The peaceful demonstration in the Occupied West Bank village of Al Ma’sara by Palestinians and Internationals was aggressively dispersed using tear gas & sound bombs, today, by Israeli Occupation Forces (IOF). This is the second week that the IOF have been using increasingly violent methods to repress non-violent demonstrations in Al Ma’sara, a reflection of their tactics across the villages of the West Bank.
Approximately 70 Palestinians and 14 Internationals, including 3 Israelis, gathered to protest against the construction of the Israeli apartheid wall which is illegal under international law. The wall runs through the land of the village, the completion of which will block the residents from their farmland; they have already lost more than 350 hectares of land to a nearby Israeli settlement.
Men and women of all ages assembled after the Friday prayer, marching through the main road of the village where they were addressed by the organisers of the demonstration, the Popular Committee Against the Wall. This was followed by an address by the Democratic Front for the Liberation of Palestine, who participated in the demonstration as part of their 41st anniversary.
Tear Gas Repression
Barbed wire was laid across the road and the procession descended towards their farmland onto a parallel road used by Israeli Settlers, at which point an IOF jeep approached. Soldiers exited and began firing tear gas and throwing sound grenades into the group. Some local youths responded by throwing rocks at the IOF as the whole group fled back to the village. Soldiers pursued into the village whilst continuing to fire tear gas and sound grenades at the group. Many residents suffered from the effects of the tear-gas in their homes and an eighteen-year old participant was injured by a tear-gas shell.
Sound grenades were used at very close range by the IOF to displace the press and international activists, and physical aggression was used against both an ISM member and a Palestinian man. An ISM member also filmed a soldier firing tear-gas canisters directly into the crowd at head level, which included young children.
Israeli army and border police used tear gas, stun grenades, rubber- and plastic-coated bullets, live ammunition and “stinky water” to disperse close to 150 Palestinians who tried to reach their village well in An-Nabi Salih. The villagers were accompanied by over 20 Israeli and international solidarity activists.
Following mid-day prayers, protesters marched towards the well and their agricultural lands but were immediately confronted with tear-gas and rubber-coated bullets. A group of 50 settlers from the neighboring settlement of Halamish watched as the Israeli Occupation Forces attacked the Palestinians. In total, 14 protesters were injured, including one hit in the face with a tear gas canister.
The march began in its usual fashion. Villagers, Israelis and internationals descended the hillside to attempt to plant olive trees in the settler-occupied land. As the contingent came within 50 meters of the road that splits An Nabi-Salih, IOF soldiers launched 15-20 tear gas grenades in rapid succession. The group went up the hill to regroup and there was an hour-long lull in the demonstration.
During this respite, a smaller group of Palestinians, Israelis and internationals began tending to the fields near the road dividing the settlement and the village. In unison, they moved large boulders and rocks to build a series of three retaining walls that will further the growth of the crops in An-Nabi Salih. Differences that seemingly divide some were forgotten in that respite from the tear gas. Words such as “ownership” and “territory” were not a part of the repertoire.
The group’s project moved them closer to the road and the 6 soldiers guarding it. As the laborers approached, the soldiers appeared flabbergasted as they didn’t know how to handle such a situation. Those soldiers knew only force and how to implement it to repress, but this show of solidarity was something quite different then anything there training had taught them. Confused looks were all they could muster.
The irony of building walls collectively wasn’t lost to the group, when barriers physical and social that keep two cultures far from one another pervade their daily lives. These walls were different. They didn’t divide, they were not impassable. These walls unified. They paved the way for An-Nabi Salih future crops. Crops that would come to fruition, in some degree, being nurtured through the solidarity between two cultures. It may be awhile, but perhaps they’ll be able to sit at a table, lacking the presence of soldiers, tear gas and conflict, and enjoy the fruits of the labor.
Wall construction ended when shots were heard from the southern edge of the village. ISM activists battled clouds of tear gas with hands visibly extended in order to reach an An-Nabi Salih home, containing women and children, which had been surrounded by IOF forces. Soldiers thankfully descended the hill after several tense moments.
Barricades were set up on the main road leading to An-Nabi Salih, using rocks and burning tires. At around 2pm, a group of soldiers entered the village from the southwest side and fired rubber-coated bullets and tear gas at protesters, endangering villagers trapped inside their homes. “Stinky water” was used twice on protesters.
Soldiers occupy the roof of a house in An-Nabi Salih
At around 5pm, a group of approximately 8 soldiers occupied the roof of a villager’s house, firing plastic-coated bullets and tear gas at protesters below. The villager reported that when soldiers entered his home, they pointed their guns at him and told him not to move or they would kill him. Four adults and six children were trapped in the house until the soldiers left, but not before damaging the family’s internet receiver, located on the roof.
Thirty minutes later, the soldiers entered the same home again, cutting the back-yard fence in order to pass through. An ISM activist present at the house was told not to film the soldiers’ actions. When the activist continued taking pictures from the entrance of the home, one soldier threw a stun grenade that exploded less than 3 meters from the activist and a young child.
The protest ended around 6pm, when soldiers began to use live ammunition.
The weekly Friday demonstrations in An-Nabi Salih commenced in December 2009, in protest to the uprooting of hundreds of olive trees by settlers from Halamish settlement. Construction of Halamish settlement began on farmland belonging to An-Nabi Salih and neighbouring villages in 1977. Conflict between the settlement and villagers reawakened in the past month due to the settler’s attempt to re-annex An Nabi Salih land despite the December 2009 Israeli court case that ruled the property rights of the land to the An Nabi Salih residents. Despite the Israeli District Co-ordination Office’s promise to allow the village unrestricted passage to the land, farmers have been barred and violently assaulted when they attempted to access the land in question. An Nabi Salih’s resistance mirrors the ongoing resistance in Bi’lin, Ni’lin and the burgeoning popular struggle in Sheikh Jarrah, Iraq Burin, Burin and Al-Ma’asara.
