Tag: Hebron

Israeli forces arrest 27 youth in Beit Ommar

11th March 2009, Beit Ommar village, Hebron region: 27 youth arrested during ongoing closure of Beit Ommar village
27 residents of Beit Ommar village in the Hebron District of the southern West Bank, have been arrested by Israeli forces while the village remains under curfew with a large-scale military operation taking place.

At approximately 12am on the morning of 11 March 2009, over ten army vehicles, including personnel carriers, invaded the village, with an army bulldozer closing the most of the roads leading out of Beit Ommar.

Dozens of soldiers then began entering houses at random and arbitrarily arrested young men. One of the arrested includes an independent journalist and volunteer for B’Tselem, the Israeli human rights organization.

This recent military invasions comes at great cost for the villagers of Beit Ommar. Today, no one can go to work or school. I have seen the smashed up homes where soldiers have destroyed property and urinated. Twenty-seven boys have now been arrested, seemingly at random, and taken to an unknown location. The military harassment of Beit Ommar has become a regular occurance. – Bekah Wolf, American activist living in Beit Ommar – Palestine Solidarity Project

A curfew has been imposed since 4am, with residents prevented from leaving their homes. Several houses entered by Israeli forces have been damaged. Soldiers have been seen breaking windows and cabinets, and they have urinated in the room of at least one residence.

The army has also passed around a letter telling residents that any youth who threw stones at the army would be arrested.

This most recent invasion comes after a week of almost nightly raids on Beit Ommar. On the night of 4 March, 15-year-old Mehdi Said Abu Ayyash was shot in the head with live ammunition and he remains in a coma in serious condition.

Israeli military invasions intensify in southern West Bank

February 27th, 2009.

In the early hours on February 24th, Israeli Forces invaded the villages of Sa’ir and Idhna, in the Hebron district of the southern West Bank, and arrested four men. More than ten jeeps entered Idhna at approximately 12:30am. Around 40 soldiers surrounded the house of Hatem Mahmoud Al-Kharuf, and ordered all the family members outside. They then proceeded to search the house, turning everything upside down and smashing a bedroom wardrobe. A shared Taxi (service) owned by Hatem’s brother that was parked outside was also ransacked, with the soldiers tearing off large pieces of the interior and inexplicably breaking open the airbags. The taxi was just recently bought, and the total cost of the damages exceeds $2,800 USD.service-02_24-idhna

Soldiers then arrested Hatem Al-Kharuf, a 37-year-old retired UN schoolteacher. Hatem was handcuffed, blindfolded, and taken away in an army jeep. He is currently being held in Gush Etzion on unknown charges. Israeli Forces withdrew from Idhna at 3:00am.

Around 20 jeeps of soldiers also invaded Sa’ir village at 6:00am. The army fired live ammunition in the streets and ransacked at least three houses. Three residents of Sa’ir were arrested, including Mohammad Mahmoud Jaradet, a 28-year-old construction worker. The soldiers told Mohammad that they were looking for his brother. When they could not find him, they arbitrarily arrested Mohammad in his place.

Additionally, for the past week Israeli forces have been entering Beit Ommar in the northern Hebron District daily, firing indiscriminately in the streets for hours at a time. One young man was shot one week ago in the leg with live ammunition. He was taken to hospital in Ramallah where he remains because of serious complications.

Israeli soldiers open fire on Hebron demonstrators, injuring 17

Ma’an News Agency

Hebron – Ma’an – Seventeen Palestinians were injured when Israeli soldiers opened fire on Palestinian demonstrators in Israeli-occupied Hebron on Friday.

Confrontations between Israeli troops and stone-throwing Palestinian youths took place on Tareq-Ibin Ziad Street, which is in a section of Hebron under the full control of the Israeli military. Medical sources said that the soldiers used live ammunition.

Medics at Muhammad Ali Hospital in Hebron said that eight children were among the 17 treated for bullet and shrapnel wounds. Most of the injuries were on the demonstrators’ lower bodies, except for two people who were wounded above the waist. Three people were shot with rubber-coated metal bullets.

Massive demonstrations have taken place in Hebron after prayer every Friday since the beginning of the Israeli assault on the Gaza Strip. In mid-January one demonstrator was killed by Israeli fire.

