On the Ground in Palestine

Just Peace Advocates is pleased to share this summary prepared for the Mid East Working Group of Bathurst/Bloor/Trinity St. Paul’s by Rev. Frances Combs.

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Art: Taqi Spateen
Bethlehem, Palestine ·
October 9, 2023

October 23, 2023

Haaretz, Oct 16, 2023, Canada is deeply concerned by the dire and worsening crisis in Gaza and wants a humanitarian corridor to be opened into the enclave, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said on Monday. “It is imperative that this happen,” Trudeau told the House of Commons lower chamber of parliament. Israel has put Gaza, home to 2.3 million Palestinians, under a total blockade and pounded it with unprecedented air strikes.

Abu Obeida, the spokesperson for Hamas’ military wing, claims that the organization is holding approximately 200 Israeli captives, with dozens being held by different factions. He also claimed that these captives are treated with dignity and respect. Abu Obeida further added that 22 of the captives were killed in airstrikes by the Israeli air force in the Gaza Strip. The spokesperson added that Hamas also holds “captives of other nationalities, and will release them when circumstances allow”.

The Israel Defense Forces and the Israeli defense ministry announced Monday that it will evacuate residents from 28 communities along the border with Lebanon. According to the statement released by both parties, the 28 communities are located within 2 kilometers (1.2 miles) of the border with Lebanon. The residents will be taken to hotels and guest houses that will be paid for by the Israeli government.
A 6-year-old was stabbed to death, and his mother suffered injuries, when they were attacked in Illinois on the basis of their Islamic faith amid the war in Israel and Gaza.
October 15, 2023 – Americans for Justice in Palestine Action (AJP Action) and American Muslims for Palestine (AMP) condemn the heinous Hate Crime against 6-year-old Palestinian American Wadea Al-Fayoume and his mother from Plainfield, IL. We urge President Joseph

Biden to promptly convene a meeting with the family of Wadea Al-Fayoume to condemn anti-Palestinian bigotry unreservedly, and to call for an immediate ceasefire in Gaza.

While President Biden released a statement rejecting Islamophobia and condemning the murder of the young boy, he must take accountability for amplifying deadly, one-sided propaganda and walk back his prior statements regarding the situation in Gaza. Uplifting Israeli propaganda and standing idle as Israel commits war crimes against Palestinians will only further enable anti-Palestinian hate crimes within the U.S.

Reported by Amnesty International, Oct 16, Yesterday, Amnesty’s Crisis Evidence Lab verified that Israeli military units striking Gaza are equipped with white phosphorus artillery rounds.1 We are investigating what appears to be the use of white phosphorus in Gaza, including in a strike near a hotel on the beach in Gaza City.2. And earlier this week, video footage analyzed by the Evidence Lab verified members of Hamas or other Palestinian armed groups from Gaza on the initial day of the attacks were deliberately shooting at civilians and taking civilians as hostages. We confirmed at least 260 civilians were killed at the Nova Music Festival.

Reported by B’Tselem, Oct 16, 2023, Israel has been bombarding the Gaza Strip indiscriminately for a week. The airstrikes have killed more than 2,000 Palestinians, including more than 700 children and dozens of families. Entire neighborhoods have been wiped out, people are living without water and power, and hundreds of thousands are internally displaced. All this is completely forbidden. A ground invasion will amplify the horror to unimaginable degrees. This must not be allowed to happen.

Reported by the Electronic Intifada, Oct 16, 2023, An Israeli woman who survived the Hamas assault on settlements near the Gaza boundary on 7 October says Israeli civilians were “undoubtedly” killed by their own security forces. It happened when Israeli forces engaged in fierce gun battles with Palestinian fighters in Kibbutz Be’eri and fired indiscriminately at both the fighters and their Israeli prisoners. “They eliminated everyone, including the hostages,” she told Israeli radio. “There was very, very heavy crossfire” and even tank shelling. The woman, 44-year-old mother of three Yasmin Porat, said that prior to that, she and other civilians had been held by the Palestinians for several hours and treated “humanely.” She had fled the nearby “ova” rave. [This massacre, by the Israeli army has been laid on the doorstep of Hamas.]

Haaretz, October 17, 2023, Hamas continued to lob rockets at Israeli cities on Tuesday. The IDF said it conducted dozens of airstrikes in Gaza today; Israel has struck 5,000 Hamas targets so far into the campaign, according to IDF sources. One Israeli strike on Tuesday, according to Hamas, killed a top Hamas commander, Ayman Nofal.

■ The IDF continued its tit-for-tat conflict with Hezbollah on the Lebanon border early on Tuesday after the latter fired anti-tank missiles at civilian targets, wounding three Israelis. In response, the IDF has also launched airstrikes on the Lebanese side, killing two Hezbollah militants, according to the Shi’ite organization. The Lebanese Red Crescent said four people were killed in the IDF strike.

■ The IDF’s international spokesperson said on Tuesday that the military was preparing for the next phase of its offensive against Hamas, and that it may not match widespread expectations of a broad ground incursion. “It might be something different,” he told reporters.

■ Gaza’s health ministry reported that 3,000 Palestinians have been killed and 12,500 wounded since the war began. In the southern city of Rafah, the Kuwaiti Specialist Hospital claimed Israel has warned it twice to evacuate, despite being located outside of the zone that Israel said Palestinians should evacuate. “We will not leave, and we will not let our people down,” said the hospital director.

The UN agency dedicated to Palestinian refugees said Sunday that it is no longer able to provide humanitarian assistance, warning that Gaza is running out of food, water and medicine.

I want to talk about my aunt, Sameeha Abu Aokal – Um Fayez, from Jabalya refugee camp in Gaza. When she was seven, in 1948, she was expelled from her home in the village of Hirbiya, which stood on the beautiful land where the kibbu

tzim Karmiya and Zikim were established. Then she was left by the sea with her family and thousands of other Palestinians, without food or water, before being told to move south. Now in Gaza, as people are again told to move south, she refuses.
The number of Gazans heading to the southern Strip declined on Tuesday as residents seek refuge in hospitals, hoping to find safety from the IDF’s bombings. Egypt says the Rafah crossing, a vital artery befo

re the fighting and now a key route for desperately needed supplies, had not been officially closed but was made inoperable due to Israeli air strikes on the Gaza side.
Israel revoked the work permits of hundreds of Gazan laborers who were working in Israel at the time of Hamas’ attack and are keeping them in a military detention facility until circumstances permit their return to the Strip. Human rights organizations claim that the government has no legal authority to detain the Gazans, and the army says that they cannot be returned to Gaza as a result of the war and are currently being detained at a facility in the West Bank as the issue continues to be examined.
Since the outbreak of the war on October 7, more and more Palestinians in shepherding communities in the West Bank have been fleeing from their homes because of escalating settler violence. In some cases, entire communities have been emptied. In others a number of families have left, or just the women and children. Palestinian residents of a village in the Jordan Valley say that a settler gave them five hours to flee their homes.
Haaretz Editorial What to the sane majority in Israel is the greatest catastrophe in its history, is to the settlers an opportunity to chase Palestinians from their land and take it over. Hagar Shezaf exposed (Haaretz, Oct. 15,) that a wave of flight has begun since the outbreak of the war, by Palestinians belonging to shepherd communities in the West Bank, due to settler violence.

Haaretz, Oct 18, 2023, Edtorial, Emergencies are fertile ground for harming individual rights, first and foremost freedom of expression. Under the cover of emergency orders, State Prosecutor Amit Aisman expressed official support last week for “investigating, detaining and trying anyone who expresses praise or support for the horrors,” even once.
The Committee to Protect Journalists said on Wednesday that three Israeli, one Lebanese and 13 Palestinian journalists have died since Hamas’ deadly attack in southern Israel on October 7. Reports of other journalists being killed, missing, detained, hurt or threatened being investigated.

Depending on what your social media feed looks like right now, you either believe that Israel deliberately struck a Gazan hospital, killing over 500 innocent people, or you believe that while Islamic Jihad was aiming at Israelis, it misfired a rocket that hit the hospital or its parking lot, and Hamas has cynically exploited the explosion for its own media victory.
The Knesset approved Wednesday a temporary change to the prison ordinance that allows those suspected or convicted of national security-related offenses to be placed on mattresses on the floor and other measures that reduce their living space. Sixteen Israeli lawmakers voted in favor of the temporary provision, which will remain in effect for three months and enable the country’s prisons to take in new inmates even if they are at full capacity.
Oct 20, 2023, As an incessant barrage of rockets from the Gaza Strip continued to hit his city, Ashkelon Mayor Tomer Glam made an impassioned appeal last week to Defense Minister Yoav Gallant, a fellow Likud member. “No one understands what’s going on here! Over 160 apartments have taken direct hits, and they’re still firing at us. I want security, not losses. Some 40,000 residents of Ashkelon, the most heavily targeted city in the war with Gaza, are lacking proper protection from rocket fire – despite the fact that funding has been budgeted for it.

Reported by OTIP (Ottawa Talks Israel Palestine), Oct 20, After examining the UN votes on Brazil’s motion for aid for Gaza, vetoed by the US, OFIP concludes that world opinion is beginning to turn against the US-backed Israeli war on the people of Gaza.

Haaretz, Oct 21, 2023, Th IDF took away weapons from Gaza border communities in recent years, and armed West Bank settlers in the thousands.

Oct 22, 2023, Hamas rocket fire at Israel, and Israeli airstrikes on Gaza, continue. As Israeli forces prepare for an imminent ground offensive in Gaza and America mobilizes more forces to the area to deter Hezbollah and Iran, tensions are ratcheting up in the Middle East, with senior U.S. officials warning of a possible regional escalation. Meanwhile, the first convoy of humanitarian aid crossed into Gaza via the Rafah crossing with Egypt.

■ On Sunday, for the first time since the second intifada in the early 2000s, Israel hit targets in the West Bank with a fighter jet, striking, according to the IDF, a mosque in Jenin in which Hamas and Islamic Jihad members were sheltering. The IDF said the squad was planning a murder spree similar to the atrocities of October 7. Israeli forces said 27 Hamas operatives were arrested overnight in the West Bank. Later on Sunday, a Palestinian was shot and killed at a checkpoint near Jerusalem; according to the IDF, he had tried to ram soldiers with a car.

■ The Palestinian Health Ministry in Ramallah reported that a Palestinian was shot dead by IDF fire in the city of Qabatiya, near Jenin. According to the ministry, since the outbreak of the war, 90 Palestinians have been killed in the West Bank.
Cigarette burns, beatings, attempted sexual assault: Settlers and soldiers abused Palestinians. A week after being assaulted in Wadi as-Seeq, Palestinians and Israeli activists struggle to recover – and accuse an army unit of ‘hilltop youth’ and settlers.
Reported by Sabeel, Jerusalem, Oct 23, 2023, On the evening of Tuesday, October 17, a strike on Gaza’s al-Ahli Arab Hospital, often called the Baptist Hospital, killed at least 500 people, most of them children and women. Images and videos revealed body parts scattered across the hospital grounds, doctors performing emergency surgeries without anesthesia, and parents screaming and crying at the side of their deceased children. This is one of the most tragic bombings Palestinians have ever experienced. In
On October 19th, an Israeli airstrike tragically resulted in the loss of at least 18 lives and numerous injuries at the Greek Orthodox Saint Porphyrius Church compound in Gaza. Before the attack, the church received multiple warnings from the Israeli military about an impending strike on the area. Sadly, due to the ongoing bombardment across the entire Gaza strip, the people at the church had no safe haven to seek refuge other than within the church itself. In the past week, 31 mosques and 3 churches have been damaged in Gaza.
Violence rises in the West Bank amid Israel’s continuing assault on the Gaza Strip. At least 89 Palestinians have been killed by Israeli troops or settlers in the West Bank since the October 7th and more than 1100 Palestinians have been arrested by the Israeli army. Moreover, Palestinians in the West Bank have been protesting against Palestinian Authority, highlighting the long-simmering Palestinian anger against President Mahmoud Abbas.
Since October 7th, Palestinian journalists and medical professionals have faced extremely dire conditions. Several Palestinian journalists have lost their lives or live under constant threats to their safety. Tragically, some of these journalists have had to report on the deaths of their own family members. Similarly, Palestinian medical workers have also been subjected to horrible situations, with some suffering injuries or losing their lives while working under unimaginably challenging circumstances.
On the 16th of October, Israeli police arrested influential singer, Dalal Abu Amnh, in her home in Nazareth. The arrest was under the alleged claims of “incitement” after she posted sympathy for the children of Gaza. This incident is part of a wider campaign of arrest and interrogation over remarks of Palestinian citizens of Israel expressing solidarity with the residents Gaza. Furthermore, Israel’s police commissioner, Kobi Shabtai, has threatened to send Palestinian citizens of Israel to Gaza for showing support for the besieged residents.
Next Kumi Now Online will focus on the subject of Antisemitism. In recent times, there has been a rise of anti-Jewish crimes particularly committed by certain right-wing movements in the West. Indeed, this corresponds with other spikes of racism around the globe.
On the 18th of October, UN General Secretary António Guterres, called Security Council resolution for an immediate humanitarian momentary ceasefire in Palestine-Israel to provide lifesaving aid for the “epic human suffering” in Gaza. Whilst 12 of the Council’s 15 members voted in favour of Guterres’ resolution, and two (Russia, and the United Kingdom) abstained, the United States, was the only vote against which vetoed the whole resolution.

October 9, 2023

Haaretz, Oct 2, 2023, The number of countries to which the Defense Ministry has authorized exports of weapons and security-related cyber systems has skyrocketed in recent years, according to its own official data. The figures coincide with the export records of Israel’s defense industries, which broke their own records two years in a row.  Last year, Israel approved the marketing of drones to 145 different countries, with a 25% increase in the number of countries to which intelligence and cyber systems were sold – reveals data disclosed in response to a Freedom of Information request

The Jewish National Fund is continuing to bolster its role as a key player in the settlement enterprise and its accompanying looting and dispossession of the Palestinians in the West Bank, in preparation for a future annexation. Like all other settlement players, JNF too seems to view all means as kosher. And if they aren’t kosher, then they’ll be koshered retroactively in the future, after the settlers finish their takeover of Israel.

800 prisoners are to be transferred to new sections after a prison guard admitted to having sexual relations with Mazen al-Qadi, who is serving a life sentence for involvement in the 2002 terror attack in Tel Aviv.

As tens of thousands of Jews make their way to Jerusalem during Sukkot, some were filmed spitting at Christian worshippers for no reason. Jerusalem churches confirm the number of similar incidents is on the rise.

Oct 3, Israeli settler Elisha Yered, who is suspected of involvement in the killing of Palestinian teen Qosai Mi’tan, wrote on X (formerly Twitter) on Tuesday that spitting at Christians is “an ancient Jewish custom.”

Egyptian mediators working to reduce tensions between Israel and Hamas have warned that if Jewish worshippers continue to go up to the Temple Mount/Al-Aqsa compound, the security situation is likely to deteriorate.

The government has slashed more than 70 percent of the funding it has been giving to organizations that provide mental health support since the coronavirus pandemic erupted in 2020.

The Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) of the United Nations on Tuesday released a report calling on Israel to halt subsidies for Yeshiva students while increasing funding for Arab schools.  Despite calling for moves 180 degrees removed from current Israeli policies, the report was not responding to Smotrich and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, but rather basing itself off of data from 2022 and earlier.  At the same time, in order to create equality between the budgets of the Arab and Jewish sectors, the OECD recommends increasing the state’s investments in education and child care budgets both through the Arab local authorities and through the schools in the Arab sector.

Despite U.S. insistence that without significant measures on behalf of the Palestinians it will be difficult to put together an agreement, Israeli officials continue to dismiss the Palestinian leader and his demands, while accusing the U.S. of paying too much attention to the issue.

Leading Jewish religious figures and Israeli government ministers condemned the rise in incidents of Jews spitting on Christian worshippers in Jerusalem on Tuesday.  The condemnations come as several incidents of Jews spitting on or near Christian worshippers in Jerusalem’s Old City, which were filmed on Sunday and Monday. The series of spitting incidents provides further proof that these attacks have become widespread.

Israeli soldiers accompanied thousands of Israeli visitors to Mount Ebal in Area B, which is under Palestinian civil control. ‘The State of Israel will implement our sovereignty here’ says local municipal leader, in an effort to “own Joshua’s altar’.  This archeological site has become an Israeli-Palestinian battleground.

Oct 4, Qatar is still undecided about whether it will provide additional economic aid to the Gaza Strip as part of their efforts to restore calm to the strip, despite Hamas appealing to the Gulf emirate to increase its financial support of Gaza residents due to their difficult economic conditions.

84 Palestinians have fled the southern West Bank village of Masafer Yatta since July, according to data maintained by the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs.   The UN says that international humanitarian law forbids the forceful transference of citizens and called on Israel to halt the restrictions on movement, destruction of structures and the conducting of military exercises.

WASHINGTON – U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken overrode a Republican-issued hold on $75 million in food assistance for the Palestinian Territories, hours before the money was set to be forcibly redistributed elsewhere.  U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken’s under-the-radar approval of $75 million in food assistance comes after months of pressure from Democrats and the UNRWA.

Oct 5, The two Palestinians reportedly opened fire at an Israeli vehicle and were shot and killed at by IDF forces. In another incident, five IDF soldiers were injured, three severely, by a grenade explosion. Around 100 Palestinians were wounded in the early hours of Thursday during clashes with Israeli security forces in the West Bank city of Nablus, near Joseph’s Tomb.  

Oct 6, Last month UNESCO recognized the archaeological site of Tel es-Sultan (also called Tel Jericho) as a World Heritage Site in Palestine. The recognition was for a World Heritage Site in Palestine, not a Palestinian heritage site. As usual, Israel tried to prevent the move.

A 19-year-old Palestinian was shot and killed in the early hours of Friday in the West Bank town of Hawara. The IDF said the man was shot after throwing a large rock towards an Israeli vehicle, though the Palestinian Health Ministry claims he was shot by a Jewish settler who had entered the town.

As the fall Jewish holidays draw to a close, Israel is dominated by a feeling of anarchy and loss of control. Violence is spreading in both the Arab and the Jewish community, even reaching the soccer pitch, while Israelis’ sense of security deteriorates. The not-yet-an-intifada in the territories is kicking up quite a storm even without being officially named. A case in point is the night between Wednesday and Thursday this week.   Thursday’s incident in which five Israeli Border Police officers were wounded near Tulkarem highlights a deteriorating security situation in the West Bank which is now spreading beyond Jenin.

Oct 7, 2023, Dozens of Palestinian militants infiltrate Israel from Gaza by land, sea and air ■ Some 2,500 rockets fired from the Strip ■ At least 250 Israelis killed, over 1,000 wounded ■ Army strikes Hamas targets in Gaza; 230 Palestinians reportedly killed ■ Terrorists hold Israeli civilians hostage in their homes.

WASHINGTON – Voices from the international community issued strong condemnation on Saturday of Hamas-led attacks on Israel, while urging an end to the violence committed by Palestinian militants against Israeli civilians.  U.S. defense secretary says the Pentagon ‘will work to ensure that Israel has what it needs to defend itself,’ as Saudi Arabia calls for ‘an immediate cessation of violence’.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netnayhu issued a statement Saturday morning, commenting on the surprise attack by the Hamas on Israel that claimed the lives of at least 40 people and wounded over 500. “Israel is at War. This is not a so-called military operation, not another round of fighting, but war,” he said.

Reported by Friends of Hebron, October 7, 2023, As the world watched the latest surge of violence in the holy land, Israeli soldiers and settlers seized on the opportunity to arrest and torture our director Issa Amro.   Issa was detained and tortured for ten hours in an Israeli army base by soldiers and settlers in army uniform. He was beaten and kept very tightly handcuffed, blindfolded and gagged. He was kept and tortured alongside other Palestinian detainees in the army base.   “Israel is not defending itself,” Issa Amro stated. “It’s occupation, it’s apartheid, it’s Jewish supremacy. I saw that today with the soldiers. They don’t distinguish between anybody. They see us all as their enemy. But we will never give up.”

Haaretz Analysis, Oct 7, 2023,  You cannot overstate the magnitude, the scale and the reverberating shock waves of Saturday’s attack on Israel. This is Yom Kippur 1973 all over again, with one fundamental difference: the toll on Israel in 1973 (3,000 killed) was exacted on the military. Saturday’s attack, sure to escalate, claimed civilian lives, terrorized an entire country and was insulting as much as it was lethal.   Hamas’ attack on Saturday is an epic Israeli debacle, in which the state led by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and the Israel Defense Forces spectacularly failed to protect its citizens.

Haaretz, Oct 8, 2023, ■ Army strikes Hamas targets in Gaza; 256 Palestinians reportedly killed ■ ‘Substantial’ number of civilians and soldiers held hostage in Gaza. At least 350 Israelis have been killed and 2,048 wounded since Israel’s war with Hamas began on Saturday morning.  In the Gaza Strip, the Palestinian Health Ministry said 313 people have been killed in the Gaza Strip thus far, and 2,200 injured.  The exact number of Israeli captives and hostages held by Hamas in the Gaza Strip is still unknown. A source familiar with the matter told Haaretz that there are around dozens of individuals. Another source mentioned that based on the information gathered in Israel, their number could be close to a hundred. Hamas has announced its intention to soon declare the number of captives and hostages, whether alive or deceased, it claims to have in its possession.

Reported by Sabeel, Jerusalem, October 9, 2023, On October 7th, a historic and devastating series of events unfolded in Palestinian-Israeli history. Hamas initiated an operation known as “Al-Aqsa Flood,” launching thousands of rockets from Gaza into Israel and breaking through the electronic boarder barrier, causing the loss of hundreds of Israeli lives, and the taking of several Israelis as captives including women and children, into Gaza. In response, Israel declared “Operation Swords of Iron,” involving a brutal and continuous aerial attack on Gaza that claimed hundreds of lives. and various acts of aggression in the West Bank, resulting in the deaths of several Palestinians. The true extent of the recent events’ damage remains unknown, marking the beginning of a period of immense suffering.

From the 29^th of September to the 6^th of October, Jews around the world celebrated Sukkot (known as the Feast of Tabernacles). Sukkot is a weeklong holiday that celebrates the gathering of the harvest, the giving of the Torah, and the protection God provided. During Sukkot many Israelis take the opportunity to provoke Palestinians in the old city of Jerusalem. This year many Christians were spat on and harassed by religious Israeli Jews.

On the 4^th of October, the International Christian Embassy of Jerusalem as a part of their annual Christian Zionist conference titled “King of the Earth”, held a Jerusalem march for thousands of Christian Zionists from all across the world. In response, Sabeel went to the march and handed out pamphlets which showed the unjust realities Palestinians face and the theological misinterpretation of Christian Zionism.

Next week, Kumi Now Online will focus on how governments, companies, and individuals are profiting from the illegal Israeli occupation of Palestine. The Israeli military-industrial complex has turned the occupied Palestinian territory into a testing ground for advanced weaponry and surveillance technology, which it exports worldwide. Indeed, capitalism and the oppression of Palestinians are linked, making the Palestinian suffering a commodity for some.

September 25, 2023

Haaretz, September 18, 2023, A Palestinian youth was lightly wounded on Saturday during an assault by Israeli settlers in the southern West Bank city of Hebron, according to Palestinian reports.

A United Nations conference voted Sunday to list ruins of the ancient West Bank city of Jericho as a World Heritage Site in Palestine.  Jericho is one of the oldest continually inhabited cities on earth, and is located in the Israeli-occupied West Bank that is administered by the Palestinian Authority ■ Israel’s Foreign Ministry deemed the decision ‘another sign of the Palestinians’ cynical use of UNESCO’.  “Israel will work alongside its many friends in the organization in order to change all of [these] distorted decisions,” it added.

Israeli Border Police officers shot a Palestinian on Monday morning after he drew a knife on them at the Mazmuria checkpoint in East Jerusalem, the police said.

WASHINGTON – Israel’s pro-democracy protest movement on Sunday received perhaps its most important and extensive profile in international media, with “60 Minutes” dedicating nearly 15 minutes of its season premiere to the pushback against Benjamin Netanyahu’s judicial overhaul.  The segment, aired on the eve of the Israeli prime minister’s arrival in America, only stands to put his visit under a more intense microscope – particularly after Netanyahu accused the protesters awaiting him of aligning with the PLO and Iran.

Politicians, Jewish groups and protest leaders condemned Netanyahu on Monday for equating Israeli judicial overhaul protesters to the PLO and Iran.

