25 November 2010 | International Solidarity Movement
In the early morning hours of November, the 25th, a night raid took place in the village of An Nabi Saleh. The four Soldiers entered the village at about 2:30 am with two jeeps, searching the house of Bassem Tamimi. Asked for the reason of their coming they claimed “it was their job” to come on a nightly basis, due to the weekly demonstrations held in the village since December 2009.
They searched the house, opening cupboards and spreading the family’s belongings on the floor, without looking for anything in particular or finding anything. The family and two internationals that were at that time present were asked for their passports and threatened. The soldiers refused to speak in English and Arabic, insisting on speaking Hebrew in spite of it not being understood by everyone. The military tried to stop the taking of any photos or videos of the incident.
They left at about 3 am, but not without mocking the family and announcing they would “come every night” and cause further problems. It became clear that the soldiers target Bassem Tamimi because they consider him the main initiator of the weekly protests. It has not been the first night raid in the village.
9 November 2010 | International Solidarity Movement
Night-raid in Bil'in
Today at about 3 in the morning the Israeli army entered the village of Bil’in. About 50 soldiers came in by jeep and by foot. As they arrived to the two targeted houses, they ran and took positions outside, while a number of them entered the house of two brothers.
Soldiers hammered on the door of one house, demanding to see 30 year Ashraf al-Khatib. It turned out they were at the wrong house. They then went to another house by forcing one of Ahsraf’s brothers to show them the way to where Ashraf lives. Soldiers entered that house and his brother’s family’s house, and with the same procedure woke up the family, again asking for Ashraf al-Khatib. His brother, Haytham al-Khatib, is a journalist from the human right’s group B’tselem and was one of the people roused by the army. Though they had again entered a house where their target did not live, they remained inside for about one and a half hours, searching all the rooms.
Haytham al-Khatib tells about his 6 year old son’s reaction when he woke up and saw tens of soldiers in his house. “He asked me to close the door, because he didn’t want to see them.” Haytham himself was held back when he wanted to record the raid in his family’s houses -– the soldiers simply locked him in a room for more than an hour, away from his children and wife. The children in the houses are aged from 1 1/2 to 8 years, and this is not the first time they have seen their homes raided in the night.
Soldier during night-raid
However, after 1 1/2 hours of searching for the target in three houses, two of them in which he does not reside, Ashraf al-Khatib was not found. Five weeks ago Ashraf was shot in his leg with live ammunition by an Israeli soldier in a demonstration in Bil’in. The bullet went through his leg, breaking the bone. Even though he was heavily injured and in major pain, the soldiers tried to arrest him. Luckily he was brought to safety by fellow protesters and then to the hospital for surgery. Tonight the army decided to come and take him in front of his wife and 1 1/2 year old daughter instead.
The soldiers retreated from the targeted houses by foot, walking toward the military road that follows the illegal segregation fence in Bil’in, about 4:30 AM. The village of Bil’in has suffered from frequent night raids over the last few years, and a number of villagers have been taken for interrogation and imprisoned for their non-violent resistance to the occupation and segregation wall on Bil’in’s land.
At 3 a.m. this morning the Israeli army entered the West Bank village of Ni`lin and detained a Palestinian man, Barakat Nafi. This is the first house raid since before the Islamic holy month of Ramadan; there used to be one or two such raids every week.
Soldiers came on foot and in jeeps from the nearby gate in the illegal apartheid wall and violently entered the home of the 35-year-old. He was taken in front of his wife, who afterwards, clearly very shaken, reported hearing him cry out, saying “don’t beat me!” According to his neighbour, Nafi has always had a stoic resolve – so such signs of distress were particularly surprising. He was forcibly taken by Israeli forces to testify against another resident that the army is accusing of participating in anti-Wall demonstrations.
The soldiers also destroyed much of Nafi’s furniture, throwing cupboards, chests and tables over, supposedly with the aim of searching the house.
Nafi has been arrested before, seven months ago, for taking part in the peaceful weekly demonstrations against the illegal apartheid wall, which snakes through Ni`lin’s olive groves, stealing half of the village’s land. Israel claims these protests are illegal since it outlawed political dissent upon commencement of its brutal occupation in 1967 (with Military Order 101). The Israeli army had also alleged, as usual, that Nafi had been throwing stones. He was held for one month before being released upon paying the Israeli authorities 8000 NIS.