The demonstrations have also seen the largest number of Hamas supporters openly showing their presence in the West Bank, which is ruled by the Fatah-dominated Palestinian Authority (PA). The PA however has no authority in the Israeli-controlled H2 section of Hebron, which is where the demonstrations have been.

Huge demonstration in Hebron in solidarity with Gaza

Another massive demonstration occurred in the Abu Sneineh neighborhood of Hebron on Friday. This marked the third consecutive imgp2849weekly demonstration protesting the Israeli occupation and the atrocities in Gaza. The crowd numbered around 2500 people, somewhat smaller than the two previous weeks when the Israeli attack on Gaza was in progress.

The demonstration began after the Friday prayers at the Wasaya mosque in the Abu Sneineh neighborhood. Israeli police and soldiers had erected roadblocks around the area prior to the demonstration in an attempt to limit access to the protestors.

Seven Palestinians were arrested including two directly charged with stone throwing. Israeli soldiers entered several Palestinian residences and took up positions on rooftops to shoot at the demonstrators.

There were 20 injuries reported requiring medical intervention including 15 people suffering from tear gas inhalation, 4 people shot with rubber coated steel bullets, and one man seriously injured by a dum dum (exploding) live bullet. This man was shot in the upper leg, fragmenting the bone in several places and destroying all of the muscle tissue in the area of the wound. He was transferred from the local hospital to Al-Mizaan Hospital in Hebron.

Despite the lower numbers of protestors this week, the demonstration was successful in forcing a retreat of the Israeli forces in several instances, including the stopping of an advance of Israeli jeeps with a massive barrage of stones thrown from the street and from the surrounding rooftops.

imgp2879Israeli forces fired large amounts of tear gas and rubber coated bullets and some live ammunition. Some of the tear gas canisters were of the type that have been used in recent weeks at Ni’lin village and other locations. These canisters are much heavier and of a much higher velocity than the normal canisters, posing a risk of serious injury or death to anyone hit directly by a canister.

On the previous Friday, a 17 year old man was killed by Israeli soldiers during the demonstration in the Abu Sneineh area of Hebron.

Summary execution in southern West Bank

Palestine News Network

During the killing of over 1,000 Palestinians in the Gaza Strip and the demonstrations against them the occupation remains in the West Bank. This week a family lost their father in Hebron.

Yasser Saqr Ismail Tameizi had his six year old son with him. They were working on their land in Ithna Village, west of the city.

It was Tuesday morning and the 35 year old farmer’s death served as a violent reminder, commented the Al Haq Human Rights Organization, “that even as Israel engages in horrific and illegal attacks against the Gaza Strip, its oppressive occupation policies continue to undermine the lives of Palestinians in the West Bank.”

Tameizi had an Israeli-issued permit to reach his lands that the Wall had divided him from. Two eyewitnesses were in an adjacent field grazing their cattle and Tameizi and his six year old were 500 meters east of the Wall which is incomplete in this area of Hebron. Instead of a 10 meter concrete wall, it consists of barbed wire fencing that cuts through the village.

On 13 January at 11:00 am four Israeli soldiers entered Tameizi’s land through a gate in the Wall. They told the little boy to leave, which he did, and one of the soldiers kicked the father. Tameizi made a move to defend himself and his son and two of the soldiers knocked him to the ground and ties his hands behind his back. He was held down on his back by two soldiers sitting on his stomach while the others watched.

At noon an Israeli military jeep with four soldiers entered Tameizi’s land. After 15 minutes the man was thrown, blindfolded and still handcuffed, into the back of the jeep.

The eyewitnesses report, “The jeep then moved toward the gate, with four soldiers inside and the other four walking behind it.”

At 1:30 an APC, Armored Personnel Carrier, arrived and still on the side of the Wall facing the Israeli boundaries it left after 10 minutes with the jeep driving quickly to Tarqumiya Checkpoint.

The Palestinian Red Crescent Society reports that its Hebron branch office received a phone call at approximately 3:00 pm in which Israeli soldiers told them to pick up Tameizi who was still in their custody.

He was dead before reaching the hospital.

The 35 year old man had been shot and died of the bullet wound to his stomach which exited through his lower back. The Red Crescent said it indicates he was shot at point blank range most likely while sitting down by someone above him aiming down.

Ramallah’s Al Haq referred today to the severe violation of international law, the Covenant on Civil and Political Rights and the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, in addition to tenets of the Geneva Conventions and United Nations resolutions, as a “summary execution.”