Tag: Hebron

50 arrested during pre-dawn sweeps in Hebron

21 August 2011 | International Solidarity Movement, West Bank

Just before dawn today, Sunday August 21, IDF forces raided the towns of Hebron and Bethlehem in the West Bank. Preliminary reports indicate that up to 250 people have been arrested in Hebron, including at least 70 Hamas leaders. Twitter feeds on the ground speak of occupation forces closing all entrances to the city and stationing themselves in the streets. Later reports finalized the count to approximately 50 Palestinians being arrested, as others were released.

No statement has been released by Israel concerning the reason for the raids and arrests. A group of ISM activists stationed in Hebron have rushed to the scene, as have ISM activists in Nablus.

At approximately 1:30 am, 40 soldiers raided four family homes on Ein  Sarah St.  alone and around. According to the International Middle East Media Center,over 100 military vehicles and jeeps entered Hebron from 4 entrances, and raided 6 villages in addition to Hebron City, breaking into homes and occupying the streets, from which Palestinian security services were conspicuously absent  The soldiers moved from home to home in  4 jeeps, a transport carrier (presumably for those arrested), 2 Land Rovers (thought to be Shabak) and two regular cars. Soldiers were carrying live ammunition but met no resistance to the arrests.

In one household they failed to find the person they were looking for so they arrested his 60 year old father instead.

B. Jabal , a local resident, described why he felt the arrests had taken place.  “This is collective punishment for the Palestinians in response to the recent shootings in Eilat.  We want peace, and our leaders want peace , but the Israelis keep killing and destroying our houses and destroying trees,” he said.

Gaza was surprisingly quiet tonight, given that it is has been under seige for the last 3 days; apparently, the occupation forces spent the night gearing up to sweep through the West Bank. So far, it looks like the only rationale behind the offensive may be the targeting of Hamas leaders, in retaliation for Thursday’s attacks in Eilat; this retaliatory gesture is surprising, however, since not a shred of evidence exists to tie Thursday’s attacks to Hamas.

Locals in Hebron also reported that a 17 year old Palestinian was run over and killed by a settler near the illegal settlement of Qiryat Arba.  Israeli forces also assaulted and detained a Palestinian man during a raid on the home of the Mufti of Bethlehem, in the refugee camp of Duheisha. So far, 2 Palestinians have been wounded by Israeli gunfire in Bethlehem. Details have yet to be confirmed.

“Price tag” campaign a pattern more than a phenomenon

15 August 2011 | International Solidarity Movement, West Bank

The so called “price tag” campaign is regarded to be a product of the illegal Israeli settlement of Yitzhar, yet the price tag to Israeli occupation and fanatical land grabbing is much more a general concept, aligned with the policy and practice of Israel let alone its illegal settlements. The “price tag” campaign, after all, is the settler pursuit to claim as much indigenous land while terrorizing Palestinians with arson, gunfire, vandalizing, and other forms of harassment resulting in even death. While Israelis may domestically see a difference between illegal settlers and the State, the Palestinian who loses self-autonomy and land ownership by military or by fanatical settlers never was able to tell the difference between what seems to be a mutual sharing of a national agenda.

The term “price tag campaign” is a so called phenomenon that comes as a reaction to the demolition of settler construction by Israel, with illegal settlers seeking revenge for such destruction on innocent, Palestinians of nearby villages. If Israel is destroying small structures within settlements, one might think it is taking a step towards stopping the settlement projects. Yet despite the illegal status of settlements, Israel continues to include them in official “national priority maps” with soldiers at hand to protect illegal pursuits at the cost of Palestinian rights and peace. Thus the price tag campaign is nothing more than a pattern in illegal Israeli occupation.

In mid-2010 illegal structures in the illegal settlement of Bay Ayen near the Palestinian village of Beit Ommar were destroyed by Israeli military. Settlers attacked the Safaa neighborhood of Beit Ommar in what became to be a systematic and regular pursuit to destroy groves with arson, damage buildings, and threaten the overall security of locals. When the Israeli military showed up during one particular instance, it arrived just as residents of the Palestinian village began to leave their homes to see what was going on.

The Israeli military fired tear gas and stun grenades at the Palestinians, injuring a number of residents while the assailants left protected and not apprehended

The Palestinian village of Burin can also attest to the relationship between Israeli military and Israeli settlers. In 2009 for example, a group of international observers saw about 50 settlers descend from their illegal settlement carrying rifles and assaulting the 13 members of Ghalib Najjar’s household. When the Israeli military showed up and allowed the settlers to leave without consequence, the military threatened the international observers from reporting or photographing the event. Snipers were positioned at the top of the family home, and international observers were threatened to be detained.

Islam Fakhuri  currently living in the H1 area of Hebron, also reveals the collaboration between settlers and Israeli military forces.

“My father had two shops – souvenior shops—on Shuhada Street In 2000 under the intifada, the army came into our house one day and they said they want to buy our house. I said, ‘this house is not for sale. We don’t want to sell our house to you, not to settlers.’

Fakhuri continued to describe what formulated to be settler and military collaboration.

“That night around 2am, they came back and set our house on fire. Two children of my family sleeping in one room died from the fire. And then the army came back and forced us to move out. You see, my house is empty now. Everyone has the same story like mine. You can speak to Abd Sadr. The children from his family died from that, too.”

He pointed to a building nearby to illustrate his experiences.

“You see the building up there, it was the office for lawyers and doctors, and now settlers live there. Beit Haddasah and Abram Avinu used to be a hospital for Palestinians. No more.”

