Category: Ramallah - Page 14 - International Solidarity Movement

Violence in Ni’lin

14th June 2014 | International Solidarity Movement, Ramallah team | Ni’lin, Occupied Palestine

A Red Crescent paramedic, present at the Ni’lin demonstration last week, spoke to ISM about the protest last Friday, 6th June. He explained that the demonstration began as the protesters marched towards the apartheid wall, with Israeli soldiers firing tear gas canisters and rubber-coated steel bullets.

After just 15 minutes, a 41-year-old Palestinian protester was shot in the leg with a 0.22 live ammunition bullet. The soldiers had been hiding in the olive trees next to the apartheid wall and were unseen by the demonstrators. When a Red Crescent volunteer tried to give the wounded protester medical treatment, after placing a bandage on the bleeding wound, he was attacked by the Israeli soldiers. The soldiers kicked the volunteer and used their guns to beat his face, after the demonstration he was taken to the hospital to receive treatment.

The 41-year-old who was shot by the Israeli military was then arrested and held for two hours, before being ‘handed back’ to the Red Crescent ambulance at the Ni’lin checkpoint. He had received some medical treatment from the Israeli paramedics, but this wasn’t immediate, and he also had wounds, including a cut on his head that required one stitch, where the Israeli forces had beaten him while he was arrested.

The protester is now slowly recovering, the 0.22 bullet fractured his tibia [a bone in his lower leg], and it will be another month before he is healed.

The demonstration yesterday was fortunately less violent, there were no injuries or arrests. However, before the protest could begin, the military moved a long way out from the apartheid wall, pushing the demonstrators deep into their own olive trees. The military fired many tear gas grenades and canisters and some of the protesters suffered from tear gas inhalation, requiring support from Red Crescent paramedics. At least twice during the demonstration, Israeli forces fired tear gas canisters directly at protesters, both highly dangerous and in contravention to Israeli military procedure, which is shooting them up into an arch to lower the impacted velocity.

Ni’lin began demonstrating in 2008, against the apartheid wall’s construction. The protests continued after the wall was completed, and since 2008, five villagers from Ni’lin have been murdered by Israeli forces.

VIDEO: Israeli forces shoot and kill two Palestinian teens near Ramallah

20th May 2014 | Defense For Children International Palestine | Occupied Palestine

Unlawful killing of two Palestinian teens outside Ofer – Video from Defense For Children International Palestine

Israeli forces fatally shot Nadeem Siam Nawara, 17, on May 15 during clashes following a demonstration marking Nakba Day.

Israeli forces killed two Palestinian teens during clashes on Thursday outside the occupied West Bank city of Ramallah.

Nadeem Siam Nawara, 17, and Mohammad Mahmoud Odeh Abu Daher, 16, were both fatally shot in the chest with live ammunition near Ofer military prison in the West Bank city of Beitunia. Both boys were transferred to the Palestine Medical Complex in Ramallah where they were later pronounced dead.

The boys were participating in a demonstration near Ofer military prison to mark Nakba Day and express solidarity with hunger striking prisoners currently held in administrative detention by Israel. The demonstration reportedly began peacefully and then turned violent when Israeli forces clashed with Palestinian youths, according to The New York Times.

Israeli forces killed Mohammad Mahmoud Odeh Abu Daher, 16, on May 15 during clashes following a demonstration marking Nakba Day.

“Israeli forces continue to use excessive force and recklessly fire live ammunition and rubber-coated metal bullets on unarmed protesters, including children, killing them with impunity,” said Rifat Kassis, executive director of DCI-Palestine. “While Israel claims to open investigations into such incidents, they are not transparent or independent, and seldom result in a soldier being held accountable.”

Mohammad Abdullah Hussein al-Azzeh, 15, sustained a gunshot wound when he was hit with live ammunition in the back and left lung while taking part in the same demonstration. He is currently in stable condition at the Ramallah Medical Complex.

Palestinians across the occupied West Bank and Gaza Strip held marches on May 15 to commemorate the Nabka or “catastrophe”, which marks the forced displacement and dispossession of the Palestinian homeland in 1948.

Mohammad Abdullah Hussein al-Azzeh, 15, sustained a gunshot wound in the back and left lung during the same demonstration.

The use of live ammunition by soldiers on unarmed Palestinian civilians, including children, has been a recent area of concern to human rights groups. In February, Amnesty International released a report finding that the Israeli army uses reckless force throughout the West Bank.

