27th October 2015 | International Solidarity Movement, al-Khalil team| Hebron, occupied Palestine
During the last two days international human rights activists have repeatedly been attacked verbally and physically by infamous illegal settler Anat Cohen.
At 7:15 this morning, Anat Cohen emerged from Beit Hadassah illegal settlement in Tel Rumeida onto Qurtuba checkpoint, where two internationals were documenting the treatment of children and teachers as they passed through on their way to school, when she started screaming in Hebrew. When both internationals listened to her for a moment, then turned up the stairs where they were headed, she charged and punched one international in the back of the head. Six Israeli soldiers stood about five feet from them and did nothing to intervene at any time.
On deserted Shuhada street, a car rode up close to three internationals returning home from their monitoring of students safety at checkpoints near school clusters. After a short while a settler identified as Anat Cohen got out of the car and immediately started to harass the three human rights observers. Over the course of approximately six minutes, she physically assaulted all three, knocking one to the ground so that he was bleeding in multiple places, and attempting to destroy recording equipment, and striking them in the head.
Anat Cohen hitting international
Among other things in the constant stream of verbal assault and profanity, she said: “Go to Auschwitz. (…) Die in Hitler’s gas.” “Are there not enough European ladies in Europe? Do you have to come here to f*** Arab women? I know you are doing that!” After she noticed a male settler had arrived with his jeep, she became more physically aggressive while continuing to rant: ”What do you help the Palestinians with? Killing us?!”
All activists strictly complied with non-violence, backed off from her or shielded themselves with a raised hand against her attacks. Israeli forces arrived on the scene and asked her what the activists had done; she replied they wanted to help the Palestinians. The human rights workers were allowed to go while she kept on complaining to the soldiers.
Watch a video of the attack on internationals:
The day before the settler had followed two activists in her car to their apartment. While they were walking up the hill towards Tel Rumeida, she trailed them in her car and then blocked the way when they attempted to cross the road. She then complained to soldiers at a checkpoint about the internationals.
Anat Cohen
While Palestinians are killed by Israeli forces on a daily basis and four inhabitants of Hebron were shot to death in and around Hebron in the last two days only, also the hostility and violence towards internationals is soaring high.
Settlers have shot close-up photos of internationals serving different organisations and put up posters of them warning soldiers and settlers of them. The headline of the individual posters read : “This is not a tourist- it’s a hostile anarchist! Watch out: The individuals in these pictures are here to harm Israelis for anti-semitic reasons. Act accordingly!”
23rd October, 2015 |International Solidarity Movement, Al-Khalil Team | West Bank, occupied Palestine
We are remembering our great friend & the great friend of Hebron, Hashem al-Azzeh, who gave this interview with ISM last year before his tragic passing earlier this week.
18th October 2015 | International Solidarity Movement, al-Khalil team | Hebron, occupied Palestine
After a day of intensified violence in al-Khalil the midnight hour brought horrifying screams for help from local mosques, the screaming sirens of ambulances and clouds of teargas drifting through the streets from Bab al-Zawiya. Three young Palestinians in Khalil lay dead from multiple gunshot wounds; two killed by Israeli forces and the other felled by the machine gun blasts of several settlers who shouted, “Arab! Arab!” before unleashing a stream of bullets into his body. The toll of Palestinian deaths has climbed to 43 in just 18 days, along with over 1900 injured.
Earlier in the day, Palestinian youth Fadel al-Qawasmeh walked in the area on Shuhada Street not segregated for the benefit of Israeli settlers. Passing settlers as an Arab, was enough of a ‘crime’ for the point-blank, execution style shooting the 18 year old endured, only to be packaged and stamped as another Arab ‘terrorist’ when officials at the scene determined the boy had a knife.
(Video Credit: Youth Against Settlements)
Fadel’s case would have been the latest in a string of Israeli murders of Palestinians who supposedly had attempted knife attacks if it hadn’t happened just a few hours later just down the street from the site. Also if he actually had a knife, which eye witnesses verified he did not and which video released by the Palestinian organization Youth Against Settlements seemed to corroborate when video taken at the scene shows one Israeli soldier handing something to another soldier standing over the boy’s body and then the soldier placing the object near him.
In the immediate aftermath of the killing, when Israeli forces should have been utilizing photo and video evidence from witnesses at the scene as well as eyewitness testimony, rather, they went on the attack. Palestinians in a home directly near the site of the killing had their home raided, terrifying the families inside and had their phones and computers confiscated only for settlers who were allowed to wander freely on the scene to be given glimpse of the evidence against them.
