Tag: Demonstration - Page 3 - International Solidarity Movement

Israeli human rights group proves military used live fire to shoot 9-year-old child in West Bank town

July 19 2019 | International Solidarity Movement | Kafr Qaddum, occupied Palestine

Abdul Rahman Yasser Shteiwi, 9 years old, shot in the head by the Israeli military in Kafr Quddum

An Israeli human rights group has proved that live fire was used by soldiers against the 9-year-old child who was shot in the head last Friday in Kafr Qaddum, exposing Israeli Military lies that none was used.

The report by B’Tselem, published yesterday, says that Abdul Rahman Shteiwi was shot with live ammunition during a protest in the West Bank town on July 12 “while sitting at the entrance of one of the homes on the edge of the village playing with a piece of wood.”

It reads: “Now hospitalised in critical condition, he is the latest victim of the reckless open-fire policy that allows soldiers to use live fire even when neither they nor anyone else is in any danger.”

Many people turned out for the weekly protest in Kafr Qaddum today, which has been held every Friday for the past 8 years, to call for justice for Abdul who is fighting for his life in Sheba Hospital near Tel Aviv.

At the demonstration, which was attended by leaders of the PLO, international observers and local and international media, Israeli soldiers bombarded protesters with rubber-coated steel bullets and tear gas canisters.

Paramedics from the Red Crescent told ISM that 40 protesters were treated for various injuries, 22 for rubber-coated steel bullet wounds and 18 for tear gas inhalation.

Ahead of today’s protest, a number of Palestinian politicians including PLO minister Walid Assaf declared that they will bring the case to the International Criminal Court (ICC). “The blood of our children is not cheap!” he said. “We will follow Netanyahu and the Israeli war minister in the ICC.”

The Israeli Military still insists that no live ammunition was used last week, despite the mounds of evidence stacking up against their hollow claims.

Kafr Qaddum resident, Riyad Shtaiwi, was sitting under an olive tree with his two children when he witnessed the shooting of Abdul last Friday.

He told ISM through an interpreter that he saw soldiers at the top of the mountain, “taking the position of sniping by lying on the ground,” just before Abdul was hit.

“When I saw the soldiers on the top of a mountain aiming and taking the position of sniping and shooting by lying himself on the ground towards us, I feel real danger,” he said. “I decided to move away from this place and to speak with the child who was opposite me, to take him away from this danger. Before I reach the child, one of the soldiers, the one who was taking the position of shooting, he shot one live ammunition. At this moment I look around myself at my children and then I saw the child on the ground and the blood.”

Mr Shtaiwi ran towards Abdul to pick him up. While he carried the unconscious boy in his arms, soldiers fired 3 or 4 more rounds of live bullets towards them which hit a metal gate just behind.

B’Tselem claims that Abdul’s severe injury is the “direct result of the open-fire policy implemented by the military in the Occupied Territories.”

“This policy illegally and without any justification permits the use of live fire against Palestinians who are not endangering anyone,” the report continues. “The policy remains in force despite the fact that it has resulted in hundreds of Palestinian deaths and thousands of injuries.”

This was not the first time the military has fired live ammunition at protesters in Kafr Qaddum in an attempt to suppress the popular struggle of the town’s residents. In January alone, five protesters were hit with live bullets including a child in the neck who was in a critical condition.

For eight years, the residents have protested against the closure of the town’s main road to Nablus by the military in the early 2000s. The blocked road is now exclusively used by illegal settlers, forcing Palestinians to take the longer road which has impacted their economy.

UPDATE: Over 100 bullet fragments in brain of Palestinian child shot in northern West Bank

July 15 | International Solidarity Movement | Kafr Qaddum, occupied Palestine

Israeli soldiers shot a Palestinian child in the head with live ammunition on Friday during a protest against settlement expansion in the West Bank town of Kafr Qaddum, Palestine.

Abdul Rahman Yasser Shteiwi, 9*, was rushed to Rafidia Hospital in Nablus at around 3pm and was operated on immediately. On Saturday, Palestinian doctors told ISM that a scan of the boy’s brain showed over 100 bullet fragments lodged in his head. Yesterday Abdul was moved to Tel Hashomer hospital near Tel Aviv.

10-year-old Palestinian boy undergoing surgery in Rafidia hospital. Nablus

Rafidia hospital’s head of neurosurgery, Othman Othman, who operated on the 10-year-old for three and a half hours, claimed that the bullet fired at Abdul was a live round.

