On Wednesday 9th October, around 5:40pm, Israeli special forces entered Nablus by car and carried out a deliberate assassination of four Palestinians who were inside a a black Skoda vehicle, in broad daylight, on Faisal Street, near a popular market. The Israeli special forces’ car was painted in Palestinian colours to pass undercover. They fired directly at the Palestinians’ car which was driving in the center of the city, and in which were five young men, one of which survived and is currently in critical condition.
The attack caused a state of horror and fear amongst the resident of the area and passersby, with people rushing to flee the scene.
One of the martyr’s loved ones in a state of distress at the funeral. @Diana Khwaelid
After shooting at the car from a distance, the Israeli special forces then got out of their car to shoot again at point blank to ensure the Palestinian’s deaths, after which they withdrew from the area. Immediately after, Palestinian medical teams and ambulances rushed to the scene as residents began to gather in front of the assassination site. Due to the intensity of the shooting, onlookers found pieces of flesh and of one of the young men’s brain. All victims were taken to the Rafidia government hospital in Nablus, where they passed away from their injuries.
Shortly thereafter, the Israeli military stormed the city and in particular took over the place where the operation had taken place. Finding that the bodies had been moved to the hospital, they left the scene again.
The funeral ceremony for the martyrs began on Thursday at 10:30 am. It started in front of the Rafidia hospital and proceeded to the martyrs roundabout in the city, where a funeral prayer was held. They then headed to the martyrs’ hometowns of Balata camp and Askar, where they grew up. Hundreds of Palestinians participated in the funeral, chanting for the liberation of Palestine.
During the funeral march, Palestinians protest against the occupation (1) @Diana Khwaelid
During the funeral march, Palestinians protest against the occupation (2) @Diana Khwaelid
Amongst the four Palestinians killed was Issam Al-Salaj, commander of the Balata camp battalion, who the citizens of the camp honoured as a martyr that had evaded the Israeli army for years.
Israeli colonial settlers and Knesset Members celebrated on social media the de facto deportation of two German citizens, who were imprisoned by the Israeli authorities, from the occupied Palestinian territories to Jordan on Sunday October 6th. Itamar Ben Gvir and Tzvi Sukot posted about the expulsion of German activists as an achievement for their special task force and governmental committee, which was created to deal with what they call “dangerous anarchists” in the West Bank. Israel’s criminal right wing government uses the term “anarchists” to refer to all Israeli and international human rights defenders who are supporting Palestinians living under illegal occupation in the West Bank.
According to eyewitnesses, on the morning of October 2, the two activists were arbitrarily arrested by Israeli forces in Masafer Yatta (South Hebron Hills) as they accompanied a Palestinian farmer to his garden in the village of Tuwani. The Palestinian farmer they were accompanying faces daily harassment, attacks, and invasions of his private land by Israeli settlers and occupation forces, which all make it difficult for him to access his land, to cultivate it, and even to remain in his home. Police claimed in court that the activists had entered a settlement, confronted a soldier and disturbed him in fulfilling his duty. These claims contradict video footage of the arrest.
The onslaught of harassment against Palestinian residents of the region of Masafer Yatta extends beyond Tuwani. Every village in the area is affected. In the village of Zanuta in this same region, residents have been forcibly displaced multiple times despite a court ruling in their favor. Residents of Um Durit have had their livestock and property stolen and destroyed, and their land abused by settlers. Last July, around 200 settlers launched a coordinated attack in which they destroyed vehicles, burned fruit trees and beat up residents in Khalet Al Daba’a and Um Fagarah. In the past year, at least 19 Palestinian communities in the occupied West Bank have been forcefully displaced by Israel settlers with the support of the Israeli occupation forces.
The activists were transferred to the central unit in the occupied West Bank near the Malleh Adumim colonial settlement. The police illegally broke into the phone of one of the activists and questioned them about photos on their phones of signs and stickers condemning the genocide in Gaza and supporting Palestinian rights. The police alleged that this proved that they supported terror and were terrorists. They were also questioned on whether they knew about the International Solidarity movement (ISM), and were shown a presentation on the organization with pictures of Israelis and internationals and asked if they knew them.
The activists were taken to court and accused of three offenses: disturbing a police officer/soldier performing his responsibilities, membership in an illegal association, and “sympathizing and identifying with a terror organization”. According to the police, the illegal association they are members of is ISM, which they claimed has been designated as forbidden to work in Israel and the West Bank.
It is important to note that while many respectable human rights organizations have been designated as terror organizations by Israel, the ISM has not yet been designated as forbidden, nor has any international ISM activist ever been indicted and charged with a crime in Israeli courts.
