Category: Reports

Protesters in Bil’in drive bulldozer at the Wall

24 June 2011 | Popular Struggle Coordination Committee

Hundreds of protesters led by a bulldozer marched on the Wall in Bil’in today after the Israeli army began dismantling it earlier this week. Palestinian Prime Minister Salam Fayyad ank MK Mohammed Barakah participated in the demonstration.

Israeli soldiers open fire at a Palestinian protester driving a bulldozer at the site of the Wall in Bil’in today, shattering one of the vehicle’s windows and pancturing two of its tires. At the time of the shooting, the bulldozer was dismantling the gate in the section of the Wall that is being relocated by the army these days.

The 500 protesters, among them Palestinian Prime Minister Salam Fayyad and Israeli MK Mohammed Barakah, marched from the village’s mosque towards the Wall. On arrival to the gate, and as the bulldozer advanced at the gate, the protesters were attacked with rubber-coated bullets, tear-gas and foul-smelling water shot by a water-cannon. Two people were lightly injured.

At a demonstration in the village of Nabi Saleh, also today, the army attacked a group of children dressed as clown who were running kites inside the village. In Deir Qaddis, the Nili settlement’s security guard shot live fire at protesters who flew the Palestinian flag from one of the houses being built in the new neighborhood of the settlement.

The Bil’in Popular Committee has declared today as the last day of the old path of the Barrier on village’s lands, and the beginning of the struggle against the new path. A mass demonstration will march on the Barrier to dismantle it and access the lands sequestered behind it.

On Tuesday morning this week, army bulldozers began work to dismantle the Wall in Bil’in. As early as 2007, after two years of weekly protests in the village and following a petition filed by the residents, Israeli high court declared the path of the Barrier illegal. The court ruled that the route was not devised according to security standards, but rather for the purpose of settlement expansion. Despite the high court’s ruling four more years of struggle had to elapse for the army to begin dismantlement. During these years two people were killed in the course of the weekly protests and many others injured.

Yet even according to the new path, sanctioned by the high court, 435 acres of village land will remain on the “Israeli” side of the Barrier.

On September 4th, 2007, the high court ordered the state to come up with an alternative path for the existing Barrier in Bil’in within a reasonable period of time. Despite the ruling, many months elapsed and no new plan was offered. On the May 29th, 2008, the residents of Bil’in filed a petition to hold the state in contempt of the court due to this delay. In response to the petition, the state offered an alternative path. However, the plan failed to comply with the high court’s ruling as the proffered path left a large area designed for settlement expansion on the “Israeli” side of the Barrier. The only difference between the two paths being that the latter offered to award 40 acres of land back to the residents.

A second petition claiming the alternative path not in accordance with court ruling was then filed. On August 3rd, 2008, the court declared that the first alternative path indeed fails to adhere to the ruling. The court ordered the state to come up with another alternative path.

On September 16th, 2008, the state offered a second alternative path. This path also left a large area designed for settlement expansion on the “Israeli” side, offering to return a100 acres of village land to the residents. A lawyer for the residents asked that the state be held in contempt of the court for violating a court ruling for the second time.

On December 15th, 2008, the high court ruled that the second alternative path was not in accordance with the original court ruling.
In April 2009 the state offered a third alternative path which left most of the area destined for settlement expansion on the “Palestian” side of the Barrier, thereby returning to the village 150 acres of 490 acres annexed by the original path.

Demonstration in Beit Hanoun

21 June 2011 | International Solidarity Movement

At 11 A.M. this morning we gathered for the weekly demonstration against the occupation in Beit Hanoun.  This demonstration was different from the other demonstrations though.  Today, a troupe of young girls were joining us.  The girls were part of the Vittorio Arrigoni summer camp that had been organized by the Forsan Al Ghad center in Beit Hanoun.  Earlier in the morning the children had learned to sing Bella Ciao and had a 1K race.  The five fastest children were awarded t shirts as prizes.  The summer camp aims not only to provide a happy refuge for the children, but also to impress upon them the importance of being active, of giving back to their communities.  The camp hopes to inspire the campers through the life of Vittorio, with his devotion to standing in solidarity with the oppressed.  When Vittorio was alive he was a regular at the demonstrations in Beit Hanoun, every Tuesday he would march into the buffer zone to protest the injustice of the occupation.

Today, we gathered, maybe 50 people, the girls holding a giant Palestinian flag over their heads, the rest of us carrying our own Palestinian flags.  Bella Ciao played over a loudspeaker, the girls sang along.  After Bella Ciao we chanted, against the occupation, for justice, in memory of Vittorio.  As always, the closer we got to the buffer zone the more tense everyone became, a jackhammer started work in the distance, everyone flinched, looked around. Everyone was worried that for some unknown reason that the Israeli’s had decided to start shoting even earlier than usual.  Two weeks ago one of the young men in the march was injured by shrapnel from an Israeli shell, since then, everyone is tenser, more worried as we approach the buffer zone.  After realizing that it was just a jackhammer, people relaxed a bit, we continued on, to the edge of the buffer zone.

Usually, we go into the buffer zone, not today.  We stopped at the edge of the buffer zone; the children looked into the distance, into the land from which their grandfathers had been expelled in 1948, at the horrible ugly wall which Israel has erected to keep them from returning to their homes.  We sang, we chanted, Sabur gave a short speech, but we did not press on into the buffer zone, it is too dangerous to take the children there.  It is enough that the Israeli soldiers saw us, that they saw the children of the men their grandfathers had expelled from their homes, and that we raised our voices against injustice.