Speaking through an interpreter, he said: “He had a penetrating injury in the frontal lobe on the right side. The injury was severe and there are more than 100 fragments.

“This is not a rubber bullet; this is a metal bullet. A rubber bullet will not enter because it does not have a sharp head. This is something that had a sharp head.”

Mr Othman added that he believes the bullet fired at Abdul was “not a normal bullet.”

“I have seen many gunshot wounds and they only break into a few pieces. Over 100 fragments is not normal.”

This disputes claims by the Israeli military that no live ammunition was fired during the Friday protest.

ISM activists also found a 5.56 bullet case on the ground where protesters had been standing some 15 minutes before. The case was hot to the touch suggesting it had been fired that afternoon. Dozens more bullet cases were also found by villagers following the protest.

The 9-year-old remains in critical condition, and is awaiting further scans. “This injury is a severe traumatic brain injury. He is in critical condition and there is a lot of blood in his brain,” Mr. Othman said. “We can’t yet say what is the real injury to the brain.”

The leader of the popular resistance committee in Kafr Qaddum, Murad Shtaiwi, told ISM: “I don’t have words to explain the sadness I feel.

“The army practised a very big fault if they think that what they did today will make the demonstration go down. No, never.”

Bullets and bullet casings found after the protest in Kafr Qaddum

Protester’s arm injured by rubber-coated steel bullets

Rubber-coated steel bullets were also fired at the crowds, as well as sound bombs. At least two people were injured by rubber bullets, including a child who was shot in the arm and a man who was also hit in the arm.

Mr Shtaiwi added: “I want to send a message to all the international community; if you care about the rights of children, come and protect them and share what happened today with the rest of the world.”

Another demonstration was held the following day on Saturday, July 13, at 4pm in Kafr Qaddum. One protester suffered a minor injury after he was shot in the stomach with a rubber-coated steel bullet by occupation soldiers.

The town has held weekly protests for 9 years against the closure of the main road to the city of Nablus due to the expansion of nearby settlements. Protesters are regularly met with tear gas and rubber-coated steel bullets fired by heavily armed occupation forces.

Updated Monday, July 15, 2019

*Correction: Abdul is 9-years-old and not 10 as stated previously in report.

Protesters break through replica of Apartheid Wall in Bethlehem symbolic run

Protesters gather for symbolic marathon near Apartheid Wall in Bethlehem

June 19 2019 | International Solidarity Movement | Bethlehem, occupied Palestine

Hundreds of people gathered in cities across the Palestinian Territories and England on Sunday June 15, to participate in a symbolic marathon in honour of the international right to freedom of movement.

The project, called “Small Park Big Run’, takes place every year thanks to the cooperation between solidarity groups in Sheffield and the Palestinian regions of Gaza, Nablus, Ramallah and Bethlehem. Two ISMers joined the run in Bethlehem, organised by Aida refugee camp community centre Aida Youth Centre, where the event was happening for the first time.

The purpose of the race was to raise awareness about Palestinian oppression focusing on Israel’s flagrant violation of the Palestinian people’s human right to freedom of movement, to raise money for local groups and to condemn the “Deal of the Century,” – the US’s new Middle East ‘peace’ deal devised by Trump’s radical Zionist son-in-law Jared Kushner.

In Bethlehem, the race kicked off near the infamous “300 checkpoint” where thousands of Palestinians are forced to queue as early as 3am every morning to make it to their jobs in Israel on time. According to the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs, it is just one of the 700 road obstacles which controls Palestinian movement within the West Bank and one of its 140 checkpoints. Protesters ran past another important symbol of the control and the oppression that the Palestinian Territories face everyday – the 708km Israeli West Bank Barrier.

Protesters finished the race by breaking through a replica of the Division Wall – a symbolic finish line – at the entrance to Aida Refugee Camp.

People walk over the broken pieces of a replica of the separation wall, used as a symbolic finish line

Freedom of movement is guaranteed under international human rights law, which fundamentally stipulates that everyone shall be free to leave any country, including his or her own, and that no one shall be “arbitrarily deprived of the right to enter his or her own country”. The importance of this right results from the fact that this is a prerequisite to the exercise of other human rights, such as the rights to family, health and education.

