Category: Reports - Page 186 - International Solidarity Movement

Gaza Ministry of Health: “Israeli attack on crowded market during ceasefire is ‘barbarity personified'”

30th July 2014 | Gaza Ministry of Health | Gaza, Occupied Palestine

Ministry of Health Gaza is outraged at the Israeli massacre perpetrated during the so-called humanitarian ceasefire, when F-16s fired missiles into the crowded Shujeiyah market as hundreds took advantage of the lull to buy food and supplies.

At least 17 people have been killed and 200 injured.

“This atrocity is barbarity personified,” said Director General, Ministry of HealthDr Medhat Abbas.

Not satisfied with exterminating entire families in their own homes, not satisfied with killing people praying in mosques, not satisfied with killing patients, staff and visitors in hospitals, not satisfied with killing ambulance drivers as they retrieve the dead and injured, not satisfied with killing women and children sheltering in UNRWA school, the Israeli death machine now blatantly attacks a crowded public market DURING a humanitarian ceasefire, in an unrivaled cruel and cynical exercise of savagery and barbarism.

The Ministry of Health Gaza condemns this latest atrocity in the strongest possible terms, and considers that any further prevarication by the international community can only be seen as complicity in the increasingly barbaric and clearly genocidal war crimes being visited on the citizenry of Gaza.

The Ministry demands immediate international intervention to bring the rogue ‘state’ of Israel under control, and an immediate end to its carnage in Gaza.

Photo by Ma'an News — Photo by Ma’an News

Video: Free the bubbles

30th July 2014 | International Solidarity Movement, Khalil team | Hebron, Occupied Palestine

At approximately 1 pm on July 28^th, international volunteers made giant bubbles with Palestinian children to celebrate Eid, in Tel Rumeida, al-Khalil (Hebron).

Several settlers passed by in their cars and were visibly annoyed, and two stopped to complain to the Israeli soldiers present. At 1:30 pm, a group of settler youth started pushing Palestinian children who were playing on Tel Rumeida hill.

Several Palestinian women stepped in to prevent the violence. Shortly after this, more setter children and a settler woman, who identified herself as Tzippi, came down from the illegal settlement of Tel Rumeida and began aggressively photographing Palestinians.

Tzippi claimed that her children had been assaulted. She pushed several Palestinians and put her camera extremely close to several of their faces. One Palestinian girl tried to run away and Tzippi chased her up the street. Meanwhile, Israeli soldiers pushed Palestinians an attempted to force some of them into their houses. Eventually, Tzippi chased the Palestinian girl into her own garden. She was then joined by more settlers. An international volunteer blocked her path, by standing with his back to her with his arms outstretched. Soldiers then rushed into the garden and started shouting at Tzippi.

After a short time the Israeli police arrived. The settlers wrongly accused several Palestinians and the international activist of pushing them. These lies were contradicted by several videos that showed what happened and were shown to the police.

Nevertheless, five Palestinians and the international volunteer were arrested by the Israeli police. They were held for around seven hours, and interrogated. One of the Palestinians remained in handcuffs and leg chains throughout his detention.

Meanwhile, the settlers wandered around the police station pointing out Palestinians who they claimed had assaulted them. These Palestinians were all together in a room with no other Palestinians, and were either in chains or behind an interrogation desk in connection with this case. The “identification” process was therefore of no evidential value.

During his interrogation, the police told the international activist that the settlers were very angry and had filed a complaint about the bubbles. The police officer said that he was not taking that particular complaint further because, “it is not illegal for Palestinian children to play.” The police also accepted his account of the incident. However, they police nevertheless took the fingerprints and DNA of those who had been arrested and only released them subject to strict conditions.

Gaza Ministry of Health: ‘Muslim holy days marred by genocide in Gaza’

29th July 2014 | Gaza Ministry of Health | Gaza, Occupied Palestine

The Ministry of Health Gaza is pained to express its deep sadness and outrage at the Israeli attacks on Gaza on our holy days of Eid al-Fitr.

In the last 24 hours, 120 people have been killed, bringing the total to 1,156.

Particularly distressing was the death in Al Bureij refugee camp of Diana Abu Jaber and her unborn baby only a week before his estimated date of delivery.

Diana’s home was struck by an F-16 airstrike.

“As it collapsed a concrete pillar fell on her,” reported Dr Kamal Khatab, Medical Superintendent of Al Aqsa Hospital. “A shell ripped her abdomen open, the unborn baby fell out and was hit in the head with shrapnel, and his brain matter was extruded. Both mother and baby died immediately.”

Dr Khatab added that Diana, in her mid-twenties, was one of 19 members of the same family to die in that airstrike, and there are still other family members missing.

