3 December 2011 | International Solidarity Movement, West Bank
After Friday’s peaceful demonstration in Ni’lin on 2 December, the Israeli military occupation forces entered the village and started following some of the demonstrators. When they caught up, they started to fire rubber coated steel bullets and live ammunition.
It’s nothing unusual that they fire live ammunition here, a witness says. But this is the first time they shoot after the demonstration has finished.
Ni’lin has most of its land in area C and the separation wall is built through the actual village, though the village is situated more than 3 km away from the Green Line. Today 39.8% of the village’s total land area is confiscated. The wall also annexes land for five Israeli settlements established on Ni’lin village’s land.
As usual, Friday’s peaceful demonstration against the wall was met with tear gas. Once the air was thick of tear gas, the demonstrators decided to finish the demonstration.
Later the occupation forces entered the village and shot rubber bullets and live ammunition among peaceful villagers that were caught up. One man was hit by a rubber bullet and live ammunition was fired in the air and against a stone.
Jenna Bereld is a volunteer with International Solidarity Movement (name has been changed).
2 December 2011 | International Solidarity Movement, West Bank
One Palestinian journalist from the Associated Press was arrested while the Occupation Forces invaded the village of An Nabi Saleh.
Before the beginning of Friday’s traditional protest in An Nabi Saleh, the Occupation Forces placed soldiers at the entrance gate to the village and began searching all cars entering the village, registrating the names of the passengers. Two protesters were hunted for several hundred meters by the Occupation Forces when trying to avoid this checkpoint, escaping a potential arrest.
An Nabi Saleh marches despite Israeli harassment – Click here for more images
The protest began after the traditional, Muslim noon prayer. While chanting the demonstrators went to the hill in front of the illegal Halamish (Neve Zuf) settlement, located opposite of An Nabi Saleh, which has illegally seized nearly one half of the village’s valuable agricultural land. There they were met by the Occupation Forces who first withdrew but then called for several military jeeps to come bringing papers claiming the area a closed military zone. One Palestinian journalist from AP was arrested by a commanding officer from the border police.
The protesters were targeted by tear gas canisters and rubber coated steel bullets shot directly at them. In the last hours of the protest the Occupation Forces used the Long Range Acoustic Device (LRAD), created by the American Technology Corporation, which has been popularly referred to as “The Scream” by Palestinians and international activists. The loud sound device has been used in earlier protests of An Nabi Saleh, and is capable of causing disorientation and even blacking out. This is the first appearance it has made since a few months ago when the illegal settlers of Halamish themselves complained of its noise.
Aida Gerard is a volunteer with International Solidarity Movement (name has been changed).
Nahad Rajab Mohamed Al-Hesy in his home (Photo: Radhika Sainath, Notes from Behind the Blockade) – Click here for more images
The Israeli navy violently seized two Palestinian trawlers in Gazan waters yesterday, shooting one fisherman in the arm, and ultimately forcing at least ten men to Ashod, Israel, where they were interrogated for several hours. Israel released all of the fishermen at 2 a.m. this morning.
Twenty-eight year old Nehad Mohamed Rajab Al-Hesy reported that his boat, along with six others, were fishing in the same area at about 11:30 a.m. Tuesday morning when he suddenly saw five Israeli naval ships—three large and two small—approach his boat, along with that of Omar al Habil. According to Al-Hesy, both men had sued Israel for destroying their boats in the past.
“The Israelis told four boats to go back to Gaza. All six boats tried to pull up their nets, but they prevented us. The Israelis started to shoot at us a lot and I got shot in the arm. The bullet entered and went out of my arm,” he added holding out his left arm wrapped in white gauze and bandages.
The Israeli navy then asked who was in charge of the boat and Al-Hesy answered that the boat was his. Next, the Israeli navy commanded him to take off his clothes, jump into the sea and swim until he reached the Israeli naval boats, then asked the three others—Mohamed Rajab Mohamed Al-Hesy, 18, Jarrimal Jehad Rajab Al-Hesy, 22 and Mohamed Jehad Rajab Al-Hesy, 19—to do the same.
“It was a terrible thing. It was a scary thing,” said 22-year-old Jarrmal. “Now we are all sick from the cold water they forced us to swim in.”
Once on the ship, Al-Hesy was blindfolded and Israeli forces tied his arms behind his back and forced him to sit in a painful position for several hours. “My back, shoulders and my arm that was shot were hurting a lot,” he said, “but I was thinking about my boat which my family depends on for income.”
In Ashod, Israeli forces began questioning Al-Hesy at 5 p.m.
“Why did you break the 3 mile limit?” an Israeli soldier asked him.
“During Oslo, we were allowed to reach 20 miles so why do you prevent us from going past 3 miles? These 3 miles not enough,” Al-Hesy responded.
“I’m not the Israeli army,” the soldier responded, according to Al-Hesy. “But there is something wrong with you. Why don’t you fishermen gather and ask the United Nations and go to the human rights centers so you can go more than 3 miles?”
The soldier subsequently changed the subject of the interrogation, asking Al-Hesy the names of the policemen working at the port. When the interrogation finished, Al-Hesy was told that he would be sent back to Gaza, but he refused to go without his boat.
He explained how in 2003, the Israeli navy took his boat along with about $10,000 worth of equipment. He told the soldier “All my family depends on this boat. We can’t live without this boat. If I don’t go back I can eat and drink here. If I go back without my boat I will not eat.”
