Tag: Demonstration - Page 116 - International Solidarity Movement

ISM volunteer shot, hospitalized; ISM co-founder arrested

19 March 2010

UPDATE: Huwaida Arraf released on 20 March after being illegally under arrest for 31 hours. Eight of these hours were spent standing in the cold in the illegal Halamish settlement. During this time she witnessed the border police by whom she was detained abuse the two Palestinian men who were also illegally arrested, Omar, 23, and Amjad, 22. She was treated with vulgar verbal abuse. After refusing to stare at wall, the police became particular violent. They picked her up by her handcuffed arms and threw onto the pavement. She was brought to Ramle Prison and released without seeing a judge.

Friday’s demonstration in An Nabi Saleh saw an increase in violence and collective punishment from the Israeli military, as twenty-five demonstrators were injured, windows of cars and homes were intentionally shattered, and three were arrested. ISM volunteer Ellen Stark was shot at point blank range (4 meters) with a rubber bullet as she stood with medics, Popular Committee members and other internationals. ISM co-founder Huwaida Arraf was arrested while negotiating with the IOF to allow Ellen through the military line to get to the hospital. According to Ellen, “we were standing on Palestinian land, in support of the village who’s land has been confiscated but we weren’t even demonstrating yet. We were standing with medics who were also shot with tear gas.”

Ellen’s had to undergo surgery to remove the bullet, which was lodged between her ulna and radius of her right arm. Her wrist is broken as a result of the bullet impact. As of 12:00 pm Saturday, Palestine time, Huwaida has yet to be located in the Israeli prison system.

Over an hour before the demonstration began, soldiers took position on a hilltop near the house of an An Nabi Saleh Popular Committee member signaling to activists that the peaceful march would likely be cut short yet again by soldiers using crowd dispersal tactics such as tear gas and sound grenades. The demonstration was able to take it’s usual course, as IOF soldiers blocked the path of the activists, and began to surround them from multiple sides. Only ten minutes into the demonstration, the army began firing tear gas and rubber bullets at a small group of international, Israeli, and Palestinian activists only four meters away, injuring International Solidarity Movement volunteer, Ellen Stark. Omar Saleh Tamimi, Amjad Abed Alkhafeez Tamimi and International Solidarity Movement co-founder Huwaida Arraf were arrested as they asked Israeli military personnel to stop firing tear gas canisters and rubber bullets at Stark as she was helped to safety.

Israeli forces then entered the center of the village where they continued firing tear gas, sound grenades, and rubber bullets for several hours. Over twenty five were injured, including an 84-year old woman who suffered from tear gas inhalation after tear gas canisters were fired into her house, and three others who were shot with rubber bullets, including an Israeli activist; four remain hospitalized.

Later in the demonstration, soldiers began shooting rubber bullets through the windows of residents’ houses, shops, and cars, shattering their homes and livelihoods, as they used collective punishment to attempt to suppress these weekly demonstrations.

These incidents comes as the Israeli government intensifies repression of the unarmed, popular resistance to the occupation of the West Bank, illegal land confiscation by settlements such as Halamish, and construction of the illegal apartheid wall. Two weeks ago in An Nabi Saleh, 14-year-old Ehab Fadel Beir Ghouthi’s skull was fractured as a rubber bullet shot by the Israeli military, leaving him in a coma for several days. He remains in a hospital in Ramallah where he is recovering; his condition is stable and improving.

Today and every Friday since January, around 100 un-armed demonstrators leave the village center in an attempt to reach a spring which boarders land confiscated by Jewish settlers. The District Coordination Office has confirmed the spring is on Palestinian land but nearly a kilometer before reaching the spring, the demonstration is routinely met with dozens of soldiers armed with M16 assault rifles, tear gas, rubber bullets and stun grenades.

The Halamish Settlement has confiscated nearly half of An Nabi Saleh’s orchard and farmland since it was founded in 1977. According to village residents the settlement confiscates more land each year without consent or compensation of the landowners.

Bil’in and Ni’lin demonstrate in the face of closed military zone orders

International Solidarity Movement

19 March 2010

The smell of tear gas hung over the villages of Ni’lin and Bil’in today. The shouts demanded an end to apartheid and access to farmlands. The odd and surreal status quo was maintained this Friday. The attempts to squash the nonviolent popular resistance have been in vain. Like the rocky, Palestinian landscape, dotted with olive trees, this resistance is fertile. As these olive trees have been uprooted or burned, the state of Israel has attempted to sow these popular demonstrations with salt. It has been to no avail.