Israel’s restrictions on the freedom of movement in the West Bank includes checkpoints, roadblocks and permit restrictions, as well as the Division Wall it has constructed along the West Bank side of the pre-1967 border. The Society of St. Yves, a legal centre based in Jerusalem, reports that: “Combined, the application of military law and control of the issuance of permits have the effect of segregating and oppressing Palestinian nationals and relegating them to second-class citizens in their native homeland”.

Other threats that reduce the right of movement is the presence of settlements officially established by the Israeli government after 1967, which is considered illegal by the international community, and the building of new outposts without government approval and so considered illegal even for Israeli law.

Palestinians hold pictures of Trump to condemning his ‘”Deal of the Century” in Bethlehem

ISM Week of Action Against Eurovision

May 2019 | International Solidarity Movement| occupied Palestine

ISM’s week of action against the Eurovision in Tel Aviv In coordination with the Palestinian Boycott National Committee (BNC) and The Palestinian campaign for the Academic and Cultural Boycott of Israel (PACBI) and in collaboration with Israeli anti zionist groups has been a huge success! From before the opening ceremony until the Eurovision final there was not a Eurvison event that was not protested and their was no coverage of the Eurovision that did not at least mention the calls to Boycott the competition in Tel Aviv often bringing images from the protests that took place on the ground.

Photo by Activestills

The Week of action started rocking the Eurovision boat before it began. The international media reported on the campaign announcement: “Pro-Palestinian activists have urged supporters to “join us in disrupting Israel’s latest PR stunt” and to participate in a ‘Week of Action Against Eurovision in Tel Aviv’. The Israeli authorities were quick to state that it would not allow the activists in. The activists were prepared to remain in Israeli custody if they were denied and thus highlighting Israel’s policy of denial of access to Palestinians, their family members and human rights defenders to Palestine. But, we managed to enter!

While preparations for the international contest where underway Israel committed yet another massacre against the besieged population of the Gaza strip. Bombing the densely populated strip from the air, tanks and gun boats, Israeli soldiers killed to 25 including a family – mother, father and 4-month old baby, and two pregnant women and a twelve year old child. On May 5th, with bombs still raining on Gaza, Eurovision events and the protests against them began. Activists descended on Tel Aviv, postering pictures of slain Palestinians in the city centre, graffitiing slogans and opening a banner calling to Liberate the Gaza ghetto at a Eurovision event.

From the day that the Eurovision opened on the 15th of May we were there Blindfolded and handcuffed at the Eurovision in Tel Aviv to remind the participants of the stolen lives of Palestinian political prisoners in Israeli prisons. We projected images of the occupation taken by activestills, during one Eurovision party and held a die-in at another in solidarity with the Palestinian Great march of Return. And hung posters at the venue to bring the faces of the children murdered in Gaza to these parties were held on the beach the land of the ethnically cleansed Palestinian village of Manshiya in solidarity with the great march of return. At the semi final and ISM activists unfurled a banner inside the venue that read “We dare to dream an end of Apartheid”

We also brought our banners and joined forces with Israeli Anti Zionists at their protests on the 14th at the Eurovision finals on the 18th and highlighted the alternative events organised by our Palestinian comrades across Palestine in Haifa, Gaza, and Bethlehem as part of the International “Global vision.”

Soldiers invade Al-Khalil; fire live ammunition at protesters

April 5, 2019 | International Solidarity Movement, Al-Khalil team | Al-Khalil (Hebron), occupied Palestine

Israeli occupation forces storm into Al-Khalil and fire live ammunition at protesters after bombarding the city with tear gas, stun grenades, and rubber-coated steel bullets.

Around 1pm soldiers invaded Al-Khalil through checkpoint 56. The soldiers fired stun grenades at protesters. Immediately following the stun grenades, the soldiers fired tear gas into the street–forcing the protesters and press personnel to move. As the tear gas disappeared, protests continued. The Israeli soldiers then proceeded to shoot protestors with rubber-coated steel bullets while continuing to fire stun grenades at protesters.

At one point the soldiers switched from rubber-coated steel bullets to live ammunition. For approximately an hour soldiers fired live ammunition and stun grenades at Palestinian protesters until eventually retiring behind the checkpoint, which was closed to the public at this time.

The protests arose again and the soldiers fired several rounds of tear gas and shot rubber-coated steel bullets. During the invasion they also threw stun grenades at the press.