Israel deports Spanish aid worker

21 June 2011 | Civil Peace Service Gaza

Ignacio Garcia-Pedraza, a Spanish PSCC worker and Al Quds University trainer, 36 years old and living in Madrid, has been informed this morning at 9:00 a.m. by the Israeli Ben Gurion airport authorities that he had been denied the entry into Israel and the occupied Palestinian Territory (oPt). After a long interrogation, he was informed that he would be repatriated to Spain due to security reasons. Until the deportation is completed, Ignacio Garcia will have to stay at the Detention Center of Ben Gurion Airport.

Ignacio Garcia-Pedraza has stated from that same center that: “this deportation is a clear evidence of the persecution against aid workers and human rights defenders. Israel uses its occupation over the Palestinian territory in order to deny the entry of human rights defenders who wish to work in this territory and, at the same time, bear witness to the violations against International Law. I think it is time for the Spanish authorities to defend Spanish aid workers and nationals and not to let them be politically persecuted by the state of Israel”.

The Israeli authorities hinder systematically the work of different international humanitarian and development aid organizations, impeding the access of their staff to the oPt, or denying the required working visas. With these practices, the state of Israel is violating different international treaties such as the IV Geneva Convention. Last January, airport authorities deported the Spanish aid worker Marcel Masferrer, holder of an Israeli working visa, also due to security reasons that were not clarified. In addition to him, a well known Spanish clown, Ivan Prado, was denied the entry in 2010.

These increasing difficulties were addressed to the Spanish Minister of Foreign Affairs, Trinidad Jimenez, by Ignacio Garcia himself during a meeting held between her and Spanish aid and humanitarian workers in February 2011. On behalf of several NGOs, Mr. Garcia briefed the Minister on the legal persecution for political purposes being carried out by Israel against Spanish and other foreign aid and humanitarian workers.

RESUME OF IGNACIO GARCIA-PEDRAZA

University graduate on Mathematics, he has a wide experience on International Aid in different countries. Ignacio Garcia-Pedraza has traveled in many occasions to Israel and the oPt since March 2009 as a consultant and evaluation expert on Spanish funded international development aid projects for several NGOs.

This time, his entry to Israel and oPt came within the framework of his duties as University Teacher and Coordinator of the Diploma on Public International Law and Non Violent Conflict Transformation, offered by Al Quds University (Jerusalem), the Popular Struggle Coordination Committee and the Spanish NGO NOVA. This activity was partially funded by the Spanish Cooperation (AECID).

Ignacio Garcia was planning also to work as a consultant and evaluation expert for the project CPSGAZA. This project has launched an international mission to monitor Human Rights on board of the boat “El Oliva”, which through its sailing within the Gaza territorial waters informs diplomatic missions and NGOs on the frequent attacks from the Israeli navy against Palestinian fishermen. It also exposes the Israeli ban on these fishermen to work within the water limits that, according to international law, should be under the authority of the Palestinian National Authority.

CPSGAZA is a mission endorsed by 82 Palestinian, Israeli and international organizations, which has been explicitly supported by 600 people, among them the Former Deputy President of the European Parliament, Luisa Morgantini, or the Jerusalem city council member, Meir Margalit.

Ignacio Garcia is right now under detention in the Deportation Center at Ben Gurion Airport, waiting for the Israeli authorities to repatriate him. He is expected to arrive to Spain tomorrow afternoon, Wednesday 22nd June, without detailing neither the flight number nor the city of arrival.

Two fishing boats shot off Gaza coast

21 June 2011 | International Solidarity Movement

At around 9am on June 21, two fishing boats were attacked by the Israeli Navy, with bullets piercing both engines, rendering them unusable.

The first boat was shot at in the motor, at the rear end and, when the 4-man crew took cover at the front of the boat, away from the shots directed at the motor, the front of the boat was fired upon.

Yaser Baker is one of the four fishermen who were aboard the first boat which was shot. “We were at around two and a half miles out to sea when they shot at our engine and it broke. We stopped the boat and all moved to the front, away from the engine so that we wouldn’t get hit. Then they shot at the front, right at us, the bullets just missing our bodies and one landed right by my leg.”

A second boat, manned by Mohammed Bakri Sabir came to assist the first, but was also attacked, both in the engine and the front of the boat, where the crew was taking cover.

Aboard the second boat were three fishermen and two of their children, aged nine and ten years old.

The boats managed to escape when around twenty other local fishing boats surrounded them and escorted them back to shore as the nine-year-old feigned an injury.  “He had to play dead,” Baker explained, “it was the only way we could get them to stop firing.”

67 people displaced following demolition of Bedouin village by Israeli army

20 June 2011 | International Solidarity Movement

A Bedouin girl plays amongst possessions scattered by the Israeli Occupational Forces

On June 20th at 7am a Bedouin village, south of Hebron in Khirbet Bir al’Idd was struck down with Israeli bulldozers destroying seven tin homes and several other sheds and tents. The Israeli army and border police arrived to demolish the homes claiming the area was classified as a closed military zone because of “illegal” building taking place.

There was no warning of the demolition in advance. Following the destruction of the village,  67 people were left homeless and displaced, including a large number of children. They also confiscated many possessions including mattresses and pillows. The mobile water source was damaged as were electricity wires. The toilet was also completely was destroyed.

Villagers reported that the Israeli army threatened that they would return in three days to take down the remaining animal tents and check no rebuilding had occurred. The army apparently told the villagers they should live in natural caves, awaiting a court order on land ownership and whether they can reconstruct the village.