As in many villages in the occupied West Bank, the apartheid wall separates farmers from the fields they need to grow their crops. In 2004 Ni`lin was one of the first villages to nonviolently resist the wall, and it has since become known for the level of brutality employed by the Israeli army in suppressing the popular struggle. Four Ni`lin residents have been murdered by the Israeli occupation forces, including a ten-year-old boy, and around 70 more people have been shot non-fatally with live ammunition. Hundreds of residents have spent time in Israeli prisons.
Protesters demonstrate against the illegal apartheid wall in Ni'lin, 27/08/10
Last night the Israeli army carried out a night raid in the West Bank village of Bil’in and arrested a seventeen year old boy.
At least 12 Israeli army jeeps entered the village at approximately 1.30 in the morning. Soldiers from two of the jeeps then closed off the house of Ahmed Abdul Fatah Burnat, 17, who was arrested during the course of the 40 minute raid.
Palestinian villagers and internationals were unable to prevent what seems to have been a targeted arrest. Ahmed is understood to have been accused of participating in an illegal protest and throwing stones.
Israeli authorities’ attempts to criminalize protest have in recent years become more fervent. Peaceful protests have been declared illegal and Palestinian residents prosecuted for being present in their own homes if the army has declared that area a ‘closed military zone’.
Both targeted and arbitrary arrests occur commonly, again symptomatic of Israel’s attempts to deter protest. Popular committee leaders such as Abdallah Abu Rahma and Adeeb Abu Rahma from Bil’in have been convicted of ‘incitement’ by military courts and imprisoned – despite their commitment to nonviolent protest. Ahmed’s older brother Ibrahim has also been jail for the last 2 months.
The justness of the Bil’in protestors cause has been reflected in judgments by both the International Court of Justice and Israel’s own Supreme Court who in 2004 and 2007 respectively ruled that the entire Apartheid Wall and specifically the route of the wall through the village was illegal.
ISM is hard at work in the West Bank and Gaza, and needs your help!
The ISM media office was raided two times in the span of four nights in February, when Bridget Chappell and Ariadna Jove Marti were arrested. In the raids, the Israeli military stole all of our computers (three laptops, one desktop) as well as several video cameras. Just a few weeks ago, the Hebron office was broken into while activists were away. We believe the military is also to blame because neighbors reported soldiers coming to look through the windows multiple times when the apartment was empty, and in the raid two laptops, multiple cameras, photo memory cards and USB memory devices were stolen, while other valuables were left in plain sight.
ISM needs to replace this equipment in order to continue the important work we’re doing. Documenting ongoing settler violence and harassment in Tel Rumeida (Hebron) and Sheikh Jarrah (East Jerusalem) are two of our most important activities. The residents of these communities demonstrate remarkable resilience by refusing to be deterred by settler violence. In order for the communities to have a chance of telling their story to the global community (one of ISM’s primary roles), and to prove the innocence of our Palestinian friends when they are falsely accused (a frequent occurrence), we need to capture high-quality footage.
We need: at least two small hand-held video cameras (roughly $150-200 each).
ISM Gaza activists risk extreme danger to document some of the worst human rights violations in the world. One primary activity is documenting use of live fire in the “buffer zone” towards farmers and non-violent demonstrators. Israel’s use of live fire has killed 14 and injured over 50 thus far in 2010. Bianca Zammit, a Maltese activist, was shot in the leg April 23 while filming a demonstration, proving that such documentation is viewed as a threat by the Israeli military.
We need: a Mac laptop computer for video editing ($1000)
A camera with good ‘optical’ zoom, such as a Canon Powershot S51S ($150-300)
The strategic theft of our media equipment, combined with Bianca’s shooting, serve as a reminder that we pose a real threat in our ability to reach global audiences with information about Israel’s actions. As non-violent activists, cameras are our weapons in exposing the Apartheid. Please, help us to continue this important work by donating here: palsolidarity.org/donate, or by sending equipment to Palestine with an activist.
