Tag: Qeitun

After School in Hebron, A Journal – 6 boys detained by Israeli forces in 2 Days

5th December 2018 | International Solidarity Movement, Al-Khalil Team | Hebron, occupied Palestine [Updated December 6]

For two days running, Israeli occupation soldiers and Border Police ambushed young children aged 10-14 years after school in Hebron.

Tuesday, 24^thDec. 2 boys were detained at Salaymeh checkpoint after being ambushed by a group of soldiers sneaking around in gardens and through a garage before bursting out behind the boys who were standing in a driveway. The boys were not throwing any the stones but were just randomly grabbed by the soldiers as they ambushed them. ISMers were only meters away and security camera footage confirms that the boys were merely standing in the driveway at the time. Two of the boys were aged 11 and one 10. One can only imagine the terror young boys experience when suddenly kidnapped by soldiers of the occupying army!

A border policeman abducts a young boy from the street after ambushing children near Hebron School. (Photo Christian Peacemaker Teams)

The Israeli Zionist forces are renowned for their cruelty even to minors: imprisoning children as young as 12 through their military courts and prisons system in which there are no rights for Palestinians. The youngest ever Palestinian child prisoner was released just days ago after a three-year prison sentence from 12 to 15 years of age.

The inhumanity of Israel is fully understood by Palestinians growing up under occupation. Collective punishment and psychological cruelty through torture and macabre tactics such as withholding bodies of Palestinians who have been killed or died during imprisonment are universally understood by Palestinians and well documented by international as well as local observers/researchers. …and there is no justice system to protect Palestinians.

Imagine what goes through the mind of a 10-year-old child suddenly grabbed by an armed solder from an occupying army and dragged from his neighbourhood! Fortunately, the boys were released after being detained for more than an hour inside the checkpoint.

Today also (December 5), 3 boys were abducted aged 14, 11 and 9. The boys attend two of the local schools and were kidnapped from the street around 300 metres from Qeitun checkpoint. They were standing in the street talking about 3 metres from an ISM activist when they were ambushed by Israeli Border Police.

The two younger boys were released later today, but the 14-year-old was taken away. According to the headmaster of the Hebron School, Khalil Abu Sunaineh, the older boy could face up to 6 months imprisonment. The military court does not need to give evidence to support any accusation on the grounds that it is “classified information”. There is a 98% conviction rate.

The headmaster showed us pictures on the wall of the school hallway, over 70 pictures taken over the last two years show child arrests, tear gas, concussion grenades both inside the school and on the street outside. They are the tip of the iceberg. He has been at the school for 14 years!

A gallery of soldier invasions of the school, abductions, concussion grenades and tear gas in the school and on the street outside.

He also told us that the soldiers and border police sneak around in the middle of the night mapping the neighbourhood and planning their ambushes. We’d witnessed this ourselves during the day. It was creepy enough in the daytime seeing soldiers just walk around in people’s gardens, exploring every alleyway, entering apartment buildings at will and ascending to the rooftops. It must feel violating to live under these circumstances.

Israeli forces justify their actions because some Palestinian children throw stones at them. To the uninformed this may seem a valid argument on the surface. However, it’s important to remember that the Israelis are the occupiers and have absolutely no rights under international law to defend themselves from the people they occupy. They are the aggressors. They are not civil enforcement officers of the Palestinian community.

This argument also holds no water because usually in any specific situation the Israeli forces are the aggressors who initiate conflict.

Even if we accepted this erroneous argument, the children who were detained on these two days were not throwing stones. To detain, or arrest and imprison them, for what someone else has done at any time at all is unjust and a form of collective punishment.

What justification can there possibly be for concussion grenades, toxic tear gas (228 tear gas rounds and 51 concussion grenades were fired in the Salaymeh / Qeitun neighbourhoods in 15 school days between November 4 and November 27, 2018 (including 34 tear gas rounds in one day!))? [Statistics from Christian Peacemaker Teams] This is on top of the usual intimidation, child abduction and invasion of streets and schools by armed soldiers in residential neighbourhoods!

