19th October 2015 | International Solidarity Movement, Al-Khalil team | West Bank, occupied Palestine
Members of the Daana family sat up into the early morning hours behind their home as explosions, gunshots and the whine of teargas canisters being fired rang out throughout the evening. In front of the family home where 16 children live, including a 13 day old infant, broken glass and large stones are strewn about; evidence of the night of violence they endured after settlers from the illegal Kiryat Arba settlement vandalized the fence separating them from Palestinian homes and went on a rampage.
Internationals from the ISM Khalil (Hebron) team joined the family after a night of settler terror injured ten Palestinians in the neighborhood. 13 year old Abdullah Nasser Daana’s chest was bandaged after a settler-thrown molotov cocktail smashed into his body. When his cousin Basil Khaled Daana, 16 rushed to his aid, settlers threw large stones at him, striking him violently just above his ankle. Ambulances were prevented from getting to the injured who had called the Mosques for help during the attack, prompting the Mosque loudspeakers desperate late night calls for assistance for the besieged family.
16 year old Basil Daana’s injuries from settler-thrown stone while aiding his injured 13 year old cousin.
25 year old Emid Sayeed Daana, whose wrist is bandaged after being injured by a stone looks up sharply after the sound of settlers screaming over the fence begins; one of many times throughout the evening this would occur. “They are shouting dirty things at us.” His words exhibit the commonality of this type of harassment the family gets on a constant basis with explosions randomly punctuating the typical miseries of life under military, and settler, occupation, “This is normal for us. The teargas, the gunshots. Where is the life? Where is the freedom.”
13 year old Abdullah Daana was injured by settler-thrown molotov.
His family is constantly on edge, waiting for the next attack. “If there are 15 of us inside the house, 15 are also outside to keep an eye out, to look out for them.” Emid, who in a rare quiet moment, shows us his diploma for studies in media, went on to express, “We cannot all be inside the home, if we do, the settlers will come through the fence and enter our families home. And the teargas from the soldiers. You see we can barely breathe here, we have a 13 day old baby inside. Teargas could kill a baby that young.”
Throughout the evening, intermittently with the deafening blasts of stun grenades, teargas filled the air, sometimes almost unbearably so which caused several members of the family to cover their faces or rush inside to escape it. In the late night hours, a hurled bottle crashed on the ground in front of the home.
One family member slept outside with two internationals to be on watch for the next attack. The settlers did not breach the fence again this night, yet every hour that passes with a family living in fear, is an hour of violence being committed against them. In the escalated chaos of the past two and half weeks in the West Bank, another Palestinian family navigates the continued crisis of a human rights crushing occupation.
18th October 2015 | International Solidarity Movement, Al-Khalil team | West Bank, occupied Palestine
Sunday 18 October
The Hebron (Al Khalil) neighbourhood of Wadi Alhussein is tonight, Sunday 18th October, under siege as armed settlers rampage through the streets with support of the Israeli forces. International human rights activists are currently standing in solidarity in the home of the Daana Family who have already suffered several physical attacks in the past few days.
As of 9.40pm, three people have been injured in the Daana house, including one young child, due to attack by fire bomb, and ambulances are being prevented from delivering aid. Tear gas has been fired extensively between Palestinian houses and many stun grenades have been used in the area. The situation is anticipated to escalate overnight as settlers from the adjacent illegal settlement of Kiryat Arba are continuing to gather around Palestinian family homes.
Hebron (Al Khalil) has been in a state of borderline lockdown by Israeli forces for over 24 hours now, following the murder of Palestinian 18 year old Fadel Al-Kawasmeh by illegal settlers on Shuhada street yesterday morning. Following this Bayan Ahmad Aseeleh, 16, was shot by Israeli forces outside the Ibrahimi Mosque on allegations that she attempted to stab a soldier. Settlers were then witnessed dancing on the site of a third shooting and lying in front of the ambulance carrying Tarek Al-Natsheh who died soon after.