Last week’s orders posted in Bil’in and Ni’lin declaring the villages closed military zones for all of Friday had no effect on the demonstrators or village-life in general. Butchers displayed their wares, children laughed and kicked their footballs about and the cries for freedom echoed off the walls. The midnight raids did nothing to deter the groundswell of the popular struggle.

The West Bank village of Bil’in is located 12 kilometers west of Ramallah and 4 km east of the Green Line. It is an agricultural village, around 4,000 dunams (988 acres) in size, and populated by approximately 1,800 residents.

Starting in the early 1980’s, and more significantly in 1991, approximately 56% of Bil’in’s agricultural land was declared ‘State Land’ for the construction of the settlement bloc, Modi’in Illit. Modi’in Illit holds the largest settler population of any settlement bloc, with over 42,000 residents and plans to achieve a population of 150,000 by 2020.

In 2004, the International Court of Justice ruled that the Wall in its entirety is illegal under international law, particularly under International Humanitarian Law. The Court went on to rule that Israel’s settlements are illegal under the same laws, noting that the Wall’s route is intimately connected to the settlements adjacent to the Green Line, further annexing 16% of the West Bank to Israel.

• Despite the advisory opinion, early in 2005, Israel began constructing the separation Wall on Bil’in’s land, cutting the village in half in order to place Modi’in Illit and its future growth on the “Israeli side” of the Wall.

• In March 2005, Bil’in residents began to organize almost daily direct actions and demonstrations against the theft of their lands. Gaining the attention of the international community with their creativity and perseverance, Bil’in has become a symbol for popular resistance. Almost five years later, Bil’in continues to have weekly Friday protests.

• Bil’in has held annual conferences on popular resistance since 2006, providing a forum for activists, intellectuals, and leaders to discuss strategies for the non-violent struggle against the Occupation.

• Israeli forces have used sound and shock grenades, water cannons, rubber-coated steel bullets, tear gas grenades, tear gas canisters and 0.22 caliber live ammunition against protesters.

• On 17 April 2009, Bassem Abu Rahma was shot with a high-velocity tear gas projectile in the chest by Israeli forces and subsequently died from his wounds at a Ramallah hospital.

• Out of the 75 residents who have been arrested in connection to demonstrations against the Wall, 27 were arrested since the beginning of a night raid campaign on 23 June 2009. Israeli armed forces have been regularly invading homes and forcefully searching for demonstration participants, targeting the leaders of the Popular Committee Against the Wall and Settlements, as well as teenage boys accused of throwing stones at the Wall. Seventeen currently remain in detention, 10 of which are minors.

• To date, 75 residents have been arrested in connection with demonstrations against the Wall.

• In addition to its grassroots movement, Bil’in turned to the courts in the fall of 2005. In September 2007, 2 years after they initiated legal proceedings, the Israeli High Court of Justice ruled that due to illegal construction in part of Modi’in Illit, unfinished housing could not be completed and that the route of the Wall be moved several hundred meters west, returning 25% of Bil’in’s lands to the village. To date, the high court ruling has not been implemented and settlement construction continues.

• In July 2008, Bil’in commenced legal proceedings before the Superior Court of Quebec against Green Park International Inc and Green Mount International Inc for their involvement in constructing, marketing and selling residential units in the Mattityahu East section of Modi’in Illit.

Israel began construction of the Wall on Ni’lin’s land in 2004, but stopped after an injunction order issued by the Israeli Supreme Court (ISC). Despite the previous order and a 2004 ruling from the International Court of Justice declaring the Wall illegal, construction of the Wall began again in May 2008. Following the return of Israeli bulldozers to their lands, residents of Ni’lin have launched a grassroots campaign to protest the massive land theft, including demonstrations and direct actions.

The original route of the Wall, which Israel began constructing in 2004, was ruled illegal by the ISC, as was a second, marginally less obtrusive proposed route. The most recent path, now completed, still cuts deep into Ni’lin’s land. The Wall has been built to include plans, not yet approved by the Army’s planning authority, for a cemetery and an industrial zone for the illegal settlement Modi’in Ilit.

Since the Wall was built to annex more land to the nearby settlements rather than in a militarily strategic manner, demonstrators have been able to repeatedly dismantle parts of the electronic fence and razor-wire surrounding it. Consequently, the army has erected a 15-25 feet tall concrete wall, in addition to the electronic fence. The section of the Wall in Ni’lin is the only part of the route where a concrete wall has been erected in response to civilian, unarmed protest.