When Al-Hesy saw the other fishermen he told them he wouldn’t go back to Gaza without his boat. The other fishermen agreed to do the same and refused to get on the bus to the Eretz border crossing. Israeli forces eventually forced all the fishermen on the bus.
Al-Hesy and the other men were eventually released at 2 a.m., but his trawler, along with that of Omar al Habil, remains in Israeli custody. Al-Hesy has been fishing since he was 13 and makes about 20 shekels a day, or $5.70. He recalls making 1000 shekels ($285) when Israel permitted fishing up to 20 miles. In addition to sustaining a bullet wound to the army, Al-Hesy also had scabs around his right ankle from the ankle cuffs.
His lawsuit stems from an incident in 2007 when the Israeli navy destroyed another boat of his. That case is still ongoing.
“We fishermen never do anything bad. We don’t send rockets from our boats, we don’t touch any of them, but they kill fishermen, arrest fishermen; they took so many boats.”
30 November 2011 | International Solidarity Day, West Bank
This morning at 7am the Israeli army entered the village of El Beida in the northern Jordan Valley with 10 military jeeps and one bulldozer. Israeli military proceeded towards Abu Tarek Fracka’s land where he houses a honey farm on the land where his father’s house once stood.
The bee farm was shared by 50 families. Previous harvest has been known to produce 900 kilos of honey with recent prices of honey, yielding 60-100 NIS per kilo. Abu Tarek is in possession of paper work permitting him to build on this land and also forbidding demolishment. Time was not granted to him to produce this paperwork, nor was a demolition notice given to him prior, as the military rushed to unjustly destroy Abu Tarek’s property, the first time he and his family experienced a demolition.
A wave of demolitions - Click here for more images
At 9:00 AM in the village of El Himma, Hassan Ahmad had the barracks of his sheep demolished. The barracks held 200 sheep. There was no prior warning of the demolition given to the family. Back in 2008 the family received orders to stop building on the land. This order was abided by with no recent additions made. The family has rented the land for 6 years from Palestinians. In the past week Israel has demolished three animal barracks within this area, accruing damages costing in excess of 15,000 NIS.
In Al Farisiya, of the Northern Jordan valley, at 9:00 AM soldiers entered the land of Ali Zuhed. No communication was made with the family; instead, the bulldozer went straight to work tearing down the barracks of the sheep. An order was also given to dismantle the remaining animal barracks within hours. The soldiers stated that if these barracks are still standing when they return they would demolish the rest of their properties including their home.
Lydia is a volunteer with International Solidarity Movement (name has been changed).
30 November 2011 | International Solidarity Movement, Gaza
Photo: Rosa Schiano - Click here for more images
Today, Tuesday, November 29, 2011 is the International Day of Solidarity with the Palestinian People. This day commemorates the racist and colonialist proposal of the United Nations to partition Palestine in 1947. All over the world, people stood in solidarity with the Palestinian struggle today. In Beit Hanoun, today, like every Tuesday for the last three years, the popular struggle raised its voice against the occupation. Against the no go zone which surrounds Gaza, which makes the refugees of 1948 and 1967 who live in Beit Hanoun refugees once again, the no go zone which throws them off their land and destroys their houses and orchards. Against the siege on Gaza which is designed to destroy them, their hopes, their dreams, their economy, their future. Under the unceasing gaze of observation balloons and drones, in the shadow of a giant concrete wall studded with gun towers which seem to come out of a futuristic horror film but which is in fact is the present and is no movie, it is Gaza. Against the occupation which can only remind the world of George Orwell’s prediction of what the future would look like, “a boot stamping on a human face, forever”.
We gathered in the shadows of the ruins of the Beit Hanoun Agricultural College, not 100 meters away from the graves of the Beit Hanoun Massacre of 2006. The Beit Hanoun Local Initiative, the International Solidarity Movement, and Palestinians from around Gaza gathered to march into the no go zone. We were buoyed by the knowledge that around the world today people were raising their voices in support of Palestine, in support of peace, justice and freedom. The megaphone crackled to life, “We Will Not Go Down” by Michael Heart. In a sea of flags from around the world, Palestine, Ireland, Italy, India, Malaysia and many others, we began our march towards the no go zone.
We enter the no go zone and begin to release balloons with Palestinian flags attached to them. The balloons will float over the walls that surround Gaza, they will take our message farther than our megaphone and our voices can. Perhaps they will be caught in the branches of an orange tree planted by the fathers or grandfathers of the men gathered here, on the land that they were expelled from. There is no risk that they will be caught in the branches of orange trees before they cross the wall, all of those trees have been bulldozed by Israel when it created the no go zone, the zone of death which surrounds Gaza. In the short story “Men in the Sun” by Ghassan Kanafini some Palestinian laborers die in a water tank while waiting to cross a border. The driver of the truck is left lamenting, “Why didn’t they say anything” as they died. We are not silent, even if are voices are lost in the space of the dead zone which Israel created around Gaza, these balloons will carry our message to the outside. Let no one say that they did not know, that we did not say anything while Gaza is strangled to death.
Sabur Zaaneen from the Local Initiative spoke to the crowd. He called upon the people of the world “to isolate Israel internationally and to exert pressure in all its forms until the end of the occupation of Palestine.” Radhika Sainath from the International Solidarity Movement also spoke, “Today the entire free world is against the settlements, the wall and the Israeli occupation. We will continue our work in Palestine with Palestinian activistsuntil we succeed in bringing freedom and justice to Palestine.” Their voices were echoed by the chanting of the crowd, against the occupation, voiced demanding peace, justice and freedom, voicing pledgingsteadfastness in the struggle to the end the occupation.