The German citizens were imprisoned in harsh conditions from Wednesday to Sunday and then given the option of leaving through the King Hussein bridge, and they are now in Jordan. For similar vague and unsubstantiated accusations, Palestinians are frequently arrested and tortured in the West Bank, and in Gaza the accused are murdered along with their families.
This most recent set of arrests is part of the ongoing barrage of harassment by Israeli settlers and soldiers of Palestinians and of human rights activists in area, and comes in the wake of the murder of ISM volunteer Ayşenur Ezgi Eygi in the village of Beita during a protest against settlement expansion on the village’s land.
On Thursday 3rd October, in the evening, the Israeli military bombed the Tulkarm refugee camp, in the North-East of the West Bank, killing at least 18 Palestinians in a single blast. The attack targeted a popular local café in the al-Hamam neighbourhood, also destroying the apartments above it and murdering the family of four that lived there, including two young children.
The bombing was carried out by an F16 jet, a war plane able to fly extremely quickly and take its target by surprise – which also meant the military was able to use a large missile, instantly wrecking the area and burying victims under heavy rubble, as well as dismembering the bodies.
Rescuers from the Civil Defense Team and Palestinian medical crews reported struggling to look for survivors under the wreckage, and finding many unidentifiable body parts that were transferred in boxes to the hospital.
In just a few days, Palestinians were already planning to commemorate the massacre of the Nour Shams refugee camp that occurred in Tulkarem on October 22 last year, in which 12 Palestinians were killed, but they did not know that the Israeli occupation would commit a new massacre with such horror just before.
One American activist currently working in the West Bank commented: “The scenes were reminiscent of the genocide still raging in Gaza. In one video posted immediately after the bombing, you see a man’s lifeless body hanging from the building. My group was supposed to be going to Nour Shams tomorrow [Saturday] to distribute aid to the camp but now we can’t because the situation is too unsafe for us. This attack has been devastating.”
While attacks from both the Israeli military and Israeli settlers have been constant in the area since last year and before, this massacre marks a worrying turn as it is the first bombing carried out by a fighter jet in the West Bank since the Second Intifada that lasted from 2002-2005, as well as the deadliest single attack there in over twenty years.
This comes after months of Israeli harassment targeting the Tulkarem refugee camp with raids, strikes and sieges, particularly intensifying in the month of August, which saw a large-scale military operation targeting both Tulkarem and Jenin. Strikes on Tulkarm tend to be particularly murderous, as this camp is home to 25,000 Palestinian refugees.
F16 jets are central to the genocide Israel is leading in Gaza, where scenes like the one seen in Tulkarem on Thursday are daily occurrences. In Gaza, as in the West Bank, refugee camps are the prime targets of Israeli raids where the primary objective is annihilating Palestinians and rendering their land inhabitable. The Israeli strategy remains one of total destruction as a preamble to colonial expansion on stolen land.
There have already been at least 701 Palestinian casualties in the West Bank since October 7th 2023, mostly caused by the Israeli army – the rest by settlers who are often assisted and directly protected by them. If Israel continues to escalate in these areas, this number is likely to go up exponentially in the next few months, furthering the total genocide of Palestinians in both Gaza and the West Bank.
ISM mourns Wafa Al Udaini, a Palestinian activist and journalist we were honored to have worked with. Israeli forces bombed her home in Deir Al-Balah in central Gaza, in the early hours of Monday morning, September 30, murdering Wafa, her husband Munir Atiyeh Al-Udaini, 5-year-old daughter Balsam, and 7-month-old son Tamim. She is survived by her two young sons.
Wafa was a dedicated and passionate Gaza-based activist and coordinator. She majored in English in Al Aqsa University, with the intention of becoming a teacher and translator. However, anger and frustration with how mainstream media ‘distorts our image in Palestine’, led her towards a career in journalism. She reported from Gaza during the invasions of 2008, 2014-2015 (during which her home was destroyed), and the current genocide, during which her and her family were displaced three times.
‘Being a journalist in Gaza is not an easy task, because every single day, you are subjected to (the possibility) of being killed, injured, or arrested by the Israeli occupation forces. In fact hundreds of journalists get killed by Israeli fire. Everyone is a target.’ – Wafa Al Udaini
She is the 174th journalist killed by Israel since 7 October 2023. Her killing was condemned by the government media office in Gaza and the Palestinian Media Forum.
The last article Wafa wrote was, “There is no such thing as protective attire for journalists in Gaza.” In it, she described the total lack of protection for journalists in Gaza, and her colleagues Israeli forces had killed. Journalists in Gaza work “on empty stomachs and often without electricity to cover the genocide of their people”, amidst the constant threat of abduction, torture, or murder from Israeli forces, she wrote.