Globe and Mail, September 17, 2023, Changes to lobbying rules could spell an end to 50 years of free trips to Israel for Canadian MPs and senators.  The Ottawa-based Centre for Israel and Jewish Affairs (CIJA), which funds the trips, says it is the group hardest hit by revisions to a code governing those who try to influence public officials.  The organization and its predecessor, the Canada-Israel Committee, have sponsored trips to Israel for federal politicians since 1973. The group estimates it has sent about 800 members of Parliament and senators to Israel over that period.  Duff Conacher, co-founder of the watchdog group Democracy Watch, supports the rule changes to address what he called “a form of legalized bribery.” He said if MPs want to travel for educational purposes they should create a travel fund and empower the Auditor-General to scrutinize trip spending.  “As studies by psychologists around the world have shown, all gifts and favours essentially buy influence, and so lobbyists and lobby groups never should have been allowed to give MPs, senators and their staff and families the costly gift of sponsored travel.”

Haaretz, Sept. 20, 2023, A 19-year-old Palestinian was shot dead, killed by Israeli army fire near Jericho after clashes broke out on Wednesday morning in the West Bank.   Israeli forces surrounded a house and arrested two young men, where clashes broke out after dozens of youth began throwing stones at the Israeli forces.  This youth was the 6^th Palestinian killed by the Israeli army in the last 24 hours.

Far-right lawmaker Limor Son Har-Melech described an Israeli convicted of murdering three Palestinians as a “holy righteous man” on Tuesday.  Following Limor Son Har-Melech’s comments, the Darkenu pro-democracy organization announced that it would contact the attorney general to examine whether the event at which she spoke constituted ‘fundraising for a terrorist,’ which is a violation of the law.

The Tel Aviv District Court on Wednesday convicted Netanel Binyamin, a 27-year-old Bat Yam resident, of a terrorist act of attempted murder for his role in the lynching of Sa’id Moussa during Operation Guardian of the Walls in May 2021.Sep 21, 2023, A crowdfunding campaign on behalf of an Israeli, Amiram Ben-Uliel jailed for murdering three Palestinians raised over one million shekels this week, following a high profile event at which an Otzma Yehudit lawmaker praised the convicted terrorist as a “holy righteous man.”  In July 2015, Amiram Ben-Uliel set out to murder Arabs, any Arabs, as an act of vengeance. Ben Uliel burned to death three members of the Dawabshe family: 18-month-old Ali and his parents, Sa’ad and Riham. Ben-Uliel hurled a Molotov cocktail at their home in the West Bank village of Duma and set it alight. Ali’s brother Ahmed, who was four years old at the time, suffered severe burns.

Reported by Defence of Children International Palestine, September 21. 2023, We are grateful and excited to share that the Rafto Foundation for Human Rights has awarded Defense for Children International – Palestine the 2023 Rafto Prize!  “By awarding the Rafto Prize to DCIP, the Rafto Foundation wants to shine a spotlight on their work to promote and defend children’s rights,” said Jostein Hole Kobbeltvedt, executive director of Rafto Foundation. “With this award, we want to support DCIP by putting pressure on international organizations, including the UN, to investigate violations of children’s rights in the OPT and other armed conflicts around the world and demand that these be stopped.”

Reported by B’Tselem, September 21, 2023,  What’s happening now in the West Bank is forcible transfer. Within about three months, four Palestinian communities have been forced to leave their homes in search of a safer place. Over the past two years, a total of seven communities have been forcibly displaced in this manner. This did not happen overnight, but as part of an ongoing Israeli policy the apartheid regime has been pursuing and implementing for years.
 A new position paper we are releasing this week explains the impossible living conditions created by this policy, which leaves the residents of these communities no choice but to leave their homes. Once they do, Israel can

Harretz, Sept. 22, 2023, A man was killed on Friday by Israeli army gunfire in the village of Dan, northwest of Jenin, in the West Bank, according to the Palestinian Health Ministry.

Israel attacked Hamas installations in the Gaza Strip on Friday, after dozens of Palestinians protested and clashed with troops near the border. During the earlier clashes at the border, the military used riot-dispersal methods, such as tear gas, as well as live fire. Incendiary balloons launched from Gaza caused two fires to break out near the border in Israel.  The Israeli government announced on Tuesday that the Gaza border will remain completely shut until further notice.

Unable to bear the presence of the Israeli army in the refugee camp that was his home  (day and night they were there, maintaining a siege of the camp 24/7 from a fortified tower at its entrance) 15-year-old Milad al-Raee threw a Molotov cocktail at the wall of the fortified tower from which the troops dominate the camp. A sniper from above shot him in the back, killing him. Milad had dreamed of becoming a musician like his father. (Gideon Levy)

Sep 23, 2023, The Israeli military prevented a tour by left-wing activists of a Palestinian village on Saturday, declaring it a closed military zone for the day. The residents of Ein al-Rashash routinely suffer from settler harassment, and is in an area where four herding communities have fled following intimidation over the past year.

Sep 24, 2023, The Palestinian organizations Hamas, Islamic Jihad, and the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine have agreed to continue escalating security tensions and violent action against Israel, they announced Sunday.

Two Palestinians, Usayed Jibawi and Abu Rahman Abu Dagesh, were killed and one Israeli soldier Sunday morning in an exchange of fire with the Israeli army after forces entered the Nur Shams refugee camp in the West Bank, according to the Palestinian Health Ministry.

September 18, 2023

Haaretz, September 12, 2023,  Police in Jerusalem’s Old City began demanding from shop owners in recent months that they stop selling T-shirts featuring the Palestinian flag and other Palestinian national symbols.  Under current police policy regarding the Old City of Jerusalem, shopkeepers cannot sell items featuring the Palestinian flag or other Palestinian national symbols  ‘I would always display an Israel flag alongside a Palestinian flag, the tourists loved it’.

For Israel, the Oslo accords were a resounding success.  In the Oslo Accords signed 30 years ago, Israel agreed to gradually shrink the occupation, while the Palestinians were forced to instantly cease all resistance. Each side interpreted the shrinking as it saw fit.  The creation of Palestinian enclaves is an internal Israeli compromise: making the Palestinians disappear without expelling them. In the meantime, Israel reaps great profits, in part by turning the West Bank and Gaza into a human laboratory. (Amira Haas)

Sept. 13, In the first-of-its-kind project,  Israel archaeologists are excavating a Palestinian village abandoned in1948, uncovering the ruins of Qadas, a Palestinian village near Lebanon, which Israel bulldozed so that refugees would have no home to return to.  The dig is the first in Israel specifically dedicated to archaeologically exploring the legacy of what Palestinians remember as the Nakba (“catastrophe” in Arabic): the uprooting of more than 700,000 Palestinians amidst the creation of the Jewish state and the first Arab-Israeli war.  “Here is something that has been hidden, erased from history, and it’s the archaeologist’s job to reveal the hidden past and highlight its relevance for the present, even though we are dealing with events from only 75 years ago,” says Prof. Raphael Greenberg of Tel Aviv University, who leads the project together with independent archaeologist Gideon Sulimani.

Five Palestinians were killed on Wednesday at the Israel-Gaza border by an explosive device that appeared to have been detonated accidentally, Palestinian officials said, as protests along the volatile frontier have ticked up after months of relative quiet.

Haaretz, September 14, 2023, Israeli authorities seized 16 tons of ammonium chloride, which is used to manufacture rockets, about two months ago in the port of Ashdod within a shipment bound for the Gaza Strip.

Israel will close its border crossings into Gaza and the West Bank from Thursday night until Sunday night, finishing at the end of Rosh Hashanah.

The Jerusalem District Court sentenced two Jewish citizens of the city on Thursday to prison terms for assaulting and critically injuring a Palestinian two and a half years ago.  In 2021, four Israelis assaulted a Palestinian in Mahane Yehuda market in Jerusalem, leaving the victim critically injured with several stab wounds.

A Haaretz investigation reveals that Israeli cyber companies developed technology that exploits the advertising system at the heart of the online economy to monitor civilians, hack into their phones and computers, and spy on them. This terrifying capability, against which no defense currently exists, has already been sold to a nondemocratic country,

Sept. 15, 2023, This is what a true resister of the regime looks like, one who battles for human rights and democracy with ferocious courage and is ready to pay a steep personal price for his struggle.  Nasser Nawaj’ah saw his family expelled from its village, which was demolished, and witnessed the murder of a shepherd by a settler. After choosing the path of nonviolent resistance, he became a field researcher for B’Tselem, and has now received the New Israel Fund’s Truth to Power Award.  (Gideon Levy)

The Israel Air Force struck a Hamas position on Friday evening after the army used sniper fire, smoke grenades and other crowd control measures to disperse hundreds of Palestinian protesters gathered near the Gaza border.   Palestinians earlier approached the border fence throwing stones, detonating explosives and burning tires, with some reporting knee injuries from IDF fire and one journalist who was wounded from a smoke grenade.

Reported by Sabeel, Jerusalem, September 18, 2023, On September 9th, Melad Al-Raei, a 15-year-old Palestinian boy was killed by Israeli occupation forces in the midst of clashes in Al-Aroub refugee camp north of Hebron. The Palestinian Authority health ministry reported that he was fatally shot in the back.

Following the controversial property deal in the Armenian Quarter of Jerusalem’s Old City between the Armenian Patriarchy and Israeli settler organization, Sabeel is continuing to call for unity among Christians in the face of this challenge. Last week, Sabeel participated in the first of what will become weekly protests against the property deal. 

On September 7th, clashes between various groups in Ein el-Hilweh, the largest Palestinian refugee camp in Lebanon, reignited. The violence resulted in 11 deaths, 2 of which were civilians, and 100 injuries. This incident follows a similar event from late July when another 13 people were killed in the camp.

In the past few weeks, Tamir Pardo, a former senior official of Mossad, described Israel’s actions in the West Bank as enforcing an “apartheid” system. Pardo has now joined the small but growing list of retired Israeli officials to speak out about the injustices being done to Palestinians.

On Sunday, September 3rd, Sabeel-Kairos UK held the first of four webinars for their new online series, “Hope for Palestine.” On the first Sunday of the month, from now until December, they will host Palestinian speakers Marah Sarji, Jonathan Kuttab, and Dr. Yasser Abu Jamei.

September 11, 2023

Haaretz, Sep. 4, 2023, Sept. 4, 2023, Between six and seven million Israelis, spread throughout 4,400 locations across the country, took part in protests against the Netanyahu government’s judicial overhaul since January, Israeli Police Chief Kobi Shabtai estimated on Monday.

The Shin Bet security service has contacted the Prime Minister’s Office and the National Security Ministry in the wake of a number of incidents in which Itamar Ben-Gvir’s car broke traffic laws.  Security sources say bodyguards complained that the national security minister was ordering his drivers to commit traffic offenses, including going through red lights, speeding and driving on the shoulder of the road ■ Ben-Gvir’s driver was summoned by the police following a collision with a family car last month.

At least 6,000 people participated on Sunday night in the funeral of Sheikh Sami Abdel Latif Masri, the imam who was killed on Saturday outside the mosque in the northern town of Kfar Qara.   A protest march took place on Route 65 after the funeral, where the demonstrators blocked an intersection. A large police force arrived in the area.

The Israeli army operated in the Jenin refugee camp in the West Bank on Monday morning. The IDF spokesperson said its forces arrested three Palestinian militants suspected of taking part in terror activities.  Monday’s operation marks the first time that the Israeli army entered Jenin since July, when it operated in the city during one of the biggest West Bank raids in 20 years.

Despite opposition from the school board, a warning from the Education Ministry and the resignation of the school’s principal over the event, the grounds of Herzliya Hebrew Gymnasium, a historic Tel Aviv high school, hosted a protest on Sunday that represented a step up from the demonstrations against Israel’s judicial coup.  Over 200 Israeli high school students declared they will refuse to serve in the IDF ‘due to the ongoing dictatorship in the occupied territories, and the developing dictatorship inside Israel’ ■ At a controversial event in Tel Aviv, the students said they hoped the judicial coup will convince more of their peers to join ‘an option of peace and justice for all’. 

Sept. 5, 2023, A 30-year-old man was shot to death in the Arab village of Iksal in northern Israel near Nazareth, raising the death toll to 169 in the Arab community.   Police have opened an investigation into the killing and are searching for the suspects and are investigating the background of the shooting.

 Haaretz Opinion: Murder streak in Israeli Arab society should be called a second Nakba.

A 21-year-old Palestinian militant was killed during an exchange of fire in the central West Bank city of Tul Karm on Tuesday, the Palestinian Health Ministry reported.  Ayid Abu Harab, a member of Islamic Jihad, was killed during an exchange of fire with Israeli forces and was considered an explosives expert.

A school building in East Jerusalem was set on fire early Tuesday morning following its recent establishment by the Jerusalem municipality to teach Israel’s educational curriculum rather than that of the Palestinian Authority. No injuries were reported.   Around 18 percent of East Jerusalem students currently study Israel’s education curriculum as the Education Ministry and Jerusalem municipality increase pressure on schools but have also received strong resistance from Palestinians.

Two masked female Israeli soldiers with rifles and an attack dog forced five female members of a Palestinian family to strip naked, each one separately, in the West Bank city of Hebron in July. The soldiers threatened to release the dog if the women did not comply, the family says.  (Amira Haas)  

An Israel Defense Forces unit, which included soldiers from the canine unit and Kiryat Arba police, raided the Ajluni family’s home in Hebron following intelligence about illegal weapons.
The eldest son, married with three daughters, was arrested. His detention has been extended several times.   Twenty-six family members, including 15 children, were gathered into the apartment belonging to a brother, Abdullah, and his wife, Amal. As is usual in such raids, the women and children were separated from the men; they were held in two rooms guarded by armed soldiers, and Israel’s humiliating practice of strip-searching Palestinian women continued.

Sept. 6, A former head of Israel’s Mossad intelligence agency told The Associated Press on Wednesday that Israel is enforcing an apartheid system in the West Bank, joining a tiny but growing list of retired officials to endorse an idea that remains largely on the fringes of Israeli discourse and international diplomacy.

Sept. 7, 2023, For Lod’s Arab residents, this side road is the main thoroughfare. It leads them directly from the isolated neighborhoods beyond the railroad track to the city of Ramle – to the shopping center, the HMO clinic, the school. This is their escape route, at least for a few hours, from the prison of their everyday life, where the body count rises weekly and gunshots and salvos are heard every day and night.  Without warning, police blocked a side road used by residents of Lod to quickly access schools, markets and other services – claiming it was used as an escape route by criminals

Haaretz Analysis: It’s amazing how many Israelis who regularly dine at McDonald’s, drive a Toyota, maybe work for a multinational corporation, or in the high-tech industry are ungrateful for the Oslo peace process. Extremists used to talk about putting the “Oslo criminals” on trial.  The peace agreement was a political fiasco. But it ended the Arab boycott and provided a critical boost to the Israeli economy.

Out of sight, at the edge of a darkened backyard, ethnic cleansing is happening. What until a few months ago seemed like a chance string of violent incidents committed by unruly settlers, tormenting their neighbors purely out of sadism, including beating up old men and children with iron bars, is growing before our blinded eyes to monstrous dimensions. It’s no longer a coincidental string of incidents; now it’s a policy, with the government either supporting it or turning a blind eye. One can no longer ignore it or remain silent. It looks like ethnic cleansing, acts ethnic cleansing and that’s what it is. (Gideon Levy)

Reported by OFIP, Sept. 7, 2023, Carleton University will hold a tribute event in Ottawa on September 22nd to launch a special new journalism award at Carleton University in honour of Shireen Abu Akleh, killed by an Israeli sniper in 2022.

Reported by CJPME, Sept. 7, 2023,  Today, CJPME is releasing the important results of a public opinion poll it commissioned which finds that Canadians are MUCH MORE likely to view Israel in terms of “apartheid” than they are to see it as a “vibrant democracy”.

Haaretz, Sept.  9, 2023, All that remains in the valley now is black, scorched earth, a memento of what was until last week a place of human habitation. There also is a sheep pen, which the banished residents left behind as a memorial or perhaps also in the hope of better days, when they will be able to return to their land – a prospect that looks very far-fetched indeed at present.   Terrorized by settlers, Palestinian shepherds in the West Bank are being forced to leave the villages they have lived in for decades. Last week it was the turn of Al-Baqa’a.  (Gideon Levy)

Israeli army soldiers entered the Arab-Israeli city of Kafr Qasem overnight on Saturday during a pursuit of Palestinians without authorization, contrary to military guidelines. The soldiers confronted local residents, fired a stun grenade at them, and, according to residents, also physically assaulted them, , resulting in injuries and medical treatment for seven individuals. The IDF has initiated an investigation into the incident.

On Tuesday, A 21-year-old Palestinian militant was killed during an exchange of fire in the central West Bank city of Tul Karm. Islamic Jihad announced that the man, Iyad Abu Harab, who was considered an explosives expert, was killed during the fighting

A 16-year-old Palestinian was killed on Saturday evening by Israeli army fire in the Al-Arroub refugee camp south of Bethlehem, the Palestinian Health Ministry reported.

Sept. 10, 2023, Since the start of the school year, Israeli police officers stationed at the Temple Mount/Al-Aqsa compound have searched the bags of Palestinian high school students wishing to enter and confiscated textbooks depicting the Palestinian flag.  According to East Jerusalem education officials, hundreds of books teaching the Palestinian Authority’s curriculum have been confiscated thus far with police claiming they are incendiary materials.

Opinion: Anxiety, genuine or false, has seized the heads of the military and the judiciary: The judicial revolution puts Israel Defense Forces soldiers and their commanders at concrete risk of prosecution abroad as war criminals.  It’s unclear whether the wave of briefings that engulfed the media over the weekend was meant only as a threat in the fight against the government coup or whether the apprehension is real. In any case, suddenly IDF commanders, fearful for their future, are telling it like it is as never before, presenting a truth they never before admitted. (Gideon Levy)

Opinion: At the demonstration in support of the government coup held in Jerusalem Thursday, what stood out was not only the threats against the Supreme Court justices issuing from the stage, but also the unofficial messages on the shirts and signs of participants, showing that Israel’s Gen Z Kahanists have a new hero – terrorists.  Among others seen in the pro-coup crowd were flags of the Kach movement flags and a host of signs and stickers in the black and yellow of Kahanism, in various versions: “Kahane was right,” “Baruch Goldstein was right” and “Amiram Ben-Uliel was right.”

Sept. 11, 2023, Israeli settlers attacked and injured a Palestinian and a left-wing activist in separate incidents in the West Bank on Saturday.

WASHINGTON – More than 75 leading Palestinian leaders, intellectuals and activists over the weekend sharply condemned Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas’ comments roundly decried as antisemitic Holocaust revisionism, stating he has long ago forfeited any claim to represent the Palestinian people.

Reported by Sabeel, Jerusalem, September 11, 2023, On the 5^th of September, the human rights organization, B’Tselem, uncovered, in a report, how dozens of masked female Israeli soldiers, with dogs, entered homes belonging to the extended Ajlouni family in Hebron. During their raid, Israeli female soldiers forced five women to strip naked in front of their frightened children.

On September 5th, Israeli forces, with armored tractors, stormed the overcrowded Nur Shams refugee camp from several fronts. During their raid, A Palestinian young man, Ayed Samih Abu-Harb, aged 21, was shot in the head by Israeli soldiers.  

On the 3rd of September, fighting broke out between two Eritrean groups, and the Israeli police in south Tel Aviv. The fighting broke out due to an event organized by Israel and the Eritrean embassy, marking 30 years of independence. Critics of the Isaias government saw it as an attempt to celebrate a dictator’s rule. During the fights, Israeli police used brute force including firing live bullets. Over 100 people were reported injured and 19 are seriously injured. Benjamin Netanyahu has expressed his intention to expel all African migrants from Israel.

September 4, 2023

Reported by OFIP, August 29, 2023, Thousands of Jewish American clerics, academics and other public figures have signed a public letter calling on their fellow Jews to speak out against the occupation of ’67, and against what they call “Jewish supremacy” in Israel.

Haaretz, Aug 29, 2023, Israel’s National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir on Tuesday arrived together with Construction and Housing Minister Yitzchak Goldknopf to oversee the demolition of houses in an unrecognized village near Tel Arad in the Negev, in Israel’s south.  ‘This is the first time ministers arrives to cheer those who ruin a house and leave its inhabitants without an alternative,’ says an Israeli-Bedouin activist. ‘It’s a cruel thing’!

Aug 30, A 22-year-old Israel was moderately wounded in a stabbing attack at a light rail station in central Jerusalem on Wednesday.  According to police, the 14-year-old assailant was shot and killed by an off-duty border police officer who was on the light rail when he witnessed the incident and immediately got off the train to respond. However, it was unclear if the boy was still armed when he was killed in what was described as a fast-moving incident.

An Israeli officer and three soldiers were wounded on Wednesday night when an explosive device was thrown at troops who were escorting hundreds of Jewish worshippers near the Joseph’s Tomb compound in Nablus in the West Bank. The device was thrown at soldiers who were on foot at the time and were inside the compound at the time.

Aug 31, 2023, One Israeli was killed and six others, including Israel Defense Forces soldiers, were injured on Thursday morning during a ramming attack near a West Bank checkpoint.  The attacker – a 41-year-old Palestinian with a work permit – was shot and killed by Israeli security guards.

The deputy mayor of Ma’aleh Adumim, a West Bank city, who is also a leading candidate for mayor, has closed down a driving school run by an Arab woman, following residents’ demand to remove Arabs from the city’s public sphere. Politicians and activists in Ma’aleh Adumim are targeting businesses which provide services to Palestinians from nearby towns.

The number of homicides among non-Arab Israelis has risen by more than 50 percent since the start of 2023, up from 26 at the same time last year to 40 so far this year.  Among Jews, 66 percent of cases have seen the perpetrator brought to justice, in contrast to just 10 percent in the Arab community, where many known killers still walk free.

Sep 1, 2023, About six weeks ago, all the inhabitants of Ein Samia, a Bedouin village adjacent to the ostensibly politically “moderate” settlement of Kochav Hashahar in the West Bank, left their homes. After loading all their possessions on trucks, they scattered across the territory of the Binyamin Regional Council. Last week, the residents of Qaboun, a small Bedouin village just to the north of Ein Samia, decided that they could also no longer cope with the settlers attacking them and encroaching on their land, and they too packed up and left. Another community erased.   Herding sheep into others’ fields, preventing access to water, blocking roads, killing animals and breaking into homes in the middle of the night – these and other tactics are part of the daily terror perpetrated by settlers in Palestinian villages.

WASHINGTON – Leading Democrats in both houses of Congress are increasing efforts to convince Republicans to lift their hold on $75 million in food assistance for the Palestinians, amid growing concerns about a looming humanitarian crisis that could spark further violence.

Over 1,000 security prisoners, mainly Palestinians, set to be released from prison on Friday will remain in custody due to a legislation change promoted by National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir.

Sept. 2, At least 150 people were wounded in clashes between Israeli police and hundreds of asylum seekers in Israel at an anti-regime protest near the Eritrean embassy in Tel Aviv on Saturday.

A 60-year-old man was shot dead near a mosque in Kafr Qara on Saturday, just one day after two people, including a 13-year-old boy, were killed in the northern Israeli-Arab city.  168 people have been killed in Arab community violence since the start of 2023, according to a count by Haaretz.

Reported by OFIP on September 2, 2023,  According to  UN press release, August 25:
“An updated mapping exercise by the United Nations reveals that 645 movement obstacles are spread across the West Bank.  “Restrictions on movement deepen humanitarian needs among Palestinians, undermining access to livelihoods and essential services such as health care and education, and have a noticeable psycho-social impact on communities.

Haaretz, Sep 3, 2023,  Every time a Palestinian kills or tries to kill an Israeli, this conveys weakness. It’s the weakness of the Palestinian leaders and of each Palestinian in the face of the systematic destruction of the remaining spaces in the West Bank. The Israelis’ goal: to make room for their ever-expanding spacious settlements. (Amira Hass)

Reported by Sabeel, Jerusalem, September 4, 2023, Three weeks ago, Agzaya al-Kar’aan, aged 51-year-old, was deported to the blockaded Gaza Strip after 32 years of living in Israel under the pretext that she does not have Israeli residency. Al-Kar’aan was forced to leave behind her 12 children, the youngest of whom is eight years old. This decision by Israeli authorities was made in a matter of hours. Thankfully, Al-Kar’aan was able to return to her family shortly after.

