November 7th 2012 | International Solidarity Movement, West Bank
Several olive trees and one apricot tree were destroyed on the morning of November 5th in a section of Khalil (Hebron) called Jales Mount, which is near the illegal settlement of Kiryat Arba.
Rashed Zaroo showed the damage to internationals that afternoon. He explained that the land is owned by his father and uncle Fayez, before that his grandfather acquired the land in the early twentieth century. The trees were planted forty years prior and were some of the strongest in a large grove that produced olives and fruit. Five months ago Shakel Zaroo was attacked and gassed by settlers that he caught damaging his property. In addition five hundred square meters of the Zaroo family land was confiscated to build the Route 60 settlers highway.
The neighboring families’ land has seen even more devastation, the Abu Rmela and Abo Sunina families had approximately 400 olive trees burned by settlers last year. The land was so unsightly that the Israeli government brought heavy equipment to remove the debris and then redistribute the uneven ground caused by the massive uprooting.
These practices come under the protection of the Israeli army. The illegal settlers who live in Hebron are of the most dangerous fanatics in all of the West Bank.
There is a spiritual link between these trees and the Palestinians and the right to live with dignity on their land has been violated by the occupying forces. The trees are rooted in this land both physically and culturally.
Just below the illegal settlement of Kiryat Arba, situated on the the eastern outskirts of Al Khalil (Hebron) is the Palestinian area of ar-Ras.
A quick online search of the Israeli settlement of Kiryat Arba provides general knowledge on the founding history and how it has been subject to Palestinian resistance since 1981 but fails to inform the reader of the consequences for the indigenous Palestinians living nearby the relatively large (ca. 7000 inhabitants) settlement. Nor will one find written that such colonies are considered illegal by international law as confirmed by the International Court of Justice. Nor of the Ibrahimi Mosque massacre in 1994 which was committed against Palestinians by an Israeli settler from the same area.
Hebron residents regularly speak with the International Solidarity Movement about constant violent attacks by the settlers, land expropriation by Israeli policies, lack of freedom of movement and the requirement of special permits for car use, lack of running water, and demolitions.
Demolitions
In 2006, Palestinian landlord Fayiz Arajar began the construction of a large building intended to house a dozen shops and several families. The building is formidably situated, overlooking the olive grove of the ar-Ras area and the distant white houses of Al Khalil, flickering in the heat.
In 2007, as the project was nearly completed, Israeli settlers occupied the building. Subsequent to a high court decision to evict them, settlers from across the West Bank gathered in the house ready to defend their illegal takeover of the building. The eviction deadline was set to December 4, 2007 by the high court.
The week leading to the deadline was tense. Israeli settlers vandalized the Palestinian cemetery, burned Palestinian cars, and attacked Palestinian houses. The escalation in such attacks came due to the arrival of thousands of illegal settlers in support of the squatters. They succeeded in fighting the eviction force. Israeli authorities simply refrained from further attempts to remove them and, as seen before, allowed the story to twist from that of property theft to a question of security (of the settlers). In recent years, Israel has even decided to erect a military checkpoint for Palestinian pedestrians in the interest of ‘protecting’ the settlers.
Muhammed Al-Jabari ‘Abu Naim’ and his family live in a house about 100 metres from the occupied building. On May 28 of this year, they began to build an extra floor ontop of their house. The family of 15 members needed more space.
Settlers from a nearby recently occupied house repeatedly attacked the building project underway by Abu Naim. Subsequently, Abu Naim was banned by Israeli authorities from continuing construction.
With reference to the Oslo accords (Annex 1, article XII) Palestinians are not allowed to build within 50 metres of security roads. In Abu Naim’s case, a security road was announced with the construction of a new military checkpoint in the area. The legal value of Abu Naim’s construction permit was overruled although his house is far from the 50 meter no-construction zone. The land on which the house was built 14 years ago has belonged to the Al-Jabari family since before the Israeli occupation in 1967.
For now, the mid-construction upper floor is left as an empty shell without windows or doors. Israeli bulldozers are on stand by to demolish the entire house should Abu Naim continue construction.
Prevention and annexation of resources
The Dana family is forced to pull up 100+ liters of water per day from this well as a result of Israeli policies preventing them from filling their water tanks – click to see more photos
Across the olive grove and by Kiryat Arba’s barbed wire fence lives Kayid Dana and his brothers. Another stunning view embraces you from just outside their house, disrupted only by a looming Israeli watchtower. Most of the occupied West Bank is spotted with these grey towers. Watching from their windows, the ever present occupation, reminding Palestinians that privacy is a luxury that few, if any, enjoy.