As a result of the Wall construction, Ni’lin has lost 3,920 dunams, roughly 30% of its remaining lands. Originally, Ni’lin consisted of 15,898 dunams (3928 acres). Post 1948, Ni’lin was left with 14,794 dunams (3656 acres). After the occupation of the West Bank in 1967, the illegal settlements and infrastructure of Modi’in Ilit, Mattityahu and Hashmonaim were built on village lands, and Ni’lin lost another 1,973 dunams. With the completion of the Wall, Ni’lin has a remaining 8911 dunams (2201 acres), 56% of it’s original size.

Ni’lin is effectively split into 2 parts (upper and lower) by Road 446, which was built directly through the village. According to the publicized plan of the Israeli government, a tunnel will be built under road 446 to connect the upper and lower parts of Ni’lin, allowing Israel to turn Road 446 into a segregated-setter only road. Subsequently, access for Palestinian vehicles to this road and to the main entrances of upper and lower Ni’lin will be closed. Additionally, since the tunnel will be the only entryway to Ni’lin, Israel will have control over the movement of Palestinian residents.

Israel commonly uses tear-gas projectiles, rubber coated steel bullets and live ammunition against demonstrators.

Since May, 2008, five of Ni’lin’s residents were killed and one American solidarity activist was critically injured from Israeli fire during grassroots demonstrations in Ni’lin.

* 5 June 2009: Yousef Akil Srour (36) was shot in the chest with 0.22 caliber live ammunition and pronounced dead upon arrival at a Ramallah hospital (https://palsolidarity.org/2009/06/7023).

* 13 March 2009: Tristan Anderson (37), an American citizen, was shot in the head with a high velocity tear gas projectile. He is currently at Tel Hashomer hospital near Tel Aviv with uncertain prospects for his recovery (https://palsolidarity.org/2009/03/5324).

* 28 December 2008: Mohammed Khawaje (20) was shot in the head with 5.56mm caliber live ammunition. He died in a Ramallah hospital 3 days later on 31 December 2008 (https://palsolidarity.org/2008/12/3742).

* 28 December 2008: Arafat Rateb Khawaje (22) was shot in the back with 5.56mm caliber live ammunition and pronounced dead upon arrival at a Ramallah hospital (https://palsolidarity.org/2008/12/3714).

* 30 July 2008: Yousef Amira (17) was shot in the head with two rubber coated steel bullets. He died in a Ramallah hospital 5 days later on 4 August 2008 (https://palsolidarity.org/2008/08/3346).

* 29 July 2008: Ahmed Mousa (10) was shot in the forehead with 5.56mm caliber live ammunition and pronounced dead upon arrival at a Ramallah hospital (https://palsolidarity.org/2008/07/3329).

In total, 20 people have been killed during demonstrations against the Wall (https://palsolidarity.org/2009/06/7647).

Israeli armed forces have shot 40 demonstrators with live ammunition in Ni’lin. Of them, 11 were shot with 5.56mm caliber live ammunition and 29 were shot with 0.22 caliber live ammunition.

Since May 2008, 112 arrests of Ni’lin residents have been made in relation to anti-Wall protest in the village. The protesters arrested by the army constitute roughly 9% of the village’s male residents aged between 12 and 55. The arrests are part of a broad politically motivated Israeli campaign to suppress grassroots resistance to the Occupation.

Israel’s repression leaves dozens wounded in Jerusalem

International Solidarity Movement

17 March 2010

In reaction to the blanket West Bank closure and Israel’s severe limitation of entrance into Al-Aqsa Mosque, demonstrations spread through Jerusalem. Police and soldiers used percussion grenades, tear gas, rubber bullets and physical assaults in an attempt to quell Palestinians show of disdain. Confrontations were reported in Isawiya and Wadi-Joz. Reports claimed that nearly 100 demonstrators were injured (about 25 seriously) and over 70 arrested.

An ominous and anticipatory air hung over the Old City on Tuesday. The normal banter of the Muslim quarter was replaced with closed shops and anxious stares. This was in response to Israel’s closure of much of the Old City. This closure only extended to Palestinians attempting to pray at the holy site. Tourists and Israeli school children were allowed free reign within its walls. The tourists’ interpretation of the situation was far removed from reality. When asked why access was limited throughout the Muslim Quarter, many responded it was because of Hamas. There was no discussion of the imprisonment of Palestinians in the West Bank. If pressed further, they usually responded that Hamas was upset because “the Muslims thought had a right to a disputed holy site.” Justice, religious freedom and unfettered access to the third holiest site of one’s religion never seemed to enter the discourse.

