Tag: Aboud

Funeral of 23 year old Mohammed Asfour leads to Israeli army invasion of village

9th March 2013| Lisa Marchant, Occupied Palestine

23 year old Mohammed Asfour died on the 7th of March, from injuries sustained during a demonstration in solidarity with Palestinian prisoners on hunger strikers in Israeli jails. He was shot in the head with a rubber-coated steel bullet at the demonstration on the 22nd of February and was treated in the Israeli Echilov hospital, but finally succumbed to his injuries on Thursday.

The funeral was held on the following day, Friday the 8th of March, with a procession of cars adorned with Palestinian flags following Mohammed’s body from Ramallah to his home village of Aboud. There was already a strong Israeli army, police and border police presence at the entrance of the village as around 2000 people from surrounding villages and across the West Bank arrived to pay their respects. Mohammed’s body was transported to his home and to the mosque, where prayers were held. He was then taken to the village cemetery and buried.

March 8th 2013 (Photo by Oren Ziv/Activestills.org)

During the burial, it was already possible to hear tear gas being fired by the soldiers surrounding the entrance of the village. Clashes broke out between the army and mourners, who moved to protect their village and express the anger and outrage felt at the death of one of their loved ones. Stones thrown at the invading army vehicles by Palestinian youth were met with volleys of teargas and rubber bullets.

Blocks placed by Palestinians on the road to the village were cleared by an army bulldozer, allowing foul-smelling army ‘skunk water’ to be sprayed into residential areas. Several people were injured by rubber coated steel bullets and by tear gas canisters, requiring treatment from Red Crescent paramedics. Many protesters also suffered from the effects of tear-gas inhalation. Clashes continued late into the afternoon.

Mohammed’s is the sixth death in 2013 resulting from shooting by Israeli soldiers in the West Bank and Gaza. There is a lack of accountability for Israeli soldiers who have caused these deaths. Investigations tend to be fruitless if they even occur, and there is rarely any punishment, let alone conviction for those responsible. Of the 240 complaints against the IDF that were registered in 2012, only one resulted in an indictment.

The demonstration that led to Mohammed’s death was in solidarity with Palestinian prisoners in Israeli jails, many of whom are on hunger strike, as well as for prisoner Arafat Jaradat who was tortured to death in an Israeli jail.

Palestinian protester dies of injury sustained on February 22

8th March 2013| Popular Struggle Coordination Committee

Muhammad Asfour, 23, was injured two weeks ago from rubber coated steel bullet in his head during a protest. His Funeral will take place after Friday noon prayer in Aboud. Since the beginning of 2013, six Palestinians were killed from soldiers’ shooting.

The medical staff of Echilov hospital declared today the death of Muhammad Asfour, 23, resident of the village of Aboud West of Ramallah, of injury sustained two weeks ago, after he was shot by Israeli soldiers during clashes that erupted during a protest at Aboud in support of Palestinian prisoners on hunger striker.

Mohammad Asfour — Funeral of Muhammad Asfour March 8th 2013 (Photo by: Oren Ziv/Activestills.org)

Asfour was shot on February 22^nd, with a rubber coated steel bullet in the head which settled in the brain. He was evacuated to Salfit hospital and then to Rafidya Hospital in Nablus. Few days later he was transferred to Echilov hospital in Tel Aviv in critical condition.

Asfour was 4^th year Physical Education student at Alquds University in Abu Dis and played football in the village’s team. Born on 9.3.1990, Asfour dies two days before celebrating his 23^rd birthday.

Asfour is the sixth Palestinian to die from Israeli soldiers shooting in the West Bank and Gaza Strip, (see B’Tselem report here), in addition to prisoner Arafat Jaradat who died two weeks ago in the Israeli prison “Megiddo”, six days after his arrest:

11 January 2013: Anwar al-Mamluk, 20, of a-Shuja’iyeh neighborhood, Gaza City, fatally shot by soldiers near the Gaza military perimeter fence

12 January 2013: ‘Udai Darwish, 21, of Dura, Hebron District, fatally shot by soldiers after crossing the Separation Barrier into Israel on his way to work

15 January 2013: Samir ‘Awad, 17, of the village of Budrus, Ramallah District, fatally shot by soldiers beside the Separation Barrier near Budrus

18 January 2013: Saleh al-‘Amarin, 15, of al-‘Aza Refugee Camp, Bethlehem District, fatally shot by soldiers in al-A’yda Refugee Camp

23 January 2013: Lubna al-Hanash, 21, of Bethlehem, fatally shot by soldiers near Route 60, by al-‘Arrub Refugee Camp

Israeli barrier bites into Palestinian village

Ivan Karakashian | Reuters

18 May 2009

Israel’s land barrier is slowly destroying the fabric of this Palestinian village of Christians and Muslims in the West Bank, setting a prime example of why the United States wants settlements to stop.