The Dana family has been living on the same land for the past 50 years. In 1958, the Israeli authorities repetitively offered them money to leave the house and make room for the growing illegal settlement. The family refused and nonetheless Israeli forces bulldozed half of their garden.
As of June 24, the Dana family has been without water. Israeli authorities prevented water trucks from entering the area to refill their water tanks. As a result, Kavid and his family are relegated to pump water from an unsanitary well outside their home. This is where they encounter the next problem: water is only available for a couple of hours each day. This is not enough to supply their 4 camels (100 liters/day) and the most basic household needs.
North of the Dana family home, through the olive groves, lives the Abdul Hay family (Abu Hossni). Their windows are fenced to prevent Israeli settlers from shattering the glass with the stones they throw. On December 4, the family was subject to a vicious attack that left 3 with dumdum (expanding bullet) wounds. Dumdum bullets are a type of live ammunition that enter the body, expand, and cause permanent injuries or death. Although dumdum bullets have been known to be used by Israeli settlers, they are illegal according to international law.
Jamal Abu Saifan, who lives in the area, captured the incident on his camera and explains how a lightly injured Israeli settler was choppered away 15 minutes after his injury, whereas the 3 Palestinians wounded by gunfire, one critically, waited 3 hours for an ambulance.
The ambulance attempting to reach them was stopped and denied entry to the area by Israeli forces.
An ultimate goal: ethnic cleansing
Unfortunately, settler attacks are far from rare and have been occurring since Kiryat Arba was established in 1968. The purpose of these violent attacks, and the army violence and policies that accompany them, are not only to injure people and destroy their lands. That is only a strategic measure to reach an ultimate goal: the ethnic cleansing of Palestine.
The next step by Kiryat Arba is the construction of a new road which will divide the vital Palestinian olive groves down the middle. The road will be inaccessible to Palestinians, not only preventing Palestinians from tending to their trees on the other side, but annexing further land, expropriating an economic necessity, and making life more difficult for the indigenous Palestinians.
Despite the collection of circumstances to make life difficult, all the families in the area have made the choice to remain on their land despite the uncertainty and pressures of their everyday life under Israeli occupation.
Markus Fitzgerald is a volunteer with the International Solidarity Movement (name has been changed).
Name: Izat J. Date of Incident: 10 March 2012 Age: 16 Location: Hebron, occupied West Bank Nature of Incident: Settler/soldier violence/detention
On 10 March 2012, a 16-year-old boy from Hebron is attacked by an Israeli border policeman and then detained at Kiryat Arba’s police station after his family’s mule cart is stolen by settlers.
“I live in the old city of Hebron, about 100 metres from the Ibrahimi Mosque [burial site of Abraham],” says 16-year-old Izat. “There is an Israeli checkpoint about 30 metres from us, and the settlers who live in the settlement of Kiryat Arba use the street in front of our house to go to the shrine.”
At around 11:00 am on Saturday, 10 March 2012, “my mother looked out the window and saw around 10 settlers stealing my father’s mule cart,” explains Izat. “There were soldiers at the checkpoint and in the street but they stood by and did not intervene.”
Izat rushed outside and saw that the settlers had left the cart in the street near the soldiers. His father was arguing with the soldiers because he wanted to take the cart back to the house, but the soldiers would not allow him until the settlers were finished with their Saturday prayers. “That could be at around 8:00 pm,” says Izat, “so I started arguing with the soldiers and I told them we would not leave without the mule cart.”
A border policeman standing at the checkpoint suddenly approached and started beating Izat. “Without any prior warning,” says Izat, “he started punching me in the face and knocked me down. Then, he kicked me hard in the head, chest and legs, and called me ‘Arab trash ‘ and other names. I was shouting in pain and trying to get up, but he kept kicking me while I was still lying on the ground. […] My mouth was bleeding.”
Another police officer arrived at the scene and ordered the policeman to stop beating Izat. “Why did you hit the boy? It’s against the rules,’” the officer said to the policeman. “After that they tied my hands behind my back very tightly with two plastic cords. It was very painful. They did the same to my father and my cousin,” says Izat.
Izat, his father and his cousin were taken to the police station inside the settlement of Kiryat Arba. Their hands were untied and they were taken for interrogation. “The interrogator asked me about the incident and I told him about the settlers and the argument we had with the soldiers,” recalls Izat. “I also told him that the policeman had beaten me hard. […] The interrogator said he had spoken to the border policeman who assaulted me, and that the policeman said that I had pushed and insulted him first. I told him that was not true; that the policeman assaulted me as soon as he arrived at the scene, before we even spoke.”