Although there was much dignified rage expressed nonviolently that day, these tourists were not privy to any of it. Thousands of police clad in riot gear, soldiers armed with automatic assault rifles ensured that any nonviolent expression of this anger was squashed immediately. As tourists took photos and meandered around the guns and those that carried them, men lined up to pray outside Al-Aqsa and across the street from the Old City. While the police effectively insulated the tourists from any sign of nonviolent resistance (handcuffing Palestinians to plain-clothes police officers, so arrests would go unnoticed to the untrained eye), they couldn’t stop it in the open air of Wadi-Joz and Isawiya.

As the Sun set the signs of resistance were readily apparent in Isawiya. Smoldering tires, barricades and youth placed in strategic positions spattered the hillsides. The day had been long for them. Their nonviolent demonstration began around seven AM and quit with the sun. The same was true for Wadi-Joz. However, the price that was paid was human and dear. Amidst the rapacious repression of the IOF and Israeli police, many were wounded. Wounded merely for demanding justice in a land where they are prisoners and unable to express the spiritual extension of their culture in places they hold so dear.

International solidarity activists visited demonstrators injured in clashes between Palestinian Jerusalemites and Israeli occupation forces in Al-Makasad Hospital, including 16 year old Muhammad Ibrahim Afanih from Abu Dis and a 14 year old boy from Ar-ram. The 14 year old, wishing to remain anonymous, received a rubber-coated steel bullet to his finger, removing its tip from his hand, when young demonstrators were ambushed by Israeli soldiers in the streets of Ar-ram neighborhood. Afanih was shot in the leg with a rubber-coated steel bullet by an Israeli soldier when a large military force opened fire on demonstrators in Abu Dis. He was then physically attacked by 4 soldiers, who continued to beat him before pulling him to the curb, where he was forced to wait approximately 10 minutes before the soldiers called for an ambulance. The ambulance was detained at Zayeam checkpoint for 15 minutes as Afanih continued blood from the gunshot wound before the vehicle was permitted to proceed to Al-Makasad Hospital. He was one of 10 injured from the Abu Dis neighborhood. Afanih reported that soldiers had used sound bombs, tear gas grenades, rubber-coated steel bullets and live ammunition against demonstrators. He will undergo an operation on his leg tomorrow, and remain in hospital for 7 days.

Nil’in commemorates year anniversary of Tristan Anderson shooting: two arrested

13 March 2010

Demonstrators remember Tristan in Nil'in

On Friday, March 13th, the one year anniversary of the critical injury of international activist Tristan Anderson, approximately 100 Palestinians, Israelis, and internationals gathered for the weekly demonstration in Ni’lin to claim justice for Tristan. Anderson, a 38 year old U.S. citizen who was volunteering with the International Solidarity Movement, was hit in the forehead by a high-flying tear gas projectile during a demonstration in Ni’lin last year. The projectile was fired against IOF regulations, as soldiers shot the canisters directly at demonstrators rather than in an arcing fashion. According to the manufacturer of the tear gas canisters, the projectile was designed to penetrate walls and to be used in confined spaces; neither was necessary at the open-air demonstration demonstration in 2009. Tristan sustained serious brain damage, and remains hospitalized in Tel Aviv, his condition too serious for him to be moved home to the US.

In Ni’lin, midday prayers took place in the shade of olive trees, creating a picturesque setting. Afterwards, demonstrators marched firmly through the fields towards the metal gate in the concrete Apartheid Wall, while chanting and holding banners supporting Tristan. Three farmers brought their donkeys along in hopes of reach their farming land beyond the Apartheid Wall.

Protest against the apartheid wall, Nilin, Palestine,12/03/2010

Ni’lin has lost about a third of its land to illegal Israeli settlements and the Wall. Only a limited amount of villagers have permission to access their lands behind the Wall, most of them elderly persons who do not have the physical capacity to farm. On Friday, all farmers were denied access to their land. While the crowd was overtaken by a viciously strong tear gas attack, soldiers passed through the gate. One of the farmers was brutally separated from his young son and arrested. Simultaneously, an Israeli activist was arrested while taking pictures.

After approximately 15 minutes the army invaded the village to surround the demonstrating crowd, plaguing the crowd with tear gas and sound grenades. The demonstrators approached the Wall again, holding up banners and chanting, which was answered by the army with more ammunition aimed directly at them. Clashes between the IOF and demonstrators continued for two hours until the army withdrew from the village.

Background on Nil’in:

The original route of the Wall, which Israel began constructing in 2004, was ruled illegal by the ISC, as was a second, marginally less obtrusive proposed route (http://www.poica.org/editor/case_studies/view.php?recordID=622). The most recent path, now completed, still cuts deep into Ni’lin’s land. The Wall has been built to include plans, not yet approved by the Army’s planning authority, for a cemetery and an industrial zone for the illegal settlement Modi’in Ilit.