An Israeli army spokesperson said that the killings were under investigation and claimed that only rubber-coated metal bullets, stun grenades and tear gas were used by Israeli forces at the time of the incident, not live ammunition, according to Haaretz.

The deaths on Thursday raise the number of Palestinian children killed by Israeli forces in 2014 to four, according to data collected by DCI-Palestine. Over 1,400 Palestinian children have been killed as a result of Israeli military and settler presence in the Occupied Palestinian Territory since 2000.

In March, Israeli forces shot and killed Yousef al-Shawamrah, 14, with live ammunition in the southern West Bank near his village of Deir al-Asal al-Fawqa. He was shot while looking for thistle in an area of land belonging to the village that now sits on the other side of Israel’s separation barrier. As he and two friends crossed through an open area, soldiers fired live ammunition toward the boys, hitting Yousef in the hip and back.

In December 2013, Wajih Wajdi al-Ramahi, 15, from Jalazoun refugee camp north of the West Bank city of Ramallah was fatally shot with live ammunition fired by an Israeli soldier. Documenting the killing, DCI-Palestine found that Wajih had been shot in the back from a distance of 150-200 meters (about 500 feet).

The Israeli military’s own regulations dictate that live ammunition must be used “only under circumstances of real mortal danger,” but the regulations are not enforced and frequently ignored by Israeli soldiers, according to research by DCI-Palestine and a recent report by B’Tselem, an Israeli human rights group.

Photo story: Palestinians protest the deaths of two martyrs

17th May 2014 | International Solidarity Movement | Ofer, Occupied Palestine

On the 16th May, Palestinians protest on the road to Ofer prison, following the murder of two Palestinian youths on the same road on the previous day during the Nakba Day protest. The youths, 22-year-old Muhammad Audah Abu al-Thahir and 17-year-old Nadim Siyam Nuwarah, were both shot with live ammunition.

The Israeli army launch another round of tear gas. Several protesters were carried from the scene by medical staff with breathing problems due to the amount of tear gas used.

Some protesters came prepared with gas masks.

A protester is treated for tear gas inhalation.

Another protester is treated for tear gas inhalation.

The tear gas canisters are hot. When they land on something flammable it will ignite. Here, the fire brigade try to extinguish a fire that had taken hold in a grassy field next to the protesters.

To protect themselves from being shot, the protesters use a metal skip. Israeli soldiers and border police were using live ammunition and rubber-coated steel bullets throughout the protest.

As the Israeli army use more tear gas canisters, another protester is carried away for treatment.

Protesters retreat following yet another round of tear gas.

A photojournalist makes his way back through the tear gas.

Protesters take cover as the Israeli army fires more rubber-coated steel bullets and live ammunition.

A protester fixes flags to a scaffold. The black flag represents the Palestinian refugees’ right to return following their expulsion in the Nakba of 1948.

Israeli soldiers take position on a nearby hill. The soldier in the middle is lining up to shoot rubber-coated steel bullets at the protesters.

A protester is shot in the leg with a rubber-coated steel bullet. Wounds from these bullets, if taken to the head or from shorter range to other parts of the body can be fatal.

Another protester is taken away for treatment after being shot in the foot with a rubber-coated steel bullet.

In all, four protesters were shot yesterday with rubber-coated steel bullets, one protester was hit with a tear gas canister in the face, another protester was shot in the face at close range with a foam-tipped projectile and one 16-year-old boy was shot in the leg with live ammunition.

Two more martyrs as the Nakba continues

16th May 2014 | International Women’s Peace Service | Occupied Palestine

Excessive use of tear gas (photo by IWPS).

In commemoration of the 66th annual Nakba day, hundreds of Palestinian youth from the Ramallah district moved against Israeli soldiers outside of Ofer prison in Beitunya. Soldiers retaliated with tear gas, live ammunition and rubber coated steel bullets. During the clashes, soldiers killed two demonstraters, aged seventeen and twenty two.

The first, who was shot in the chest, died in hospital, while the second, who was shot in the abdomen, died in the ambulance. An additional twenty four Palestinian protesters were shot with live ammunition and rubber bullets during the confrontation, and two victims are currently hospitalized in the Intensive Care Unit at Ramallah Public Hospital. Over ten youth have also recieved medical attention for excessive tear gas inhalation.