 In the past few weeks, Swimmers from all over the world took part in the ‘SwimWithGaza’ campaign, which aimed at raising awareness of the evil siege imposed by Israel on the Gaza Strip. They participated in their thousands from all around the world holding banners  2023, in support of Gaza.

On the 30th of August, hundreds of Google employees and pro-Palestine activists participated in a demonstration in San Francisco, California, in solidarity with the Palestinian people. This demonstration calls for the end of the company’s contract with the Israeli government and army which helps maintain the system of Apartheid in Palestine.  

August 28, 2023

Haaretz, August 21, 2023, A 40-year-old Israeli woman was killed in a shooting attack while driving in the south Hebron hills in the West Bank, Israel’s Magen David Adom emergency service says.  The woman was later identified as Batsheva Nagari, a mother of three and kindergarten teacher from the settlement of Beit Hagai. She will be laid to rest at the cemetery at Kfar Etzion settlement.  The second victim was taken to Soroka Medical Center in Be’er Sheva, and he is reported to be in serious condition. He was later identified as Arye Gotliv, also of Beit Hagai. A 12-year-old girl, who was also in the car, was uninjured.  The gunman fled, prompting Israeli security forces to embark on their second manhunt in three days.  The military shut down all entrances to the Palestinian city of Hebron along with other towns to the south and east.

A Palestinian is in critical condition after being shot in the back on Monday by Israeli security personnel in the West Bank.  Israel Border Police were operating in Nablus and responding to stone throwing. The man was taken to hospital in critical condition, and five other Palestinians were wounded,

Aug 22, 2023,  An Israeli army investigation published on Tuesday determined that the Israeli soldier killed in the July Jenin operations died of friendly fire.

Israeli security forces stormed into a town the northern West Bank on Tuesday, leading to fighting that killed a 17-year-old Palestinian, according to Palestinian health officials, the latest violence to grip the occupied territory.  The Israeli military conducted an arrest raid before dawn in the town of Zababdeh south of Jenin, local medics said. The Palestinian Health Ministry reported that 17-year-old Othman Abu Kharj was fatally shot in the head. The raid came as Israeli security forces were still searching for the Palestinian gunman that carried out a shooting in the northern Palestinian city of Hawara that killed an Israeli father and son on Saturday.  Nearly 180 Palestinians have been killed by Israeli fire in the West Bank since the start of this year, according to a tally by The Associated Press.

Reported by Stop the Wall, August 23, 2023,  This week, children in Palestine are back to school. Some will find their school in ruins, and some will be missing schoolmates they had only a few months ago. Since the beginning of 2023, Israel has killed at least 38 Palestinian children, injured almost 1000, while 160 are lingering in Israeli jails. 2280 Palestinian children have been  killed since January 2000. 

Haaretz, August 23, 2023, Israel has turned travel into a nightmare for Palestinians. Easing entry and exit arrangements for Palestinian Americans as part of the visa waiver pilot program provides relief for some, but is also riddled with pitfalls, the same time it blows up the claim that all Palestinians are a security threat.

Just hours after four people were gunned down in northern Israel, a man was stabbed to death near Lakiya, a Bedouin town in the south of the country early Wednesday.  He was later identified as 18-year-old Majid Faisel Dais, a Palestinian from the West Bank village of Yatta, south of Hebron.  According to Haaretz’s count, there have been 159 homicides in Israel’s Arab community since the start of the year – compared to 111 in the whole of 2022.

Opinion: What is left to say about the endless cycle of bloodshed in the Arab community? How can you cry so loud that it’s heard everywhere? Since the beginning of the year, 159 Israeli Arabs have been murdered. On this terrible Tuesday evening, four men aged 30 to 50 were killed in the town of Abu Snan in the Western Galilee. It just so happens to be the town I live in.

Aug 23, 2023, The Israel Police unit responsible for investigating offenses by officers has opened a probe into the circumstances surrounding the shooting and injuring of an unarmed Palestinian in the back by Border Police Monday in the village of Beita.  Ameed Beni Shamsa was critically wounded when he was shot in the back by Border Police while attempting to help another injured person.

At the session of a closed hearing of the Knesset Constitution, Law and Justice Committee on the implications of the judicial coup, which was held in February and leaked only now, representatives of all the security organizations warned that the legislation endangers the occupation regime (or the “settlement enterprise,” as it was referred to in the article). The reason, they said, was that a strong and independent court serves as “Israel’s flak jacket” before the world and “provides a reasoned stamp of approval” for human rights violations in the territories, thus preventing Israeli soldiers and officials from being tried abroad.

The Israeli Education Ministry is freezing a Hebrew proficiency program for Arab students citing a lack of funding, Israel’s Kan public broadcaster reported on Monday.  The Ivritana Hebrew proficiency program helps high schoolers from Israel’s Arab society practice Hebrew, which affects their success rates in the matriculation exams and in the job market ■ The Education Ministry denied reports of the program’s cancellation.

A local council in the Western Galilee two weeks ago carried out unauthorized earthworks around a complex of ancient buildings slated for preservation that included two churches used until 1948 by the residents of the Palestinian village of Al-Bassa. A few days later, the Beit al-Khouri building in the complex collapsed.  The head of the Western Galilee local council says earthworks near the ancient buildings slated for preservation, were part of an approved plan to widen a nearby road. The Israel Antiquities Authority says no approval or coordination was given.

August 24, 2023, Opinion: The basic statistics show the magnitude of the failure of the current government in handling the violence in the Arab community and the events of recent weeks prompt a dual concern – that it has no idea how to deal with the increasingly grave problem, but also that it doesn’t really care.

Israeli ‘heroes’ execute Arabs with impunity:  The video clip is horrific. A group of young men are caring for a wounded man who is lying on the road, with cries of people living nearby heard in the background. A man wearing a white shirt is seen running toward the injured man. An ambulance sounds a siren. And then, suddenly, the horror. A gunshot is heard and a bullet hits the man in the white shirt, who is shot from behind. He falls on his face. He has been executed with impunity by an Israeli ‘hero’. (Gideon Levy)

The High Court of Justice issued its approval on Thursday to demolish the home of a 13-year-old Palestinian boy who had stabbed an Israeli Border Police officer at the Shoafat checkpoint outside Jerusalem in February.

Opinion: National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir is not the father of Israeli apartheid. If anything, it would be more correct to say he is its child. From the way he thinks, speaks and acts, it is evident that the language of apartheid is his mother tongue. He knows no other. He was nursed on Jewish supremacy, and today, in his adulthood, he embodies its worldview. Sorry Itamar, but this is the reality.

For a certain generation of U.S. Jews, Golda Meir was the American woman who made aliyah and became leader of Israel. But will younger American Jews care for a new movie in which Israel is the apparent victim of the story?

August 25, 2023,The U.S. told Israel that it would have to make substantial concessions to the Palestinians in any future deal to normalize relations between Israel and Saudi Arabia, and that Israeli officials who claim that this would not be required are incorrect.  Benjamin Netanyahu’s government, which depends on far-right parties, will find it hard to make such concessions.

NEW YORK – Nearly 400 students, alumni and faculty at Princeton University have signed a petition expressing solidarity with a professor under attack for including a book deemed hostile and even defamatory to Israel in her fall syllabus.

August 26, 2023, A Palestinian teenager from Jericho was on the way to visit relatives in the city’s outskirts when he was caught in a Border Police raid. A single round of shots felled and killed him. ‘Two terrorists were eliminated, including the subject of your inquiry,’ police told  Haaretz. (Gideon Levy)

Aug 27, 2023, The killing of 19-year-old Qosai Mi’tan by settlers is one of this summer’s major stories in Israel, but it’s actually the latest in a string of similar shootings and stabbings of West Bank Palestinians where no one has been indicted.  When Israeli settlers kill Palestinians and don’t get indicted: 8 cases that ended without a trial.

The Israel Police abruptly expelled to Gaza a woman who was born in the Strip, the mother of 12 children with Israeli citizenship, including four minors.   Agzayeh Karan was born in Gaza but had been in Israel since 1992 after she married an Israeli citizen. A mother of 12 including four minors, Karan was not permitted to speak with or children or a lawyer once the deportation process began.

Reported by Sabeel, Jerusalem, August 28, 2023, Last week, Sabeel in cooperation with their Armenian partners in the old city of Jerusalem issued a statement titled “Standing Unwavering and Resolute”. This statement addresses the challenges faced by Christian communities in the Holy Land, particularly the recent events like the controversial property deal in the Armenian Quarter of Jerusalem’s Old City between the Armenian Patriarchy and Israeli settler organizations. The statement further calls for unity among Christians, international support, and the protection of historical heritage in the face of discrimination.

Last week on the 21st of August, Palestinian protesters marched along the eastern borders of Gaza City to mark the 54th anniversary of the arson attack on the Al-Aqsa Mosque. Israeli soldiers were stationed along the Gaza borderlines attacking protesters with live ammunition and tear gas canisters, shooting and injuring one person.

On the 22nd of August, Othman Abu-Khoruj, aged 17, was fatally shot in the head during an Israeli raid on the town of Zababdeh, south of Jenin. Abu-Khoruj worked at the local bakery and was the youngest son of his family. This is the highest number of Palestinian fatalities since 2005 in the West Bank.

We are delighted to announce that during the previous week, the board of Friends of Sabeel North America convened in Chicago for discussions regarding the optimal path forward in their mission. Adding to this good news, Jonathan Kuttab, the Executive Director of Friends of Sabeel North America, was honored with the prestigious title of the 2023 Legacy Peacemaker by the Mennonite Church in USA. This esteemed award is bestowed upon individuals who have dedicated their lives to the pursuit of peace and justice.

Last week, San Francisco State University (SFSU) once again worsened its harassment of Dr. Rabab Abdulhadi. SFSU cancelled the Palestine course which was moderated by Dr. Abdulhadi, and thus confirmed its pro-Israel bias and complicity with Zionist organizations that have long sought to silence Palestinian voices in higher education.

In the past week, the Christian community in Jerusalem came together to honor the assumption of Mary, a celebration of profound beauty. This meaningful observance includes cherished indigenous customs, like the symbolic journey from the Church of Resurrection to the Church of the Sepulcher of Mary. Sabeel Jerusalem, in gratitude for the rich tapestry of traditions that define our world, with a mission to rekindle the spirit of the community picnic commemorating the Virgin Mary’s Assumption, is actively arranging a vibrant bazaar for this purpose. Set to unfold in the serene Garden of Gethsemane, situated within the grounds of the Armenian Orthodox Church, this noteworthy event is scheduled for the first and second days of September.

In the upcoming week, Kumi Now will delve into the issue of unfair discrimination encountered by Palestinian citizens of Israel within the realm of education. This discrimination manifests in various aspects such as inadequate funding, biased curriculum, and the pervasive violence directed towards Palestinian students, thereby highlighting an additional element of the systematic prejudice against Palestinians.

August 21, 2023

Haaretz, Aug 13, 2023, Opinion, Last week, a delegation of Democratic Congress members, organized and led by AIPAC, visited Israel. The members of the delegation met with Prime Minister Netanyahu, opposition leader Lapid and other leaders around the country. Blatantly absent from the carefully planned agenda was one item – a meeting with leaders of the pro-democracy mass movement, the largest, most impressive in Israel’s history, widely considered historic by global standards. The Congress members were also not offered a visit to neither the main weekly demonstration in Tel Aviv, at the Kaplan junction recently renamed “Democracy Square,” nor any one of the 150 locations across the country where protesters are gathering for 30 consecutive weeks.  After it endorsed GOP election deniers, it’s about time AIPAC realizes that there are no longer any buyers for the fake picture of Israel it’s trying to sell.

Aug 14, 2023, Nine Palestinians were arrested over the past month on suspicion of being involved in establishing a terrorist infrastructure on behalf of Hamas and planning the abduction of an Israeli soldier, according to the Shin Bet, Israel’s internal security services.   The initial investigation reportedly shows the nine have been studying IDF routines in the West Bank, mapping escape routes, and preparing a hideout.

 Ismail Nashwan, who suffers from pulmonary fibrosis, has had to shuttle between his home and hospital since temperatures rose over 38 degrees Celsius (104 Fahrenheit), because he could not run his ventilator, or even just a fan, at home.

Saudi Arabia’s appointment of its first ambassador to the Palestinian Authority, who will also serve as consul general to Jerusalem, was not coordinated with Israel, and Israeli diplomatic figures are struggling to gauge its implications for the efforts to normalize relations with the kingdom.

The Jerusalem District Court rejected on Monday the appeal filed by the attorney of Yehiel Indore, the main suspect in the murder of 19-year-old Palestinian Qosai Jammal Mi’tanin in the village of Burqa two weeks ago, ordering that he be kept in custody.

In a rare move, Israeli security forces demolish four illegal buildings in an outpost in the central West Bank on Monday morning.

The courts have freed hundreds of detainees in recent weeks due to lack of space in the jails, which are fully occupied.

Power cuts in the Israel-controlled enclave – home to more than 2.3 million – now last for around 12 hours a day as demand for air conditioning soars. ‘Power cuts deprive patients of their right to regular oxygen ventilation and that pushes patients to keep visiting hospital,’ one Gazan doctor said.  Ismail Nashwan, who suffers from pulmonary fibrosis, has had to shuttle between his home and hospital since temperatures rose over 38 degrees Celsius (104 Fahrenheit), because he could not run his ventilator, or even just a fan, at home.

The anti-coup movement in Israel is making the rounds in the United States and reaching American Jewish communities in an unprecedented fashion. ‘We’re just not used to this,’ Rabbi Jay Rosenbaum from Seattle says. ‘This is new territory for the American Jewish community, but we’re beginning to get it. We have a lot of work to do’.

The leaders of Egypt and Jordan, and the Palestinian president on Monday slammed Israel, saying it was fueling chaos and violence in east Jerusalem and the occupied West Bank as bloodshed surges between Israel and Palestinians.  The condemnation comes at the end of a three-way summit in Egypt, where the leaders accused Israel of a number of violations against Palestinians including incursions by Israeli forces at the Al-Aqsa Mosque and illegally withholding Palestinian money.

Aug 15, 2023, An Israeli court ordered the release of Yehiel Indore to house arrest on Tuesday, who is the main suspect in the killing of 19-year-old Qosai Jammal Mi’tan in the West Bank town of Burqa two weeks ago.  In addition, two Palestinians were arrested for assault and stone throwing during the clashes in which an Israeli settler killed a Palestinian.

Aug 16, 2023, The boundaries of two West Bank outposts in the South Hebron Hills that had been built without government permission and legalized by the new Israeli cabinet in February are to be expanded considerably, maps released on Monday by the Israeli Civil Administration in the West Bank show. The cabinet retroactively authorized the two outposts, Asael and Avigayil, as well as eight others in February.

Israeli forces shot and critically wounded a Palestinian man in clashes close to Joseph’s Tomb near the West Bank city of Nablus on Wednesday night, according to the Red Crescent.  The

Aug 17, 2023, Israeli forces shot dead a 32-year-old Palestinian militant during the exchange of fire, which lightly wounded another Palestinian, while operating in the West Bank city of Jenin on Thursday, the Palestinian Health Ministry reported.

WASHINGTON — GOP presidential contender Vivek Ramaswamy has called on the U.S. to use normalization deals in the Middle East as a tool to end its military aid to Israel after 2028.  Vivek Ramaswamy says that an Abraham Accords 2.0 with the likes of Saudi Arabia, Oman and Qatar could help wean Israel off U.S. military aid by 2028, and ‘get it on its own two feet’.

Azad Essa, the award-winning Indian-South African journalist with Middle East Eye, offers an interesting and thought-provoking perspective in his book Hostile Homelands: The New Alliance between India and Israel (Pluto Press, 2023).

Israel’s Interior Ministry has stopped issuing clergy visas to evangelical Christian organizations based in Israel, in a sudden and unexplained policy change they say threatens their future operations.  The International Christian Embassy in Jerusalem was notified that its requests for clergy visas have been rejected on the grounds that the organization no longer qualifies as a religious institution. Group’s attorney: ‘We will bring our case to court’.

Aug 18, 2023, Israel’s coalition has decided to grant de facto recognition to West Bank settlements lacking official independent status. This decision entails direct funding allocation to these settlements.  The decision will likely include approval of funding amounting to hundreds of millions of shekels for infrastructure, paving roads and education. A source adds that the move falls short of recognizing of illegal outposts.

In view of conflicting media reports about the chances of success of the tripartite negotiations between the Biden administration, the State of Israel and Saudi Arabia to draw up a normalization agreement between the latter two countries, one should look at the last decades and understand that such an accord is inevitable – but has a dark underside to it. A historical examination of how other countries have severed and renewed their relations with Israel indicates that the danger to the rights and freedoms of hundreds of millions of civilians should normalization be achieved.

Aug 19, 2023, Two Israelis succumbed to their wounds on Saturday following a suspected shooting attack at a car wash in the West Bank, near the Palestinian town of Hawara.  The Israeli army is looking into the circumstances behind the shooting of two Israeli men at a car wash on the main road of the West Bank town. Local Palestinians administered CPR to the victims until Israeli aid arrived.

After reports emerged that a Palestinian man suffered serious wounds at the hands of Israeli police while detained, a Jerusalem District Court judge has requested that the Justice Ministry unit that investigates police misconduct look into the case.  The man, who is suspected of drug offenses, appeared in court with serious wounds, including what lawyer says is an imprint of a Star of David; police say they needed to use ‘reasonable force’ to subdue him.

Soldiers rained down dozens of rounds on a car in which two students were traveling in their West Bank village. One was killed, the other was wounded and then beaten by the troops. It was a reprise of yet another incident, from last month, which the army also claimed, falsely, was an attempted car ramming. (Gideon Levy)

The police stopped thousands of Christian worshipers from visiting a church in the Galilee for the Feast of the Transfiguration holiday on Friday, despite prior coordination. Police, fire and rescue services announced a day after its beginning that the pilgrimage was too unsafe.

Aug 20, 2023, The farmers of the village of Anin want to work their land properly every day, so they requested that the gate in the separation barrier blocking their plots from the village be opened daily, not twice a week. They filed this request in 2007, around five years after Israel built the barrier on their land, but they were refused.  Israel’s High Court rejected Anin villagers’ petition to work their land beyond the separation barrier every day, ruling that twice a week was sufficient. Now Israel’s army says the farmers should access their land just twice a year. (Amira Hass)

Reported by Sabeel, Jerusalem, August 21, 2023,  On Tuesday the 15th of August, Israeli forces invaded Aqabat Jabr refugee camp in the city of Jericho and shot 16-year-old Qusay Al-Walaji and Mohammed Nujoom, 25-years-old. Al-Walaji and Nujoom eventually died from their wounds. This brings the number of Palestinians killed by Israeli forces so far this year to 216.

On the 7th of August, Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich refused to release NIS 200 million (around $55 million) for economic development in Palestinian municipalities in Israel. Moreover, Smotrich announced a five-year freeze of funds amounting to hundreds of million dollars to the development of East Jerusalem. At the same time Smotrich has allocated more funds to the building of more illegal settlements.

For the past few weeks, a total of 13 Palestinian detainees remain on an open-ended hunger strike. This is in protest of their unfair administrative detention under Israel’s so-called administrative detention policy. According to B’Tselem, 2023 has been the year with the most Palestinians in administrative detention since 2003.

It’s truly wonderful news that Rev. Dr. Ateek is visiting Palestine and Sabeel Jerusalem from the United States this week. Rev. Dr. Ateek’s legacy as one of the founders of Sabeel and the father of Palestinian Liberation Theology has left a lasting impact amongst Palestinians, Internationals, Palestinian Theology, and many other areas. The land of Rev. Dr. Ateek’s origins eagerly anticipates the return of one of its esteemed native sons.

Next week, on the 29th of August Kumi Now will reflect on art as resistance. Art has always been a powerful channel for human expression, capable of transcending boundaries, defying oppression, and bearing witness to the struggles and aspirations of individuals and communities. In Palestine, art has long played a role in providing a voice to the voiceless and articulating the Palestinian condition.

August 14, 2023

Armed with an M16 and Jewish entitlement, Zvi Bar Yosef makes Palestinian’s lives hell.  A series of complaints of violence against Palestinians in the vicinity of settler Zvi Bar Yosef’s outpost – sometimes with his active participation – provides a glimpse of the impact of a tiny outpost on the lives of Palestinians living nearby.

Haaretz, Aug 7, 2023, Around 6:30 P.M. last Friday, residents of the West Bank village of Burqa received an alert on their WhatsApp group chat that Israeli settlers coming from the illegal outpost of Oz Zion were approaching their farmland.  ‘More and more kept coming’: Burqa residents describe setters deadly rampage on the Palestinian village.  Eyewitnesses told Haaretz that Israeli settlers opened fire randomly, and that the main suspect in the killing of 19-year-old Qosai Jammal Mi’tan was injured only after opening fire. Lack of an autopsy will make the investigation harder.

Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich is persisting in his refusal to allocate funding to Arab municipalities and educational programs in East Jerusalem, defying stark warnings from the Shin Bet security service.

Aug 8, 2023, The Education Ministry has reluctantly accepted cancelation of a special budget for higher education in East Jerusalem in an effort to prevent cuts to the budget for other schools in the area.

Israel’s security establishment is pushing to issue an administrative detention order against Elisha Yered, the suspect in the murder of 19-year-old Palestinian Qosai Jammal Mi’tan in the central West Bank village of Burqa last Friday. . Israeli security services believe they have ample intelligence on Elisha Yered, who has been targeted by the Shin Bet since youth. A top security official notes his tension-raising role and savvy political connections.

Aug 9, 2023, Israeli police rejected Hadash-Ta’al lawmaker Ahmad Tibi’s request to meet with five Palestinians arrested over their suspected involvement in clashes with armed Israeli settlers near the West Bank village of Burqa that left one Palestinian resident dead last week.  Hadash-Ta’al lawmaker Ahmad Tibi says ‘two types of MKs have been created in the Knesset – [Israeli] Jews who enjoy immunity and rights and Arab MKs without rights,’ after request denied despite visits to Jewish settler suspects.

Editorial: As a settler who advocates Jewish supremacy and is used to living like a lord among Palestinian subjects with no state, no citizenship, no protection and no rights in occupied territory under the army’s aegis, the very idea of an Arab Israeli citizen with equal rights is beyond the grasp of Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich.

From a report by Progressive International on August 7, 2023, As we (rhe delegation to Palestine from Progressive International) write in the report, these brazen acts of violence underscore the fragility of the Zionist project. The Israeli regime forces we encountered appeared to be terrified, cowering, prepared at all times to unleash disproportionate violence against people who posed no apparent threat to them. The Palestinian people, on the other hand — despite routine humiliation and constant violence — remain unafraid and dignified in their struggle. In a very visceral sense, it is obvious that the commitment of the occupied to liberation is greater than the commitment of the occupier to subjugation. 

Haaretz, Aug 10, 2023, The Justice Ministry’s department that investigates police misconduct intends to indict a policeman, subject to a hearing, for firing a sponge-tipped bullet at a 16-year-old girl outside her house in the East Jerusalem neighborhood of Sheikh Jarrah.

Haaretz Analysis, Aug 11, 2023, West Bank Palestinians are prohibited from defending themselves – their lives, their land or their property – from Jewish attackers. Self-defense against Jews in the West Bank is a criminal offense subject to arrest, trial, imprisonment and heavy fines – or death. (Amira Hass)

Haaretz, Aug 11, 2023, Israeli forces killed one Palestinian and wounded four in an operation in the occupied West Bank early Friday, according to Palestinian sources.  Reports name fatality as Mahmoud Jerad, killed in the Tul Karm refugee camp.

A Palestinian family evicted from their home in the Muslim Quarter of Jerusalem’s Old City following a decades-long legal battle were ordered to pay Israel Police and Israeli settlers tens of thousands of shekels to cover the costs of the eviction.

Reported by Sabeel Jerusalem, August 14, 2023, Last Sunday, Thousands of Palestinian and Jewish-Israelis protested in what is called “The March of the Dead”. This was a joint call on the Israeli government to combat the spiralling violence amongst Palestinian communities in Israel, that has claimed 141 lives so far this year. The Israeli state has systematically neglected and removed funds to address the needs of the Palestinian communities in Israel.

