Category: Reports

IDF shoots live ammunition at ISM activists at sea

24 July 2011 | International Solidarity Movement, Gaza

On Saturday the ISM crew for CPS Gaza rode out on the trawler that rescued us during the second attack on the Oliva on Thursday, July 14th.  As I mentioned before, the Oliva project is currently on an indefinite hiatus.  Nils, Joe and I went to the port at 7:10 am and we rode out to sea around 7:30.  There were 3 adult Palestinian men on the boat and two young boys.  Joe, Nils and I sat on the deck of the ship’s bow and the captain and other passengers stayed in the middle and back of the vessel. Around the 2 to 2.5 mile point we spotted the Israelis coming towards us from the north.  When they were still about a mile’s distance from us I called them over the radio and said that we were “Unarmed international observers on board, 2 United States citizens and one Swedish citizen.”  I repeated this a number of times but they continued to approach us at a high speed.  Joe and I were on the bow of the boat when we noticed that the Israeli Navy was now about 100 meters from us and had fired 2 shots into the water.  We retreated to the center of the boat where the steering cabin is and I repeated again over the radio that we were “unarmed international observers.”  This did nothing to sway their actions and they fired live rounds both in the water and directly at the boat for around 15 or 20 minutes.  Joe returned to the front of the boat and tried speaking to them over the megaphone, repeating the fact that we were internationals and that the boat had no hostile or military intentions and the captain and his crew were just going to fish.  By this point the trawler had reached the 3-mile limit.  The captain desperately wanted to go further out to 4 or 5 miles because the 3-mile area is completely overfished and he said “it’s better to return home than to even bother fishing here.” While the shooting was still taking place, we decided to have Nils speak to them over the radio so they could hear someone with a Swedish accent.  We were holding out desperate hope that our status as internationals would save the boat and allow the men to fish.  At one point the gunboat retreated slightly—only to double-back and continue harassing us.  Nils repeatedly said over the radio, “Israel, why do you do this?  We are peaceful people, we mean you no harm.”  After at least 30 minutes of creating turbulence and shooting live rounds at us the boat retreated again, this time for good.  I jumped back on the radio and told them to “let us go, we are not hostile and the captain only wants to fish.”  The Israelis responded and claimed that we were past 3 miles and were somewhere between 4 and 5 miles out to sea and insisted that I tell the captain to go back to the 3 mile mark.  The captain said that we were basically 3 miles, then he corrected that we were 3 miles and about 700 meters.  He asked me to tell them that he wouldn’t go past this point and only wanted one hour to fish here because there wouldn’t be any fish within the 3-mile limit.  He said they need to fish for food for Ramadan and there would be no food if we were to move further in to shore.   I said this to them in English several times awaiting a response since it had only been a few minutes since they had communicated with us directly.  After this the captain and his friend took the radio and begged them in a broken mixture of Arabic and Hebrew to let the boat stay where it was for one hour—just to fish—just to get food for Ramadan.  It was heartbreaking to watch.  It’s perverse that the Palestinians should have to beg for this right from an illegitimate occupying force.  Although it seemed that the Israelis weren’t concerned with the status of the international passengers as they were shooting at us, I have to assume that it would have only been worse had we not been on board.  The captain seemed used to this procedure and was firm in his decision to stay at sea to fish—in the face of Israeli violence.  After about 10 minutes had passed and the captain was still on the radio begging to be allowed a few extra hundred meters for just one hour, the gunboat left and another warship equipped with the water canon took its place.  The intensity of the water pressure seemed stronger than ever and the hit the boat for 20 or 30 minutes before we were able to get away.  Unfortunately at this point the captain saw no use in staying out there and brought the ship back to the port.  While we were riding back I leaned over the edge of the bow and saw the new bullet holes from the day’s attacks.

When I went out today, one of my intentions was to observe the situation in the absence of the Oliva, and after this experience I can say two things with confidence.  My first conclusion is that this harassment is a frequent, if not daily occurrence for Palestinian fishermen.  The second is that Israel’s claim that the Oliva is a “constant provocateur” has not a shred of validity (not that it did before, but this confirms it) as the Israeli Navy is equally if not more violent without the Oliva and its observation crew at sea.

A longer version of this report originally appeared on Against Empire, the blog of International Solidarity Movement – Gaza Strip member Alexandra Robinson.

Escalation of attacks by the Israeli navy on the CPS Gaza boat

23 July 2011 | Civil Peace Service Gaza

Footage of the second water-cannon attack by the Israeli navy against the Civil Peace Service Gaza boat “Oliva” on Thursday, July 14, 2011. The camera used was lost in the sea when the crew evacuated the “Oliva,” recovered in a fishing net, and returned on Wednesday, July 20.