E., who volunteered with ISM and worked with Wafa, said: ‘I first got to know Wafa when she was writing about the Great March of Return and life in Gaza under Israeli seige. One thing that impressed me while collaborating with her was her conviction and determination to stay true to what she felt was right, even at great personal cost.’
‘As the genocide became worse and it was clear that Israeli forces would kill anyone who dared to report on it, Wafa continued faithfully documenting the atrocities happening around her, and how Palestinians tried to help each other survive. Even after being targeted by Israeli tank fire, she continued sharing the stories of Gazans until the end, telling me she wanted to “help in spreading the truth.”‘
‘To me, Wafa was a hero, and one of the bravest people I ever knew. Rest in power Wafa, and may you live on in our memories and the truths you told.’
Neta Golan, ISM co-founder, said: ‘Wafa and her family were murdered and dismembered because she was committed to delivering a message from Gaza to the world, about the reality of Israeli colonialism, in English. She believed in us. She believed that if we knew, we would do all we can to end the genocide and support Palestine’s liberation. She risked her life to tell us about the reality of the unfolding genocide, and The Israeli occupation murdered her and her family members for it. But the truth can not be silenced. We are committed to Wafa’s mission of amplifying Palestinian voices, and we are committed to heeding their call.’
For the past two weeks, the Israeli army has been conducting the largest military operation in the northern West Bank, causing the displacement of dozens of families from the Jenin Camp, Nur Shams Camp, and Tulkarem camp. This comes following Israeli calls to evacuate the camps, raising concerns about the repetition of the Gaza scenario in the West Bank.
“Gaza scenario”
Israeli Foreign Minister Yisrael Katz said on August 28 that the threat in the West Bank must be dealt with in the same way as the Gaza Strip, coinciding with the start of the West Bank operation.
Katz explained in a tweet on his X page that the Israeli army is launching an intensive military operation in the Jenin and Tulkarm refugee camps for Palestinian refugees against what he called “the Iranian Islamic terrorist infrastructures that have been established there”.
He added that Iran is working to establish what he described as, “a terrorist front against Israel from the West Bank, based on the Gaza and Lebanon model, by financing and arming saboteurs and smuggling advanced weapons through Jordan.”
Katz also called for a temporary evacuation of the population there, and for any other necessary steps to be taken, justifying this by saying that: “This is a war on everything and we must win it.”
Inside the Tulkarem refugee camp
Israel’s grand plan
Since the launch of the large-scale military operation in the northern West Bank, which began on August 28, Israel has aimed at eliminating all Palestinian militants in the camps in the north of the West Bank, to facilitate the access of Israeli settlers to these areas and settle in them, as in the case of Masafer Yatta, the Jordan Valley area in Tubas, the villages of Nablus, Ramallah, and Hebron.
The Palestinian camps in the West Bank, specifically in the North west Bank, are a hotbed of terrorism for Israel.
Al-Balawneh neighborhood in Tulkarem camp
Breaking the popular incubator in the camps
Has Israel succeeded in breaking the popular incubator in the Palestinian camps?
During its military operation two weeks ago, the Israeli occupation forces destroyed the northern West Bank camps and turned them from a vital camp to a place where it is no longer possible to live; the northern West Bank camps have turned into a block of rubble and the infrastructure has been destroyed.
Fortunately, the Palestinians in the camps are aware that Israel’s first goal in destroying the camps, including houses, infrastructure, and shops, is to break the popular incubator and turn the Palestinian civilians living in the camp against the Palestinian fighters who have chosen the path of resistance and defend the camps in every way.
Palestinians from inside Jenin, Nur Shams, and Tulkarem camps who lost their homes and private property had the same opinion.
They said: “The occupation will not make us turn against the resistance, and if they demolish my house, I will build another house better than it.”
The footprints of an Israeli soldier during the storming of one of the Palestinian houses in the camp
For the Palestinian community, the Palestinian camps are the representation of steadfastness and challenge, because they are Palestinians who have been displaced from Palestinian cities that have been occupied since 1948 to the West Bank, they paid the price for their stay in Palestine, and the occupation continues to pursue them until now in destroying their place of residence in refugee camps.
For the Palestinian refugees in the West Bank camps, Israel has failed in all its attempts and will never succeed in displacing them from the camps. However, there are dozens of families who have emigrated from the camps because of fear for their families and because there are special cases of illness.
These are the remnants of the occupation – a military bag with food inside for Israeli soldiers in one of the Houses of the Tulkarm campMap of the Al Hammam neighborhood used by the occupation soldiers during the military operation in the camp