On Friday the 4th of August, A mob of armed Israeli settlers stormed Burqa east of Ramallah, torching at least two cars and opening fire at Palestinians who were there. Qusai Jamal Ma’atan, aged 19, he was shot dead by the armed settlers and four other Palestinians were wounded. This marks another death of a young Palestinian by armed settlers this year. [See Haaretz, Aug 7, above]

In the past few weeks, a petition has been circulating among Jewish academics, practitioners, and public figures titled “The Elephant in the Room”. This petition Supports the Israeli protest movement, yet calls on it to embrace equality for Jews and Palestinians within the Green Line and in the Occupied Palestinian Territories. Moreover, the petition demands from elected leaders, institutions, and governments around the world to confront “The Elephant in the Room”, which is the injustices committed by Israel against the Palestinian people.

This week on Tuesday the 15th, Sabeel will be launching Kathleen Christison’s new book titled “Justice on the Cross: Palestinian Liberation Theology, the Struggle against Israeli Oppression, and the Church”. This book surveys several Liberation Theologies before exploring more deeply Palestinian liberation theology, illuminating the powerful and contextual prophetic voices around the globe.

Next Tuesday the 22nd of August, Kumi Now will reflect on the Jerusalem Declaration on Christian Zionism, issued on the 22nd of August, 2006. This declaration was jointly written by several Palestinian Christian leaders addressing the implications and theological corruption of Christian Zionism. Christian Zionism perceives Palestinian presence as an obstacle to God’s plan and believes in the divine sovereignty of Jews in the whole land of Palestine, promoting an exclusivist, violent, and racist theology.

August 7, 2023

Haaretz, Aug 2, 2023,  Parents Circle – a nonprofit organization with both Palestinian and Israeli bereaved families – will no longer be allowed to operate activities in Israeli schools. The   Education Ministry made the announcement following pressure from right-wing groups.

Expat doctors abroad report a surge in requests from colleagues in Israel willing to pay a high personal and professional price after the vote to weaken the judiciary. Hundreds of doctors leaving Israel might be just the start.

Aug 3, A quarter of all Palestinians being held in Israel prisons are administrative detainees – imprisoned without charges or trial – according to Israel Prison Service figures obtained by HaMoked, the Center for the Defense of the Individual.  This situation is ‘unprecedented and worrying.’

Aug 4, 2023, A Palestinian militant was shot dead during an exchange of fire with Israeli forces in the West Bank, the Palestinian Health Ministry said on Friday.  The Israeli army reported that amid arrest operations throughout the West Bank, suspects in Tul Karm shot explosives and threw stones at soldiers who responded by returning fire, adding that ‘hits were identified’

Two Israeli settlers were arrested in relation to the killing of a 19-year-old Palestinian, Qosai Jammal Mi’tan, who was shot dead on Saturday, after clashes broke out between armed settlers and residents of the central West Bank village of Burqa on Friday night.  . One detained settler allegedly served as a spokesperson for an MK from Ben-Gvir’s Otzmah Yehudit party.

Aug 5, A Palestinian ambulance carrying an unconscious stroke victim is prevented from passing through an East Jerusalem checkpoint, whereupon he undergoes fruitless attempts at resuscitation. Mundal Jubran, aged 40, died. (Gideon Levy)

Aug 6, 2023, Analysis: Let’s make a bet: The Jewish Israeli settler who is under arrest on suspicion of shooting and killing Qosai Jammal Mi’tan on Friday in the West Bank village of Burqa, east of Ramallah, will not be indicted for murder. It’s doubtful that he’ll be charged at all.   The extremist and violent wing of the settler movement senses that the Israeli government and coalition lawmakers are backing them.

Aug 7, Israel Police and army forces have arrested five Palestinians on Sunday night for their suspected involvement in clashes with two armed Jewish settlers in the West Bank village of Burqa. During the clashes, one of the settlers shot and killed 19-year-old Qosai Jammal Mi’tan.

Aug 6, A senior Palestinian official called on the international community to declare the far-right Israeli political party Otzma Yehudit a “terrorist party,” after a settler affiliated with the party was arrested in connection to the shooting of a Palestinian on Saturday.

An Israeli municipal patrolman was killed in a suspected shooting attack in Tel Aviv on Saturday evening. His partner shot the assailant, a Palestinian from the Jenin area, after a brief chase.

Last week’s debate on PBS would have been considered almost fictional in the past. Facing each other were a former U.S. ambassador to Israel and a senior White House official, discussing whether it was time to stop America’s military support for Israel. An issue once thought to be totally consensual in American politics has become a contentious subject, and one that’s increasingly discussed in Washington.  The calls to end the U.S. military aid to Israel have extended beyond the Democratic Party’s progressive wing and are now being discussed by Republican circles.

Aug 7, 2023, Oz Tzion, the outpost where many of the settlers involved in the deadly attack in Burqa on Friday came from, was first established in 2021, apparently during the Bennett-Lapid government. It was built on privately owned, officially registered Palestinian land, east of Ramallah. The settlers employ a familiar strategy: Initiating aggressions through armed patrols on the fringes of Arab villages. This serves to intimidate Palestinians and set the groundwork for baseless future land claims.

A 17-year-old who was hit several days ago by Israeli fire near the town of Silwad has died, the Palestinian Health Ministry says on Monday.. 

Reported by Sabeel, Jerusalem, August 7,2023, Last week, two Palestinian boys, Mohammad Farid al-Za’areer and Mahmoud Abu Sa’n were killed by Israeli forces. Mahmoud Abu Sa’n, was killed from point blank range at the Nour Shams refugee camp, east of Tulkarm.  Mohammad Farid al-Za’areer was killed near the illegal Israeli settlement of Shim’a close to Hebron. According to local Palestinian sources Za’areer was one of the top students in his class and had just finished the 9th grade.

Over the last couple of weeks, clashes between Palestinian armed groups broke out in the refugee camp of Ain al-Hilweh in the coastal city of Saida. At least 11 people have been killed and 40 wounded, hundreds of Palestinian refugee residents have fled the camp for their safety.

On the 27th of July, Israeli forces raided Palestinian farmland in occupied Hebron with bulldozers and poured concrete into the water sources to stop agricultural irrigation in an area that serves 25 families. This marks another incident in a long assault on Palestinian agriculture and water sources this year.

Last week, the World Youth Day (WYD) occurred in Portugal. WYD is a gathering of young people from all over the world with the Pope. It is also a pilgrimage, a celebration of youth, an expression of the universal Church and an intense moment of evangelization for the youth of the world. Although its Catholic identity is clearly evident, WYD opens its doors to everyone, no matter how close to, or distant from the Church they are. This year over 150 young Palestinian Christians are participating in this event.

Next week’s Kumi Now will mark August the 19th as World Humanitarian Day. On this day we advocate for humanitarian aid workers and for all those affected by crises around the world. Simultaneously, we call for attention regarding the massive cuts in humanitarian aid to Palestinians and for the suffering of refugees living in Gaza, Syria and the Lebanon now living in dire need. 

August 1, 2023

Palestine Online, July 24, 2023, Israeli occupation forces demolished today a Palestinian house belonging to Jaafar Bsharat in Hamsa Tahta in Jordan Valley, the occupied West Bank. Jafaar, his wife & their 5 children are now homeless.

Haaretz, Jul 24, 2023, what has occurred in the last several hours in the Israel Defense Forces reserve duty system is starting to resemble an avalanche. Thousands of reservists have signed declarations vowing not to continue reporting for duty if the judicial overhaul legislation was passed, and now the time has come for them to act.

Jul 25, After Knesset lawmakers passed a key judicial overhaul law revoking the Supreme Court’s authority to overturn government decisions it deems unreasonable, tens of thousands of protesters took to the streets across the country. They were met with violence by the police and government supporters.

The Knesset approved an expansion of the so-called Admissions Committees Law that would allow more communities to screen applicants and reject those they deem unsuitable.  Critics say the newly expanded law – which was enacted in 2010 to circumvent a Supreme Court ruling that banned communities from selling land to Jews only – has patently ‘racist intentions.’

Israeli settlers broke into Palestinian homes in the West Bank villages of Tuba and El-Abid in the southern Hebron hills on Tuesday morning, escorted by Israeli soldiers.   One video shows settlers ordering a Palestinian woman to open a storage closet in her home. In another, a settler is seen entering a home as a soldier stands at the entrance.

Jul 27, 2023, A Palestinian teenager was killed by Israeli forces in the West Bank city of Qalqilya overnight Thursday, according to the Palestinian Health Ministry.  14-year-old Fares Abu Samra was reportedly shot in the head by Israeli troops.

Israel’s National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir visited the Temple Mount/Al-Aqsa compound in Jerusalem on Thursday morning to mark Tisha B’Av – a Jewish day of fast and mourning commemorating the destruction of both temples and the exile of the Jewish people.  Hamas spokesman said the ‘raids’ into the compound constitute ‘an escalation of the religious war the occupation is waging against Jerusalem and Al-Aqsa’.

The former head of the Mossad, Tamir Pardo, said that “horrible, racist parties” in Netanyahu’s coalition are similar to the notorious American white supremacist Ku Klux Klan.

Palestine Online, July 27, 2023,  Israeli occupation forces incursed Palestinian primary school (Bado Kaabna primary school) in Jericho & stole construction equipment incl. cement packages, cement blocks & building tools that was allocated to build a small fence around the school.

Israeli soldiers fill Palestinian homes with sewage water, driving around in spraying trucks.

Haaretz, July 29, 2023, Soldiers suddenly opened fire on cousins Suheib and Mohammed Kilani, seriously wounding them both for no apparent reason as they drove to their family’s grove to seek respite from the scorching sun. The army accused them of attempting a car-ramming attack but didn’t detain them.  (Gideon Levy)

An Israeli court has ordered the evacuation of some 550 residents of an unrecognized Bedouin village in southern Israel, to build a new neighborhood for the city of Dimona, a new predominantly Jewish neighborhood.

Israeli settlers set fire to Palestinian agricultural fields in a village south of Nablus in the West Bank, Palestinian media reported on Saturday.  The incident is the latest in a series violent attacks by Israeli settlers against Palestinians in the West Bank over the past few months.

The cement mixer vomited out the grayish liquid, which made a noise as it flowed noisily into the water wells, clogging them. Standing there were the soldiers who served as guards, the Civil Administration employees who devised this evil plan, the laborers who carried it out and the peasants who saw their sustenance snuffed out for eternity. (Gideon Levy) 

Reported by Sabeel, Jerusalem, August 1, 2023, About fifty Israeli settlers arrived in buses at the Mar Elias Monastery and church on Mount Carmel, near Haifa with the intention of breaking into the church and reciting Jewish prayers. A similar attempt had been thwarted earlier in the week. This time Palestinian worshippers prevented the settlers from disrupting services and made them retreat. Officials are now considering setting up perimeter gates to stop future incursions. 

Aljazeera have just screened a film by Jerome Evans entitled, Weaponising Water in Palestine, (27.7.23). It reveals how the Israeli occupation and the climate crisis have made Palestinians some of the most water insecure people in the world. Decades of Israeli occupation have left Palestinians struggling to access clean water. Israel now controls a majority of the freshwater resources in the occupied West Bank. While most of the water supply in Gaza is now unfit for human consumption.

Early on Thursday morning, on the 27th of July, a 14-year-old Palestinian boy, Fares Sharhabeel Abu Samra, was shot in the head by an Israeli soldier. Confrontations had broken out in Qalqilya in the occupied West Bank after the Israeli army had started to raid the area. The military claim they are investigating his death, but the Israeli human rights group Yesh Din recently revealed that less than one percent of Israeli soldiers accused of harming Palestinians are ever charged with crimes. 

Last weekend three Palestinian women from three different Palestinian cities, Nazareth, Jerusalem and Jenin spoke in the Newcastle area. They will visit eight UK locations to speak about how their lives are impacted by the Israeli occupation in the ‘Building Hope and Voices for Palestine’ Tour, sponsored by UK activists. 

Four Gaza fishermen were detained by Israeli naval gunboats about three nautical miles off the al Sudaniyya coast, northwest of Gaza City on Monday, the 24th of July. The fishermen, all from the Bakr family, were arrested and taken to Ashdod and their boat was seized. On the same day seven Israeli military vehicles, including bulldozers and tanks, crossed borders east of Khan Yunis, in southern Gaza and destroyed agricultural land.

Next week’s Kumi Now will mark the International Day of the World’s Indigenous People which falls on the 9th of August. There is much evidence to establish the indigenous status of Palestinians on their land. Decades of loss and oppression under the Israeli occupation link them to the sufferings of other indigenous people.

July 24, 2023

positions within the air force jointly declared their suspension of voluntary duty in a public letter.  Protesters against the Israeli government’s judicial overhaul understand that such a wave of announcements might be the most critical milestone yet in their struggle against the judicial overhaul.

Tens of thousands of Israelis blocked major traffic intersections and train stations across the country Tuesday in the latest “day of disruption” against the government’s attempted judicial overhaul.  Protesters blocked highways and train stations across Israel ■ Hundreds gather outside U.S. Embassy in Tel Aviv as Herzog meets Biden ■ Police use water cannon to disperse protesters ■ Far-right ministers Ben-Gvir and Smotrich heckled by anti-coup demonstrators.  Dozens of the protesters were arrested.

National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir and Minister Yitzhak Wasserlauf, both of Otzma Yehudit, are demanding an end to the plan to raise the socioeconomic level of Arab society, and for a reassessment of the decision. The demand is a continuation of the government’s intention to soon approve a transfer of about 130 million shekels ($36 million) that was earmarked for the Arab community – to avrechim, or married yeshiva students.

WASHINGTON – Bernie Sanders and at least six other progressive Democrats boycotted Israel’s President Isaac Herzog’s address to a joint session of Congress on Wednesday, hours after the U.S. House overwhelmingly passed a highly politicized Republican resolution meant to divide Democrats after Congressional Progressive Caucus chair Pramila Jayapal deemed Israel a “racist state.”

Jul 20, Protests against the Israeli government’s planned judicial overhaul continued on Thursday morning around the country. The particular focus of the protests is the passage of a bill through the Knesset that would deprive the courts of the power to overturn government decisions as unreasonable.

A 19-year-old Palestinian, Bader Sami Masri, was shot and killed overnight into Thursday in clashes that erupted between Israeli troops and Nablus residents when thousands of Jewish worshipers, including Israel’s police chief, entered the town to pray at the site of Josephs Tomb.

During the second intifada, Israeli women founded Machsom Watch – machsom means checkpoint in Hebrew. The goal: Visit the West Bank checkpoints, help the countless Palestinians suffering the humiliation of the occupation, take photographs, write up reports and bear witness to the wrongs.  A new documentary, screened at Jerusalem Film Festival, follows the courageous women of Machsom Watch ■ ‘They took on a moral mission. People spat at them from all directions’

Palestine Online, Jul 21, ,Israeli occupation bulldozers have destroyed hundreds of olive trees and grapes owned by Palestinians in Hebron.

Yesterday in Hebron, a Palestinian family were peacefully celebrating their daughter’s High School Exam result until the lsraeli occupation forces decided to steal their joy by invading their house and kidnapping four.

Israeli occupation forces have murdered the 18-year-old Palestinian youth Fawzi Makhalfeh in Sabastia town in Nablus.

Backed by Israeli occupation forces, colonial Israeli settlers have thrown the furniture of Sub Laban Family outside to the streets, after seizing it by force on July 11th in the old city of Jerusalem.

Israeli occupation forces detained the Palestinian youth Rafat Sub Laban from outside of his home in occupied Jerusalem. Sub Laban family’s home has been stolen by colonial settlers along with occupation forces on July 11th.

Haaretz, Jul 21, 2023, The letter signed by over 1,000 Israeli Air Force personnel on Friday announcing they would suspend their reserve duty if the government continues pushing the judicial overhaul legislation is the most critical step taken by the pro-democracy protest movement thus far.

Jul 22, 2023,  WASHINGTON – Two former U.S. ambassadors to Israel on Saturday called upon the Biden administration to cut military assistance to Israel, arguing that the U.S.-Israel relationship would be better suited without a sense of financial dependency.  The two former U.S. ambassadors to Israel claim that the aid provides ‘no leverage or influence’ over Israeli decisions, and cause U.S. to seem like ‘enablers’ of Israel’s occupation.

They loaded their belongings on two trucks and two tractors, and left the place they’d lived for decades. A brutal history, repeating itself.  Yet another shepherding community is driven out by settler violence.  (Gideon Levy)

Haaretz, Jul 23, Opinion: As it is poised to pass another bill that will roll back women’s rights, Israel’s far-right government should not underestimate the power of the rage and courage of women who refuse to see their rights usurped in the name of a conservative, religious and messianic agenda.

Jul 24, 2023,  Saja Shakir works at Jerusalem’s Hadassah Hospital, Ein Karem and lives in Sawahra al-Sharqiyeh, a neighborhood in the city’s southeast. It should take her half an hour to get to work, but it actually takes one to two-and-a-half hours. This is because Shakir, an Israeli citizen with a master’s degree from Hebrew University, does not have a permit to go through the small checkpoint that separates her neighborhood from the rest of the city.  Residents who live within Jerusalem’s city limits but on the Palestinian side of the separation barrier take circuitous routes for trips that should take minutes, because they can’t get permits – dealing with the bureaucracy is ‘an endless loop,’ one say 

Reported by Sabeel, Jerusalem, July 24, 2023, Aljazeera’s recent documentary, “Shooting the Messenger’, (19.7.23), focuses on how journalists are being targeted by the Israeli army. Since 2000 more than 55 journalists have been killed and many others seriously wounded. Israel claims that its troops are engaged in an ‘act of war’ and protects the identities of Israeli soldiers who cause death or injury. 

Almost 90,000 students across the Palestinian Territories, including 5,200 students in Jerusalem, are celebrating the release of the results of their Tawjihi, or matriculation exams. Sadly, not every Palestinian family is celebrating as some are grieving for the six Tawjihi students who were killed by the Israeli army this year. The students were named as: Mahmoud Al-Saadi, Mohammad Turkman, Majdi Arrawai, (all from Jenin) Wadi’ Abu Ramoz(from Jerusalem), Ahmed Daraghmeh, (from Tubas) and Osama Adawi, (from Hebron). 

Last week Nikodemus Schnabel, an abbot in the Benedictine Order of the Dormition Abbey in Jerusalem was approached by an usher at the Western Wall and told to remove the cross he wears over his robes, as she deemed it was ‘a provocation’. At the time Schnabel was escorting the German Education Minister to an awaiting car after she had visited the Jewish holy site. He stated that this incident was symptomatic of the growing number of verbal and physical attacks he had recently experienced in the city, saying, ‘there have been many spitting attacks on me, verbal attacks, people who really push me.’ In the holy city for three religions, Christians, Moslems and even some Jews no longer appear to be welcome. 

On Thursday, the 20th of July, two armed Israeli settlers broke into the Greek Orthodox Church in Jerusalem, laid blankets and possessions down on the ground and announced they would remain there. When they were asked to leave by a church official they became abusive and shouted racist insults. The church has been caught up in legal battles with settler organizations which stake claims to the site of the church land. 

It is now over a year ago since Shireen Abu Akleh, a Palestinian-American journalist, was shot dead during an Israeli military raid on Jenin. Dozens of US human rights’ groups are now urging Congress to pass a bill which would require the public reporting on the circumstances surrounding her death. Independent experts working for major media outlets have all concluded that Shireen was shot by an Israeli soldier.More than a hundred members of Congress have called for a thorough US-led investigation that results in accountability for those found responsible for Shireen’s death.

Next week Kumi Now will look at Israel’s use of collective punishment against Palestinians. The Fourth Geneva Convention outlawed the use of collective punishment and yet Israel still implements this form of punishment without drawing down international condemnation. The blockade of Gaza, home demolitions, forcible transfers, restricting entry permits and night raids are all routine policies carried out by Israeli forces against Palestinians. Such discriminatory policies are defended by Israel as ‘necessary to its security’.

July 17, 2023

Haaretz, Jul 11, 2023,  Israel Police evicted a Palestinian family from its home in the Muslim Quarter of East Jerusalem on Tuesday morning to make way for Israeli settlers, who took possession of the home shortly after the eviction.  Israeli police forcibly evict the last resident, Mustafa Sub Laban, in his 70s, as well as activists after decades of struggle. Demonstrators protesting the eviction arrested.

Jul 12, 2023,Tens of thousands of Israelis took to the streets Tuesday in response to a vote held overnight in the Knesset, during which the Benjamin Netanyahu-led government advanced one of the key bills in the judicial upheaval legislation.  At least 80 people were detained during Tuesday’s large-scale protests against Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s plan to weaken the judiciary.

Israel’s Justice Ministry is advancing a large-scale plan submitted by a real estate company run by right-wing activists to build 450 housing units for Jews in East Jerusalem, in the heart of a Palestinian residential area.

July 13, Opinion: Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his coalition partners have not concealed the goals of the coup they have been resolutely advancing since their victory in the November election: to dismantle Israel and reassemble it as an ultranationalist, religious state that will establish “in all parts of the Land of Israel” a regime of Jewish supremacy and Arab inferiority. A state with unfettered domestic power that can perpetuate its rule even if elections are held.

Opinion | So how did you sleep, cursed settlers, in the house in Jerusalem’s Muslim Quarter that you coveted and robbed from a sickly, elderly couple who had been thrown out of it? What was your first night among the ancient walls like?  Israel’s rotten, racist justice system is ‘liberating’ Jerusalem. (Gideon Levy)

Shin Bet security agency chief Ronen Bar urged Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich not to stop funding used to encourage Palestinian residents of Jerusalem to study at Israeli institutes of higher education.

The European Union Parliament adopted a statement in support of an investigation by the International Criminal Court in The Hague into possible war crimes by Israel in the West Bank.

Jul 16, 2023,  The Israeli military is allowing a group of Jewish settlers to remain in a property in the West Bank city of Hebron that they recently inhabited despite the structure having been designated a closed military zone and the state testifying before the High Court that it was vacant.  Israel’s high court denied a petition by two Palestinians demanding the state’s help in removing the settlers from the house, saying that a tour of the property found it to be unoccupied. Haaretz now discovered that in the last few days settlers have once again occupied the building.

Reported by Sabeel, Jerusalem, July 17, 2023, On the 11th of July, the Soblaban family was forcibly displaced from their home in the Old City of Jerusalem after a prolonged legal battle with the Israeli courts. They had to watch as their home was taken over by Israeli settlers, an action deemed illegal under international law. Regrettably, their story is not an isolated incident in Jerusalem, and sadly, more such incidents are likely to occur in the near future. 

Sabeel remains busy this month with various projects and new developments. In collaboration with Bethlehem University, Sabeel held a one day leadership training among scout groups in Ramallah and neighboring areas. Additionally, Sabeel has recently welcomed two new staff members, Evon Bajjali and Samuel Munayer, who will support the ongoing projects of Kumi Now and Sabeel initiatives. 

In a lawsuit filed in June, B’nai Brith, a Jewish human rights group, is seeking $35,000 in damages from Rabbi David Mivasair, a long-time anti-Zionist activist in Canada. The claim made by B’nai Brith alleges that Rabbi Mivasair made numerous tweets, including labeling B’nai Brith as “racist” and promoting “anti-Palestinian hate.  Sabeel prays for Rabbi David Mivasair, asking for strength and encouragement. May the Canadian judicial system recognize the truth and act accordingly.  

The devastation caused by military and settler attacks on Jenin Refugee Camp still reverberates. The Israeli attacks on Jenin in the Occupied West Bank, which lasted approximately 48 hours from both the air and ground on July 3rd, are considered the most significant destruction in the region over the past 20 years. Once again, Palestinians from Jenin Refugee Camp have been displaced from their homes, exemplifying that the Nakba continues to this day. Furthermore, instances of damage to property and agricultural lands by Jewish settlers against Palestinians have intensified throughout the Occupied Territories this year.

Next week’s Kumi Now will address the issue of family reunification among Palestinians. Israel’s stance on recognizing the right of Palestinians to family unification has been a contentious matter, leading to various obstacles for Palestinian families seeking reunification. One significant challenge is the annexation of East Jerusalem, which has created a political border separating numerous Palestinian families in the West Bank. Israel’s imposition of a rigid family unification policy not only conflicts with the norms of Palestinian society but also establishes a separate system for Palestinians, contrasting with the comparatively easier process for Jewish citizens. These actions by Israel against family unification among Palestinians are driven by political considerations, which are inappropriate according to international law governing occupied territories.

