Category: Reports - Page 23 - International Solidarity Movement

Watch: Israeli soldiers harass Palestinian teenager and try to intimidate internationalists in Masafer Yatta

On August 10th, three israeli soldiers harassed Abud Huraini, a palestinian teenager from the village At-Tuwani, in the region of Masafer Yatta in the South Hebron Hills, while he was brining out his flock of goats to graze.

The three soldiers arrived by jeep from the illegal israeli settlement of Ma’on, which is located just few houndred meters away from At-Tuwani, and tormented Abud, asking him to leave the road from which he was tending to his flock. However, the three soldiers were confronted by a large group of Palestinian men and women accompanied by internationalist activists, including three ISMers, who filmed the soldiers and interposed themselves between them and Abud.

Just a few hours earlier Hamoudi, Abud’s older brother and an activist of the palestinian group Youth of Sumud, had been arrested arbitrarily by israeli soldiers as he was driving his car to return home in At-Tuwani. Hamoudi would be released a midnight without charges from the police station of Qiryat Arbaa’, after being blindfolded and physically abused by the soldiers who kidnapped him.

The three israeli soldiers, who had gotten nervous due to the determination of the group, asked for orders on the radio and thus tried to intimidate the internationalist activists present by filming them with phones and by trying to take pictures of their IDs. The soldiers also lied by insisting that the internationals were legally obligated to hand over their passports and allow them to take pictures.

Having this last intimidation tactic failed, the soldiers had no choice but to wait for Abud to finish herding the flock.

A palestinian told us that the three soldiers were likely new in Masafer Yatta: “They have rotations. These ones [the three soldiers] clearly don’t know the area, they don’t know what’s happening here. They probably just received a call from a settler who told them to go and bother [Abud]”.

Last year, on the very same place where Abud was harassed by the soldiers, Abud’s father Hafez, a human rights defender, was brutally attacked by five settlers. That time, the settlers broke both of Hafez’s arms with metal pipes. When Hafez’s family rushed to the scene, one of the settlers began shooting into the air with an assault rifle. Sami, Hafez’s oldest son and an activist, recounted that when soldiers arrived, they started pushing the Palestinians away from Hafez, who was lying on the ground.

“The settlers were giving orders to the soldiers. They told them that my father had attacked them and ordered the soldiers to arrest him” said Sami

When an ambulance of the Red Crescent arrived to the scene, the soldiers blocked the entrance of the vehicle to prevent medics from transporting Hafez to the hospital, while a settler pierced the tyres of the ambulance with a knife.

Eventually, Hafez was arrested and charged with attacking the settlers.

Palestinians accused of a crime are not tried in civilian courts, but rather in military courts, which according to Amnesty lnternational “systematically fail to meet international standards of fair trial, and where the vast majority of cases end in conviction”. Hafez would probably have spent the rest of his life in prison, had it not been for the videos recorded by Palestinian and internationalist activists on the scene, which clearly showed that he had been the victim of the attack. The charges were dropped, and after recovering Hafez was able to go home to his family.

Destruction after destruction in Nur Shams camp

Photos and text by Diana Khwaelid for ISM

20 days after the storming and the recent massacre in Nur Shams refugee camp (in Tulkarem), the Israeli occupation launched a military campaign into the camp again. On the night of Saturday, 24-9-2023, at 12:00 AM, dozens of Israeli military vehicles, two bulldozers and two D9-type military bulldozers stormed the Nur Shams refugee camp.

The Israeli occupying forces have launched large-scale military campaigns against Nur Shams camp in the past few weeks. The camp’s infrastructure had been almost rebuilt and restored after the last invasion 20 days ago. After Saturday, however, the Israeli occupation forces once again destroyed the electricity and water systems, as well as the roads and the communication network.

Dozens of Palestinians were injured in this large military operation, and medical teams were prevented from entering the camp to aid the injured and transfer them to the hospital. Two of the injured people died. The young martyr Abdul Rahman Abu Daghesh from Nur Shams camp and the martyr As Abu Ali, 21, who was shot with a live bullet in the head.