Peaceful Protest in Al Masara Halted with Tear Gas and Sound Bombs
Yesterday around 1pm, a peaceful demonstration at Al Masara was stopped by the Israeli army when tear gas and sound bombs were unexpectedly thrown into the crowd.
The protest comprised of around 20 Palestinians, 8 internationals and 7 Israeli activists. Three mini busses of approximately 75 Palestinians from neighboring villages were stopped at a nearby checkpoint and prohibited from attending the protest.
Palestinian demonstrators at this protest were completely nonviolent, both verbally and physically. The crowd at once obeyed the orders from the commander of the army to move off the spontaneously demarcated closed military zone.
The first tear gas was fired soon after two youths waved Palestinian flags in front of a military vehicle as the crowd was moving back according to the orders from the commander. The assault was followed by two more hand thrown tear gas grenades and two sound bombs, one of which was thrown directly at a crowd of press after most of the demonstrators had left the area.
Local Palestinians were protesting for the right to access their land in the region where the separation barrier is currently being constructed. Similar nonviolent protests occur every Friday in Al Masara, which provokes frequent night raids by the IDF into the homes of the organizers.
Tear gas, stun grenades, rubber bullets and rocks: It must be Friday afternoon in the West Bank village of Bil’in.
It’s billed as a nonviolent protest against what Israel calls its security barrier, what the Palestinians call the apartheid separation wall.
The barrier separates the villagers from their farmlands. Protesters come from all over the world to support the Palestinian cause.
A few Palestinian youths covering their faces with scarves throw stones at a couple dozen Israeli soldiers in full riot gear and armed with tear gas, stun grenades and bullets.
The protest soon degenerates into chaos as it has nearly every week for the past five years. Six protesters have been killed in Bil’in and the neighboring village of Na’alin since July 2008, according to the Palestinian group, Popular Struggle, one of several organizers of the weekly protests. Several hundred have been injured by tear gas canisters and Israeli bullets. One hundred Israeli soldiers have been injured from stone throwing, according to the Israeli military.
The organizers say they have little control over the youths who prefer to throw stones at the rallies. They insist that non-violence is the best weapon they have to fight against Israel’s wall and occupation.
Israel has increased its nighttime raids into the West Bank in recent months, arresting those it believes have acted violently or those who are suspected of organizing the protests.
“They cannot be above the law, and that’s what we’re dealing with,” Israel Defense Forces spokesman, Peter Lerner said, referring to the protest organizers.
Critics say Israel is simply arresting those who oppose its policies towards the Palestinians. Mohamed Othman, one of the organizers of Stop the Wall campaign, was detained in September upon his return from Norway where he was lobbying the government for support.
He said he was held for four months — three in solitary confinement — then released without charge. Israel does not comment on these cases.
“We can see that Israel is starting to be afraid of the popular resistance because it’s coming from inside the people and the people decide,” Othman said.
Israel has arrested at least 150 protesters from the two villages’ demonstrations over the past two years, according to Popular Struggle. More than 30 are still locked up, the organization said. The Israeli military told CNN it was checking those figures.
One coordinator of the Bil’in Popular Committee Against the Wall, Abdallah Abu Rahmah, also a teacher, was arrested in December. One of the charges against him was arms possession for collecting tear gas canisters used by the Israeli military against demonstrators and showcasing them.
The anti-wall demonstrators say this is a grass-roots movement. The Israeli military accuses those it has arrested of incitement.
The IDF denies it has changed its tactics in dealing with the anti-wall protesters, even though the number being arrested has risen sharply. The IDF on the ground now considers Bil’in a closed military zone on Fridays.
CNN was refused access by Israeli military forces stationed outside the village, who said only those who lived in the neighborhood could enter. But IDF spokesman Peter Lerner said the closure was meant only for protesters.
A few hours later, in Bil’in, the Israeli soldiers withdrew from the village under cover of tear gas. Some Palestinian youths followed them with stones, while the vast majority of nonviolent protesters head home.
Palestinians, Israelis and internationals walk on Road 60 during the demonstration.
Activists in Ma’asara village near Bethlehem changed their demonstration route today and marched to the “settler only” road outside the village. Once they reached Highway 60 the demonstration was surrounded by Israeli soldiers and the area was declared a closed military zone. Demonstrators were then besieged by tear gas as they made their way back to the village. Soldiers began following people into the village once the activists crossed the razor wire fence that the military uses to block the progress of weekly demonstrations. Many people suffered from tear gas inhalation at today’s demonstration, and many children were terrified once the military invaded the village.
Demonstration against the Wall in Al Ma\’sara
At the beginning of 2010 the Israeli military began intensifying the level of violence used in their methods to repress non-violent demonstrations in villages opposing the apartheid wall and settlements. Compared to Bil’in and Nil’in villages, which have dealt with military violence for their involvement in campaigns to halt the building of the apartheid wall and illegal Israeli settlement for the last five years, this is a relatively new occurrence in Ma’asara. International activists have been intermittently staying in Ma’asara to document and hopefully diminish soldier violence since the beginning of the year. The army has been targeting activists and popular committee members involved in organizing non-violent demonstrations in a series of night raids. People from the village expressed concern that the military would return tonight and continue targeting activists.