Immediately following this, a group of approximately 200 settlers tore down the fence between the Kiryat Arba settlement and the H2 neighbourood of Wadi Alhussein, throwing stones and fire bombs at Palestinian houses. Ten Palestinians were injured in the attack, including 13 year old Abdullah Nasser Dana, who was hit in the chest with a molotov cocktail, and Basil Khaled Dana, 16, who was hit in the ankle with a stone while helping Abdullah. 25 year old Emid Sayeed Dana, who was hit with a stone on the wrist, said earlier today ‘I think they will come again tonight.’ An unidentified Palestinian was also shot with live ammunition by a settler.
Dezeray, an international activist from the US who has been living in Hebron, is currently in the Daana house. She stated: ‘this situation is an absolute violation of peoples’ basic rights. The Daana family are just one example of daily life for Palestinians and the escalating settler violence of the past few weeks.’
Italian human rights defender Orion added, ‘Israel must be held accountable for soldiers’ extrajudicial attacks on Palestinians, as well as their support of settlers’ arbetrary attacks on innocent Palestinian families.’
The Daana family have been victim to attacks by illegal Kiryat Arbar settlers in the past, including a 2008 fire bombing of the house. In 2003 they were detained in their home for a week, with food being delivered by the Palestinian Red Crescent Society. They have also had 5 horses poisoned by settlers in the past 10 years.
Nine families are living in the house, with 50 people, the majority of which are women and children.
Photo Credit: Youth Against Settlements. Ambulance carrying dying Palestinian prevented from leaving Shuhada Street by settlers 17-10-15.
18th October 2015 | International Solidarity Movement, al-Khalil team | Hebron, occupied Palestine
After a day of intensified violence in al-Khalil the midnight hour brought horrifying screams for help from local mosques, the screaming sirens of ambulances and clouds of teargas drifting through the streets from Bab al-Zawiya. Three young Palestinians in Khalil lay dead from multiple gunshot wounds; two killed by Israeli forces and the other felled by the machine gun blasts of several settlers who shouted, “Arab! Arab!” before unleashing a stream of bullets into his body. The toll of Palestinian deaths has climbed to 43 in just 18 days, along with over 1900 injured.
Earlier in the day, Palestinian youth Fadel al-Qawasmeh walked in the area on Shuhada Street not segregated for the benefit of Israeli settlers. Passing settlers as an Arab, was enough of a ‘crime’ for the point-blank, execution style shooting the 18 year old endured, only to be packaged and stamped as another Arab ‘terrorist’ when officials at the scene determined the boy had a knife.
(Video Credit: Youth Against Settlements)
Fadel’s case would have been the latest in a string of Israeli murders of Palestinians who supposedly had attempted knife attacks if it hadn’t happened just a few hours later just down the street from the site. Also if he actually had a knife, which eye witnesses verified he did not and which video released by the Palestinian organization Youth Against Settlements seemed to corroborate when video taken at the scene shows one Israeli soldier handing something to another soldier standing over the boy’s body and then the soldier placing the object near him.
In the immediate aftermath of the killing, when Israeli forces should have been utilizing photo and video evidence from witnesses at the scene as well as eyewitness testimony, rather, they went on the attack. Palestinians in a home directly near the site of the killing had their home raided, terrifying the families inside and had their phones and computers confiscated only for settlers who were allowed to wander freely on the scene to be given glimpse of the evidence against them.
And while a member of Youth Against Settlements who was filming was detained while his evidence was confiscated and evaluated, settlers were allowed to photograph the boy’s bleeding body who received no immediate first aid; a common obscenity between settlers and soldiers of humiliating Palestinians as they lay dying. Settlers served tea and snacks on the scene.
Just hours later, near the Ibrahimi Mosque, 16-year old Palestinian teenager Bayan Eiseleh was seen and photographed by a witness as she was being screamed at in Hebrew by Israeli soldiers. The photograph shows Bayan with her hands up, holding nothing. The witness reported that Bayan backed away in horror as the shouting continued. Minutes later, she was bleeding on the ground after Israeli forces fired multiple shots into the unarmed woman. And no matter how much evidence there is to the contrary, Bayan joins the numerous others described in headlines across the world as another Palestinian who attempted a stabbing on an Israeli soldier; and as Netanyahu described their deaths, she committed suicide. These are the post death wounds inflicted by those who already inflicted wounds on them across a lifetime of occupation and subjugation.
