Category: Press Releases

Four More Arrests in Bil’in; Further Arrests Resisted by Villagers

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Israeli soldiers invaded Bil’in last night for the fourth time in six days. A group of about 20 Border Police arrived in jeeps and arrested four non-violent Palestinian activists who they accused of damaging the fence, including an expectant father, two brothers and a 16 year old boy. Afterwards, a group of regular military came in mostly on foot. The soldiers said they had pictures of further Palestinians who they wanted to arrest, but a group of at least 30 villagers came out on the streets singing and chanting, in reaction to which the soldiers left. For the second night in three days, non-violent resistance was successfully used to oppose an Israeli military invasion of Bil’in.

The names of the new arrestees are:

Basem Ahmed Issa Yaseen, 28 (an expectant father, with two children)
Khalid Shokat alKatib, 20
Baasil Shokat alKatib, 21 (brothers)
Mohammend Abdel Fateh Burnat, 16

These four arrests are in addition to the previous arrests of eleven Palestinian non-violent activists, including a sixteen year old child and three brothers from one family. Only one of them, who had been arrested by the soldiers in order to pressure his brother to turn himself in, has been released so far.

On the 21st of October, in an act of non violent resistance villagers from Bil’in began to implement the decision of the International Court of Justice that Israel’s illegal wall should be dismantled and removed metal posts meant to serve as foundation for the wall on Bil’in land. The Israeli military reacted to this act with arrests and distribution of a text in Arabic warning people not to take part in direct action against the wall. In the Arabic text the army claimed that “every Friday for the last six months, the IDF has allowed the people of the village to conduct non-violent protests against the construction of the wall on their lands”, despite regularly firing on non-violent demonstrators with tear gas and rubber bullets. The text concluded with the threat that “the acts of the people violating the law will disturb your daily lives”.

For the last ten months, Bil’in has launched an ongoing non-violent campaign against the annexation barrier supported by hundreds of Israeli and International activists, and met by violence from the Israeli army. Israel designed the current route of the barrier to annex 60% of Bil’in’s agricultural land, and expand the settlement of Modi’in Elite. Plans for Modi’in Elite’s expansion have yet to be approved by the Israeli government.
For more Information:
Abdullah AbuRahme, Coordinator of the Popular Committee against the Wall and Settlements: 0547258210
ISM media office 02-2971824

“Demolish all the illegally built homes in the West Bank” – Israeli Chief of Staff General Dan Halutz

PRESS RELEASE
by the Israeli Committee Against House Demolitions (ICAHD)

ICAHD notices with concern the statement by Chief of Staff, Gen. Dan Halutz, as reported in Ma’ariv (October 26, 2005), in which he is quoted as saying that in response to the recent suicide attack in Hadera Market he would implement various responses. Amongst responses he proposes is “to demolish all the illegally built homes in the West Bank, as those houses are used as shelter by terrorists.”

In the West Bank there are thousands of illegally built homes, as a result of the deliberate policies of the Israeli government’s “Civil Administration” (the Army), which prevents Palestinians from receiving building permits, and even demolishes in Area B.

Chief of Staff Dan Halutz is well known as a man without conscience, an extremist hardliner, whom we remember as having given an order to use a one-ton bomb on a house in a densely populated area, to kill a militant leader. His remarks after the operation even shocked judges in Israel’s Supreme Court: that he “sleeps well at night” even though 14 civilians were killed during that notorious operation, including many innocent women and children.

Even though we understand that the Chief of Staff will be unable to demolish literally “thousands of homes,” we are certain that he will make sure to demolish many homes in revenge for attacks, whether now or in future.

We call on the international community to demand that the Israeli Ministry of Foreign Affairs stop these diabolical projects and that Israel be forced to abide by international law which forbids an occupying power to demolish the homes of innocent civilians.

For further details:

Meir Margalit, Co-ordinator: 0544-345 503