These violent actions occur  almost weekly, outlining various villages throughout the West Bank with some Israelis even calling on the Israeli military to act more responsibly. But how can one ask a military to act responsibly when its State continues to violate international law and disregard Palestinian rights?

Whether one is looking at Nabi Saleh,  the Jordan Valley, Hebron, Sheikh Jarrah,  and the places erased of names and labeled in the language of imperialists—it is clear.

The colonial state has merely birthed violent colonialists who take it upon themselves to do what the Israeli military traditionally does. And thus, to the Palestinian both are the same.

One wears fatigues, but the two carry guns.

Palestinians protest expansion of Havat Ma’on Outpost

19 July 2011 | Christian Peace Makers Team

At-Tuwani: Palestinians protest expansion of Havat Ma’on Outpost; Israeli Military responds with violence

On 18 July 2011 around 6:35 p.m. three settlers attacked two members of Operation Dove and one member of the Christian Peacemaker Teams (CPT) with clubs and stones in the Meshakha valley outside of At-Tuwani in the South Hebron Hills. The settlers came out of the Havat Ma’on outpost, covering their faces with scarves and then ran with clubs toward two Palestinian shepherds who were grazing their sheep in a valley nearby. 
 The masked settlers could not catch the shepherds who, alerted to the approaching danger, left the vicinity.  The attackers then turned and ran toward the internationals, who had entered the valley to intervene and document the attack.  The settlers then made threats and attempted to strike the internationals as they filmed the settlers’ actions.  When the internationals retreated, the settlers begin throwing stones, narrowly missing their targets.

No Palestinians or internationals were injured in the incident. 
 This incident follows a similar attack of 13 July 2011 where three settler youth attacked Palestinian shepherds.  Five attacks by settlers from the outpost of Havat Ma’on against internationals and Palestinians have occurred within the last 30 days.

Operation Dove and Christian Peacemaker Teams have maintained an international presence in At-Tuwani and South Hebron Hills since 2004.

Additional photos of the incident are available here. (The unmasked men in the photos are the internationals)

Video of the incident is available here.

 

CPT: Israeli Army Destroys 9 Water Tanks in Palestinian Village

6 July 2011 | Christian Peacemaker Team, Hebron

Late Tuesday morning, around 11:30, a convoy of Israeli Army, civil administration, and border police arrived in the Palestinian village of Amniyr accompanying a flat bed truck with a front end loader and a backhoe. Israeli settlers having a picnic at the settlement outpost next to the Susiya archaeological site looked on as the army destroyed nine large tanks of water and a tent.

Amniyr is a small village of 11 families in the South Hebron Hills, just northeast of the Palestinian village of Susiya and the Israeli settlement of the same name. The village of shepherds and farmers, like most villages in the area, is totally dependent in the summer on tanks of water.

Nor does that water come cheap. Costs of transportation, due to the poor infrastructure in the area – Palestinians are normally not permitted to build roads in Area C of the West Bank and have restricted access to Israeli roads – mean the cost of water is much higher than normal. A cubic meter of water in the nearby town of Yatta costs 6 shekels. In Amniyr it cost 35. The tanks themselves cost 1000 shekels each, and each tank held 2 cubic meters of water, yielding a total of over 10,000 shekels in damage, which for many in the area is equivalent to a half year’s work.

This is the fifth demolition in Amniyr in the last year, according to village residents and Nasser Nawaja, a B’Tselem worker. One month ago the army destroyed 11 houses and two cisterns full of water. The cisterns had also been destroyed 5 months ago and rebuilt with the help of Israeli activists from Ta’ayush. The ruins of houses from previous demolitions are still present; broken stones and twisted metal. Located just south of the archaeological site of old Susiya, the Israeli government claims it is state land.

Ten of the families now sleep in Yatta and come during the day to tend to their olive and almond trees as they have no place to sleep and no water. One couple though has refused to move. Mohammed Hussain Jabour and his wife Zaffra refuse to leave. The morning after the demolition they were making tea on an open fire next to their tent. “I’ve been here with my father and our sheep since I was a little boy,” he said, with visible indignation. “Now I’m an old man. And now Israel tells me I can’t be here. I’m not leaving.”

“What are we supposed to do?” his wife Zaffra asked. “What will we drink? We can’t live without water.”

The demolition comes on the heels of the demolition of 6 tent homes and a toilet in the village of Bir al Eid, just two kilometers to the south, two weeks ago. Both incidents are the latest in a long history of demolitions of Palestinian homes and buildings in the area by the Israeli army, affecting both these villages and the villages of Susiya and nearby Imneizel.

15 year old injured after attack with stones in Hebron

30 June 2011 | International Solidarity Movement

On Sunday June 25, 15 year old Muhammed Jabari was attacked by settlers throwing stones in Hebron, causing injuries to his wrist and leg.

The land and house of the Jabari family is situated between the illegal settlements of Kiryat Arba and Givat Ha’avot in east Hebron, making the family exposed to harassment and attacks by settlers as reported previously. On Sunday settlers from Givat Ha’avot took one duck and four goslings from the land of the Jabari family, stealing them away to the illegal settlement. Muhammed and his younger brother were allowed by settler guards to go inside and get the birds.

Bystanders were prevented from filming by soldiers guarding the illegal settlement. They returned after they heard the 15 year old boy screaming in pain. Approximately seven teenage settlers threw stones at him, injuring his wrist and his leg.

No one interfered when the boy was attacked. At least one soldier was watching the attack, and there are several surveillance cameras covering the area. Additionally, thesite of the attack is about two minutes away from the Israeli police station of Kiryat Arba. Muhammed was taken to hospital after the attack.