Moreover, Israeli snipers were deployed on the rooftops of Palestinian homes in the camp. Strong clashes took place between Palestinian fighters and the Israeli occupation forces. The clashes lasted until the withdrawal of the occupation forces from the camp, after almost five continuous hours. The occupation forces used anti-armour munitions to bomb a Palestinian house. The house belonged to the martyr Sanad Ghoneim, killed in 2001. Palestinian militants were allegedly hiding inside it.

A comprehensive commercial strike and day of mourning mourning were declared in the city of Tulkaram and its villages because of the massacre suffered by the Nur Shams camp. Hundreds of Palestinians in the city, camps, and villages participated in the funeral of the two Palestinian martyrs. There is a state of anger, tension, and fear in Nur al-Shams of the occupation forces storming the camp again and killing Palestinian youth. The people of the camp are still steadfast despite all the violent and criminal occupation practices against them and the camp.

Funeral of a Martyr after the attack on Nur al Shams

Six Palestinian martyrs in less than 24 hours

Six Palestinian martyrs in one day - 19 Septemeber 2023 — Six Palestinian martyrs in one day – 19 Septemeber 2023

Jenin – 20-9-2023

By Diana Khwaelid

An Israeli Special Force unit stormed the Jenin camp in the northern West Bank on Tuesday evening, 19-9-2023, around 20:30 to besiege a Palestinian house. Palestinian fighters were inside the house, which belongs to the Abu Al-Baha family.

Dozens of Israeli military vehicles stormed the camp, and Palestinian fighters confronted the Israeli occupation forces in the attempt to defend the camp and its residents. The Israeli occupation forces damaged one of the houses in the camp, a civilian car belonging to one of the camp residents, and the pylon which distributes electricity in the camp. The electricity in the camp was cut off from the first minutes of the invasion, as the Israeli occupation forces blew up the electricity transformer in the camp. The invasion lasted almost three and a half hours continuously.

After that, fear and tension reigned throughout the camp and its inhabitants, women and children had their share of this situation. Medical staff and journalists were also targeted while inside the camp. Medical personnel were prevented from reaching and assisting the injured.

Four Palestinian martyrs were killed in this military operation, two died upon arrival at Avicenna hospital and two died later because of serious injuries. The martyr Mahmoud al-Arrawi was 24 years old, the martyr Mahmoud al-Saadi was 23 years old and the martyr Tamo SA was 29 years old from the town of Qabatiya, one of the neighbouring Jenin villages. The youngest of them is the young martyr Arafat Omar Khamaisa, 22 years old. At least 30 people inside the camp were injured by live ammunition. They were taken to the hospital for treatment.

In Gaza, Palestinian crowds mourned the body of the young martyr Yousef Salem Radwan, 25, from the city of Khan Younis, south of the Gaza Strip, who was shot by the Israeli occupation forces after clashes broke out between young men and the occupation forces on the border with the Gaza Strip.

The sixth martyr, 19 year old Dergham Al-Akhras from Aqabat Jabr camp in Jericho was shot dead while he and some young men were in the camp while the Israeli occupation forces stormed the Aqabat Jabr camp this morning. Palestinian crowds in a state of anger and vigilance called and grieved the six Palestinian young men in Jenin, Gaza, and Jericho. These killings have raised the number of martyrs since the beginning of 2023 to 250 in the West Bank, Gaza and Jerusalem.

Palestinians in Qaryut reassert their right to visit their spring, despite IOF violence

On Friday 15th of September the people of Qaryut – a village between Nablus and Ramallah – held a demonstration reasserting their rights over the village spring.

The village is close to the illegal settlements of Eli and Shilo, and every Friday settlers come to wash in the spring. This is a clear act of provocation, aimed at staking a claim on even more of the surrounding land.