Examples of tear gas being used in the Saleymeh / Quetun neighbourhoods.

These are children! Such actions are totally unacceptable on minors.

Do such actions promote peace? Do they not actually sustain and deepen the inhumane occupation of the Palestinian people?

Do they not also inspire rejection of the immoral occupation, and provoke further resistance against such oppression?

Fortunately, Palestinians usually choose non-violent resistance rather than violence, leaving Israelis with the moral predicament of enforcing the immoral and illegal occupation and the international community with the shame of their inaction.

Addendum:

These are part of a much larger continual attack on Palestine’s future by targeting children and their education: The following links show the extent of these attacks in just one week of November and other articles by Palestinian and international commentators are given for reference:

VIDEO: “They look like they’re in a war zone, but what they’re aiming at is five-year-olds”

31st December | International Solidarity Movement, Khalil team | Hebron, Occupied Palestine

By 10:30 am on Tuesday morning of December 30, Palestinian children attending school near Qeitun checkpoint in al-Khalil (Hebron) had endured over forty tear gas canisters, multiple rounds of rubber coated steel bullets and stun grenades, and the arrest of a twelve-year-old boy.

Israeli forces fired down the road leading from the checkpoint to the schools, filling the street adjacent to the schools with a choking cloud of gas and preventing Palestinians walking through the checkpoint from continuing down the street. As it is exam season in al-Khalil’s schools, children were attempting to reach school between seven and eight am and leaving again between nine thirty and eleven. Israeli military forces kept up a sporadic barrage of fire from the time some children were still walking to school until after school finished, forcing anyone traveling in either direction to brave whistling tear gas canisters and the dizzying smoke which still lingered even after the shooting had halted.

Early in the morning, Israeli occupation forces grabbed the twelve-year-old near the checkpoint, accusing him of throwing stones. Eyewitnesses present at the scene denied the accusation. After they took the young boy away to the police station, Israeli army and border police advanced further down the road away from the checkpoint, heavily armed with tear gas, stun grenades, and the long rifles used for firing rubber coated steel bullets. Sometimes they fired systematically, setting off five or more rounds of tear gas at a time; at other times it seemed bizarrely random, as when a single border policeman would suddenly run up the street and fire off a tear gas grenade at the distant crowd of children.

In between assaults, when the Israeli military temporarily halted their fire, young boys kicked stun grenades around and tried to squash tear gas grenades with their shoes. Many of them were stuck, waiting behind and among the soldiers as lingering clouds of tear gas fogged the road in front of their school. Looking down the road from near the military’s position to where the tear gas was landing, one could catch glimpses of the impacts: a small child coughing, a teacher dodging the falling tear gas canisters.

Israeli forces advanced down the main road, standing menacingly across it and also occupying the corners of side-streets, aiming their rifles up towards nearby neighbourhoods. Some stood far down the street, partly hidden by a parked car, in the same location where Israeli border police had arrested a seventeen-year-old boy a couple of weeks earlier. “They look like they’re in a war zone,” one ISM activist commented at the scene, “but what they’re aiming at is five-year-olds.”

As some of the ISM activists walked home, travelling up through the souk (market) in al-Khalil’s Old City, they asked if the tear gas from the area around Qeitun checkpoint had reached all the way up to the shops. “Not too much today,” one shop owner replied. He asked how the activists were. After they gave a brief summery of their morning, he responded matter-of-factly: “there’s always tear gas down there.”

It is a fact of life in al-Khalil – one which perfectly illustrates the senseless, violent injustice so characteristic of the zionist occupation. This morning is only one of countless violent mornings and afternoons these children will face along their everyday route to school. Military assaults and checkpoints are as familiar to them as their daily assignments and schoolbooks. These repeated attacks expose the absurd lengths to which the Israeli occupation has invaded the lives of Palestinians, when even the road to school becomes a battlefield.