After interrogating Izat, his father and his cousin, the interrogator told them that the three of them were under arrest until the following day. “He said we were under arrest based on the statement of the border policeman, who accused me of insulting him and pushing him first,” says Izat.
Izat’s father begged the officer to let Izat go so he could go to the hospital. After consulting with his superior, the officer agreed to release Izat on 500 shekels bail. “I was taken to ‘Alia Hospital,” says Izat. “They gave me first aid and treated my wounds. Luckily, I did not have any internal injury. I only sustained bruises to my head and shoulders, and an injury in my mouth.”
Izat’s father filed a complaint against the border policeman who assaulted Izat, and was released later that night. His cousin, however, was detained in Etzion interrogation centre for eight days. Izat’s trial in a military court has been scheduled for September 2012.
11 March 2012 | International Solidarity Movement, West Bank
On March 9 2012, 6 volunteers of International Solidarity Movement were walking down Shuhada Street near Checkpoint 55 at approximately 11 AM, when drunk settlers attacked the group and injured one international volunteer.
About 5 drunk male settlers began to scream at and surround the internationals, yelling “keffiyah,” the traditional Palestinian scarf, that two internationals were wearing. Settlers were visibly carrying bottles of alcohol.
The drunk settlers shoved one woman from the back and then threw wine on her.
At the point the group began filming the settlers continued to hit, shove and try to grab the cameras of all 6 people. A police car drove by and did not stop the attack. One settler, wearing a dinosaur tail costume on his back put a towel on his face before trying to grab the camera of a Canadian ISM volunteer and then punched a British ISM woman in the face. They then fled shouting.
The British woman fell to the ground and dropped her camera, and another settler picked it up. The ISM volunteers walked up to 5 or 6 Israeli soldiers sitting about 50 yards ahead and told them what happened.
They laughed and said the internationals had brought it upon themselves by wearing keffiyehs. The internationals then walked to a police car parked at the next junction. While they were explaining what happened, settler Anat Cohen came up to the internationals and police screaming in Hebrew, and then slapped a Canadian ISM woman on the arm, in front of the police. The police then sent this woman to retrieve the camera.
They told the internationals that this woman was the “head of the settlers” and that they had a “special relationship with her.” “We do her favours and she does us favours,” they said.
The camera was not returned so the internationals attempted to file a complaint at the Israeli police station near the mosque, but were told to go to the Kiryat Arba police station. When the British woman asked for a police escort they said to take the bus (motioning to the settler bus station).
A police report was filed at Kiryat Arba but was only in Hebrew so the Candian ISM woman and the British woman refused to sign these statements. The police have instructed them to bring in the film footage after Shabbat.
The attack comes following weeks of warning and aggression towards photojournalists and activists with cameras by Israeli military and police, which have stated to internationals that Israeli law forbids the photography of their operations, or rather, their breach of international law and human rights.
Activists have received these warnings for weeks now, and today’s attack comes parallel to the deliberate targeting by Israeli military of journalists and activists with cameras, by shooting tear gas canisters and bullets directly at them at most West Bank demonstrations.
About a month ago, Reporters without Borders published this statement regarding these warnings and threats.
While this attack is an escalation against internationals in the region, and while it is evident that the Israeli military and illegal settlers are collaborating in attacking Palestinians and internationals, International Solidarity Movement will not desist from bringing proof of Israeli aggression through pictures, videos, and its continued reporting.
12 February 2012 | International Solidarity Movement, West Bank
On Sunday 12 February, about 200 settlers, mainly youth, gathered at the bottom of Assima settlement in Al Buwayra to cultivate and steal Palestinian land with accompaniment by the Israeli military.
They were carrying Israeli flags and posters. The military opened a gate leading these illegal and typically violent settlers onto Palestinian land and marched them to Hilltop 25. They remained there for a while and then moved to the other side of Road 60 leading to the illegal settlement of Kiryat Arba and planted trees.
The Israeli Occupation Forces and police were faciltating the planting, and they let the settlers play music loudly from a car equipped with amplifiers to disturb the peace while making their presence a loud infringement on Palestinian land.
As ISM and Ecumenical Accompaniment Program in Palestine and Israel members walked up to visit Palestinian families, they were stopped by Israeli police, who checked IDs. When they were asked why they were checking their passports, the answer police answered that, “This is not Israel, it’s Hevron. It’s very dangerous.”
The Palestinians families told internationals that the illegal settlers had thrown stones at the house and broken a window. The settlers left shortly after the internationals got there, but were heard saying they would come back the following day.
The land where they planted trees is meant to be used to build houses for the children of the Palestinian families.
Pascaline is a volunteer with International Solidarity Movement (name has been changed).
