18 February 2013 | International Solidarity Movement, Huwarra, Occupied Palestine
Four people , including one eleven year old boy, were arrested today during clashes between Israeli Soldiers and Palestinian Youth (Shebab). At least one person was taken away from the scene in an ambulance. The Israeli Army used tear gas and sound bombs against a crowd of roughly 100 Palestinians who had gathered to protest the ongoing detention of hundreds of Palestinians without charge , particularly Samer Issawi who is on his 210th of hunger strike. Jafar Izzedin, Ayman Sharawneh and Tariq Qadan are also on hunger strike in Israeli Jails.
12 February 2013 | International Solidarity Movement, Sabastiya, Occupied Palestine
Sabastiya is an ancient city located just 10 km north of Nablus, West Bank. It contains Canaanite, Israelite, Hellenistic, Herodian, Roman and Byzantine ruins as well as the tomb of John the Baptiste. The winding city streets along with its history make Sabastiya an ideal place to visit. Yet, as charming and beautiful as the old city is, the nearby Israeli settlement of Shafi Shamrom is making lives of Sabastiya’s residents very difficult: settlers uprooted olive trees, introduced wild boars into the environment to damage the land, and most recently, sewage has started leaking from the settlement flooding Palestinian fields.
In 2001 settlers uprooted and destroyed around 1000 olive trees, substantially damaging the land of several families. In 2006 the army put up a fence in an attempt to confiscate the land where the trees had originally been. Sabastiya’s farmers acted: they pulled the fence down in a defiant act of resistance and since that time there have been no further attempts to install it again.Flooded Palestinian agricultural land
The most recent and disturbing action on the part of illegal settlers of Shafi Shamron is pumping their raw, untreated sewage directly onto Palestinian fields. As the sewage is absorbed into the land, olive and apricot trees are rendered diseased and, according to the residents, “poisoned”. The flow of human waste begins from a pipe on the perimeter of the settlement, creating a sort of reservoir which then runs through the adjacent Palestinian fields, compelling each subsequent land owner to create a canal in order to drain the sewage water on to his neighbors land and further away.
Residents of Sabastiya are currently bringing legal action against Shafi Shamron in order to stop the settlement from dumping its sewage on Palestinian lands. The malodorous sewage running through the fields must remind a regular visitor of non-violent protests of a very effective strategy used by the army; the “skunk” water, which is chemical liquid smelling of excrement commonly sprayed on protesters. Settlers are evidently using a similar technique to make local residents’ lives even more difficult. The Shali Shamron settlements sewage pipe
12 February 2013 | International Solidarity Movement, Urif, Nablus, Occupied Palestine
UPDATE: All of those detained today have been released and the Brit who was pepper sprayed has been let out of hospital
At around 11am this morning, a group of internationals including three volunteers from the Michigan Peace Team travelled to Urif in Nablus. They were attempting to assist in planting olive trees at the top of the village near the school, an area which has been the scene of much of the recent troubles in Urif.
Despite being nowhere near the illegal Israeli settlement, Yizhar, Israel forces have a constant presence on the hilltop. One local resident said, “we always know when we are about to be attacked by settlers, because the army leave their position at the top of the hill“.
On arrival activists were immediately approached by the Israeli Occupation Force who were asking for internationals’ passports, the army then tried to arrest a Palestinian farmer.
The internationals tried to intervene but 6 including three from the Michigan Peace Team and 3 volunteers from the ISM were arrested. The three ISM activist currently in detention at the Ariel settlement are from America, Denmark and Finland; no Palestinians were arrested.
Two ISM volunteers were pepper sprayed which hospitalised one British volunteer.
12 January 2013 | International Solidarity Movement, Occupied Palestine
Last night more than forty Israeli soldiers invaded the city of Nablus and raided two homes looking for two young men. One of them was arrested during the raid and the other one avoided arrest as he was working at the time of the raid.
At 2.30 am, dozens of Israeli soldiers with several dogs broke into Mead Nijad’s house breaking the door with a hammer and violently interrupting the family’s sleep. As the soldiers entered the house, they ordered everyone to have their hands up; they asked for Emad, blindfolded, handcuffed and arrested him. Immediately after, they took the ID’s of all family members and locked them outside the house on a cold winters night. In the meantime, the soldiers ransacked the whole house causing widespread destruction. They also took with them the young boy’s working tools. As Emad’s mother explains, “if they come with dogs, why do they have to destroy everything? If there is something in the house, the dogs would find it”. Furthermore, no reasons for why they arrested Emad were given; the commander just said “your son has caused problems to the Israelis, if you want to know where your son is, come to Huwwara”. The family still does not know the fate of their son.
In the case of Moaz Darduk (19), dozens of only Hebrew speaking soldiers arrived in his house at 3 am while he was at work and woke his parents up. As they asked for him and his father told the soldiers he was not at home but working, they locked his mother in a room and took his father to his other son’s house just in the next building. The commander, who was the only one speaking Arabic, kept saying to his father “do you know who I am? I am Haroun and I came here to kill your son”. When the commander went back to Moaz’s house he told to his parents “I want you to remember who I am, I am Haroun and I am here to kill your son. If you do not bring your son to Huwwara tomorrow morning at 9.30, we will kill him and return him to you in a coffin”.
Night raids and home searching are common tools used by the Israeli Occupation Forces to arrest Palestinian youth for no reason and as a collective punishment to scare Palestinian families.