Just after the sun went down, on Shuhada Street, Israeli forces shot and killed Tarek an-Natseh after he failed to follow their orders to stop. He jumped on one of the soldiers, unarmed according to an eyewitness at the scene, and was then shot, “again and again and again.” This brings up an issue that must be looked at in a very real way before the death toll climbs above the already staggering number of 43 where it currently sits. Excessive force. Are the countless ways to incapacitate someone you feel is a threat being completely abandoned? Seemingly yes.
Immediately after the shooting, settlers, who were celebrating in a frenzy on Shuhada Street, prevented the ambulance carrying Tarek’s body from leaving the scene. Some even laid on the ground to prevent the emergency vehicle from getting the critically injured and dying man to the hospital. Tarek would die soon after.
Photo Credit: Youth Against Settlements. Ambulance carrying dying Palestinian prevented from leaving Shuhada Street by frenzied settlers.
Into the late night hours, clashes raged in Bab al-Zawiya as the Tel Rumeida neighborhood went on lockdown. No one was allowed to leave their homes and several were threatened at gunpoint to stop looking out of their windows. Meanwhile gunshots blasted periodically outside.
Settlers cut the fence that separates the illegal Israeli settlement of Kiryat Arab from nearby Palestinian homes, and nearly two hundred settlers went on a violent rampage, attacking the Palestinian villages of Wad al-Huseen and Wad al-Nasara with firebombs and stones, prompting the mosques desperate yells for assistance for the Daana family, whose home was attacked by dozens of Israeli settlers who then injured at least three of her neighbors who have been identified as 40-year-old Imad and two minors, Abdullah, 13, and Muhammad, 17.
As morning approached, new ‘security measures’ have been enacted, including the deployment of numerous Israeli forces throughout Khalil, who are, alongside settlers, the main aggressors and instigators of violence against Palestinians. The security measures have not meant any change for settlers who are privy to wander like tourists across crime scenes where Palestinian bodies lay dying. Nor have they meant the body and bag searches that every single Palestinian passing through al-Khalil streets have been subjected to. Nor does it mean the humiliation of dropping your belongings on the ground before a group of sneering Israeli soldiers and backing away with your hands up while they search your personal items and then toss them smugly back at you.
These are the new ‘security measures’ that Netanyahu has called for in al-Khalil. They spell out the furtherance of violence, dehumanization and unbridled terror against an already occupied people.
Palestinian man being body searched this morning in Tel Rumeida as part of new ‘security measures’ in Khalil.
Video of a few of the body searches happening in just two hours in Tel Rumeida (accelerated speed and without audio):
As of the writing of this report, Israeli forces have been consistently firing teargas, stun grenades and rubber coated steel bullets for hours from the roofs of Palestinian homes.
17th October 2015 | International Solidarity Movement, Nablus team | Nablus area, occupied Palestine
Palestinian civilians joined by International solidarity activists will gather tonight, Friday 17, October 2015, at the Nablus city homes of Yahya Hamad, Karam Al-masri and Sameer Al-kosa after Israeli forces threatened revenge demolitions.
This action of resistance started on the 15th of October where hundreds of Palestinians gathered outside the house to protest the illegal practice of house demolitions and managed to prevent Israeli forces from demolishing the house. Both yesterday and today the resistance has been joined by international civilians supporting the Palestinians. These international civilians consists of a vast variety of nationalities including the United States, Australia, France, Italy, Ireland, the United Kingdom, Holland, Moldovia, Chile and Canada.
A Call has been launched to maintain vigil outside of the targeted buildings and prevent the occupation forces from carrying out the demolition process.