July 10, 2023

Haaretz, July 3, 2023, The Israeli army struck the Jenin refugee camp from the air with drone attacks in the early hours of Monday, followed by a ground incursion in which Israeli forces exchanged fire with armed Palestinians, in one of the biggest West Bank raids in 20 years.  After drone strike on militant HQ, Jenin op continues with ground incursion ■ At least ten killed, 100 wounded ■ Water supply to city cut off ■ Aerial defenses boosted in case of Gaza rockets ■ Palestinian president’s spokesperson: ‘War crime’ ■ White House says ‘monitoring situation closely’.

Palestinian militant factions Hamas and Islamic Jihad threatened on Monday to retaliate for the Israeli operation launched in the West Bank refugee camp of Jenin overnight Monday which has killed seven Palestinians.  ; President Abbas office calls for international action against ‘Israeli war crime’

July 4, The Palestinian death toll in Israel’s most extensive West Bank operation in years rose to ten early Tuesday, amid Palestinian reports of Jenin refugee camp residents fleeing their homes for fear of being harmed in clashes with security forces.

Hospitals in Jenin on Monday treated dozens who were wounded during the military operation Israel launched on the local refugee camp, but city residents said that ambulances, in many cases, were unable to reach and evacuate those hurt.  Residents of the Palestinian city say that both electricity and internet services were disrupted during fighting with Israeli troops.

Israel’s operation in Jenin’s refugee camp entered its second day on Tuesday, as a humanitarian crisis begins to escalate for the more than 15,000 residents of the camp who live in less than half a square kilometer of space.  Amid conflicting reports of whether residents were ordered to flee or not, thousands of Palestinians in the Jenin refugee camp require food and drinking water as the UN mobilizes humanitarian aid.

What is the objective of the Israeli operation in Jenin, which began shortly after midnight on Monday? The answer depends on who is briefing reporters. Was it a military priority, or a show for the settlers?

Arab states decry Israel’s latest military operation in the Palestinian city of Jenin – in which ten Palestinians were killed –calling it tantamount to a war crime – while calling on the international community to intervene.

Former UN secretary general recently warned that the two-state solution is no longer relevant. His statement joins the calls of others, who believe that the time has come to abandon the ‘land for peace’ formula and focus on the demand that Israel grant equal rights to Palestinians.

Twelve U.S. Jewish groups issued a joint statement on Monday expressing “growing anguish and horror” over the recent wave of “violent attacks by Jewish Israeli settlers against Palestinian communities in the occupied West Bank.”

July 5, 2023, An army with equipment straight out of a science-fiction film attacking an Indian tribe. That, more or less, is the balance of power, and that is one of the aspects which make the Palestinians of the Jenin refugee camp into heroes.  Israel’s master plan is to ensure that most of the West Bank is annexed de facto to Israel and ‘cleansed’ of Palestinians, who will be crowded into bounded reservations. (Amira Hass)

Five rockets were launched overnight Wednesday from the Gaza Strip towards Israel in the wake of the operation in Jenin, all intercepted by the Iron Dome.  Israel responded to the rockets with an air strike on Hamas munitions production facilities, ‘significantly impeding Hamas’ efforts to intensify the conflict,’ as operation in Jenin comes to an end.

An IDF spokesperson announced on Wednesday that the operation in the Jenin refugee camp has now ended, and all Israeli forces have left the camp. As Israel was withdrawing its forces from the camp on Tuesday, an Israeli soldier was killed during clashes with Palestinian militants. Rockets were also fired from Gaza during the withdrawal.   According to the Israeli military on Wednesday, Sergeant-Major David Yehuda Yitzhak, a 23-year-old from Beit El, was killed by live fire in the Jenin refugee camp. The army is investigating whether his death was caused by IDF fire from his fellow unit members, as two Egoz unit squadrons were operating in the area simultaneously.

Haaretz, July 6, 2023, An Israeli soldier was killed in a shooting attack on Thursday near the northern West Bank settlement of Kedumim, the Israeli army said.  The assailant attempted to flee but was shot dead by Israeli soldiers; Hamas took responsibility for the attack as a ‘response to the Israeli aggression against Jenin’.   July 7, Two Palestinians militants were killed on Friday in an exchange of fire with the Israeli army in the old city of Nablus in the West Bank. Three other Palestinians were detained, and another three injured but in a stable condition.  Israel’s security forces named the Palestinians who were killed in the raid as Hamza Maqbool, 32, and Khairi Shaheen, 34, residents of the city, who were suspected of shooting at a police car at the Har Bracha settlement on Thursday. The weapons that were used in the attack were seized and no Israeli casualties were reported, the security forces said. July 8, Shepherds in the South Hebron Hills were shocked to discover that a tent had been pitched by settlers on land that the settlers were forbidden to enter. Four brothers whose family owns the land were arrested – and the settlers are still there.  Another illegal outpost is born.  (Gideon Levy)   Palestinian journalists who covered the Israeli military operation in the Jenin refugee camp last week say that soldiers shot at them, despite the helmets and armored vests they wore identifying them as members of the media.  A video of the incident published by the Qatar-based Al Araby TV network and other media outlets shows soldiers firing at a television camera, destroying it. ‘

July 3, 2023

Palestine Online, June 26, 2023, Israeli occupation troops searched the Palestinian prisoner Ahmed Manasra’s house and vandalize its contents. Ahmed was arrested as a child when he was only 13. He has developed psychological disorders due to being incarcerated in Israel’s solitary confinement.

June 27, Israeli occupation has postponed the hearing court of Palestinian prisoner Ahmad Manasra for 20 days. Manasra has been suffering from difficult psychological conditions in isolation. Ahmad, 21, was violently beaten and detained in 2015 when he was only 13 years old.

Far-right Israeli minister Itamar Ben Gvir: “In this government, we have killed 120 Palestinians in the last six months, and there will be more in the future.”

Israeli army arrests the former prisoner, Hamza Mamoun Jaara, after storming his house in Nablus.

June 28, Hundreds of worshippers perform Eid al-Adha prayer at Al-Aqsa mosque.

June 30, Israeli settlers burn olive trees belonging to Palestinian residents in Tuwani village in Masafer Yatta, south of Hebron.

July 2, Last night, Palestinian resistance fighters in Jenin refugee camp, north of the occupied West Bank, successfully downed an Israeli military drone flying over the camp.

Israeli settlers uprooted today dozens of trees and destroyed agricultural crops in al-Khader town, south of the occupied West Bank city of Bethlehem.

Reported by B’Tselem, June 26, 2023, “we are operating under a hostile regime: a regime that is hostile to human rights and to freedom, to women and to the poor. But more than anything, it is a regime that is hostile to Palestinians. Our struggle is a struggle against the Israeli regime with the goal of changing it, transforming it into a democracy and instilling in it values of dignity, equality and justice.”

Haaretz, June 26, 2023, An Israeli journalist was derided and spat at, including by a child and a soldier, as he spent a day dressed as a priest in Jerusalem to investigate spiraling hate crimes against Christians in the city.

Jun 27, Israel’s President Isaac Herzog condemned on Tuesday recent acts of settler violence in the West Bank in a phone call with his Palestinian counterpart Mahmoud Abbas.  Defense Minister Yoav Gallant made a similar declaration in a call with Palestinian Civil Affairs Minister. It is the first time since the government’s formation six months ago that a member of the government has spoken with a Palestinian minister.

A 5-year-old Palestinian boy lost his eye last weekend following clashes between Israeli troops and Palestinians in the West Bank.  ‘I don’t know why they aimed at my car,’ Akram Malalha, whose son was shot in the back seat of a car while traveling to a wedding, says. ‘I don’t know if anyone will investigate it at all’.

Reported by the Adalah Justice Project June 26,  

BREAKING: Sierra Club workers just passed a union resolution to stand in solidarity with the Palestinian people in a historic vote of the Progressive Workers Union (PWU). We have been working closely with PWU over the last two years, and this is a significant milestone for the relationship between the labor movement and the Palestine solidarity movement. 

Haaretz,| Jun 28, 2023, Israeli lawmaker Sharren Haskel – who was ordered off the Knesset podium on Tuesday because she dared to walk up to the microphone with a (quiet) baby in a baby-carrier – is not a radical.  Treating women as second-class citizens isn’t just wishful thinking for Israel’s ruling coalition.  Theis government has a blunt message for Israeli women: go home.

The IDF’s Chief of Staff Herzl Halevi stated on Wednesday that any officer who stands by as “an Israeli citizen” torches a Palestinian house, “cannot be an officer.” The statement by Lt. Gen. Herzl Halevi comes amid a spate of brutal assaults by Jewish settlers in the West Bank on Palestinian Villages.

Knesset Speaker Amir Ohana spoke out against the recent spate of attacks on Israel’s Christian minority, declaring Israel’s “commitment to ensuring the safety and freedom of all.”

Jun 29, 2023, About a hundred Israeli writers, poets, translators and editors said on Wednesday that they will not submit their works for the literary awards presented by the Culture and Sports Minister Miki Zohar to protest his choice of board of trustees that would nominate three prominent Netanyahu supporters to select the judges of the prizes.

June 30, Haaretz Analysis: Settlers pogroms, their support in the government and Netanyahu’s latest right-wing pivot have driven some officers to warn of a West Bank ‘sinkhole’ that will require ever more resources.

Jul 1, 2023,  Israeli settlers have been involved in an alarming average of 95 monthly attacks against Palestinians in 2023, according to data collected by the UN Office for Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs from the beginning of the year until June 26th.  Data collected by the UN Office for Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs reveals that there have been at least 570 attacks against Palestinians in the West Bank this year – an average of three attacks a day. (Amira Haas)

Reported by Sabeel, Jerusalem, July 3, 2023, On Wednesday, the 28th of June, Jonathan Kuttab’s new book entitled, ‘The Truth Shall Set You Free’ was launched. Palestinian human rights lawyer writes about his personal journey from anger at the injustices he witnessed in his work to a deep commitment to peaceful activism. 

We are deeply saddened by the death of Maysoon Asadi Masri, a prominent Palestinian writer at the age of sixty. Maysoon was a highly influential figure in the literary world, both for her captivating storytelling, as well as for her literary reviews. She supported other local writers and artists by featuring their work in local newspapers and other publications. She also contributed articles for Sabeel’s ‘Cornerstone’ magazine. 

On Wednesday, the 21st of June, relatives of the Ahmad family in the village of Turmus Ayya were busy preparing for a family wedding. A number of them were getting ready in a room in the courtyard of the family home. However the celebratory atmosphere suddenly turned to terror when more than four hundred armed Israeli settlers raided the village, setting fire to homes and cars, throwing rocks and threatening the residents. One young Palestinian and father of two children, Omar Qattin, was killed in the raid. Young Palestinians helped the Ahmad family to escape from danger, but the damage to their home was extensive. The young couple were later married before just a few family members with ‘no singing and no joy’.

June 26, 2023

Reported by AJP (Americans for justice for Palestine), June 19, 2023, In a brazen show of force, Israeli soldiers descended upon the Jenin refugee camp this morning, employing U.S.-made Apache helicopters, live ammunition, stun grenades, and toxic gas. This assault resulted in the tragic deaths of five Palestinians, including a 15-year-old boy, and left at least 91 people wounded.  

Haaretz, June 21, 2023, Palestinians reported that Sedil Naghniyeh was struck by a live bullet in the head while standing in the front yard of her house. This brings the number of total casualties from Monday’s clash in Jenin to seven.  The 15-year-old Palestinian girl who was critically wounded in an exchange of fire with Israeli army forces and Palestinian militants in Jenin on Monday succumbed to her wounds on Wednesday morning.

The Inside-Palestine, June 19, United Nations official today expressed extreme worry about the deteriorating situation in the occupied Palestinian territories following the killing of five Palestinians and wounding 91 others in the northern West Bank camp of Jenin.

June 20, Israeli forces break up a water pipeline in the Jenin refugee camp in the West Bank, yesterday.

The Israeli occupation forces forcibly evacuated worshippers and guards from Al Aqsa Mosque.

Israeli occupation forces targeted an ambulance with gas bombs, causing a part of it to catch fire in the town of Hawara, south of Nablus.

Haaretz, Jun 20, 2023, United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres on Monday urged Israel to halt and reverse what he described as troubling and alarming decisions on settlement activity in the occupied West Bank, a UN spokesperson said.  The comments by UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres follow condemnations by the U.S. after Israel moves to shorten the process of approving settlement construction

Two Israeli soldiers were lightly wounded in a car ramming attack on Monday evening at a West Bank checkpoint, the IDF said in a statement.  The Palestinian Health Ministry stated that the two Palestinians were evacuated to a nearby hospital in Jenin with gunshot wounds, with one in critical condition.

A 20-year-old Palestinian man Muhammad Zakaria Al-Za’oul was shot dead in clashes with the Israeli army in the town of Husan near Bethlehem in the West Bank, the Palestinian Health Ministry said early Tuesday morning.

Coalition Knesset members threatened on Monday to act against a youth village for renting its complex to host a summer camp for the children of bereaved Israeli and Palestinian families.

The deaths of four Israelis on Tuesday afternoon, in a shooting attack near the West Bank settlement of Eli, will fuel calls being heard in Israel in recent weeks – chiefly from the right – for a major military offensive against the Palestinian armed groups operating mainly in northern Samaria.

Hours after the deadly shooting attack near the West Bank settlement of Eli, where four Israelis were murdered, groups of settlers arrived at several Palestinian cities and villages and began to block traffic, throw rocks, burn, and vandalize property.

Crowds of fans shouted racist chants and jeers toward an Arab player on Israel’s national soccer team in Jerusalem’s Teddy Stadium on Monday, during a home victory. Midfielder Mohammed Abu Fani was called a ‘terrorist’ as he made his way off the field following an international match against Andorra in Jerusalem.

Palestine Online, June 21, 2023, Nearly 60 vehicles and 30 houses were set on fire by around 400 armed Israeli settlers in Turmusaya town, north of Ramallah.

Reported by DCIP (Defence for Children International Palestine), June 21, 2023, On Monday, during an Israeli military incursion into Jenin refugee camp, Israeli forces shot and killed two Palestinian children, both 14 years old. Ahmad Saqer died Monday morning after an Israeli soldier shot him in the abdomen, and earlier today, Sadil Naghnaghieh died in Jenin Government Hospital, two days after an Israeli soldier shot her in the head as she filmed the military incursion on her phone from in front of her home.  Both of these children were shot and killed by Israeli forces in broad daylight, demonstrating that Israeli forces enjoy complete impunity and have no fear of repercussions.

Reported by AJP (Americans for Justice in Palestine) June 21, 2023, On Tuesday, June 20th, hundreds of armed Israeli settlers carried out a series of violent attacks, deliberately setting homes and cars on fire in the Palestinian village of Turmusayya in the occupied West Bank. The vast majority of the residents of the village happen to be Palestinian Americans. The settlers who attacked Turmusayya from the neighboring illegal settlement of Shiloh, killed Omar Hisham Jbara al-Qatin, who was defending his family home in the village. Omar was a father of two young children and a US Permanent Resident.  Similar to what occurred in Huwara a few months ago, this event can be defined as a “pogrom.” A pogrom is a violent attack or organized massacre perpetrated against a specific ethnic, religious, or social group, typically involving destruction, looting, and physical harm. 

Haaretz, June 21, 2023, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s government announced on Wednesday the immediate advancement of planning for 1,000 housing units in the settlement of Eli, near the site of Tuesday’s deadly shooting attack in which four Israelis were killed.

An Israeli army drone launched an airstrike on Wednesday evening against Palestinian militants near Jenin, in the northern West Bank.  Three Palestinians were killed.  This is the first targeted Israeli strike in the West Bank since the end of the second intifada, nearly two decades ago.

Jun 22, 2023, Israel Police and military forces working overnight on Thursday in the West Bank city of Nablus razed the home of the Palestinian assailant involved in the murder of an IDF soldier last October.   The IDF encountered clashes with some residents during the operation, with at least 33 Palestinians injured by tear gas at the scene in Nablus.

Newly released footage shows masked Israeli settlers, accompanied by a dog, tearing apart a Quran stolen from a mosque in the West Bank village of Urif during a rampage Wednesday, in which settlers also set fire to a school and tried to torch homes and the mosque. Egyptian minister says attack ‘uproots any chance of coexistence’

June 23, Intelligence files suggest that the 1950 murder of a Jew in the Judean Hills, which was always attributed to Palestinians, was committed by Jews – immigrants from Tunisia who engaged in forbidden commerce with Arabs and were protecting the smuggling route to Jordan.

Even half a century later, reading minutes from the Israel Defense Forces’ Judea and Samaria Division discussions is difficult. Each step in the establishment of a West Bank settlement is cataloged, step by step, from planning to execution. Israel poisoned Palestinian land to build West Bank settlement in 1970’s. the documents reveal.

Dozens, if not hundreds, of young Jews descend on a Palestinian village. Cars are torched, windows are smashed, flames rise from among the houses. All this happened Wednesday night in the West Bank village of Turmus Ayya, north of Ramallah.

June 24, Fifty Palestinians, 15 of them kids, became homeless when Israeli authorities razed homes in the Negev town of Arara, where some families have lived for generations.  (Gideon Levy)

Thanks to its popular college, the northern Israeli city of Safed has been attracting large numbers of Arab students from neighboring villages. While they generally get along quite well with their Jewish peers, city residents – many of them ultra-Orthodox – are not as welcoming

A soldier serving in the Israel Defense Forces’ Judea and Samaria Division was interrogated by the Military Police on suspicion of sharing classified information with settlers involved in setting up outposts in an effort to help them thwart evacuation by security services.  Sources told Haaretz that although his commanders knew the soldier is a well-known figure among extremist settlers known as the ‘hilltop youth,’ nothing was done to prevent him from accessing sensitive information.

The U.S. administration and a number of European states have conveyed their concern and bafflement to Israeli officials in recent days following a series of five unabated mob attacks by Israeli settlers against Palestinians throughout the West Bank.  This week alone, mobs of settlers rampaged through five Palestinian towns and torched homes and property, sometimes in the presence of Israeli soldiers who stood by, leading representatives from 20 countries to visit the Palestinian village of Turmus Ayya over the weekend

Jun 25, An IDF soldier was arrested on Saturday for alleged involvement in a settler riot in Umm Safa, a Palestinian village in the central West Bank.  The  soldier was one of five people arrested after dozens of settlers rampaged across Umm Safa earlier in the day, setting fire to four houses and 20 vehicles.

There aren’t many populations in the world as helpless as the Palestinians who live in their own country. No one protects their lives and property, let alone their dignity, and no one intends to do so. They are totally abandoned to their fates, as is their property. Their houses and cars can be torched, their fields set on fire. It’s all right to shoot them mercilessly, killing old people and babies, with no defense forces at their side. No police, no military: no one. If some such desperate defense force is organized, it’s immediately criminalized by Israel. Its fighters are labeled “terrorists,” their actions “terror attacks,” and their fates sealed, with death or prison the only options.  (Gideon Levy)

The Biden administration has informed Israel on Sunday that the United States will not transfer any funds to research institutes or scientific and technological projects taking place in the West Bank.

June 26, Editorial | Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is the person responsible for what happens in the West Bank, including Jewish acts of terror.

Palestine Online, June 24, 2023, BREAKING: Israeli occupation forces target medical crews in the village of Um Safa, west of Ramallah.

Israeli settlers attack Umm Safa village in Ramallah, burning several Palestinian houses and other properties.

Colonial Israeli settlers set fire on olive trees owned by Palestinians in Wadi Saer, north of Hebron.

A Palestinian child takes part in the funeral of her 39-year-old father, Tariq Idris, who was murdered by Israeli forces in Nablus.

Colonial Israeli settlers set fire on the main electricity station, which cut off the electricity for Umm Safa, Deir Sudan, Ajjoul and Attarah in Ramallah.

Israeli settlers set fire in the fields of Turmusayya village, north of Ramallah.

June 25, Israeli occupation forces abducted three Palestinian children during a military raid into Till Street in the city of Nablus. 

Reported by Sabeel, Jerusalem, June 26, 2023, On Friday, the 23rd of June, the High Commissioner for the United Nations, Volker Türk, spoke out about the Israeli raid on Jenin refugee camp on Monday night . He stated that, ‘the violence risks spiraling out of control, fueled by strident political rhetoric and an escalation in the use of advanced military weaponry by Israel.’ Israeli helicopter gunships were deployed in the Jenin raid, which left seven Palestinians dead and more than ninety seriously injured.

A day after the deadly Jenin raid, Palestinian gunmen retaliated by killing four Israeli settlers at a petrol station not far from Nablus. Only hours after that incident Israeli settlers took revenge into their own hands by storming through Palestinian towns, torching property and smashing cars. The Israeli authorities were slow to respond to these outbreaks of  settler violence and there was widespread damage to properties, terrorizing Palestinian residents  and one Palestinian, Omar Qattin, was killed by Israeli army fire. 

Eid al-Adha is the most important feast in the Muslim calendar and it will be celebrated for several days in Palestine, beginning on Tuesday, the 27th of June. One of the main traditions practiced during this festival is the charitable giving of food, money and clothes to the poor. 

A fifteen-year-old Palestinian teenager, Sadil Ghassen Turkman was caught up in the Israeli Jenin raid on Monday night. During the assault she was critically injured when she was shot in the head by an Israeli soldier. Sadly, she died just two days later. 

On Sunday, the 18th of June, hundreds of protestors turned out in the city of Haifa to demonstrate against the targeting of St Elias’ Church and Monastery by Israeli extremists.  The religious extremists had entered the church on Thursday and prayed out loud there, claiming they had a right to do so as the tomb of a Jewish figure lies in the church courtyard. They were ejected from the church by a young Christian from Haifa. The Israeli police took no action against the irreverent actions of the extremists, but arrested and interrogated the young Christian claiming he had assaulted them. Residents from Haifa, Christian Clergy and Moslem Imams joined the protest in solidarity with one another.

June 19, 2023

Haaretz, June 13, 2023, Openly, in flagrant violation of international commitments, Israel, led by Benjamin Netanyahu, is moving to reverse the 2005 Disengagement.  So that water now flows in the illegal West Bank settlement Homesh.

Palestine Online, June 13, A Palestinian 19-year-old Fares Hashash was killed by Israeli occupation forces during a military raid into Balata refugee camp in Nablus city.

Israeli military forces are preventing medical staff from reaching a Palestinian child who was injured by Israeli forces in the targeted house during a military raid in Balata refugee camp in Nablus.

Khalil Anees  was fatally shot by Israeli occupation forces during last night’s brutal raid on Nablus.

June 15, 2023, Israeli occupation forces demolished a Palestinian house in  Beit Jala town, south of Jerusalem, this morning, displacing its residents.

June 18, Ein Samia Bedouin community near Ramallah is witnessing expulsion from their homes after Israeli settler attacks intensified against them.

The Israeli occupation court sentenced Mustafa Awwad to 8 years imprisonment for taking part in a protest denouncing the 2021 Israeli aggression on Gaza.

Haaretz, June 15, 2023, According to a report released on Wednesday, nearly half of the West Bank land expropriated for public purposes is used only by Jewish settlers. Expropriated land that must legally be used to serve both Israeli settlers and Palestinians now holds settlements and roads for Jews only.

The Israeli army decided that no disciplinary action will be taken against a soldier who fatally shot a Palestinian toddler and injured his father at the entrance to Nabi Saleh village in the West Bank earlier this month.  IDF inquiry states the soldier mistakenly believed Tamimi family fired at him, as the sound of the shots came from a nearby IDF officer. Army acknowledges communication deficiencies, incorrect decisions.

A conference dealing with attacks against Christians in Jerusalem, which had been planned for Thursday, was moved from the Tower of David Museum to another site in the Old City following pressure from the municipality.  Sources say Jerusalem mayor’s aides threatened to fire the museum CEO if the conference, which the mayor called ‘antisemitic,’ was held.

CNN published an investigation on Thursday documenting the Israeli military response to the deadly settler riot in the West Bank town of Hawara this past February. During the riots, hundreds of Israeli settlers set fire to Palestinian homes and cars and threw stones seemingly  without any interference by the Israeli army.  A soldier who spoke exclusively to CNN said that dozens of soldiers were present at the scene, along with border police, and that they were aware of the threat posed by the settlers – but did not do anything to intervene. “We just let them continue to advance,” the soldier said, adding that by and large the IDF “doesn’t know how to deal with settler terrorism.”

Reported by Addameer, Prisoner Support and Human Rights Association,  June 15, 2023,  A breaking point has been reached; Palestinian administrative detainees who have been held without charge or trial under the Israeli policy of administrative detention have decided to embark on a mass hunger strike. Determined to challenge this oppressive system, Palestinians are committed to using their bodies as a means to demand justice. The hunger strike that is to begin on Sunday, 18 June 2023, exemplifies their persistence to shed light on the dire violations of their human rights under the Occupation’s Regime.