One third of Aboud’s open space has been turned into a buffer zone. Hundreds of olive trees have been uprooted to make way for a dirt road closed off with barbed wire and patrolled by the Israeli army.

The land seized lies beyond Israel’s barrier along the 1948 Green Line that was once the Jewish state’s western border. The bulge encroaches six kilometres (4 miles) inside occupied Palestinian territory to safeguard the Jewish settlements of Beit Arye and Ofarim.

Palestinians hope U.S. President Barack Obama will press Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu at talks in Washington on Monday on their demand to remove settlements, checkpoints, walls and fences, and establish a state in return for peace.

Aboud’s parish priest Father Firas Aridah blames the Israeli barrier for decimating the income of Aboud’s Christian community and forcing 34 families since 2000 to leave in search of more stability and security.

“The biggest problem is the loss of their land. Their olive trees have been cut down, and this in turn has cut them off from their source of livelihood,” said Aridah.

The Fawadleh brothers, George, Francis and Khalil, watched 117 trees owned by their family for generations being uprooted early last year. They now have only 26 left and worry those will be destroyed as well.

“It felt like having a stroke,” said George Fawadleh, a Catholic. “It’s our land. When they uprooted the trees, it was a catastrophe for us.” Nearly 70 Christian families own land in the buffer zone, said Aridah. While they currently are able to reach their land through open gaps along the road, to tend their trees or graze livestock, they fear one day being completely cut off.

APPEAL FAILED

Aboud lies north of Jerusalem in the Ramallah governorate. About half of its 2,200 residents are Christians. The parish runs a school up to ninth-grade, and most pupils are Muslim.

“We live together in every respect, as a united town, as Palestinians, we live with each other in harmony,” said Father Aridah, 34, who also serves as headmaster.

Across a small courtyard lies a building housing the church and Aridah’s office and residence. The church is beautifully decorated and well kept, in stark contrast to his hectic office.

“In Aboud, the priest is for everyone, no exceptions,” Aridah said. “Not just for Christians, but also for Muslims.”

But the Christian presence in Aboud is dwindling, as it is across the West Bank. The main reason they cite is the Israeli occupation and the security restrictions it imposes, stifling the economy and limiting opportunity.

Palestinians say the 720-km (450-mile) barrier Israel began constructing in 2002 is a naked land grab. Israel says it is a temporary security measure which radically reduced Palestinian suicide attacks and has kept its cities safe.

Aboud petitioned against the road before the Israel Supreme Court in 2006 but its plea was rejected. The Israeli army says the security fence tries to balance security needs “with Israel’s desire to reduce, to the greatest extent possible, any disruptions to Palestinian residents’ quality of life”.

It notes the court’s conclusion that “the path of the Security Fence (at Aboud) was built to the greatest possible extent on Israeli state land and close to Israeli communities”.

Father Aridah has raised the issue with the Vatican and testified before a United States congressional subcommittee.

Several U.S. senators, including Patrick Leahy, have visited Aboud, so far without producing any change on the ground.

But the priest intends to carry on fighting for the rights of his people, Muslim as well as Christian. “The voice of the church must defend the victimized,” he says.

The Palestinian Authority says the Christian population of the West Bank — about 50,000 — has shrunk over the last 30 years due to emigration. Christians tend to be better educated and richer than the average Palestinian and have opportunities to vote with their feet and seek a new life abroad.

During his pilgrimage to the holy land last week, Pope Benedict lamented the departure of Christians and the artificial divisions disrupting normal life for Palestinians.

“One of the saddest sights for me during my visit to these lands was the wall,” the pontiff said after confronting the towering barrier between Jerusalem and Bethlehem.

“As I passed alongside it, I prayed for a future in which the peoples of the Holy Land can live together in peace and harmony without the need for such instruments of security and separation.”