Nakba day is the annual commemoration of the eight hundred thousand Palestinians who were forced out of their homes in Historic Palestine during the War of 1948. Nakba, which is the arabic word for catastrophe, is also used to describe the situation of Palestinians at the hands of the Israeli occupiers. At the heart of the catastrophe are the five million Palestinians currently living as refugees, the largest refugee population in the world.

Demonstrators chose Ofer prison as the site of their demonstration today, because five hundred Palestinian political prisoners are currently jailed there. Forty detainees in Ofer are currently on hunger strike to protest the Israeli practice of administrative detention, or imprisonment without formal charges.

Medics evacuate a young boy who passed out from tear gas inhalation (photo by IWPS).

Video: Protest on World Press Freedom Day: “They don’t consider Palestinian journalists to be journalists.”

3rd May 2014 | International Solidarity Movement, Ramallah Team| Occupied Palestine

Yesterday, Saturday 3^rd of May was the United Nations World Press Freedom Day. Yesterday, journalists celebrated, remembered, and protested, on a date commemorated worldwide since 1992.

In Palestine, the 3^rd of May calls for a protest by members of the Palestinian Journalists Syndicate (PJS), and yesterday this was at the Beit El military checkpoint.

We witnessed approximately 70 journalists gather in the city of Ramallah, driving towards the Bet El checkpoint, before leaving their cars and attempting to walk through the military gate.

The journalists carried nothing but signs and cameras, chanting for freedom from the Israeli occupation. It was a completely non-violent demonstration.

On arrival to the checkpoint, Israeli Border Police first closed the gate, and then called many more soldiers to the area, who proceeded to watch and film the demonstrators with their private smart phones.

The journalists then tried to open the gate, which is when Israeli Border Police started to throw stun grenades at the demonstrators. More than eight stun grenades were thrown, seemingly directly at the legs of the protesters. One stun grenade hit my ISM colleague in the foot, she was lucky to be wearing thick running shoes and jeans, so did not receive an injury.

The level of aggression was surprising to me, I commented upon this to a demonstrator, a Palestine journalist, causing him to turn to me and smile.

“Maybe they don’t know we’re journalists.”

“Sorry?” I asked.

“If they did, they wouldn’t throw them [the stun grenades] at us.”

He laughed, and walked back toward the gate.

Several times during the protest, the journalists tried to open the gate, each time it was swiftly closed by Israeli forces. After approximately 40 minutes, it seemed the demonstration was ending, and a large group of the journalists began to walk away from the gate.

It was at this point that the Israeli forces present began to throw more stun grenades, roughly six, and one tear gas grenade. Ironically this caused the demonstration to last longer, as after this attack the journalists decided to continue the protest for a further 30 minutes.

After the demonstration ended, in which there were fortunately no injuries or arrests, we had the opportunity to speak to Omar Nazzal, a board member on the steering committee of the PJS.

Omar has been active in journalism for 30 years, and a member of the PJS for the last 18. The PJS was created in Jerusalem in 1978; it was originally named the ‘Arab Journalists League’ as they were not allowed to use ‘Palestinian’ in the title. This changed in 1994, after the Oslo Accords the organization could be renamed.

The PJS has approximately 1300 members, 800 in the West Bank and 500 in the Gaza Strip. It is a member of the Arab Journalists Union and of the International Federation of Journalists.

An issue that is impacting the journalism profession in Palestine, as it does with many workers worldwide, is the impact of globalization. As multinational companies buy out smaller media outlets, individual journalists are loosing their jobs. Or, forcing journalists to move towards shorter-term contracts, loosing their rights, leading to lower wages and little or no insurance.

Omar explained that there are many problems of being a journalist in Palestine, and one huge issue is their treatment by the Israeli authorities.

“They don’t consider Palestinian journalists to be journalists.”

Horrifying statistics echo this statement.

Since the year 2000, approximately 300 journalists have been imprisoned, over 500 have been injured, and 21 Palestinian journalists have been killed by the Israeli military.

Omar continued: “Sometimes they beat journalists, arrest them, shoot them, they’re forbidden to move freely.”

Currently there are nine Palestinian journalists in Israeli military prisons.

Muhammed Muna, one of the imprisoned nine, is a West Bank correspondent of the UK-based Quds Press International News Agency. He was arrested in August 2013. He was sentenced to six months in administrative detention, which essentially means that the Israeli government can hold a person indefinitely without charge. Muhammed’s detention was renewed for a further six months earlier this year, with no release date in sight.