Haaretz, Jun 18, 2023, An Israeli Jew threw stones Thursday evening at the windows of the room said to be the site of the Last Supper, outside Jerusalem’s Old City walls, shattering the stained glass – , amid a sharp rise in vandalism and assaults against Christian and Christian institutions in Israel.

Jun 19, 2023, Israeli security forces raided the West Bank city of Jenin on Monday and are currently exchanging fire with Palestinian militants. Seven Israel Defense Forces soldiers and border police officers were injured, as the Palestinian Health Ministry reported of five Palestinians killed and 66 injured. Clashes are still ongoing.

Palestine Online, June 19, Israeli snipers open fire at Palestinian journalists whist covering the ongoing aggression in Jenin.

Reported by J Space Canada, June 19, In today’s meeting, the cabinet [of the Israeli government] transferred full authority over the West Bank from the military to the Minister Bezalel Smotrich (who called for the eradication of 7,000 Palestinians just months ago) against the advice of IDF commanders and Israel’s security apparatus.  

Reported by Sabeel, Jerusalem, June 19, 2023, The United Nations Relief and Works Agency, (UNRWA), is struggling to fulfil its mandate to provide services to 5.9 million Palestinian refugees living in Gaza, the West Bank, Jordan, Syria and Lebanon. Cuts in donor funding and rising costs are throwing the agency into crisis. Staff teams across the West Bank have just returned to work after a month-long strike over salary reductions. 

A growing number of children living in Gaza are suffering ‘ongoing trauma’ according to a recent Save the Children report. In less than eighteen years they have experienced Israeli bombings and attacks during fifteen military operations. Thousands of people have been killed in the enclave and there is no escape for those who remain. Children make up almost half the population in Gaza and many of them experience high levels of anxiety leading to frequent bedwetting, lapses in concentration and difficulties in communication.

 Weekly protests have been held by the Armenian community in Jerusalem over alleged secret land sales by their Patriarch Archbishop Manougian to Israeli investors in East Jerusalem. The disputed land sale would make up about 25% of the Armenian Quarter in the Old City and would result in loss of property to the population of several thousand Armenian Christians who live in the area.  The Palestinian Authority and the Jordanian government have now intervened to try and revoke the disputed contract and protect the Armenian community.

Next week’s Kumi Now will look at Israel as a nuclear power. Israel neither denies nor admits to owning nuclear weapons, but is thought to have 80-90 nuclear warheads. It has declined to sign the Treaty for the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons, (NPT) and has never allowed the International Atomic Energy Agency, (IAEA), to supervise its nuclear production.

June 13, 20223

Haaretz, June 5, 2023, Editorial, After the government declared war on flying the Palestinian flag, it has now marked the Arab school system and Arab teachers as the next target of its ultranationalism.

Palestine Online, June 5, 2023, According to United Nations Office for the Coordinated of Humanitarian Affairs, Israeli occupation demolished 43 Palestinian-owned structures in two weeks, displacing 56 people, including 33 children.

Army-backed extremist Israeli colonizers attack Kafr Thulth village, southeast of Qalqilya, firing live bullets at Palestinians and setting fire to farmlands, today.

 June 6, With sorrow and pain, Palestinian families of Barqan, Nassar, and Al-Taweel watch the demolition of their homes after being forced by Israeli occupation authorities to self-demolish their only shelter in Wadi Qadoom in Silwan town, occupied Jerusalem.

June 7, 2023, Israeli occupation forces have raided Ramallah City, injuring Palestinians, including children.

June 8, Israeli occupation forces shot and injured Palestinian journalist Momen Samreen while covering last night’s military raid into Ramallah.

June 11, Israeli occupation forces arrested Palestinian amputee Ghanem Hamarsheh after raiding his house in Ya’bed town in Jenin.  The Palestinian youth previously lost half of his leg due to an injury inflicted by the occupation forces.

June 12, Israeli occupation bulldozers demolish 5 Palestinian-owned houses belonging to the Al-Ghoul family in Arara in occupied Al-Naqab.

Haaretz, June 6, 2023, Two-and-a-half year old Mohammed Tamimi, who was wounded by IDF gunfire last week in the West Bank and died of his wounds on Monday, was laid to rest Tuesday following a funeral procession from Ramallah to his home village of Nabi Saleh.  Tamimi died following four days in the hospital, after he and his father were injured by Israeli army gunfire near their home in the West Bank village of Nabi Saleh.

Learn spoken Arabic to become better at driving Palestinian farmers and shepherds from their land. This is the latest mutation to the security-intelligence motivation for studying Arabic in Israel. This was the message voiced at an introductory lecture for an online course in spoken Arabic that was written and promoted by a 28-year-old, American-born man who lives in one of the ever-expanding West Bank settlements north of Ramallah. (Amira Hass)

Israel is barring a Gazan resident from traveling to Jordan through Israeli territory for medical treatment that would prevent his leg from being amputated. Egypt is also preventing H., 43, from going through its territory.  The Israeli army rejected H.’s request in light of ‘classified intelligence’ that suggests he has ‘ties to terrorist operatives’ ■ Concluding that traveling to Jordan isn’t possible, H. has made arrangements to have his leg amputated in Gaza next week.  (Amira Hass)

Opinion: On Monday, two peoples marked the anniversary of their national disaster: The Palestinians mourned 56 years of humiliation under Israeli occupation. The Jewish-Israeli people marked another year of falling into the abyss of apartheid, tyranny and isolation.  If Israel doesn’t wean itself off its lust for power and continues its slide toward messianism, it will assure its demise as a Jewish and democratic state.

Reported by OFIP (Ottawa Forum Israel Palestine) on June 7, 2023,  from the UN summary report: Between January 1 and May 29 2023, Israeli forces killed 112 Palestinians in the West Bank, including East Jerusalem, more than twice the number of deaths (53) in the same period in 2022.

Haaretz, June 8, 2023, The Palestinian Authority is blaming Israel for an acute drug shortage in the West Bank that is affecting Palestinian hospitals and residents with chronic conditions, arguing Israel has failed to help the organization supply and fund the medicines. The Gaza Strip is facing a similar crisis.

Ultranationalist activist Bentzi Gopstein, who was banned by the High Court of Justice from running for the Knesset, who is facing racism and terror charges, is advising National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir and police top brass.  Senior security source: ‘It’s insane that this man advises the national security minister’.

A family is heading out to a celebration of an aunt’s birthday, in the neighboring village. On his way home from work, the father had stopped off at the aunt’s house to drop off a birthday cake from the pastry shop where he works. Now back home, he lifts up his son, Mohammed, places him in the back seat of his Skoda and then walks around the car to get into the driver’s seat. An Israeli sniper shot two-and-a-half year-old Mohammed Tamimi in the head, then shot his father in the chest, as they set out for a birthday party. The toddler died four days later. He was the 150th Palestinian killed this year. (Gideon Levy)

Jun 9, A Palestinian man was killed by Israeli army gunfire on Friday, after trying to take the weapon of an Israeli soldier at a checkpoint in the West Bank, according to the IDF. The man was trying to pass through the Rantis checkpoint into the West Bank in a stolen car, according to the Israeli army.

June 11, The European Union’s Special Representative for Human Rights says Israel needs to do more to investigate and stop attacks by Israeli settlers in the occupied territories against Palestinian civilians. In a conversation with Haaretz at the end of his three-day visit to Israel and the West Bank, special representative Eamon Gilmore said that he had urged Israeli officials to act on this issue but did not sound optimistic about the future.

The white protest has succeeded. It has stopped the overhaul of the judiciary and for that, its participants deserve all due respect and gratitude. There have not been many protest movements in this country’s history, and this one seems to have been the most successful. Applause, dear friends. You’ve proven that Israelis are not Hungarians or Poles. But the eager applause should not mask the ills and flaws of this protest. The symptoms have recently only grown worse. (Gideon Levy)

June 12, Opinion: We’re not an occupying country, we’re an occupation with a country. The occupation is our major national project, and it has gone on for so long that we can’t imagine ourselves without it.  Israelis have learned to exact a price for every news report about the occupation, every hint that Palestinian blood is as red as theirs.

Israeli forces, usually the army, have killed 28 children so far this year in the West Bank and Jerusalem. In Gaza, 5-year-old Tamim died of fear, literally, during an airstrike. In the West Bank, Mustafa was shot in the heart after he and his friends threw stones at soldiers 50 meters away.

Four opposition lawmakers voted last week for a bill that is a keystone of the governing coalition’s program to attract Jewish residents to northern Israel and to expand small settlements in the West Bank. The lawmakers supported a bill introduced by far-right coalition party Otzma Yehudit, that proposes to expand the use of admissions committees in communities in northern Israel, which critics say can be used to reject Arabs, LGBTQ people and people with disabilities.   

Reported by Sabeel, Jerusalem, June 13, Late on Wednesday evening, the 7th of June, the Israeli army entered Ramallah to demolish the home of a Palestinian accused of planting two bombs in Jerusalem last November. Hundreds of Palestinians gathered to protest over the army’s presence in a Palestinian city over which it has no jurisdiction.  A Palestinian news photographer, Moamen Sumreen, who was wearing a clearly marked Press jacket, was observing the demolition from a rooftop when he was shot in the head by an Israeli soldier. Another photographer, Rabih Al-Munir was also injured, shot in the abdomen. 

The Israeli Prison Services, (IPS) has summoned Palestinian administrative detainees and put them under pressure to refuse to participate in hunger strikes. The Committee of Administrative Detainees has called for hunger strikes to start on Sunday, the 18th of June. Since the beginning of this year more than 1,300 administrative detention orders have been issued by the IPS.

Next Tuesday, the 20th of June, marks World Refugee Day and on that same day Kumi Now will consider the plight of Palestinian refugees. In 2021 there were 5.9 million Palestinian refugees registered with the United Nations Relief and Works Agency and about one third of them live in 58 refugee camps in Jordan, Lebanon, Syria, Gaza and the West Bank, including East Jerusalem.

June 5, 2023

Haaretz, May 30, 2023, UK, EU join U.S. criticism of the Israeli government decision to illegally relocate the West Bank outpost of Honesh.  In a statement, the U.S. State Department said Israel’s move to allow its citizens to establish a permanent presence in the Homesh outpost ‘violates Israel’s commitment to the Biden administration.’

A representative of the Israel Medical Association censured a bill to prevent funding for medical treatments to “improve quality of life” for Palestinian security prisoners at a hearing of the Knesset National Security Committee on Monday.  Slamming the ‘deceptive’ policy, an Arab lawmaker noted that Palestinian security inmates in Israel have never faced trial.

May 31, 2023, Two Arab children exposed Israel’s fast-moving Apartheid.  “Carmiel, a Jewish city, was designed to create a foundation for the Jewish settlement of Galilee. Opening a school for native Arabic speakers [as well as] money for bussing them at any time and place will change the demographic balance and harm the city’s character (which is 6 percent Arab),” said Yaniv Luzon, a magistrate’s court registrar in the Krayot outside Haifa, explaining why he was rejecting a November 2020 lawsuit filed by two Arab children living in Carmiel.

Settlers from an illegal outpost entered the Palestinian village of Jalud, northeast of Ramallah, and attacked village residents and property by throwing rocks and attempting to start fires on Tuesday night.  They damaged homes and injured at least 3 Palestinian residents. Police arrived after the event, but no arrests were made.

An amendment to the Students’ Rights Bill is due to appear in the near future before the Ministerial Committee for Legislation. The amendment would require academic institutions to suspend or even permanently expel students and not recognize their degrees obtained overseas if they are found to have expressed themselves in a way that could be perceived as supporting terrorism. The amendment further proposes a ban on raising the Palestinian Authority flag (according to the wording of the bill) on academic campuses and punishing those who wave them, even though waving a Palestinian flag (for the moment at least) is not illegal.

Jun 2, 2023, The state is allowing six sheep farms run by Israelis to operate in Masafer Yatta, a region in the southern West Bank that’s been declared a firing zone, after the justices of the High Court of Justice allowed the expulsion of its Palestinian residents.  Six sheep farms operate in Masafer Yatta, south of Mount Hebron, and the young men who stay there violently drive the Palestinian residents of the area away from their grazing lands. (Amira Hass)

June 3, Palestinians petitioning the High Court of Justice against the reestablishment of Homesh are requesting that the attorney general order a criminal investigation against ministers Yoav Gallant and Bezalel Smotrich for their involvement.  

Reported by Sabeel, Jerusalem, June 5, 2023, On Thursday, the 1st of June, an Israeli soldier shot a two-year-old Palestinian boy in the head and injured his father while they were sitting in their car parked in the village of Nabi Saleh, near Ramallah. The Israeli army claim they opened fire in response to gunfire towards the nearby Neve Tzuff settlement. The boy is now in a critical condition in Sheba Hospital, while his father was taken to a hospital in Ramallah. 

This week the Israeli Parliament has advanced two bills that would bring Palestinian schools and their staff in Israel under increased scrutiny from the Israeli security services.  One bill will require the Education Ministry to carry out more stringent security checks on Palestinians training to be teachers, while the other bill will make it much harder for candidates to obtain a teaching licence. 

There has been a recent outbreak of unbridled violence in the Nablus area by Israeli settlers against Palestinian communities. Settlers in Qusra, south of Nablus, set fire to Palestinian farming land and the fires spread over a wide area; while north-west of Nablus, in the village of Burqa, near the Homesh settlement, Israelis smashed gravestones in one of the village cemeteries. 

A number of Palestinian activists have recently been arrested by the Palestinian Authority.   Human rights organisations and local communities have condemned these arrests as an assault on freedom of speech in Palestinian civil society.

 Asif Al Rifai is a twenty-year-old Palestinian prisoner from Kafr’ Ein, near Ramallah. He has been suffering from cancer since the age of sixteen. Despite his serious state of health he was arrested in September 2022. Since then his condition has deteriorated, but he was denied chemotherapy treatment by the Israeli prison authorities until just recently when they relented.

Canadian Friends of Sabeel are organizing an online Remembrance Service for Fr. Robert Assaly, co-founder and long-time chair of Canadian Friends of Sabeel. Fr. Robert passed away on March 26 2023 after a short battle with cancer. The event is scheduled on Saturday, June 10 from 11:00 am – 12:15 pm eastern time (Canada time zone) ( 6:00 PM, Jerusalem time). 

Next week Kumi Now will focus on the issue of how tourists coming to Palestine/Israel can make ethical choices in the way they travel. Some tourists remain unaware of how Israel has annexed the tourist industry. It restricts tourist access to Palestinian sites, favours Israeli tour companies and disseminates propaganda to justify its position as an occupying power. In 2019 Amnesty International published its report ‘Destination Occupation’ which exposed how illegal Israeli settlements in the occupied Palestinian territory were being promoted as tourist venues by Airbnb, Booking.com, Expedia and Trip Advisor.

May 29, 2023

Haaretz, May 22, 2023, Three Palestinians were shot dead early Monday morning after Israeli soldiers entered a West Bank refugee camp, according to the Palestinian Health Ministry.  The three deceased were identified as 32-year-old Mohammad Bilal Zeitoun, 30-year-old Fathi Jihad Rizq and 24-year-old Abdullah Yousef Abu Hamdan.  Six others were wounded – one critically – during the clashes, according to the Palestinian Red Crescent. They were taken to the Rafidia Surgical Hospital.  The men were killed during a firefight with Israel Defense Forces soldiers who had entered the Balata refugee camp, according to eyewitnesses ■ ‘What happened tonight is a true massacre,’ said a senior Palestinian official.

Palestine Online, May 22, 2023, Thousands of people take part in the funeral of three Palestinians, who were murdered by Israeli occupation troops this early morning in a raid on Balata refugee camp, north of the occupied West Bank.

The Israeli municipality in Jerusalem has announced plans to build 400 illegal settlement units in the town of Abu Dis in occupied Jerusalem.

May 23, About 200 residents of Ein Samia, a Palestinian village near Ramallah, were forced to leave their homes due to escalating settler violence.

May 24, Israeli occupation troops completely destroyed a Palestinian-owned house under the pretext of building without a permit in Enab Neighbourhood, south of Hebron city.

May 25, Amidst Israel’s recent brutal aggression targeting the besieged Gaza Strip, Najwa Abu Eshaa, a 48-year-old Palestinian mother and the sole caregiver for her family of seven, tragically became paralyzed.

LAST NIGHT: Israeli forces blindfolded, handcuffed, and arrested a Palestinian youth during a brutal military raid into Aqabat Jabr refugee camp in Jericho.

At least 200 Israeli settlers invaded Al-Aqsa Mosque, citing the so-called Jewish “Feast of Weeks” as Pretext. Israeli occupation forces backed the Israeli settlers and prevented the Palestinians from entering Al-Aqsa Mosque courtyards to pave the way to the settlers’ invasion.

May 26, Israeli occupation forces shot and murdered the 28-year-old Palestinian youth Alaa Qaisiya in Hebron.

A Palestinian father documents the moment when Israeli occupation stormed his house to arrest his child while the family members were sleeping at dawn in occupied Jerusalem.

Haaretz, May 25, 2023, The Palestinian Health Ministry says that eight people were wounded, one of them seriously, during an Israeli military arrest operation in a refugee camp near Jericho.

Several European countries have added their voices to American criticism of a proposal to restrict the ability of Israeli human rights organizations to accept donations from foreign governments.

Israeli settlers began preparing the groundwork on state-owned land in the West Bank outpost of Homesh on Thursday to relocate a yeshiva established on privately owned Palestinian land. Despite U. S. rebuke, Israel approves settlers groundwork.

The heads of Israel’s universities have come out strongly against a proposal that would force academic institutions to suspend any student who displays the Palestinian flag or expresses support for terrorism.  Isreal’s university chiefs slam “fascistic’ bill outlawing Palestinians flags and warn of academic boycotts.

Ghazi Shihab, 66, is having coffee in a West Bank refugee camp before work. Two shots ring out from the street. He peeks out, and is fatally shot by a soldier. Meanwhile, army bulldozers crush six cars and a few stands. (Gideon Levy)

May 26, A Palestinian man was shot dead near a synagogue on Friday morning after attempting to stab people in a West Bank settlement with a knife, according to local reports.   The incident occurred in the Israeli settlement of Tene Omarim, which is located in the South Hebron Hills.

There are an estimated 150,000 Palestinians currently working in Israel, but is Israel using economic relations as a tool to retain control over the occupied territories and its people?

May 28, 2023,  Opinion |

One of the greater achievements Benjamin Netanyahu can chalk up to his credit is the final removal of a two-state solution from the table. Moreover, in his years as prime minister he has managed to remove the entire Palestinian issue from the public agenda.  Only two options remain for Israel: another Nakba or one state for two peoples.  (Gideon Levy)

Opinion | From nighttime detentions without a court order, to blindfolding and beatings: the silence of Israeli mental health therapists in the face of severe harm to Palestinian children is particularly alarming.  Childhood trauma: Protect the 2,000 Palestinian children Israel detains every year.

Haaretz, May 29. 2023, Israel annexed the West Banks’s largest park and ‘is turning it into a Disneyland’.  Israel is developing the Nebi Samuel national park while ignoring its Palestinian villagers, who aren’t allowed to have plumbing or plant trees.

Israeli settlers relocated overnight on Monday a yeshiva that was established on private Palestinian land in the West Bank outpost of Homesh, to a nearby spot designated state-owned land – with government approval and despite international uproar.  The IDF preventing journalists from accessing the outpost.

A Palestinian intelligence officer was killed Monday morning by Israeli army gunfire in the West Bank city of Jenin, according to the Palestinian Health Ministry. 

Reported by Sabeel, Jerusalem, May 29, 2023, Last week BADIL Resource Centre and Kairos Palestine gave an online presentation of a joint document entitled, ‘Palestinian Christians- ongoing forcible displacement and dispossession.’ This document builds on their initial joint study which was published in 2012.

 Shadi Khoury attended his court hearing on Sunday, the 21st of May. It was alleged that he participated in a demonstration on the 22nd of October 2022, a charge he denies. The first prosecution witness was Bara, a fifteen-year-old Palestinian boy. He surprised the court when he denied any prior knowledge of Shadi and withdrew his previous confession to the police, stating that it was obtained under coercion. Another court session has been set for the 23rd of October and Shadi will remain under house arrest.

Next week Kumi Now will consider the devastating environmental impact the Israeli occupation has had on Palestine, as we mark World Environment Day on Monday, the 1st of June. Illegal Israeli settlements, military zones, the apartheid wall, the dumping of industrial toxic waste, the diversion of water resources have all been part of the exploitation of Palestine by Israeli authorities over the past seventy years.

May 22, 2023

Haaretz, May 16, 2023. Thai agricultural workers in greenhouses near Moshav Ami’oz, where a rocket from Gaza landed last week, describe a lack of nearby shelter, barely audible rocket sirens and the fear of telling employers they don’t want to work during rocket fire.  When Gaza rockets fly, migrant workers in Israel are left exposed.

WASHINGTON – The U.S. State Department’s annual religious freedom report on Monday detailed a series of events in the past year when Israel failed to deter religious-based hostilities and promote freedom of religion and belief.  The report cites the Chief Rabbinate’s refusal to recognize non-Orthodox Jewish converts, anti-Arab hate crimes, and modesty signs discriminating against women as some of the key concerns over religious and ethnic discrimination in Israel.

The settler terrorists in Palestinian vineyards: An ancient olive tree cut down: this image is worthy of being the state’s symbol for a poster marking its 75th year, which I would raise on Tel Aviv’s Kaplan Street with a single explanatory sentence: “The electric saw belongs to Jewish settlers, the hands – to the State of Israel.” And I would also add: “Sponsored by the indifference, disregard and silence of most of Israel’s citizens.” (Amira Hass)

The eyes of the country should be fixed on Jerusalem this Thursday. That’s when the pinnacle of the ‘Death to Arabs’ Jewish extremist calendar is scheduled to take place: the Jerusalem Day Flag March.  This Thursday, the Israeli government’s far-right extremists are ensuring 50,000 more East Jerusalem Palestinians are exposed to its supremacist taunts and dangerous nationalist bravado.  Thousands of Israeli police plan to protect Jewish participants in the controversial Jerusalem Flag Day March.  Marchers will also set out from Israeli settlements in East Jerusalem, increasing concerns for a repeat of the violence of recent years

Palestine Online, May 17, 2023, Members of the Nabhan family in Gaza sit on the rubble of their house, which was completely destroyed by Israeli occupation warplanes during the latest Israel’s 5-day bombardment of the besieged Strip. The house was a shelter for 7 families with 40 people, including children and disabled persons.

Haaretz, May 17, 2023, Communications Minister Shlomo Karhi is threatening to take action against Channel Makan 33, Israel’s public Arabic-language channel. In a letter sent on Wednesday to Israeli public broadcaster Kan’s board, the minister denounced the channel, stressing that it seems like its “broadcasts are funded by the Palestinian Authority.”

Israel advances a law imposing one-year jail terms for public display of Palestinian flags. The bill sponsored by a far-right lawmaker passed the first of four legislative hurdles.

May 18, editorial, Israel’s Flag March of Shame: Thursday is Jerusalem Day, marking the 56th anniversary of the city’s reunification. The annual Flag March, in which tens of thousands of teens, nearly all of from the religious Zionist movement, parade through the alleys of the Old City’s Muslim Quarter, has long since become the day’s main event. Regrettably, the march, with its displays of racism, hatred and violence, accurately reflects Israeli society today, not only in Jerusalem and not only on Jerusalem Day.

The U.S. State Department condemned what it called “outrageous and unacceptable” violence and racist behavior at the annual Jerusalem Day Flag March on Thursday.

May 19, 2023, Several people have been wounded on Friday from stone throwing after clashes erupted between Jewish and Palestinian worshippers in Jerusalem’s Old City, Israel’s Magen David Adom says.  The clashes erupted after a mass Jerusalem Day prayer at the Western Wall, and reportedly involved stone-throwing, resulting in injuries to several people, including an Israeli police officer.

Contrary to what propaganda claims, for Palestinians, Nakba Day is not about marking the event of Israel’s creation as a catastrophe. It’s about the catastrophe that has been the ongoing fate of Palestinians ever since, as a consequence of a persistent policy by Israel and many other countries, who refuse to see the Palestinians as a people and a national group entitled to self-determination.  

