During Operation Cast Lead Israel committed massive war crimes for all the world to see. Among these crimes the use of White Phosphorus in densely populated areas, use of Depleted Uranium, bombing civilian targets of all sorts without military necessity, destroying civilian infrastructure with no military justification and the infamous massacre of the Samouni family… among many other crimes.
In the aftermath of Cast Lead, Justice Richard Goldstone, a Zionist Jew, was commissioned by the United Nations to write a report on the alleged war crimes. Although the report did not go nearly far enough in exposing the brutality of all the crimes committed, crimes committed by the fourth largest military in the world against a essentially defenceless and captive population, it did allege that Israel (and Hamas) was almost undoubtedly guilty of war crimes and possibly, crimes against humanity.
Construction of Zeid Amran's houseOn Friday afternoon at around 4.30 pm, three young men from the village of Burin, south of Nablus, were attacked by two settlers while picking “akoob” (a plant used in cooking) in the mountains. The men were around 200 meters away from the illegal settlement of Bracha when two settlers attacked them by throwing stones. Ten minutes later, 35 more masked settlers, two of them carrying M16 rifles, came down to attack the three men. When the villagers of Burin came to protect the men by throwing stones, settlers started firing live ammunition at them, forcing them to hide behind rocks.
One settler shouted at the villagers, in Arabic: “We should burn you, you are rubbish!”
At approximately 5.30 pm, one hour after the settlers had arrived, the Israeli army came and forced the villagers to leave their land, while the settlers were allowed to stay.
Again, yesterday at around 10.30 am, five villagers were attacked by settlers while they were constructing a house. 18 settlers, of whom two were carrying guns, attacked the workers by throwing stones at them and their tractors and prevented them from doing their work. The workers called the Red Cross and asked them to call the Israeli army to come and stop the settlers. Around 30 minutes later the army came, but the settlers had already left. When the villagers told the soldiers what have happened, the soldiers called them liars, telling them that the settlers would never attack on a Saturday since it is the holy day for Jewish people.
Then at around 4 pm, the settlers came back and attacked the workers again, throwing stones at them and their families. Again by the time the military had come, the settlers were already gone, and instead of helping the villagers, the soldiers prevented the workers from driving their tractors to get water and soil some 100 meters up the road, threatening to shoot them.
Today at 9.30 am around 30 settlers, of whom three were carrying guns, attacked the five workers once again with stones. 30 minutes later, the Israeli army arrived with four military jeeps, but as in the previous incidents, the settlers had left just before the army came. The two houses under construction belong to the two brothers Zeid and Ghassan Amran. Their family have been under constant attack since they started to build the first house last year. Ghassan Amran lives with his family in one of the houses, he is scared that something will happen to his children, three boys aged three, seven and eight years old.
The village of Burin is surrounded by the illegal Israeli settlements of Bracha in the north, and Yitzar in the south. The settlers make regular visits to the village and in previous incidents have destroyed olive trees, stolen and shot animals, set crops and houses and cars on fire, destroyed homes, shot at people with live ammunition and fired rockets at the village.
In other similar incidents in the Nablus area, according to Ma’an News Agency, Imad Husni Salahat, 47, was severely beaten by settlers in Kawkab Salah near the illegal settlement of Ma’ale Efrayim yesterday. The same day, settlers from the illegal settlement of Yitzar destroyed water pipes south of the village of Madama.
Also, on the night between Wednesday and Thursday, in the village of Aqraba, south east of Nablus, 400 olive trees that had been planted three months earlier, were uprooted and stolen by settlers from the illegal settlement of Itamar. The week before 300 olive trees were uprooted and three wells were destroyed in a settler attack on the village land.Illegal settlement of Bracha
Today, small peaceful demonstrations in Beit Ommar were met with disproportionate force by the Israeli army. Just after 11 o’clock this morning, a small group of villagers and internationals marched to the entrance of the village where they were met by lines of soldiers preventing them from exiting the village. The soldiers soon declared the area a closed military zone and erected a barricade preventing vehicles from entering and exiting. The army then threw teargas and sound grenades directly at demonstrators to drive the small group back into the village. The march was organised to commemorate Land Day and protest the encroachment of Karmei Tsur settlement on land belonging to local farmers. Karmei Tsur is one of five illegal settlements built on land belonging to Beit Ommar villagers.
Later in the day a group of approximately 25 Israeli activists arrived to protest the closure of the village and were greeted by truckloads of soldiers who violently dragged them away from the village and detained them at the petrol station next to the village. A number of members of the group, who had all come to protest peacefully, were arrested.
1st April 2010 | International Solidarity Movement / Ma’an News Agency
According to Ma’an News Agency, in the past 48 hours the residents of Hebron have suffered a number of attacks by settlers. On Thursday a three year old girl was hospitalised in a hit-an-run attack by a settler car, outside the Al-Ibrahimi Mosque. Witnesses apparently report that the Israeli army was present at the time of the incident. This is the third time in March that Israeli settlers have hit Palestinians in their cars before fleeing the scene. Also on Thursday, settlers destroyed the contents of a store in the Jaber neighborhood and damaged a Palestinian home in Tel Rumeida in central Hebron. Today settlers also set fire to the front of a shop on Shalala Street.
This week the Israeli army killed 3 Palestinian and wounded 3 others in the Gaza Strip. They also wounded 5 Palestinian civilians, including two children, in the West Bank, the Palestinian Center for Human Rights said in its weekly report.
The report, which documents daily human rights violations in the Palestinian territories, covers the period of Thursday, March 24, to Wednesday, March, 30, 2011.
Shooting:
In the Gaza Strip, on 30 March 2011, the Israeli air force extra-judicially executed an activist of the al-Quds Brigades (the armed wing of Islamic Jihad) and wounded another one seriously in the southern Gaza Strip town of Rafah.
On 27 March 2011, Israeli troops killed two activists of the al-Quds Brigades and wounded a third one in the northern Gaza Strip. An Israeli warplanes fired at these activists after they had fired home-made rockets into Israeli towns.
On 24 March 2011, a Palestinian resistance activist was wounded by a missile fired by an Israeli army drone in the northern Gaza Strip.
During the reporting period, Israel’s military launched a series of air strikes and artillery shelling against targets in the Gaza Strip. As a result of these attacks, two tunnels on the Egyptian border were destroyed and at least 30 houses and two schools were damaged.
In the West Bank, Israeli soldiers wounded 5 Palestinian civilians, including two children.
During the reporting period, Israeli troops used excessive force to disperse peaceful demonstrations organized in protest to Israeli settlement activities and the construction of the annexation wall in the West Bank. As a result, 4 Palestinian civilians, including two children, were wounded, and dozens of Palestinian civilians and international human rights defenders suffered from tear gas inhalation. IOF also arrested 14 Israeli human rights defenders and two Palestinian civilians.
On 25 March 2011, a Palestinian civilian, who suffers from a psychological disorder, was wounded by the Israeli police in Fassayel village near Jericho.
Incursions:
During the reporting period, the Israeli army conducted at least 52 military incursions into Palestinian communities in the West Bank, during which they arrested 27 Palestinian civilians, including 14 children.
The widest incursions were into Beit Ummar town, north of Hebron, during which Israeli troops arrested 18 Palestinian civilians, mostly children.
In the Gaza Strip, the military conducted two limited incursion into Palestinian areas, during which they leveled areas of Palestinian land.
