Tag: Bil’in

Library picture. From a previous Bil’in raid on the 15th of April.

by the Michigan Peace Team in Bil’in

At 2:00 a.m. last night, while we were staying in the town of Bil’in, we were awoken and informed that the Israeli army had come into the village. We were asked if we could accompany members of the Popular Committee of Bil’in and others as they followed the soldiers through town. A few of us joined a cameraman and others in a part of the village where the IDF were surrounding a family’s home. The IDF eventually detained one man and witnesses say they used him as a human shield in order to find one of his family members that was believed to be in another part of the village. The Israeli High Court ruled in October 2005 that it was illegal for the IDF to use Palestinian civilians during military actions. The decision was made on a petition that Israeli group B’Tselem and six other human rights organizations filed in 2002. Since then the Israeli military has argued against the ruling and continued the practice, ignoring the Israeli High Court.

Meanwhile, at another family’s home other international Human Rights Workers witnessed a man being arrested. The man was blindfolded and dressed in an orange prison uniform. The Israeli military had more than five soldiers standing around the front of his home and a number of others sitting in four jeeps (there were seven jeeps in total inside Bil’in). This lasted for over two hours. At one point, a soldier came up to a Palestinian and pointed his gun at him and said, “If you follow us, I will kill you.” They finally left the home and we followed the jeeps until we hit the middle of town. The people of the town had put up barricades in the road with large rocks and burning debris to put up a resistance to the invasion of their village. As the jeeps were rolling through town, the young men threw stones. The Israeli military fired rubber bullets and used sound bombs numerous times throughout the night. Finally, as the last jeep was exiting the center of the village at 6am, someone threw a molotov cocktail at the side of the military jeep creating a burst of flames with no visible damage.

As we were writing this report the man that was arrested had not been released. He is father of three, 29-year old Ahmad Katib, the brother of Mohammed Katib, one of the organisers of the weekly non-violent demonstrations against the apartheid barrier in the village. Abdullah Abu-Rahme, also from the Popular Committee Against the Wall and Settlements said that another villager, Ayad Burnat, was being held hostage in order to pressure the family into “giving up” his brother Mujahid who they want to get hold of for reasons that were unclear.

Photo By IMC Israel

By ISM Media Office volunteer

Today Palestinians from the village of Bil’in had another demonstration against the apartheid wall. They were joined by internationals from several different countries as well as Israeli activists.

photo Tess Scheflan

There is a small outpost on the outside of the village on the other side of the annexation barrier. This is within view of the Israeli settlement there. Different people are posted daily to keep watch. Two activists–one from Sweden and one from the UK–staying here for several days, were present during the World Cup when their countries played against each other. TV Arabia came to interview them in this interesting circumstance, that they should be here, struggling together against this illegal occupation, watching this game with other Palestinians while their friends were possibly in the stands or at home enjoying the same match.

From this, an idea for today’s action was born. Several people came dressed in various team jerseys representing different countries, and a giant soccer ball was created for use in a mock match. In addition, several activists wore white t-shirts stained with red paint to represent the continuous massacre of Palestinians while the world enjoys the football games in Germany.

We arrived at the fence, where soldiers greeted us with jeeps, guns and shields. There were several people who threw the large soccer ball around, and things were relatively quiet until a local man was seized by the soldiers and pulled over the gate where he was carried away by more than 5 soldiers. He was later released.

The soldiers crossed the gate and tried to push us back. People lay in the white ‘blood’ stained t-shirts blocking the jeeps passage until they started to toss sound bombs into the crowd.

Afterward activists linked arms and sat down in front of the jeeps passage. The soldiers didn’t advance further.

Children tossed rocks at the soldiers, and they released tear gas upon the group as we walked. Afterward we debriefed the day’s actions together before parting.