May 20, 2023, By the time 15-year-old Mustafa Sabah died last month, his parents had already lost six of their 11 children. Mustafa, though, was leading a normal life. Aspiring to be a police officer, he had fashioned himself a wooden rifle and insisted on carrying it with him. Perhaps that’s why soldiers shot him. (Gideon Levy)

May 21, 2023, The Israeli military’s Central Command chief signed an order on Thursday that allows Israelis to remain at the evacuated settler outpost of Homesh in the West Bank, that was built on private Palestinian land.  Defense Minister Yoav Gallant issued the order to authorize entry into the Homesh outpost in order to curb an appeal filed by the Palestinian landowners to the High Court of Justice demanding that the Israeli settlers be cleared out and grant them access to the land.

National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir visited the Temple Mount on Sunday morning, and released a statement asserting Israeli control over the contentious site, which also hosts the Al-Aqsa Mosque complex.  ‘All the threats from Hamas won’t help them, we’re in charge of Jerusalem and all of the land of Israel,’ the far-right minister said during his visit to the contentious holy site ■ Jordan’s Foreign Ministry condemned the visit as a ‘serious violation of the status quo,’ Egypt called on Israel to ‘immediately stop the escalation’.

May 22, 2023, Due to opposition from Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich, a five-year plan to improve life in East Jerusalem was removed from the cabinet’s agenda on Sunday at the last minute.  The plan, which proposed a 2 billion shekel investment in Palestinian infrastructure, education and employment, was scrapped in the final hour due to opposition from Israel’s Finance Ministry – and far-right Minister Bezalel Smotrich.

The U.S. State Department spokesman Matthew Miller issued a message Monday night condemning the visit of Israel’s National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir to the Temple Mount. Miller stated that the U.S. is concerned by “the provocative visit […] and the accompanying inflammatory rhetoric.”   U.S. State Department spokesman Miller also stressed that legalizing the Homesh outpost is ‘inconsistent with both former Prime Minister Sharon’s written commitment to the Bush Administration and the current Israeli government’s commitments to the Biden Administration’.

Three Palestinians were shot dead early Monday morning after Israeli soldiers entered a West Bank refugee camp, according to the Palestinian Health Ministry.  The three deceased were identified as 32-year-old Mohammad Bilal Zeitoun, 30-year-old Fathi Jihad Rizq and 24-year-old Abdullah Yousef Abu Hamdan.  Six others were wounded – one critically – during the clashes, according to the Palestinian Red Crescent. They were taken to the Rafidia Surgical Hospital.  The men were killed during a firefight with Israel Defense Forces soldiers who had entered the Balata refugee camp, according to eyewitnesses ■ ‘What happened tonight is a true massacre,’ said a senior Palestinian official.

Reported by Sabeel, Jerusalem, May 22, 2023,  Israeli occupation forces have used live fire and tear gas against Palestinians who joined a demonstration on the besieged Gaza Strip’s eastern border with Israel, injuring several Palestinians. The demonstration was held at the same time as far-right Israelis held a so-called ‘flag march’ in occupied East Jerusalem’s Old City. 

Although Israel has emerged as a global frontrunner in water management and technology, with notable achievements such as the groundbreaking project that commenced last year, channeling desalinated seawater from the Mediterranean to the receding Sea of Galilee, concerns have been raised by rights groups regarding the impact on Palestinians. The situation remains challenging as the Israel occupation maintains control over approximately 80% of water reserves in the West Bank, while both the West Bank and Gaza Strip confront acute water shortages.

For the first time, a symposium marking the 75th anniversary of the Nakba was hosted at the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO’s) Headquarters in Paris. The symposium was organized by the Arab Group of UNESCO in cooperation with the permanent delegation of the State of Palestine to UNESCO and in conjunction with the meetings of the organization’s Executive Council, during which two resolutions in favor of Palestine were adopted.

This week’s Kumi Now online gathering focuses on how Palestinians are working to preserve their culture and history.  Next week, on Tuesday, the 30^th of May, the topic will be the high number of child fatalities in Palestine. Defense for Children International Palestine monitors these fatalities and records widespread Israeli military violations against Palestinian children living under occupation.

May 8, 2023

Haaretz, May 4, 2023, Editorial | The disgraceful detention and death of Palestinian hunger-striker Khader Adnan:  Khader Adnan was a political activist in Palestinian Islamic Jihad. The Shin Bet security service arrested him for the first time nearly 20 years ago, and since then it arrested him and threw him into prison 12 times, nearly always without charges or trial. He undertook his first hunger strike in an Israeli prison in 2000, repeating it six times over the years until his death this week. Nine years of his life were stolen from him in the effort to break his spirit, although he was never prosecuted for serious security offenses.

Khader Adnan wasn’t suicidal by nature, just the opposite – he was extremely optimistic. During each of his six hunger strikes over the last 18 years, he believed there would be at least one responsible Israeli institution that would try to prevent his death by reaching a gentleman’s agreement with him.  Khader Adnan’s mission to expose the basic injustice in Israel’s military justice system and its casual denial of basic freedoms was logical, called for, and nothing short of courageous – but once again, he was forced to take the individual path, sending a message about the lack of a Palestinian collective struggle. (Amira Hass)

Palestine Online, May 4, 2023, Israeli occupation troops broke into a Palestinian wedding party in the occupied West Bank city of Hebron.

The Israeli occupation forces assaulted and shot Palestinian youth, Anas Abo Hussain, 29, in Bethlehem.

Extremist Israeli settlers assaulted Palestinian shepherds while practising their work in Maghayir Al- Abeed town in Masafer Yatta.

Haaretz, May 6, 2023, Two Palestinians were killed by Israel Defense Forces gunfire on Saturday in the northern West Bank city of Tul Karm, the Palestinian Health Ministry and IDF reported.   A local militant group announced that two of their operatives were killed in an IDF raid in the Nur al-Shams refugee camp, and also said that one of the operatives was responsible for a West Bank shooting attack this past Tuesday.

An Israeli soldier fired a stun grenade directly into the face of a Palestinian teenager who was hiding from the troops in a schoolyard. Umar Asi is now lying at home, blind in one eye – and at risk of losing the other as well.  A 15-year-old boy wearing surgical gloves is squeezing eye drops into the wounded eyes of his 16-year-old brother. He does it several times a day. His brother’s eyes are shut; his face contorts with pain when he tries to open them. The sight in one eye has now been lost forever, and when he manages to open the other one, he can distinguish only strong light and sometimes also shadows. Umar Asi is liable to remain in this condition for life, although he may not know that yet. (Gideon Levy)

A 19-year-old resident of a northern Israeli Arab village was shot dead by a 32-year-old Jewish Israeli on Saturday. Two-hundred residents of the victim’s village of Sandala are protesting the killing, which police suspect was a result of a road rage brawl.  ‘A racist policy and bloodletting of the Palestinian citizens of Israel by the government,’ one Arab lawmaker says about the road rage killing

Haaretz, May 7, 2023, Israel is refusing to hand over the body of Khader Adnan, a prominent Palestinian prisoner who died as a result of an 86-day hunger strike last week, the first ever Palestinian to die from the widespread protest tactic. Palestinian sources told Haaretz that the ceasefire negotiations between the IDF and Gaza militants on Wednesday focused on the return of Adnan’s body to his family. The government has not clarified whether it intends to do so..

Israel’s Supreme Court denied on Sunday a petition demanding that residents of the Palestinian village Khan al-Ahmar be immediately evicted.   Khan al-Ahmar has become an international symbol of the Israeli-Palestinian battle for control over Area C, and has some 250 residents.

After years of Israeli’s neglect, preschool is still out of reach for many Bedouin children.  Over 5,000 children are unregistered to education institutions, with registration among Jews standing at 100 percent. Among the causes: Lack of facilities, and transportation difficulties..

Reported by Sabeel, Jerusalem, May 8, 2023, On May 7^th, Israeli authorities demolished Jibb Al-Deeb School, in the Palestinian village of Bayt Ta’mar, east of Bethlehem. The same school was demolished by the occupation authorities in 2017 but rebuilt shortly after by activists. Hours after Israeli forces demolished the school last week, Palestinian residents and activists rebuilt the school again which houses about 60 students from the first to the fourth grade.

For the 16^th day in a row, the tourist city of Jericho in the occupied West Bank remains under a suffocating Israeli military siege, with checkpoints stifling Palestinian traffic on all the entrances to the city. 

A Palestinian child was injured by an Israeli rubber-coated round this afternoon in the town of Kafr Qaddum, in the occupied West Bank province of Qalqilia. The 12-year-old child was injured by Israeli occupation soldiers during an Israeli military operation in the town. 

Israeli settlers destroyed about 258 olive saplings for Taysir Ali Ahmad, a Palestinian land owner in the town of Kafr al-Dik, in the occupied West Bank province of Salfit.

 Visually impaired Palestinian political detainee Izz al-Din Amarneh suspended his hunger strike after 12 days in protest of his detention without charge or trial by the Israeli occupation authorities. The Palestinian Prisoner’s Society (PPS) said Amarneh’s decision to suspend his hunger strike came as a result of an agreement with the Israeli occupation authorities to release him in upcoming October.

This week’s Kumi Now online gathering looks at the US support for Israel. The US is providing vast amounts of military and economic aid to Israel. Israel is using that aid to oppress Palestinians with impunity. Next week’s Kumi Now will look at the ‘ongoing Nakba’. For Palestinians Saturday, the 15th of May will be the day they commemorate the catastrophe of the Nakba when thousands of Palestinians were forced to flee their homes. Present-day Israeli policies sustain a coercive environment which gives many Palestinians no option but to leave their homes and communities.

May 1, 2023

Haaretz, Apr 25, 2023, WASHINGTON – Bipartisan U.S. lawmakers are set to introduce a resolution honoring the 75th anniversary of Israel’s founding on Tuesday which excludes language on the Palestinians or the two-state solution.  The solution and focus on expanding Abraham Accords reflects the growing Republican attitude towards Israel – and flies in the face of Democrats’ efforts to take a harder line amid concern about the country’s standing as a democracy.

Thousands of people attended a joint Israeli-Palestinian memorial ceremony for victims of the conflict in Tel Aviv on Monday night, running the gauntlet of a handful of right-wing activists who shouted hated slogans.  Some 200 Palestinians attend Tel Aviv ceremony, after Israel’s top court ordered the state to grant them entry permits; a handful of right-wing activists demonstrated outside the event.

Palestine Online, April 26, 2023, Extremist Israeli National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir performed provocative Talmudic dances in Al-Ibrahemi mosque in occupied West Bank city of Hebron.

Haaretz, Apr 27, 2023,  About a dozen fat cows emerged from an olive grove and nimbly climbed a green hill before disappearing on the other side. On the wide slopes of a nearby hill, 15 or 16 of their sisters were resting and enjoying the sun on a Wednesday early last month.  For 20 years Palestinians have been forced to sell many of their sheep, goats and cows due to the takeover of grazing land after the construction of the fence.  And now Israelis are using land near the separation barrier as a cattle pasture.  (Amira Hass)

Reported by Friends of Hebron, April 28, 2023, Just days ago, Israelis demolished several Palestinian shops in the old Hebron vegetable market. These are shops that were forced closed by military order for security reasons — reasons that have now proven themselves as a mere pretext for settlement expansion. We fear more destruction to come – we need action now!

Haaretz, Apr 29, 2023, Three open graves are waiting in the Jenin refugee camp for the next residents to be killed by the Israel Defense Forces. Here the graves are dug in advance – and, appallingly, they don’t remain empty for very long. Almost 50 armed fighters and others have been killed here in the past year by Israeli soldiers. The camp, in the northern West Bank, is experiencing its most difficult and violent time since the second intifada, some two decades ago.  The Jenin refugee camp has turned into a veritable fortress: steel barriers on every streetcorner, security cameras, surveillance of every outsider who dares enter, hundreds of armed men preparing for the army’s next incursion. And there will be blood.  (Gideon Levy)

Palestine Online, April 30, 2023,  

Isrseli occupation troops handcuff, blindfold, and abduct some Palestinian youths at the Al-Murabaa military checkpoint, southwest of Nablus.

IOF arrested 3 Palestinian children from the Aida refugee camp. They were playing soccer at the local football pitch when armed soldiers came in pointing their guns at the kids before tying up & detaining 3 of them.

Haaretz, May 1, 2023, For several months, the Israeli army has been preventing Sayed Awad, a Palestinian living in the South Hebron Hills, from reaching land he owns near a Jewish outpost.  As part of ongoing efforts to block Sayed Awad from his land, soldiers erect barriers on the road leading to his home in Umm Lasafa, a village south of Hebron. They also threaten and detain him regularly.

Reported by Sabeel, Jerusalem, May 1, 2023, Israeli occupation authorities have started plans to confiscate 70 Palestinian homes in the Old City of Hebron. Director of the Hebron Construction Committee Imad Hamdan said the Israeli occupation plans to hand over the Palestinian homes to Israeli settlers

 On April 28, 2023  Mustafa Amer Sabbah, a sixteen-year-old Palestinian teenager was shot and killed by the Israeli army’s live fire during confrontations that erupted in the village of Tuqu, West Bank district of Bethlehem.

The following day in  the same village of Tuqu, a number of Palestinian students suffered from suffocation from teargas inhalation when Israeli occupation soldiers attacked a school with teargas in the village.

On Saturday, April 29^th, Israel settlers assaulted two Palestinian siblings and stole their car near Ramallah, Westbank.

The settlers attacked Bassem and Wael Abu Harzan while plowing their land. The brothers suffered cuts and bruises before the settlers stole their car and left the area. The attack is part of numerous similar violations targeting the Palestinians, their homes, lands, and holy sites in several parts of the occupied West Bank. 

Visually impaired Palestinian detainee Izz al-Din Amarneh has been on hunger strike for eight days in a row in protest of his detention without charge or trial by the Israeli occupation authorities. Amarneh, 52, a blind man from the town of Ya’bad in the northern West Bank province of Jenin, was arrested by the Israeli occupation authorities in February 2022, and has been held in administrative detention ever since. Amarneh has five sons and daughters. His two male sons, Ahmad and Mujahed, are also currently imprisoned by the Israeli occupation authorities. 

A pro-Palestine grassroots movement based in the UK, has set up a protest camp outside Elbit UAV Tactical Systems in preparation for the group’s siege on the Israeli arms factory. Activists have confirmed they plan to hold their positions until Elbit closes their weapons factory. From May 1, those in the camp are due to be joined by hundreds for the siege and to mobilize against Elbit’s business-of-bloodshed.

This week’s Kumi Now considered the threats of censorship and violence suffered by Palestinian journalists, as World Press Freedom Day is remembered on Monday, the 3rd of May. Next week’s Kumi Now online gathering will focus on the US support for Israel. The vast amount of  US military support  for Israel is used to harm Palestinians living in the Holy Land.

April 24, 2023

Palestine Online, April 18.2023. Israeli occupation troops shoot and injure a Palestinian woman in Hebron, for allegedly carrying a stabbing operation.

There are currently 19 Palestinian journalists held in Israeli occupation prisons for practicing the right of freedom of expression and documenting Israeli occupation crimes against Palestinians.

Occupation forces arrested 3 Palestinian children in the occupied city of Jerusalem . What’s their fault? Is it because they threw stones?

April 19. Israeli occupation troops stormed Jenin camp, injuring at least 6 Palestinians.

April 20, Israeli occupation troops arrested Palestinian journalist and writer Osama Al-Issa and his son Jamal during a military raid into Al-Dehaisha camp in Bethlehem.

Colonial Israeli settlers backed by the occupation forces demolished 5 shops in Hebron.

April 21, British MP Andy McDonald: “11 Palestinian children are currently being held in administrative detention by the Israeli military. Children can be held indefinitely without ever being charged.”

Haaretz, Apr 18, 2023, The Palestinian Arabic daily newspaper, Al-Quds, has started publishing in Hebrew, marking the first central Palestinian media group to address a Hebrew speaking audience.  The digital edition of the Jerusalem-based Al-Quds newspaper – one of the oldest and most important media outlets for Palestinians – has hundreds of thousands of readers of its digital edition and sells about 30,000 physical copies every day mainly in East Jerusalem and the West Bank.

Apr 19, 2023,  Israeli security forces on Wednesday arrested a 15-year-old Palestinian who suspected of shooting and wounding two Israelis in the East Jerusalem neighborhood of Sheikh Jarrah a day earlier.   Two Israeli men were lightly and moderately wounded on Tuesday in a shooting attack while they sat inside a car near the Tomb of Simeon the Just in the East Jerusalem neighborhood of Sheikh Jarrah.

The Jerusalem municipality has retracted its support for a plan to build a new neighborhood for Palestinian residents in the northern part of the city.  The neighborhood, which sits on land owned by local Palestinian residents, was set to be the first in Jerusalem specifically built for Palestinian residents since 1967 ■ Sources familiar with the plans say Jerusalem’s mayor feared approving the construction before local elections later this year.

April 21, The volleys of rockets fired at Israel during Passover on three different fronts – southern Lebanon, southern Syria and the Gaza Strip – were explained as a fraught Arab reaction to the violent night raid by the Israel Police on Al-Aqsa Mosque and the attendant harsh images of police officers beating Muslim worshippers. But, in retrospect, there was an additional factor stirring fury in the territories and in neighboring countries: the efforts by right-wing Temple Mount activists to sacrifice goats as a Passover offering on the mount in the midst of Ramadan.

April 22, Ayid Salim, a 20-year-old Palestinian interior design student, took part in demonstrations against Israeli troops who raid his hometown. A soldier who thought Ayid was throwing firecrackers shot him five times. He was the third man to die this way in Azzun in a year.  The young men of this Palestinian town keep dying.  (Gideon Levy)

April 23, Bus passengers coming from Jerusalem were greeted with empty streets in Nablus – but that’s how it always is when Jewish worshippers visit Joseph’s Tomb in the West Bank city, where the Israeli army forces Palestinians to put their lives on hold, where Jewish prayer means a military raid.

The publication of the Transportation Ministry’s budget last week revealed a case of greenwashing on the part of the settlement enterprise. The settlers like to see themselves as lovers of the land who guard it and live an environmentally friendly lifestyle.  As settlers boast themselves as environmentally friendly, a quarter of Israel’s transportation budget which is due to be invested in the West Bank will destroy the environment and make the lives of all residents miserable, especially Palestinians’.

April 24. A Palestinian was killed by Israeli military fire during an operation in the Aqabat Jabr refugee camp in the West Bank on Monday, Palestinian sources say.  The governor of Jericho said that Sliman Ayesh’s body is currently held in Israel. Palestinian sources reported that four people were injured near Jericho as the IDF stated it operated to arrest suspects, shooting two which ‘tried to flee’. 

Reported by Sabeel Jerusalem, April 24, 2023, The West Bank city of Jericho, which last year welcomed record numbers of tourists, was devoid of visitors this year as road closures and military checkpoints made travel all but impossible. Abdulkarim Sidr, the mayor, said that the racist policy of Israeli military authorities prevented many locals and visitors from reaching tourist places. “These closures are without any known reason, and there is no clear explanation,” he said. 

On April 23, 2023 Israeli settlers under army protection assaulted Palestinian herders while grazing their cattle in the area of Ein es-Sakout in the Jordan Valley and forced them to leave. Attacks by Israeli settlers on Palestinians are commonplace, but attacks on farmers and herders are particularly intensive in the Jordan Valley area. Most of these attacks usually occur in the presence of the Israeli occupation army, which usually does nothing to stop the attacks and rather provides protection for assailants. 

On April 19^th, Sabeel launched its book on antisemitism. The book titled “This Is Where We Stand: A Sabeel Reflection on Antisemitism” was in the making for the past 4 years with many participating in its making. We are thankful for all who participated in the launching especially our guests: Hana Bendcowsky, Rabbi Guy Alaluf and Fr. David Neuhaus.

This week we remember the many killed during the Armenian genocide, and particularly lift up the Palestinian Armenian community as they commemorate the genocide of 1915.

This week’s Kumi Now online gathering focused on the Nation-State Law which was passed in the Knesset on the 1st of May, 2018. Next week’s Kumi Now looks at the threats of censorship and violence suffered by Palestinian journalists, as World Press Freedom Day is remembered on Monday, the 3rd of May.

April 17, 2023

April 11, Israeli PM Benjamin Netanyahu: “We dropped 50 tons of explosives on Gaza.”

Haaretz, April 11, 2023, Israel will bar Jewish visitors from accessing the Temple Mount/Al-Aqsa Mosque compound in Jerusalem until the end of the Muslim month of Ramadan to prevent further escalation of violence, the Prime Minister’s Office announced Tuesday.  Far-right National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir called Netanyahu’s decision to close the Temple Mount to Jewish visitors ‘a serious mistake that will not bring peace, but may only escalate the situation’.

Palestine Online, April 10, 2023, Israeli occupation troops fired rubber bullets and teargas canisters at Palestinian journalists while covering the confrontations in Beita, Nablus.

Two Palestinians, who opened fire at the West Bank settlement, were killed Tuesday by Israeli army fire at the village of Deir al-Hatab, near the settlement of Elon Moreh in the northern West Bank.  According the Palestinian sources, the two who were killed were former prisoners who lived in the Balata Refugee Camp near Nablus.

Apr 13, 2023, Two Israeli soldiers vandalized a car used by a Palestinian couple to transport their disabled daughter in the West Bank town of Beit Ummar on Wednesday.  The army claims that the soldiers had intelligence that a weapon belonging to a wanted man was stored in the car, and only broke into it after the father refused to give them the keys. The father, however, says the soldiers did not contact him beforehand, and hit him after he tried to stop them from damaging the car which is used to transport his disabled daughter.

April 14, 2023,  WASHINGTON — Fourteen Democratic lawmakers on Thursday urged the Biden administration to undertake a foundational shift in its approach to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict in progressives’ most significant missive to date against the Israeli government since Benjamin Netanyahu’s far-right coalition assumed power.

April 16, 2023, The Eid family has fortified itself against settler marauders from the Givat Ronen outpost. Their home has an alarm system, heavily barred windows, security cameras and a heavy iron front door. Life under terror. The Eids refuse to give in, to abandon their well-kept house, in the face of the ongoing intimidation by the settlers on the mountain. (Gideon Levy).

An East Jerusalem Palestinianin his 20s was shot by Israeli police early on Monday morning following reports that he set fire to a number of vehicles in the neighborhood of Neveh Yaakov.

Around 2,000 Palestinian students in East Jerusalem have been out of school for two-and-a-half months because their teachers are on strike.  Teachers in the Palestinian Authority, who make about $1,000 a month at most, are demanding a 15 percent raise and have been striking since February.

Palestine Electronic Forces, April 16, 2023,  Israeli occupation forces brutally assault Christians in the occupied Jerusalem, preventing them from reaching to the Church of Holy Sepulcher to celebrate the ‘Holy Saturday’. 

 Reported by Sabeel, Jerusalem, April 17, 2023, Again, Palestinian Christians celebrated the resurrection in the city of the Resurrection according to the Eastern Calendar. Candles were lit, church bells rang loudly and choirs chanted Hallelujah while scout groups played music filled with joy. The road blocks and military checkpoints were able to stop many of the faithful from reaching the city of Jerusalem and the Church of the Resurrection.  

For the past 17 years, Israeli authorities occupying the West Bank have prohibited Assem Khater, from a village near Nablus, from making any additions to the home he finished building when he was 21, on private land he inherited with documentation from his family. Khater wants nothing more than to build a fence around his yard, to protect his three children from falling 4 metres (13 feet) into the adjacent valley while playing. 

Israel intends to bar Bereaved Palestinian Families from attending a joint Jewish-Arab Memorial Day Ceremony. Israel is ignoring previous Israeli Supreme Court ruling in past years.  

 Last March, the Palestinian Authority PA, refused to renew the registration of a respected Palestinian legal organization: Lawyers for Justice, which has represented Palestinians detained by the PA in the West Bank. In July 2022, Human Rights Watch and Lawyers for Justice submitted parallel reports to the United Nations Committee Against Torture ahead of its review of Palestine.

This week’s Kumi Now will focus on the Nation-State Law which was passed in the Knesset on the 1st of May, 2018.  Next week’s Kumi Now looks at the threats of censorship and violence suffered by Palestinian journalists, as World Press Freedom Day is remembered on Monday, the 3rd of May.

