Category: In the Media - Page 49 - International Solidarity Movement

Khamis, injured by the Israeli navy while fishing in the waters of Gaza

by Rosa Schiano

27 March 2012 | il Blog di Oliva

A Palestinian fisherman, Khamis Baker, was injured on Sunday morning when the Israeli navy opened fire on a group of Palestinian fishing boats in the waters of Gaza.

The Khamis family’s home, in Al-Shati camp (“Beach” camp), is poorly lit , the ceiling falls into pieces, and there is no glass on the windows.

Khamis Baker, Gazan fisherman - Photo courtesy of Rosa Schiano, 2012

Khamis has a bandage on his forehead. The doctors sewed his wound with three stitches. A group of children crowded the room during our visit.

“Every day we face difficulties” Khamis began to tell us. ” Every day we face the fire of the Israeli navy which wants to prevent us from fishing. ”

Khamis was on the boat with his 16 year old son and three cousins.

“The previous day I sent my son to the gasoline station, we decided to go fishing on Sunday morning. While we were at sea, the Israeli Navy started to shoot using water cannons. Suddenly my son told me that there was blood on my face, I was wounded.”

“It was a waste of time and gasoline, -Khamis continues, – hours and hours spent at the gasoline station in order to get the fuel.

The Israeli navy ship fired continuously since the morning and it turned quickly around our boats in order to create waves.”

Khamis and the other fishermen were in the “permitted” area, designated by Israel within three nautical miles from the coast. Nonetheless, the soldiers were shouting to them, “Go to the south, go away.”

There were more than twenty fishing boats at sea. But because they could not fish anymore, they all went back to the port.

Khamis has worked for thirty years as a fisherman and has nine children. In the same home live also the families of his relatives, totaling about one hundred people. They all depend on fishing.

I ask Khamis how much they can gain from fishing. “150 shekels,” he answers me which is the equivalent of $40, “but half of it goes to pay the gasoline only. The rest is divided by five, so we gain a maximum of 20 shekels each.”

Khamis tells us that there is no way to fish beyond three miles. The Israeli navy ships arrive quickly. Once their boat overturned and they felt in the sea.

I finally ask Khamis if he feels like sending a message to the international community.

“We demand at least a guarantee for our future, we need to live in safety, we ask at least a guarantee for the security of our children.We do not ask anything, just to end the siege, because the Palestinian people suffer and die because of it. Every fisherman suffers from this situation.”

Khamis is just one of the many fishermen injured by the Israeli navy in the waters of Gaza.Israel regularly attacks the Palestinian fishermen within the limit of three nautical miles and prevents them from fishing by using firearms and water cannons.The restrictions on the fishing area have a significant impact on the subsistence of the fishermen of Gaza. This area should extend for 20 nautical miles according to the Jericho Agreements of 1994 (under the Oslo agreements), but was then reduced to 12 miles, then 6 and finally at 3 miles in January 2009. The “buffer zone” of water imposed by Israel prevents the Gaza fishermen from accessing the 85% of the marine area that the Oslo agreement entitles them to use.

Rosa Schiano is a volunteer with International Solidarity Movement.

Nabi Saleh: Israeli Soldiers Shoot 15 year old in the face with rubber coated steel bullet

by Jonathan Pollack

23 March 2012 | Popular Struggle Coordination Committee

15 year-old Ez Tamimi minutes after being shot in the face. Picture credit: ActiveStills

The bullet shot from a short distance hit the boy in the face penetrating his right cheek and piercing it.

Israeli Border Police officers shot a rubber-coated bullet at 15 year-old Ezz Tamimi’s face from a distance of about 20 meters, during the weekly demonstration in the West Bank village of Nabi Saleh today. The bullet, which hit the boy’s cheek, went through it, gouging a large hole in it. The Israeli army’s own open-fire regulations forbid the use of rubber-coated bullets against minors.

Media contact: Jonathan Pollak +972-54-632-7736

The incident took place at the center of the village ,hundreds of meters away from where a demonstration was taking place, when Border Police officers invaded the village.

