9th January 2015 | International Solidarity Movement, Nablus team | Kufr Qaddum, Occupied Palestine
Dozens of demonstrators braved the rain today to protest the continued closure of the Kufr Qaddum’s main road to Nablus.
Photo by ISM
A peaceful march began at noon after prayers ended. Villagers, alongside Israeli and international activists, walked up Kafr Qaddam’s main street as soldiers looked on from about 100 metres away. Within minutes the first rounds of tear gas were fired. The wet weather and high winds only worsened the effects of the tear gas, which was blown in all directions, making it impossible to avoid.
A local organizer and Kufr Qaddam resident ended the demonstration by a call to all gathered (translated), “Even in the snow, even in the bad weather we will keep resisting, to open our road… The amount of people gathered today, even in this weather, shows how powerful we are.”
Villagers have been demonstrating every week for three years with one simple demand: to re-open the road that is the village’s main route to Nablus. The road has been closed for Palestinian access due to the neighbouring illegal Israeli settlement, Qedumin. Alternative routes add an extra 20 minutes onto the journey time to Nablus – a nuisance which costs both time and money and presents a real danger in emergency situations.
Despite the tear gas and Israeli military presence in the village, today’s demonstration will be seen by many as a “quiet” one. In recent weeks, the Israeli military have used live ammunition against demonstrators, injuring many.
Residents of Kufr Qaddum have made it clear that the resistance will continue.
20th December 2014 | International Solidarity Movement | Turmusaya, Occupied Palestine
Update 22 December:
Palestinian activists Mohammed Khatib and Jaffar Hamayel, both arrested on December 19 while peacefully demonstrating in Turmusaya, were released today, December 22, on bail of 7500 shekel each.
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Hundreds of Palestinian children, women, and men gathered at Turmusaya on Friday December 19th to complete the tree planting began by Palestinian Authority minister Ziad Abu Ein, who was killed by Israeli soldiers on Wednesday December 10th.
“Ziad was planning to plant olive trees on private Palestinian land near the illegal outpost of Adei Ad, but was violently prevented from reaching the site by the Israeli military who assaulted and killed him. We thought that after killing the minister, yesterday the military would allow us to plant trees peacefully but we found the same soldiers prepared to use even more violence against us,” Said human rights defender Abdullah Abu Rahmah.
“Despite the occupation forces’ violence, we planted trees in the place where Ziad had planned to plant them. Despite their violence, we will continue to struggle with the farmers whose land is stolen and the farmers who are prevented from cultivating their land by the occupation. ” Abu Rahmah was injured by a stun grenade that was thrown directly at him while he was planting an olive tree.
After praying near the spot where the minister was stopped by the army, protesters with olive trees climbed the hill to the site where Abu Ein had intended to plant trees. They began planting under a barrage of tear gas, stun grenades, and beatings by Israeli border police.
Mohammed Khatib
Two Palestinian activists, Mohammed Khatib and Jaffar Hamayel, Israeli citizen and ISM co-founder Neta Golan, and US citizen and activist Danika Padilla, were all violently arrested.
Danika Padilla, to the left, and Neta Golan as they are arrested.
In another area of the protest, youths responded to the military assault with stones as the army sprayed demonstrators with putrid water known as “skunk”, fired rubber-coated steel bullets and .22 caliber live ammunition. Many demonstrators suffered severe tear gas inhalation and two Palestinians sustained leg injuries from the .22 bullets.
The four arrested activists were taken to the Binyamin settlement police station. Neta and Danika were released in the early hours of this morning. Mohammed and Jaffar have been charged with assaulting and disturbing the border police and rioting after being told to disperse. They were taken to the Russian Compound police station in West Jerusalem where they remained in detention until their court date at Ofer military court.
11th December 2014 | International Solidarity Movement | Turmusaya, Occupied Palestine
Yesterday, an Israeli soldier killed Palestinian Authority (PA) Settlment minister, Ziad Abu Ein, at a non-violent demonstration in the village of Turmusaya.
ISM spoke to Abdallah Abu-Rahme, coordinator of the Bil’in Popular Committee and present at the demonstration yesterday. “Yesterday was International Human Rights Day and we were going to plant olive trees in Turmusaya, on Palestinian land close to an illegal settlement outpost. We were completely non-violent but Israeli soldiers had gathered and made a line blocking us from the land, not allowing anyone to pass. Ziad Abu Ein, was standing face-to-face with a soldier, who then hit him on the head and in the face. He fell to the ground and when we took him to the ambulance, they told us he was dead.”
Photo by Oren Ziv and Yotam Ronen/Activestills.org
Settlers have been attacking the village of Turmusaya for many years. Close to Turmusaya lies the illegal settlement outpost of Adei Ad and yesterday Yesh Din (an Israeli human rights organization) and four Palestinian villages, petitioned the Israeli High Court of Justice demanding that the military remove the illegal settlement outpost.