There are often clashes between village youth and the settlers at the spring, and the Israeli Occupation Forces (IOF) protecting them. This week, however, the community had called on other communities to join them in reasserting their rights to the spring. The protest was also over the closure of the main road into the village by the occupation forces. The demonstration began after Friday prayers and marched down from the village toward the spring.

The IOF blocked the road, firing tear gas and rubber coated steel bullets. One man was shot in the face and injured with a rubber coated bullet. Several people were treated by the Red Crescent medical services after inhaling gas.

Settlers could be seen on the hillside watching the army’s repression of the demonstration

The photo above shows the moment a tear gas canister was fired through the window of a building in Qaryut, you can see the gas billowing from inside.

The whole village of Qaryut was flooded with gas fired by the IOF. Canisters rained down onto residents – threatening to cause serious injury

Demonstrators persisted – however – and were eventually able to march to the spring. This video shows them dancing in celebration.

Palestinians from many communities in the West Bank had come to support the people of Qaryut in their demonstration.

Report on the weekly protests in Kafr Qaddum

The Palestinian village of Kafr Qaddum is located 13 kilometres west of Nablus and has a population of roughly 4300 citizens. Eleven thousand dunams of the village’s land (roughly 52% of the total area) are part of area C, under full control of the Israeli Occupation Forces. Saqerobeed, the former mayor of the village told ISM that, for the residents of Kafr Qaddum, this means being banned from accessing the land where their olive trees are planted. Olives are the main source of employment for the locals.

Saqerobeed, who served as the mayor of the city for six years, told us:

The army gives us permission to reach this land only twice a year; one week during olive harvest season and two other days during the year to take care of the land, which is not enough”. He also explained how settlers often go to these Palestinian lands and destroy the olive trees or impede the harvesting of these.

Other than being denied access to their land, Palestinians in Kafr Qaddum have been banned from using the main road of the village since 2003, one which easily connects it to Nablus. This is because of the presence of a settlement, which was built by the extreme right-wing Zionist group Gush Emunim in 1975 and has been enlarging ever since.

Reaching Nablus used to take only 15 minutes by car, but the trip now takes at least 40 minutes due to this permanent roadblock.

Soldiers shoot at demonstrators in Kafr Qaddum

After bringing this issue to an Israeli court multiple times throughout the years with no result, the citizens of Kafr Qaddum began organising weekly demonstrations in 2011, taking place every Friday.

For the past 12 years, the Israeli Occupation Forces have violently repressed these protests by shooting tear gas, rubber-coated steel bullets, and live ammunition. On the 12th of August, a 15-year-old boy lost an eye after being shot with a rubber-coated steel bullet. A week after, seven more Palestinians were hit with the same ammunition, one of which led to hospitalisation. The number of people suffering from suffocation due to tear gas reaches the dozens every week, and this includes many children.

During the demonstration of the 1st of September, for instance, the IOF arrived to shoot tear gas canisters outside of a shop where people were sitting while drinking coffee, forcing them to run away immediately. Moreover, 175 people have been arrested for attending these demonstrations, leading the villagers to pay more than half a million shekels of bail-out money over the years. It is also routine for the IOF to place one or two snipers in an abandoned building adjacent to the site of the demonstration.

Four attempts at negotiations with the IOF have taken place, the last one in 2014. The community offered to halt the weekly demonstrations if the road was re-opened. During his time as mayor, Saqerobeed participated in these and recounted how, during the last negotiations, they had come close to reaching the goal of re-opening the street. Even though an agreement had been made and the demonstrations were due to be halted, the IOF still refused to open the road.

When asked about the steadfastness with which the villagers attend this demonstration, the ex-mayor said:

We believe in this form of protesting because there is no one helping us from outside. If we ask for help to NGOs and human rights organisations, or other countries, no one will do anything so we do it alone. We will continue even if we lose people to jail, we all pay the price of this, because the alternative is to accept the way things are right now, which is impossible for us.

Demonstrators in Kafr Qaddum

Photos by Diana Khwaelid