The house of Sameer Kosa family in Al Dahiyya, the house of Yaha Hamad family in at Rojeeb st, and the house of Karam Al-masri family in North mountain are all under threat of demolition tonight on allegations of their involvement in the killing of a settler couple from the illegal settlement of Ithamar against earlier this month. All are Palestinian prisoners whose families will endure the collective punishment measures which have been Israel’s long established practice.
Marie, an international activist from the US staying in the house: ‘Punishing a family for something that one of their members has allegedly done, is just not acceptable, this is illegal and should not happen in any country which respects human rights and considers itself democratic’.
For more information call: 059-892-0497
Repost of an appeal by Palestine Medical Relief Society:
In light of the current climate of tensions in the West Bank and in East Jerusalem particularly which has led to deadly attacks on civilians and the unacceptable systematic use of lethal force by Israeli forces against Palestinians, the Palestinian Medical Relief Society (PMRS) calls for the respect of international humanitarian law and condemns in the strongest terms the excessive use of lethal force by Israeli forces which has resulted on several occasions within the past three weeks in what can only be described as executions of Palestinian men and women. PMRS calls on international non-governmental institutions, as well as all levels of international civil society to demand Israel respect its obligations under international law and pressure the Israeli government to abandon at once its logic of brutal repression and unrestrained use of force against children and young people.
Since the beginning of this month, 31 Palestinians have been shot dead, including several children. PMRS is gravely concerned by the escalation in the killing of Palestinian minors by police, army and settlers, the extra-judicial execution character of many of these killings, as well as the allegations – seemingly corroborated in several cases by videos and witness statements – that Israeli forces and settlers have tampered with several of the killing scenes, planting weapons next to the Palestinian victims in order to justify the murders.
Moreover, an estimated 1,500 Palestinians were injured by live rounds and rubber-coated steel bullets only since the start of hostilities, or an average of 100 a day. This number does not include the injuries resulting from excessive tear gas inhalation and physical assaults.
According to Dr. Mustafa Barghouti: “What we have witnessed during the last two weeks is intentional attacks by Israeli forces on Palestinian health professionals, doctors and first aid providers. That has included beating them, shooting them with live ammunitions and metallic bullets. One victim was Doctor Amer Aqel, who was hit in the eye with one of the rubber-coated steel bullets and lost his left eye. Ten first aid providers from the PMRS have been injured in various ways in Ramallah, Bethlehem, Jerusalem and Nablus. Additionally, several health workers and nurses working with the Ministry of Health and the Red Crescent were also injured. The Israeli army’s behavior does not respect the neutrality of medical professionals. Many ambulances were also hit with tear gas bombs and rubber bullets. Additionally, the Israeli army has been attacking journalists to prevent coverage of what is going on. So far, 41 journalists have been injured. Many have been beaten. One of them, Salah Ziad , working for Pal Media, was hit a live ammunitions.”
The violence of the past two weeks did not happen in a vacuum but rather is the inevitable result of the Israeli ongoing occupation and the ever-growing repression and Human Rights violations that come with it. Colonization, home demolitions, displacement of entire families, the impunity granted to settlers and armed forces, indiscriminate shooting and bombing of civilians… all these have been going on for decades with the international community idly watching by, hiding behind a long-time moribund peace process and the Oslo accords which have been emptied of their meaning and purpose by continuous Israeli violations. In recent decades, European countries have spent millions of Euros of taxpayers’ money to rebuild what Israel keeps destroying with impunity, from Palestinian homes, water supplies, livelihood to their very lives. This has to stop now.
PMRS calls on the international community to demand that Israel cease its serious breaches of Human Rights and humanitarian law at once, failing which, economic and political sanctions should be considered.
PMRS, just as other local and international health organizations has activated its emergency response plan in East Jerusalem and all over the West Bank. First aid teams, ambulances and mobile clinic vehicles are on the ground, ready to deploy to areas of need as they arise. Considering the level of tensions and the absence of any prompt resolution in sight, PMRS has concerns about its capacity to sustain its work during these times of emergency due to low funding and chronic medication shortages. Accordingly, PMRS calls on all international donors to allocate contingency funding and medical supplies to the current emergency.
