrations.

At 2pm on the 28th of December, a demonstration to show solidarity with the people in Gaza took place in Jerusalem.

The demonstration to support the people in Gaza and to show the participants anger at the Israeli attacks, took place near Damascus Gate in the old city. The demonstration also called to break the silence of the whole world about what is happening in Palestine.

The demonstration began with 21 people leaving from the solidarity tent in Sheikh Jarrah, towards Damascus gate while carrying signs and banners. When they got to the Gate more people joined, with a total of eighty people gathering to join the demonstration.

Signs were shown to the people walking by with the demonstrators chanting. The demonstration lasted for about one hour and a large number of police and border police were surrounding the demonstration forcing a couple of young participants were forced to show their IDs.

Um Kamel al-Kurd – Sheikh Jarrah:

“I want to tell Israel to stop the war on Gaza and the Arab world to stop talking and act to stop the attacks in Gaza. This is enough!”

On the signs several different messages were written, including, “Calling for Palestine”, “One state, one Palestine, one nation”, “One nation, Muslims and Christians together.”