Ni’lin is effectively split into 2 parts (upper and lower) by Road 446, which was built directly through the village. According to the publicized plan of the Israeli government (http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/819633.html), a tunnel will be built under road 446 to connect the upper and lower parts of Ni’lin, allowing Israel to turn Road 446 into a segregated-setter only road. Subsequently, access for Palestinian vehicles to this road and to the main entrances of upper and lower Ni’lin will be closed. Additionally, since the tunnel will be the only entryway to Ni’lin, Israel will have control over the movement of Palestinian residents.

Israel commonly uses tear-gas projectiles, rubber coated steel bullets and live ammunition against demonstrators.

Since May, 2008, five of Ni’lin’s residents were killed and one American solidarity activist was critically injured from Israeli fire during grassroots demonstrations in Ni’lin.

* 5 June 2009: Yousef Akil Srour (36) was shot in the chest with 0.22 caliber live ammunition and pronounced dead upon arrival at a Ramallah hospital (https://palsolidarity.org/2009/06/7023).
* 13 March 2009: Tristan Anderson (37), an American citizen, was shot in the head with a high velocity tear gas projectile. He is currently at Tel Hashomer hospital near Tel Aviv with uncertain prospects for his recovery (https://palsolidarity.org/2009/03/5324).
* 28 December 2008: Mohammed Khawaje (20) was shot in the head with 5.56mm caliber live ammunition. He died in a Ramallah hospital 3 days later on 31 December 2008 (https://palsolidarity.org/2008/12/3742).
* 28 December 2008: Arafat Rateb Khawaje (22) was shot in the back with 5.56mm caliber live ammunition and pronounced dead upon arrival at a Ramallah hospital (https://palsolidarity.org/2008/12/3714).
* 30 July 2008: Yousef Amira (17) was shot in the head with two rubber coated steel bullets. He died in a Ramallah hospital 5 days later on 4 August 2008 (https://palsolidarity.org/2008/08/3346).
* 29 July 2008: Ahmed Mousa (10) was shot in the forehead with 5.56mm caliber live ammunition and pronounced dead upon arrival at a Ramallah hospital (https://palsolidarity.org/2008/07/3329).

In total, 20 people have been killed during demonstrations against the Wall (https://palsolidarity.org/2009/06/7647).

Israeli armed forces have shot 40 demonstrators with live ammunition in Ni’lin. Of them, 11 were shot with 5.56mm caliber live ammunition and 29 were shot with 0.22 caliber live ammunition.

Israeli Army: Bil’in and Ni’lin a Closed Military Zone for a Six Month Period

Popular Struggle Coordination Committee

14 March 2010

Soldier points a gun at the camera as another solder posts fliers in Bil'in.

One week after the head of the Israeli Shin Bet threatened to aggravate the repression of the Palestinian popular struggle, a large military force raided the villages of Bil’in and Ni’ilin at 3:30AM this morning. The sole purpose of the raids was to post decrees designating the land between the Wall and the developed area of the villages as closed military zones between 8AM to 8PM every Friday for a period of half a year. The decrees, which came into effect on February 17th, are signed by the recently appointed commander of the Israeli Central Command, Avi Mizrahi, himself. Closed military zone orders are usually signed by a brigade commander, a much lower rank.

Gaby Lasky who represents residents of the villages, said that “This is yet another illegal measure taken by the Army, which makes ill use of its authority in order to suppress dissent and infringe on the already volatile freedom of speech in the Territories. Closed military zone orders are not meant to deal with demonstrations, which are clearly in the civic rather than the military realm”.

Issuing of these decrees happens in the midst of an ongoing persecution campaign against Palestinian activists in an attempt to suppress the rising tide of West Bank popular resistance to the Occupation.

Masked soldier posts flier stating that Bil'in is a closed military zone.

In recent months Israel has carried dozens upon dozens of protest related arrests. Recently, the Army issued a blanket decree forbidding certain cars belonging to Israeli activists from entering the West Bank on Fridays, regardless of who is in them, where they are heading or the purpose of their trip. Seventeen Israeli protesters were also arrested last Friday in the Sheikh Jarrah neighborhood of East Jerusalem after the police declared the demonstration illegal for no apparent reason. Arrests were made despite a clear ruling by the Israeli Supreme Court the previous week stating the importance of allowing protest in the neighborhood.

Additionally, Iyad Burnat, the head of the Bil’in popular committee was summoned to a Shin Bet questioning yesterday, only an hour after he sent out an email titled “The third Intifada is knocking on the door”, which contained reports on various demonstrations and protest activities that took place in the West Bank during the previous week.