The entrance to the Outpatient Clinic of Shifa Hospital in Gaza city was shelled yesterday afternoon, bringing the number of attacks on medical facilities to 34. Windows in the Medical Library were shattered, an exterior wall was partially destroyed, and several trees were severely damaged. It is pure good fortune that none of the displaced people sheltering in the outpatients area, or staff working in the library, were killed or injured.

“There is a deliberate strategy of attacking to kill Palestinians in two ways – one in their homes with bombs and bullets, and the other by depriving them of essential medical services,” observed Deputy Minister of Health Dr Yousef Abu Al-Rish.

Israeli airstrikes before dawn on the sole Gaza power plant destroyed fuel tanks, and put the plant out of production. This will have an immense impact on the provision of services in Gaza’s hospitals, and significantly contribute to a looming humanitarian disaster in the Gaza Strip.

Despite numerous appeals by both Palestinian and international organisations to cease attacks on children and women, to cease attacks on medical facilities, and to cease attacks on civilian infrastructure

Israeli military strikes on civilian targets have not abated.

The Ministry of Health Gaza calls on the United Nations, the international community, human rights organisations, and all people of good conscience wherever they may be to act immediately to stop the genocide in Gaza.

In the words of Bishop Desmond Tutu, “If you are neutral in situations of injustice, you have chosen the side of the oppressor.”

Video: Israelis in Tel Aviv chanting, “There’s no school tomorrow, there’s no children left in Gaza! Oleh!”

29th July 2014 | International Solidarity Movement | Tel Aviv, Occupied Palestine

Israelis in Tel Aviv, on 26.7.2014, the 19th day of Israel’s massacres in Gaza, cheer the genocide on: “There’s no school tomorrow, there’s no children left there [in Gaza]! Oleh!”

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h7qFACSfd_k

Every evening, in Tel Aviv, right wing marchers flood the streets, waving Israeli flags and chanting hate-slogans, such as the most common, “death to the Arabs” and many others. Often, these are counter-protests to the anti-war demonstrations that have begun since Israel’s latest onslaught on the Gaza strip, but these are also independent initiatives, which aim to encourage the State of Israel to continue the bombardment with full force.

Israeli activists who oppose the war have become the victims of these rallies, as they turn into full-fledged riots. One of the activists testified that after the rally in the video, “a few of them started kicking and throwing punches, someone tried to beat us with a flag stick, and one rioter in an IDF uniform pepper sprayed me in the face…friends who stayed in the area told me that the cops shook the soldier’s hand.”

The day of this particular rally, OCHA reported: Approximately, 1000 Palestinians have been bombed to death, over 200 of them children. Over 6200 have been injured, 2000 of them children. Over 215,000 displaced people- schools have turned into refugee camps. 130 schools have been bombed.

This is Israel’s third such operation on the Gaza Strip in the past 6 years, which it besieges from land, air and sea. Gaza is 360 km² , about twice the size of Washington DC. It is one of the most crowded places in the world, with a population density of 4,505 persons per square km. 52% of its population are children.

Israeli forces fire live ammunition injuring 15 protesters in Beit Furik

27th July 2014 | International Solidarity Movement, Nablus team | Beit Furik, Occupied Palestine

At 22:00 in the evening of Friday, July 25th, Israeli forces injured 15 Palestinians during a protest in the village of Beit Furik, which is located fifteen km southeast of Nablus in the northern half of the West Bank.

Approximately 2000 protesters were marching towards the checkpoint near the village. Roughly 40 Israeli soldiers were waiting for them there, and when they came into view, the soldiers began to shoot tear gas canisters in their direction. Shortly after the protest began, the soldiers changed from firing tear gas, to live ammunition.

23-year-old Yousef Mfeed Mletat was struck by a bullet in his left hip. He recounted the scene tearfully in his bed in Rafidia hospital in Nablus. “They were less than four meters away when they shot me. And then they started to beat me. A soldier was standing on my stomach while some of the others were kicking me. This went on for 15 minutes.” He revealed several welts on his arms and shoulders.

Yousef Mfeed Mletat (Photo by ISM). — Yousef Mfeed Mletat (photo by ISM).

Yahya Hanay, who is 25-years-old, was trying to escape from the scene, when a stun grenade struck his hand, which was covering his face at the time. As he lay on the ground, another stun grenade hit his knee. Yahya has nerve damage in his left thumb, which is said to be serious.

19-year-old Yezen Tala Khatatba, was attempting to help an injured protester, when he was shot in the left knee. The bullet exited his left knee and then entered an exited his right one. He was wearing bandages on both knees as he told his story. “The ambulance was taking me to the hospital, when soldiers twice stopped me for half an hour at a checkpoint. When I told them I had a leg injury, they said it would have been better if I’d been hit in the head.” Yezen also mentioned that another injured protestor had been taken from the ambulance at the checkpoint and beaten by soldiers.