And while a member of Youth Against Settlements who was filming was detained while his evidence was confiscated and evaluated, settlers were allowed to photograph the boy’s bleeding body who received no immediate first aid; a common obscenity between settlers and soldiers of humiliating Palestinians as they lay dying. Settlers served tea and snacks on the scene.
Just hours later, near the Ibrahimi Mosque, 16-year old Palestinian teenager Bayan Eiseleh was seen and photographed by a witness as she was being screamed at in Hebrew by Israeli soldiers. The photograph shows Bayan with her hands up, holding nothing. The witness reported that Bayan backed away in horror as the shouting continued. Minutes later, she was bleeding on the ground after Israeli forces fired multiple shots into the unarmed woman. And no matter how much evidence there is to the contrary, Bayan joins the numerous others described in headlines across the world as another Palestinian who attempted a stabbing on an Israeli soldier; and as Netanyahu described their deaths, she committed suicide. These are the post death wounds inflicted by those who already inflicted wounds on them across a lifetime of occupation and subjugation.
Just after the sun went down, on Shuhada Street, Israeli forces shot and killed Tarek an-Natseh after he failed to follow their orders to stop. He jumped on one of the soldiers, unarmed according to an eyewitness at the scene, and was then shot, “again and again and again.” This brings up an issue that must be looked at in a very real way before the death toll climbs above the already staggering number of 43 where it currently sits. Excessive force. Are the countless ways to incapacitate someone you feel is a threat being completely abandoned? Seemingly yes.
Immediately after the shooting, settlers, who were celebrating in a frenzy on Shuhada Street, prevented the ambulance carrying Tarek’s body from leaving the scene. Some even laid on the ground to prevent the emergency vehicle from getting the critically injured and dying man to the hospital. Tarek would die soon after.
Photo Credit: Youth Against Settlements. Ambulance carrying dying Palestinian prevented from leaving Shuhada Street by frenzied settlers.
Into the late night hours, clashes raged in Bab al-Zawiya as the Tel Rumeida neighborhood went on lockdown. No one was allowed to leave their homes and several were threatened at gunpoint to stop looking out of their windows. Meanwhile gunshots blasted periodically outside.
Settlers cut the fence that separates the illegal Israeli settlement of Kiryat Arab from nearby Palestinian homes, and nearly two hundred settlers went on a violent rampage, attacking the Palestinian villages of Wad al-Huseen and Wad al-Nasara with firebombs and stones, prompting the mosques desperate yells for assistance for the Daana family, whose home was attacked by dozens of Israeli settlers who then injured at least three of her neighbors who have been identified as 40-year-old Imad and two minors, Abdullah, 13, and Muhammad, 17.
As morning approached, new ‘security measures’ have been enacted, including the deployment of numerous Israeli forces throughout Khalil, who are, alongside settlers, the main aggressors and instigators of violence against Palestinians. The security measures have not meant any change for settlers who are privy to wander like tourists across crime scenes where Palestinian bodies lay dying. Nor have they meant the body and bag searches that every single Palestinian passing through al-Khalil streets have been subjected to. Nor does it mean the humiliation of dropping your belongings on the ground before a group of sneering Israeli soldiers and backing away with your hands up while they search your personal items and then toss them smugly back at you.
These are the new ‘security measures’ that Netanyahu has called for in al-Khalil. They spell out the furtherance of violence, dehumanization and unbridled terror against an already occupied people.
Palestinian man being body searched this morning in Tel Rumeida as part of new ‘security measures’ in Khalil.
Video of a few of the body searches happening in just two hours in Tel Rumeida (accelerated speed and without audio):
As of the writing of this report, Israeli forces have been consistently firing teargas, stun grenades and rubber coated steel bullets for hours from the roofs of Palestinian homes.
16th October 2015 | International Solidarity Movement, Al-Khalil team | Nablus area, occupied Palestine
Palestinian civilians joined by International solidarity activists will gather tonight, Friday 16, October 2015, at the Nablus city homes of Yahya Hamad, Karam Al-masri and Sameer Al-kosa after Israeli forces threatened revenge demolitions within 24 hours.
Yesterday night, hundreds of Palestinians gathered outside the house to protest the illegal practice of house demolitions and managed to prevent Israeli forces from demolishing the house. Tonight, they will be joined by internationals from the United States, Australia, France, Italy, Ireland, the United Kingdom and Holland.
A Call has been launched to maintain vigil outside of the targeted buildings and prevent the occupation forces from carrying out the demolition process.
The house of Sameer Kosa family in Al Dahiyya, the house of Yaha Hamad family in at Rojeeb st, and the house of Karam Al-masri family in North mountain are all under threat of demolition tonight on allegations of their involvement in the killing of a settler couple from the illegal settlement of Ithamar against earlier this month. All are Palestinian prisoners whose families will endure the collective punishment measures which have been Israel’s long established practice.