Israeli forces arrest disabled Palestinian man

9th October 2014 | International Solidarity Movement, Khalil team | Hebron, Occupied Palestine

Yesterday at approximately 10 PM in the Qeitun region of Al-Khalil (Hebron), a group of 6 Israeli soldiers accused 14-year-old Amjad Taha of throwing fire crackers at them outside of his home. Amjad’s cousin, Muhammad Taha (17 years-old), was standing close by with his 2-year-old cousin when the Israeli soldiers began to aggressively grab Amjad. A few of the soldiers then grabbed Muhammad, who was still holding his baby cousin. The soldiers began to take Amjad, Muhammad, and their baby cousin away from the front of their house.

The 2-year-old’s father and the boys’ uncle, Jamil, hearing the soldiers outside his home, came outside to where the boys were to find the Israeli soldiers attempting to take his nephews and son away. Jamil took his baby son from Muhammad and then the soldiers became increasingly aggressive to both boys. The Israeli soldiers proceeded to hit Muhammad in his leg and then push him against the wall causing him more pain. While this was happening, the boy’s uncle, Osama Taha (27 years-old), ran towards Muhammad and attempted to stop the Israeli soldiers from beating him by pushing a soldier away from his nephew. Then the soldier grabbed Osama and told him that he would kill him. The Israeli soldier then shot a live bullet into the air as a warning. Seven more Israeli soldiers arrived at the scene and they proceeded to blindfold Amjad, Muhammad, and Osama. Then the Israeli soldiers violently forced them into an Israeli army jeep. As Muhammad was being forced into the jeep, the soldiers pushed his head onto the vehicle causing him pain. Amjad was also pushed against the jeep very forcefully resulting in a broken finger.

The three blindfolded Palestinians were then taken to Shuhada checkpoint in Tel Rumeida and transferred into Israeli police custody. The Israeli police took all of them to the police station by Ibrahimi Mosque in H2 for questioning. Amjad and Muhammad were held there until 1 in the morning. Osama Taha was kept in the police station and then transferred to a prison near Bethlehem where he is currently being held without charge. Osama’s brother told ISM activists: “I can’t believe they still have him. He didn’t do anything. He was just trying to protect his nephew. Osama has learning disabilities. I really fear for how this will affect him and how they will treat him.”

As a result of the Jewish holidays, the amount of soldiers in Al-Khalil (Hebron) has increased immensely. The Israeli army enters Palestinian neighborhoods almost weekly, detaining and arresting Palestinians without cause or reason. This method of harassment is one of many tools that the Israeli army uses in an effort to force Palestinians out of their homes.

Two young Palestinians arrested and abused

24th September 2014 | International Solidarity Movement, Khalil team | Hebron, Occupied Palestine

20140922_204351 — Muhammed (Photo supplied by family)

Monday afternoon in Hebron, two young Palestinian men were arrested and abused north of Qeitun after being falsely accused of stone throwing.

21-year-old Muhammad Ghaleb Abu Sbeih was walking home from work when soldiers from the Israeli military force arrested him. Six boys had been throwing stones in the area and Muhammad was accused of taking part even though the soldiers had no evidence. A local Palestinian stated that Muhammad had been beaten while walking up to the checkpoint where he was held for two hours along with 19-year old Shadi Abdel Hamed Al-Atras.

When the boys’ families arrived the soldiers were rude to the mothers and Muhammad’s sister. Muhammad’s mother heard her son’s screams from inside the army jeep in which he was being held captive and beaten. Initially, the soldiers denied that anyone by that name was in the jeep but then changed their tactics and started mocking the family, saying bad words to the women in both Arabic and Hebrew.

The soldiers kept laughing and joking around and at one point they wanted the password for Muhammad’s iPhone to access it. After being held inside the jeep for two hours, Muhammad and Shadi were finally driven away and the soldiers shouted, “with love Muhammad“ and clapped.

The young men were driven to Kiryat Arba police station and are still being held. According to the DCO (District Coordination Office) Muhammad is being transferred to Ofer court and Shadi has been moved to a checkpoint in Hebron where he will hopefully soon be released.

Addendum:

Opinion – redactional

Reports (Nov 2018)

Older reports on palsolidarity.org