For the first time in months, protesters managed to reach the vicinity of the contested water spring, which sparked village demonstrations over two years ago when taken over by settlers. The protesters, mainly women from the village, managed to confound the soldiers by advancing towards the spring from an unexpected direction. The protesters who were held back by the soldiers meters away from the fountain proceeded to block the road leading to the adjacent Jewish-only settlement of Halamish for some 20 minutes.

The previous night, the Israeli army staged another nighttime raid on the village, an what has become an almost nightly practice in the past three weeks.

Awaiting release and hearings of local activists, Kufr Qaddoum met with more Israeli violence

by Robin and Leila

23 March 2012 | International Solidarity Movement, West Bank

Protest against the occupation, Kfer Qaddum, West Bank, 23.3.2012 — Demonstrators take cover as the Israeli army shoots tear gas. Photo by: Oren Ziv/ Activestills.org

It was under a bright, sunny sky that the people of Kufr Qaddoum once again gathered to protest against the roadblock which isolates them from the rest of the West Bank. The past week there had been much frustration and anger since Murad Ashtawi, member of the Popular Committee, was arrested during last week’s demonstration.

To everyone’s suprise, Murad was released yesterday, along with four other prisoners who are locals of Kufr Qaddoum. Ahmad Ashtawi, who was bitten by an attack dog in last week’s demonstration, is still being held captive along with seven other prisoners from Kufr Qaddoum.

Both Ahmad and Murad have their court hearings this Sunday. Murad is accused of pushing a soldier, and Ahmad is accused of throwing rocks.

There was a great turnout of people today consisting of both Palestinians and internationals. Spirits were high as the demonstration moved towards the road block that cuts of Kufr Qaddoum from easy access to Nablus. Marchers were accompanied by music and cheering. When they reached the soldiers blocking the road there was dancing and speeches.

The soldiers immediately responded with excessive amounts of tear gas, which scattered the crowd and pushed the demonstration further back. The military then shot a significantly high amount of rancid smelling “skunk water” at the people and at the homes of Kufr Qaddoum as the skunk water truck entered the village.

Many people experienced an increased amount of tear gas today which resulted in several people suffering from tear gas inhalation and also being hit by flying canisters.

According to the Popular Struggle Coordination Committee,

A delegation of foreign diplomats visited Kufr Qaddoum, south of Nablus, after soldiers sicced a dog at one of the protesters last week, causing him serious harm. During the visit, several of the diplomats suffered from the effects of tear-gas, shot at protesters to disperse the demonstration. Jorge Lobo de Masquita, Representative of Portugal to the Palestinian Authority , as well as a South African diplomat were rushed to an ambulance, where they were given first aid for tear-gas inhalation.

Rubber coated steel-bullets and soundbombs were also used to harm the protesters. Mita, a French international activist, was hit by a canister fired at the crowd as she was running from the soldiers. The tear gas cannisterboth bruised and burned her lower calf.

Robin and Leila are volunteers with International Solidarity Movement (name has been changed).

Video: Civil resistance in Palestine

22 March 2012 | International Solidarity Movement, West Bank

From Nablus, Palestine to New York City, civilians stand up to the forces of order and privilege.
Palestinian villagers confront the Zionist military of the State of Israel in Kusra and Kufr Kaddoum villages near Nablus, the occupied West Bank. The Jewish international opposition expresses its solidarity with the Palestinian struggle for freedom.

MPEG4 format available from the Alliance of Concerned Jewish Canadians saalaha@fokus.name & Tanweer Cultural Enlightenment Forum of Nablus mustafa.azizi@hotmail.com

Mustafa Azizi, the filmmaker, describes his production:

I am Mustafa Azizi, a Palestinian filmmaker from the people under occupation. My art offers images of the resulting occupation, carrying dreams of ordinary people to the world in order to narrate the horror of being under occupation, to look for hope among the rubble of difficulties.