Marie, an international activist from the US staying in the house: ‘Punishing a family for something that one of their members has allegedly done, is just not acceptable, this is illegal and should not happen in any country which respects human rights and considers itself democratic’.
Watch a video of the events of last night, where you can hear Palestinians chanting when the army arrives (despite the low quality of the image, the sound illustrates the amount of people present) :
16th October 2015 | International Solidarity Movement, al-Khalil team | al-Quds (Jerusalem), occupied Palestine
The Old City of al-Quds (Jerusalem) in the last few weeks has witnessed an explosion of Israeli forces’ presence, supposedly for ‘security reasons’. But having a closer look at – or just opening your eyes for – the multitude of restrictions, hindrances and fears aroused by this, proves that all of this has nothing to do with ‘security’ – but everything with instilling fear in the Palestinians still resisting the manifold ways the Israeli forces are trying to expel them not only from the Old City of Jerusalem, but all of Jerusalem in general.
Just two days ago, on Thursday 14th of October, Israeli forces shot and killed a 20-year old Palestinian youth. Immediately after he was shot, bystanders were forced to move back by Israeli forces, while the young man was lying on the ground bleeding to death, with no-one administering first aid. Whereas Israeli settlers from settlements within East Jerusalem, illegal under international law, where allowed to get closer to take trophy-photos of yet another killed Palestinian, Israeli forces suddenly stormed towards a group of Palestinians, threatening to beat them with their rifles and batons. Palestinians, thus, were between a rock and a hard place: run and risk being shot multiple times with live ammunition for the simple act of running away from a heavily armed trigger-happy militarised force that just killed another Palestinian, or walk away slowly and be attacked by the same army. Being forced away, Palestinians held on to their phones in their hands – prevented to take photos of the Israeli forces’ crimes – with fear high that if someone reaches into a trouser-pocket or bag to take out anything, including a phone, they would receive multiple fatal gun-shot wounds by the Israeli forces closely watching every movement of the Palestinian bystanders. Israeli settlers, on the other hand, were free to approach the body of the youth, who, in the meantime has died without ever receiving any medical attention, to take photos. The Palestinian Red Crescent Ambulance Crew right outside Damascus Gate was physically pushed back to the ambulance and then forced to leave by the Israeli forces.
Israeli forces threatening bystanders
With the recent escalation of killings of Palestinians in al-Quds (Jerusalem) by Israeli forces, this is hardly an exception. This in itself, is already a message: when the killing of a Palestinian youth is no longer something ordinary, but something that just happens, something that will not be investigated under any circumstances, something that enjoys wide acceptance and often even provokes cheering by Israeli bystanders, – is it something that became ‘normal’? Various news networks have decided that instead of bringing their equipment over and over again, it’ll be easier to leave it at Damascus Gate all the time. Sanitation workers were ordered by the Israeli forces to clean off the blood of the Palestinian youth from the ground to erase every spot of the crime just committed. Police barriers are kept outside Damascus Gate, ready to close off the entrance at any time.
Sanitation workers ordered to clean off the blood from the ground
The Old City of al-Quds (Jersualem) is ‘fortified’, at least two, or groups of four to ten Israeli forces, are at every corner or alleyway. Every-day life for Palestinians was forced to a halt, while Israeli forces are comfortably occupying plastic chairs kept outside of shops for tourists to rest, languishing on porches where people used to play cards, or sit in front of locked shops closed in fear of the constantly rising threat of settler and police violence against Palestinians. The omnipresence of Israeli forces and restrictions, though, seem to be geared only towards Palestinians. The persons asked to pass through the metal detectors set up in the Old City are always Palestinians, ordered to lift up their shirts and trousers, take off their shoes and empty their bags even after passing through, from time to time with their children looking on in horror, children’s faces distorted by fear. For Palestinian children, there’s no place to be a child and play, with an occupying army, waiting just around every corner, shouting at children for accidentally exploding a balloon they were playing with in their parents’ shop. Parents try to keep an eye on their children at all times, simple tasks like sending them out to buy bread might result in them going missing and a frantic search – just to find out that the Israeli police arrested minor children and did not even bother to inform their parents. There is no regard for Palestinians basic human rights, or even respect for them as human beings. Whereas Israelis and tourists are free to roam the streets of the Old City, Palestinian residents are often stopped at any or even various of the checkpoints, forcing to explain again and again that they are residents, arguing for being allowed to do the most normal thing in life: trying to go back home.