Beit Hanoun, 63 years and 300 meters later

19 July 2011 | International Solidarity Movement, Gaza

The Nakba, the ethnic cleansing of Palestine, happened sixty three years ago.  The theft of Palestinian land continues even today.  Every Tuesday, for the last three years, the people of Beit Hanoun have protested both the occupation and Israel’s three hundred meter “buffer zone” which Israel has declared on Palestinian land near the border of Gaza.  We gathered today, like we do every Tuesday near the agricultural college in Beit Hanoun.  Local farmers warned us that for the last couple of days Israeli forces had been camped out in the abandoned houses near the border.  Just as their grandfathers were driven from their homes by Zionist violence, so these farmers were driven out of their homes by Zionist violence.  Sometimes, the more things change, the more they stay the same.  Over the weekend six were injured in Beit Hanoun when Israel bombed a well in the middle of a residential district.

At eleven A.M. we set off toward the wall, toward the land that their grandfathers were expelled from.  A drone buzzes overhead.  We can see the clouds of dust raised by the movement of Israeli tanks on the other side of the wall.  The farmland in the “buffer zone” has been newly desecrated, bulldozed again, an area that used to be fields and orchards that had been reduced to a few hardy weeds, now devoid of even weeds.  The Palestinian flags that we had planted there during previous demonstrations buried under the earth.  Given the warnings of Israeli soldiers in the abandoned houses and the bombing over the weekend, we were all more nervous than usual.  Bella Ciao boomed out over the megaphone, but few sang along, most of us thinking our own thoughts, worrying alone.

We walked past the last tree still standing, a beautiful tree covered in fragrant pink flowers.  We entered the newly destroyed “buffer zone”, stopped, planted new flags, dreamed of planting new trees, of seeing a dead zone brought back to life.  People looked into the distance, dreaming of their grandfathers trees, trees that many of them have never been allowed to see, their fruit stolen by the grandchildren of the same people who drove their grandfathers from their land.  We chanted for a free Palestine.  Dust rose from the movement of an Israeli tank.  We returned to Beit Hanoun, but at least we had left a flag behind to commemorate that we were there, that the grandchildren of the cleansed still live.

Songs tear down fences in Izbat Tabib

13 July 2011 | International Solidarity Movement, West Bank

On July 13th villagers in the small town of Izbat Tabib wanted to protest against the illegal Israeli construction of barbed wire fences outside the village, preventing farmers from tending their lands and olive trees.

In the beginning of the afternoon, villagers and international activists gathered at the mayor’s house before the demonstration. Afterwards, the demonstration started and participants headed towards the barbed wire fences, not far from the village entrance. Here the villagers and activists from ISM helped each other tear down the fences, this continued for around half an hour, until the arrival of Israely military jeeps with about 20 soldiers. The cutting of the fences halted, and together the villagers and activists,  prevented the entry of the soldiers into the village by  means of peaceful singing and demands for Palestinian rights to their rightful
land.

Israeli armed forces gun down 21 year old

14 July 2011 | International Solidarity Movement

Ibrahim Omar Serhan, 21 years old, was left to bleed to death by the Israeli Occupation Forces, on July 13, 2011
Ibrahim Omar Serhan, 21 years old, was left to bleed to death by the Israeli Occupation Forces, on July 13, 2011

A 21 year-old student was killed by the Israeli army on July 13th in Al Faraa refugee camp, whilst on his way to prayer.

Around 3:30 am the Israeli military entered the refugee camp with several heavily armed vehicles. Ibrahim Omar Serhan, a student at Al Najah University, was on his way to the mosque when he came across a group of soldiers standing approximately twenty meters away.

The soldiers ordered Ibrahim to stop; frightened, he turned around and tried to run away. As he was fleeing, soldiers shot Ibrahim twice from behind – once in each leg – rupturing an artery. Ibrahim managed to get to a house nearby where a local person gave him some basic first aid. Fearing for his safety, people from the camp moved him to a second house away from the soldiers.

He stayed in this house for around twenty minutes waiting for the ambulance, which was delayed due to the army presence in the camp. Soldiers followed the trail of blood that Ibrahim had left on the ground, and forcibly entered the house to arrest him. The family of the house unsuccessfully tried to  prevent the soldiers to take him, pleading with them to wait for the ambulance. When the ambulance eventually reached the house, they were unable to assist as no one knew where Ibrahim had been taken. Ibrahim bled to death whilst in the custody of the army. Soldiers only handed Ibrahim over to the Palestinian medics once he was dead.

Ibrahim’s funeral took place at 1.30pm on the same day in the camp cemetery.

During the invasion, the Israeli army arrested fifteen people from the camp, three of whom are still in custody.

Background

Army incursion and arbitrary arrests in the camp have been frequent in the last few years. In 2008, Fadi Subuh and Mustafa Zalat, 21 and 25 years-old, were killed by the army whilst sitting with friends in the olive trees near the camp.

Al Faraa refugee camp is located in the Jordan Valley, seventeen kilometers North East of Nablus. The camp was established right after the Nakba in 1949 and comprises 8000 refugees from 80 different villages in Palestine 1948. The support of UNRWA, which has been working in the camp since 1950, has declined drastically in the last few years: food relief is now only being distributed to 50 families. Unemployment in the camp now exceeds 70%.