The petition argues that, “the outpost should be removed not only because it is constructed in part on private Palestinian land, but also because it constitutes a focus of criminal activities and grave violence against the Palestinian residents of the area with the goal of usurping their land and displacing its owners.” Wrote Yesh Din in a statement they released yesterday.
9th December 2014 | International Solidarity Movement, Nablus team | Kufr Qaddum, Occupied Palestine
Bashar, a journalist from Palestine TV, was shot in the left leg at Kufr Qaddum on Friday the 5th of December 2014.
The weekly demonstration aims to highlight the issue of the road that has been closed to Kafr Qaddum and demands for it to be reopened. The road is closed to Palestinians but connects several illegal Israeli settlements nearby. The road was once the Palestinians’ main route to the villages of Jit and Sarra, and to the city of Nablus. Residents of Kafr Qaddum and nearby villages must now use a 14 kilometer detour on badly paved roads through olive groves. This proves especially problematic in emergency situations when ambulances are trying to get patients to Nablus hospital. Kafr Qaddum villagers state that several people have died because of the longer ambulance trip.
Bashar has been going to the Kafr Qaddum demonstrations since they began four years ago. This particular one was a special demonstration in solidarity with Patrick, an Italian activist who was shot in the chest with a .22 caliber bullet the Friday before. The demonstration began peacefully with people holding Italian and Palestinian flags. A skunk water truck, a renowned demonstration repression technique, sprayed the people who were peacefully holding flags right at the beginning of the protest. Within ten minutes, Bashar had been shot in his left leg by an Israeli sniper.
The bullet used to shoot Bashar was an expanding bullet, often called a “dum-dum”. International law has declared their use illegal in war because they are so destructive. Bashar was shot by a sniper with a weapon that is only supposed to be used when soldiers are at mortal risk and skunk water, tear gas, rubber bullets, rubber coated steel bullets, and other nonlethal weapons have all proved ineffective. This is supposed to be the last weapon soldiers use before they shoot to kill with M16s. Witnesses say that Bashar was filming as he usually did when he was shot. He was no threat to the soldiers at all. Witnesses say that there were no people in front or behind him throwing stones.
Bashar was taken by ambulance to Nablus hospital. The X-ray showed that the dum-dum bullet did as it was designed to, breaking into many pieces when it entered his leg.
Bashar had an operation on the 6th of December, the day after he was shot, to take out most of the bullet fragments.
Doctors have decided to leavein some pieces for the time being because they are very close to veins and would be dangerous to remove. Bashar will be bed bound for two weeks until the decision is made, but his condition remains stable.
Within one week at Kufr Qaddum, three people were shot with lethal, live ammunition—two with .22 caliber bullets and one with a dum-dum. One was a journalist, another an international peace activist. None of them were any threat to the soldiers. So why, then, were they shot at? To create fear for all the people who are in solidarity with the Palestinians and who want to tell the world the story of what is happening here? To physically stop peaceful resistance using the most extreme repression techniques?
It will not work. Patrick and many other international, Palestinian and Israeli activists will continue to nonviolently resist the confiscation of their lands in Kufr Qaddum each week. Bashar will continue to report their stories to the world. The unnecessary use of violent repression techniques will only continue to delegitimize the illegal occupation of the Palestinian people.
6th December 2014 | International Solidarity Movement, Ramallah team | Nabi Saleh, Occupied Palestine
Yesterday, Israeli soldiers invaded Nabi Saleh during the Palestinian village’s weekly Friday demonstration and shot one young Palestinian in the leg with .22 caliber live ammunition. The soldiers also fired tear gas canisters at demonstrators, along with more rounds of the .22 live caliber bullets.
http://schwarczenberg.com/
“At one point, after the boy had been shot, a soldier fired three tear gas canisters straight at internationals and Palestinians who were just standing there, trying to see what was going on up the road,” recalled one ISM activist present at the scene. “He [the soldier] was quite close to us, and could easily see that no one was throwing any stones. The canisters landed no more than a few meters away.”
http://schwarczenberg.com/
The young Palestinian who was shot is between seventeen and eighteen years old; he was rushed away from the scene and taken to a hospital for treatment. Nabi Saleh has been suffering from a spate of violence recently at the hands of Israeli forces, who shot three Palestinians including 38-year-old Nariman Tamimi at a demonstration two weeks ago and 14-year-old Ahmed Barghouti last Friday.
The Kufr Qaddum weekly demonstrations have been met with similar violence. Last week a Palestinian youth and an Italian ISM volunteer were both shot with .22 live ammunition in the chest. During yesterday’s protest a Palestinian journalist was shot in the leg with a .22 live bullet.