I try to understand the reality converting it to the dreams, I say frankly and boldly what is happening and will happen. From this came this product which was conceived simple and crazy, to say this is my country and this is what’s happening to her. I am responding to what they give me, as a Palestinian. I want to give my opinion. I need Palestine as I want it and as I love it, not as they want to give it to us.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bxbsziJQZg8

My film is simple.
This film was made because of an increase in the recent attacks of the occupation on the citizens and the various forms of stealing and burning land and killing Palestinian livestock farmers , and because the settlers have become the first line of Israel’s attack against the Palestinian villages.
The idea of this product was to address the world in its own language and explain to it the width of the issue of Palestinian Civil Resistance’s their weekly protest against the expansion of settlements, land theft, occupation. The closure of the main entrances to these villages, and daily attacks from settlers and army.
The film shows Palestinian people working hand in hand with international solidarity activists to move the conflict to a higher level, a global struggle against all forms of racism, humiliation and occupation against the forces of authoritarianism that enslave peoples and loot and steal in order to further colonial objectives. This conflict has become the popular form of expression the world uses against all types of exploitation. The non violent struggle has become a form of the Palestinian model and applies in all the corners of the world: sit-ins, tents and demonstrations against the authority, power and tyranny of monopoly and other types of capitalism that crush the poor.

This film simply connects what is happening in Palestine to what is happening in the world. It also sheds light on a range of other issues and information about the Palestinian issue, which gives us a simplified idea of the conflict here for decades.

Settlers grab Palestinian water springs: U.N. report

by Jihan Abdallah

19 March 2012 | Reuters

A female Israeli soldier stands next to a man-made pool containing water from a spring located near the West Bank village of Nabi Saleh, and the Jewish settlement of Halamish, near Ramallah March 19, 2012. REUTERS/Baz Ratner

(Reuters) – Jewish settlers have seized dozens of natural springs in the occupied West Bank, barring Palestinians or limiting their access to scarce water sources, a United Nations report said on Monday.

The U.N. Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) said it had surveyed 530 springs in the West Bank and found that 30, mostly in areas where Israel retains military control, were taken over by the settlers.

It added that Palestinians currently had limited access to 26 other springs where settlers had moved in and threatened to take control. The report said settlers had not encroached on 474 remaining springs surveyed.

“Springs have remained the single largest water source for irrigation and a significant source for watering livestock,” the report said, adding that some also provided water for domestic consumption in areas not connected to pipelines.

“The loss of access to springs and adjacent land reduced the income of affected farmers, who either stop cultivating the land or face a reduction in the productivity of their crops,” the report said.

It added that settlers had turned dozens of springs into tourist sites and some were used for swimming.

“Settlers have developed 40 springs as tourist sites, deployed picnic tables and benches and given them Hebrew names … It is generating employment and revenue for the settlements and it is a way of promoting or advertising settlements as a fun place,” OCHA researcher Yehezkel Lein said.

David Ha’ivri, a settler leader, said settlers were using the springs “for purposes of recreation and for the people who live here, more so than for tourism purposes.”

In 2009 a spring named Ein el Qaws, located near the village of Nabi Saleh, was taken over by settlers from Halamish, forcing villagers to obtain their irrigation water from other sources, the report and residents said.

“The spring was used to irrigate hundreds of olive and fruit trees in the village and the children used to swim in it, now if we try to go to the spring, the settlers and soldiers come and kick us out,” said villager Nariman Tamimi.

A spokesman for Israel’s military-run Civil Administration in the West Bank said there was free access to the Ein el Qaws spring for everyone, except on Fridays when Palestinians usually mount protests against the spring’s takeover and soldiers keep people away.

He said Israel had curbed illegal building at one spring and had started legal proceedings against work at another site.

About 500,000 Israelis and 2.5 million Palestinians live in the West Bank and East Jerusalem, areas Israel captured in a 1967 war. Palestinians seek the territory for an independent state along with the Hamas-controlled Gaza Strip.

Palestinians say settlements, considered illegal by the International Court of Justice (ICJ), the highest U.N. legal body for disputes, would deny them a viable state.

Israel cites historical and Biblical links to the West Bank and says the status of settlements should be decided in peace negotiations.