April 10, 2023

Haaretz, April 3, 2023, Two Palestinians were killed on Monday morning during violent clashes with the Israel Defense Forces in the West Bank city of Nablus, the Palestinian Health Ministry reported.  IDF spokesperson says forces ‘came under fire and shot back,’ while raiding Nablus to arrest Palestinians reportedly involved in last week’s shooting in Hawara, injuring two Israeli soldiers

 Four people were arrested late on Sunday during a protest in the northern Israeli city of Haifa against the killing of Mohammed Khaled Alasibi by police at the Temple Mount compound in Jerusalem the day before. Dozens took to the streets of northern Israel, waving Palestinian flags and protesting the death of Mohammed Khaled Alasibi in Jerusalem on Saturday.

Israel’s Supreme Court ruled against evicting a Palestinian family in the East Jerusalem neighborhood of Silwan on Monday, capping a 32-year battle.  The judges rejected a request by the Jewish National Fund, who wanted to evict the 18 members of the Palestinian family, and ordered its subsidiary to compensate them.

Haaretz, April 4, 2023, The Israeli ministry that oversees settlements intends to double the budget allocated to settlers for drones and inspectors to monitor Palestinian construction. The budget for inspectors, drones, and other equipment and infrastructure – such as fencing off land to prevent use by Palestinians – is slated to hit 40 million shekels, or $11.1 million.

At the end of Saturday night’s protest in Tel Aviv against the judicial overhaul, a gang of right-wing activists, holding the outlawed ultra-nationalist Kach party’s flag, went on a violent rampage through the city’s streets. They assaulted a young couple, who hadn’t even been at the demonstration; punched a young woman in the face and threw rocks at an apartment flying a rainbow pride flag.

An Israeli court ordered two Arab men released from custody on Friday because it said police arrested them illegally.  The judge said the arrests were illegal because police never obtained an arrest warrant, and requested to approve the men’s detention on the basis of suspicions that hadn’t even been mentioned at the time of the arrest.

In a raid by Israeli police at the Al-Aqsa Mosque, Israeli police and riot-control units clashed with Palestinian worshippers inside the Al-Aqsa Mosque overnight on Wednesday, arresting around 400 according to police sources and injuring seven according to the Palestinian Red Crescent. Three of the injured were hit with rubber bullets, the Red Crescent added.   Throughout the night, rockets were fired from the Gaza Strip into southern Israel and the IDF attacked targets in the strip in response early Wednesday morning. An Israeli soldier was also injured during the night in a shooting attack in a village north of Hebron, the military spokesperson said.

Palestine Online, Jordanians demonstrate before the Israeli embassy in Amman denouncing the violent Israeli attack on Al-Aqsa Mosque.   Israeli occupation forces prevent ambulances from reaching Al-Aqsa Mosque to evacuate the wounded Palestinians”.

Haaretz, April 4, Earlier in the night, a 15-year-old Palestinian teen was shot by Israeli border police in the East Jerusalem neighborhood of Silwan, and is reported to be in stable condition.  According to the police, the teen and several other Palestinians threw rocks and Molotov cocktails, while trying to damage an Israeli vehicle patrolling the neighborhood while keeping watch over Israeli settlers’ homes.

Palestine Online, April 6, 2023, Israeli occupation warplanes have launched a series of airstrikes on the besieged Gaza Strip.

Haaretz, April 8, 2023, Under the radar, a U.S. group is grooming right-wing judges who will reshape Israel.  Six U.S. Supreme Court justices were cultivated for their role by the same organization. Now its Israeli counterpart, financed by the New York-based Tikvah Fund, is operating along similar lines.

Haaretz Opinion Israel’s rule over the Palestinians has created a new Judaism.  Supremacy, oppression, force – never before has the Jewish people engaged in such an explosive fusion of sovereignty and rule. Messianic fervor, once under the radar, is now rearing its head.

Opinion | Ehud Barak was right.  The Occupation would rot Israel from within.

Haaretz, April 8, 2023, Residents of Hura, the Bedouin town where Mohammed Alasibi lived, are certain police killed him wrongfully. Alasibi was about to graduate from medical school when he was shot dead after Ramadan prayers in Jerusalem.  “We lost a leader” say family and friends as they mourn the death of the med student killed by police. (Gideon Levy)

Palestine Online An Israeli court has sentenced the Palestinian prisoner Khalil Awawdeh (40) to 16 months of jail for allegedly trying to smuggle a cellphone to the jail.

The 20-year-old Palestinian youth Ayed Salim was shot and killed yesterday by Israeli occupation forces in Qalqilya,

Haaretz, April 9, 2023, Hundreds of Jewish visitors gathered on the Al-Aqsa compound/Temple Mount Sunday morning, as dozens of Palestinian worshipers remain barricaded in the Al-Aqsa Mosque since Saturday night. Hundreds more are expected to go to the Temple Mount throughout the day.  Amid simmering tensions, Jewish visitors went to the Temple Mount as many more Jews are expected to be at the Western Wall for the annual Priestly Blessing.

Haaretz, April 10, 2023,  Thousands are participating in a right-wing march on Monday, making their way to the illegal West Bank outpost of Evyatar under the protection of the Israeli army.  This marks the first time that the Israeli army is allowing settlers to enter the area of Evyatar and hold a large scale event there since the illegal outpost’s eviction two years ago.

A Palestinian resident of the Hebron area saved a Jewish couple from a nearby settlement after they were attacked last week. The man took the couple to his home, and later the army evacuated them from the area.

A 15-year-old Palestinian was shot and killed near Jericho on Monday during a clash with the Israeli army, the Palestinian Health Ministry reported.  The clashes erupted at a refugee camp near Jericho after the Israeli army entered the area to apprehend suspected terrorists.

As Israel advances its plans to take over Palestinian vacant lands, profiting from their political fragmentation and weakness, the importance of Jerusalem’s Al-Aqsa Mosque to Palestinians becomes more evident.  For Palestinians, Al-Aqsa goes beyond religion.  It’s a symbol of freedom and resistance. (Amira Hass)  

Reported by Sabeel, Jerusalem, April, 10, 2023, Israeli police clashed with Palestinians for the second time at the Al-Aqsa Mosque in Jerusalem on Wednesday, the 5th of April. These clashes broke out hours after the arrest and removal of 350 Palestinian Muslims by Israeli police. These confrontations at this highly sensitive time during the Muslim holy month of Ramadan and on the eve of the Jewish Passover triggered rocket attacks from Lebanon and Gaza. The Israeli military then carried out retaliatory airstrikes in both areas.

 Palestinians were attacked by illegal Israeli settlers in the Nablus and Bethlehem governates on Friday, the 7th of April. Settlers attacked Palestinian-licensed cars in the Huwwara and the Furush Beit Dajan area, as well as setting fire to greenhouses owned by local Palestinians. Settlers sealed off the southern entrance to al-Khader town near Bethlehem so they could attack Palestinian cars. 

This week more than thirty UN independent experts asked Mr Karim Khan, Prosecutor of the International Criminal Court, to send out an urgent mission to investigate possible Israeli war crimes in Palestine. They expressed their concern for ‘the pervasive impunity and ever-deteriorating human rights situation in the occupied Palestinian territory owing to acts that may amount to widespread and systematic violations of international law.’

This week Kumi Now will focus on the topic of administrative detention as it marks Palestinian Prisoner Day (17th April). The Israeli human rights organisation B’Tselem states: ‘Israel routinely uses administrative detention and has, over the years, placed thousands of Palestinians behind bars for periods ranging from several months to years, without charging them, without telling them what they are accused of or without disclosing the alleged evidence to them or to their lawyers.’

April 3, 2023

Haaretz, March 28, 2023, Six Palestinians were injured by Israeli settler violence on Monday in the village of Hawara, the site of last month’s settler rampage that killed one and injured hundreds, the Palestinian Health Ministry says.  The Israel Police confirmed that they had arrested four Israelis and two Palestinians for disorderly conduct associated with the incident, which is the second of its kind the Palestinian village has seen in just over a month.

Reported by 7amleh, March 28, 2023, in an index of racism, hate speech and incitement, March 28, 2023, Digital spaces are reflections of lived reality; the spread of hate speech, racism, and incitement online is an extension of the escalations and attacks that happen outside the digital realm. The year 2022 witnessed a significant increase in the volume of violent speech directed at the Arab and Palestinian communities, as violent speech increased by 10% compared to 2021 and the number of violent publications published through networks in the Hebrew language reached 685 thousand conversations, compared to 620 thousand violent publications during the year 2021. 

Haaretz, Mar 29, 2023, WASHINGTON- U.S. President Joe Biden on Tuesday said Israel “cannot continue down this road,” after his administration put significant pressure on Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s government to postpone the planned judicial overhaul.  U.S. President Joe Biden’s statement Tuesday that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu will not be invited anytime soon to the White House shocked and surprised the PM’s office and underscored the simmering diplomatic tensions the premier was hoping to allay.

Senior members of Israel’s police, including Commissioner Kobi Shabtai, strongly oppose the formation of a new national guard that will be subordinate to National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir.

Palestinian public schools in the West Bank have been closed since Feb. 5 in one of the longest teachers’ strikes in recent memory against the cash-strapped Palestinian Authority (PA). Teachers’ demands for a pay raise have escalated into a protest movement that has vexed the increasingly autocratic Palestinian self-rule government as it plunges deeper into an economic crisis.

Palestine Online, April 2, Mohammed Al-Osaibi, 26-year-old Palestinian was murdered by Israeli forces on the second Friday of Ramadan at Al-Aqsa Mosque after Taraweeh prayers.

Haaretz, Apr 2, 2023. The circumstance of Mohammad Khaled Alasibi’s death at the Chain Gate which leads to the Al-Aqsa Mosque compound in Jerusalem immediately raised questions about the police’s conduct at the scene, as well as the question of what this incident may lead to.  The young Bedouin’s death comes at a very sensitive time, not just because of Ramadan, but also in light of the current government’s policies in the Negev. Maybe it’s time for the pro-democracy demonstrators to join the call for an independent investigation.

Three Israeli soldiers were injured, one of them seriously, in a suspected car ramming attack in the southern West Bank on Saturday. The IDF reported that the driver, 23-year-old Muhammad Baradeya from the village of Surif and a member of the Palestinian security forces, was shot dead.

Haaretz, editorial, Israel is currently holding 971 people in administrative detention – a 20-year high. All but four of them, 967, are West Bank Palestinians, Palestinian residents of East Jerusalem or Arab citizens of Israel. This must stop.  

Reported by Sabeel, Jerusalem, April 3, 2023, On Thursday, the 30th of March, Palestinians commemorated the First Land Day, which took place in 1976. A general strike and marches had been organized in Arab towns to protest against the forcible seizure of large swathes of Palestinian land by the Israeli authorities. At that time the Israeli army shot six unarmed Arab Israeli protestors, wounded more than a hundred others and arrested many more in the ensuing clashes. 

Israeli police disrupted a football match between Balata Center and Jabal Mukaber football teams at the Al-Husseini International Stadium in the northern West Bank last Thursday evening. They fired a barrage of tear gas canisters which affected children and adult spectators, as well as players. The fans were forced to flood onto the pitch to avoid the tear gas attack.

 During the course of 2022 Palestinians living in East Jerusalem and the West Bank have suffered the demolition, or the seizure, of 953 of their buildings by the Israeli authorities.  Building permits are rarely, if ever granted to Palestinians living in Israeli-controlled areas and their homes then become targets for demolition orders.

B’Tselem has reported that a father of four children living in Gaza City has been denied a travel permit by the Israeli authorities, despite his critical state of health. Khaled Al Bahtini  has kidney failure and has been on dialysis for the past sixteen years. He now needs to attend al-Makassed hospital in East Jerusalem to undergo an artery transplant to enable him to continue with further dialysis. Repeated requests for travel permits since December 2022 have been turned down by the Israeli authorities.

March 27, 2023

Palestine Electronic Forces, March 20, 2023, Israeli occupation authorities released the Palestinian paramedic Fawaz Al Bitar, from Nablus city, after spending 5 months of detention.

Haaretz, March 21, 2023, WASHINGTON – The U.S. State Department’s annual report on human rights records across the globe took aim at Israel’s respect for civil liberties, restrictions on Palestinians and investigations of security forces for abuses – noting “several reports that the government or its agents committed arbitrary or unlawful killings.”

Israel has announced an easing of travel and religious restrictions for Palestinians ahead of Ramadan, including increasing the amount of worshipers allowed to access the Temple Mount.  The new guidelines, which include family reunions and wider access to the Temple Mount/ Al-Aqsa Mosque, will be in effect dependent on a rolling assessment of the security situation

Mar 22, 2023, The Israel Defense Forces’ Spokesperson’s Unit conducted a psychological warfare operation against Israeli citizens during the May 2021 Guardian of the Walls campaign in Gaza, with the aim of boosting public awareness of the IDF’s offensive maneuvers and the “toll” these moves take on the Palestinians.  IDF used fake social media accounts to push the message it was ‘forcefully retaliating against Hamas’ ■ It posted dozens of #Gazaregrets videos in Netanyahu Facebook groups and tagged right-wing politicians ■ Senior officer: this is illegal, must not be done ■ IDF in response: We erred.

Though Israel’s Knesset passed an amendment to the Disengagement Law late Monday night allowing Israelis to return to four previously dismantled West Bank settlements, Kadim, Ganim, Sa-Nur and Homesh were never removed from the Yesha Council of Settlements’s list of existing settlements on its Hebrew website.  The approval of a bill allowing Israelis to remain in four West Bank settlements reflects the rise of the monster against its creator. Methods that Israel and the settlers successfully used against Palestinians are now undermining segments of Jewish Israeli society. (Amira Hass)

WASHINGTON — The Biden administration summoned Israel’s Ambassador to the U.S. Mike Herzog to the State Department on Tuesday, a U.S. official confirmed, hours after the U.S. excoriated Israel over its passage of a law permitting the resettlement of illegal outposts evacuated in 2005.

For the first time since the start of the protests against the judicial overhaul led by Benjamin Netanyahu’s government, army officials report that there has been a significant drop in the number of ground forces reservists reporting for duty.  In one battalion of an elite Brigade, only 57 percent of reservists who were called for training have reported, while the usual turn-out rate stands at 90.

Israel is waging a war against Palestinian journalists in Jerusalem. Plainclothes police officers came to the offices of an East Jerusalem production company Monday, arrested five journalists and slapped the company with a six-month closure order. Why? Because the company provides production services to Palestinian television.

Reported by the Adalah Justice Project, March 22, 2023, Early this morning, one day before the start of Ramadan, Israeli troops raided the cities of Ramallah, Nablus, Jericho, and Bethlehem.

The latest Gallup poll confirms that for the first time ever, more Democrats sympathize with Palestinians (49%) than sympathize with Israelis (38%). 49% is more than double the 23% who sympathized with Palestinians in 2014 polling. This is a seismic shift. 
Even more noteworthy is that the number of Americans who claimed neutrality on Palestine has dropped significantly. Only 13% of respondents said they had no opinion on the issue compared to 26% just ten years ago. 

Reported by Defence of Children International Palestine, March 22,2023,  Israeli forces shot and killed two 14-year-old Palestinian boys last week: First, Amir in Qalqilya, then Omar in Jenin, who was riding his bike when an undercover Israeli soldier shot him in the back.  These killings bring the year-to-date total of Palestinian children killed by Israeli forces to 17. Israeli forces are carrying out military incursions into Palestinian cities, particularly in the northern occupied West Bank, on a near-daily basis, and shooting to kill Palestinian children in situations not justified by international law.

Haaretz, March 23, 2023, The greatest threat facing Israel is the democratic threat. There is no greater danger to the regime in Israel than its turning into a democracy. There is no society that opposes democracy like Israeli society. There are plenty of regimes opposed to democracy, but not a free society. In Israel the people, the sovereign, is opposed to democracy. This is why the current struggle, which presumes to be about democracy, is a masquerade. It is designed to maintain the pretense of democracy. (Gideon Levy)

A 25-year-old Palestinian was killed on Thursday by gunfire from Israeli security forces in the village of Izbat Shufa near Tulkarm in the western West Bank. Undercover border policemen and IDF forces raided an apartment where Amir Imad Abu Khadija was hiding, according to a police statement.  (From a Palestinian tweet: On the first day of Ramadan, lsrael has murdered the 25-year-old Palestinian, Ameer Abu Khadija, with more than 40 bullets.)

The markets in Jenin and Nablus have been especially busy ahead of Ramadan in recent days. For years the northern West Bank has been the Palestinian economy’s engine, even during times of crisis. However, the atmosphere this year is accompanied by uncertainty and fears of clashes with Israeli forces and attacks by settlers. Since the start of the year, two-thirds of the deaths in the West Bank came from the north with 56 dead.

Palestine Electronic Forces, March 23, 2023, Israel occupation authorities have decided to prevent Palestinians aged under 55 from entering Al-Aqsa Mosque in occupied Jerusalem during the holy month of Ramadan.

March 24, Israeli soldiersand settlers harassed and attacked Palestinian shepherds in Masafer Yatta, south of Hebron, today.

Israeli occupation troops attacked Palestinians while gathering in Bab Al-Amoud area in occupied Jerusalem to celebrate the fasting holy month of Ramadan.

Israeli occupation forces brutally assault a Palestinian father and his children who were heading to Al-Aqsa Mosque in occupied Jerusalem for Friday prayers, this morning.

Israeli occupation forces prevented thousands of Palestinians from entering Al-Aqsa Mosque to perform Friday prayers on the first Friday of the holy month of Ramadan

March 25, Israeli occupation forces attack Palestinian vendors and vandalize their goods in Bab Al-Amoud area in occupied Jerusalem.

Mondoweiss, March 22, Sunday, two Israeli radicals entered Jerusalem’s Greek Orthodox Church of Gethsemane, destroying property and injuring Archbishop Joachim, who was leading the service. A second priest was also injured. In a statement released Sunday, The Greek Patriarchate of Jerusalem, represented by Patriarch Theophilis III, laments that “terrorist attacks, by radical Israeli groups, targeting churches, cemeteries, and Christian properties, in addition to physical and verbal abuse against Christian clergy, have become almost a daily occurrence.”

Good Shepherd Collective, March 18, 2023, This morning Israeli settlers invaded Atuwani, Masafer Yatta and cut 24 olive trees owned by Palestinians from the village. This land lies on the side of Atuwani closest to Havat Ma’on, a settler outpost built on the village’s land.

Haaretz, March 25, 2023, A teenager rushes out into the street in the dead of night to throw stones at Israeli soldiers who have invaded his refugee camp. An armored jeep stops and a soldier shoots him dead. Hamza al-Ashqar is the fifth resident of the Askar camp to be killed in the last year.

March 26, Vandalism and assaults targeting Christians and Christian institutions in Jerusalem have risen sharply since the beginning of the year, something leaders of churches in the city link to the tone of the new government.  Church sources accuse Israeli police of downplaying acts of violence towards them, and attribute Jews’ vandalism to a growing national legitimization of discrimination.

Palestine Electronic Forces, March 26, 2023,  BREAKING: Israeli occupation forces attack Palestinian worshippers after forcing them to leave Al-Aqsa mosque.

Israeli settlers set a Palestinian-owned home on fire last night in Sinjel village, near Ramallah, while its residents were inside the home. The family was pulled out alive thanks to the father’s vigilance & neighbors who rushed to help.

Reported by Sabeel, Jerusalem, March 27, 2023, t is with great sorrow that we share with you the sad news of Father Robert Assaly’s passing. He left us, this March 26th Sunday morning. His wife, Nancy, sent a message saying: “Robert has passed and is no longer suffering.  He is resting in peace.” Father Robert leaves behind his wife Nancy and children, Kristy, Ben, Justin, Bishara, Janan and Fedi, as well as his siblings and his mother, Gloria, along with countless friends and colleagues. Robert will be greatly missed at Sabeel and CFOS for his long term of service, his hours of dedicated work, his unfailing commitment and his passion to see justice reign.  He was a true friend to many.  Rest in peace, Father Robert.

An independent United Nations Commission of Inquiry completed a second series of public hearings in Geneva last week. These hearings looked at human rights violations in Israel and the occupied Palestinian territories, with a special focus on attacks on human rights activists, lawyers and journalists. Colleagues and relatives of the former Al Jazeera journalist Shireen Abu Akleh were among those who gave evidence. The findings will be presented to the Human Rights Council in June 2023.

On Monday, the 20th of March, the Armenian Genocide Square was inaugurated in Haifa.
The Mayor of Haifa and the Armenian Ambassador to Israel gathered together with representatives from the Armenian Patriarchate of Jerusalem and members of the Armenian community to remember the painful massacre of their forefathers in 1915.

Two Jewish extremists broke into the Greek Orthodox Church of the Tomb of the Virgin Mary on Sunday, the 19th of March, while a service was being held by Archbishop Joachim. One of the men was holding an iron bar and they started to smash sacred objects and then attacked one of the priests attending the archbishop. They were stopped by some worshippers who held them until the police came.

Next week the Kumi Now community looks at the plight of Palestinian children caught up in the Israeli military system. Under the Israeli occupation many Palestinian children have been left traumatised by night arrests and abuse in Israeli military prisons. When Palestinians remember Children’s Day on the 5th of April their thoughts will be clouded by this grim reality.

March 20, 2023

Reported by Combatants for Peace on March 15, 2023: Over the last ten weeks, we have witnessed some of the largest political protests in Israel’s history. When the weekly demonstrations began in Tel Aviv, there were only a few organizations connecting threats to democracy with the occupation of the Palestinian territories. Since the beginning, Combatants for Peace (CfP) has taken to the streets with signs and chants proclaiming the truth we have known all along:

Those who share our message at the demonstrations are known as the “Anti-Occupation Bloc.” While this bloc was initially met with resistance from fellow protesters, a shift is taking place. 

 As Israelis witnessed the brutality of the occupation in Hawara, eyes opened. Following the Hawara attack, hundreds of Israelis joined CfP in a protest, demanding human rights for ALL

Haaretz, March 16, 2023, WASHINGTON – Democrats’ views on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict continue to evolve on a foundational level, with a major new poll showing that   Democrats sympathize more with Palestinians than Israelis for the first time.  According to Gallup’s annual poll, 49 percent of Democrats surveyed hold greater sympathies for the Palestinians — marking an 11 percent increase over the last year — compared to 38 percent with Israelis.

Israeli soldiers shot a wanted Palestinian at point-blank range to confirm he is dead in a raid in the West Bank refugee camp of Jenin on Thursday. Four Palestinians were killed and 18 others wounded as large Israeli forces reportedly enter the Jenin refugee camp in search of suspects.

United Arab Emirates President Sheikh Mohammed bin Zayed al-Nahyan has ordered the transfer of $3 million to support rebuilding efforts in the West Bank village of Huwara in aid to those affected by the Hawara rampage, the country’s state news agency said on Thursday.

March 17, One hundreds officers from a classified Israeli Air Force unit have threatened to stop reporting to duty if the government’s legal coup goes ahead. “The call of our conscience may determine that we can no longer report to reserve duty,” the officers wrote in a joint letter, published by Israel’s Channel 12 News on Thursday night. Among the signatories are two former Air Force chiefs.

Palestinian Electronic Forces, March 17, 2023, Israeli occupation forces brutally assault Palestinians in Al-Lubban al-Gharbi village in Ramallah.  Israeli occupation forces suppressed journalists and prevented them from covering their brutality against Palestinians in Al-Lubban al-Gharbi village in Ramallah.

Israeli settlers stormed the al-Ibrahimi Mosque in Hebron and held dancing concerts inside its courtyards.

Israel’s army assassinated FOUR Palestinian young men in Jenin today, Thursday, including two resistance leaders. That brings the total number killed to 88 in 75 days.

Israeli  occupation forces have arrested 1300 Palestinians since the beginning of 2023.

Haaretz, March 18, 2023, Rami Hamuda went out to buy crayons for his daughter in the Shoafat refugee camp in East Jerusalem. Israeli police fired dozens of rounds at his car without warning, seriously wounding him. (Gideon Levy)

Rocket sirens were sounded in a southern Israeli kibbutz near the border with Gaza on Saturday after a rocket launched from Gaza landed in an open area, the army reported. 

Reported by Sabeel, Jerusalem, March 20, 2023, The Israeli army carried out an undercover raid in the occupied city of Jenin last week. Israeli soldiers shot and killed four Palestinians, Yousef Shriem ,29, Nidal Khazem, 28, Omar Awadin, 14 and Luay Zghayyar, 37. This raid comes after three Palestinians were shot and killed in Jenin just last week.

Last week a number of settlers attacked a Palestinian family living in a tent near the village of Deir Jarir, east of Ramallah. The Israelis from a nearby settlement beat Sadek Farakhneh and his family members and raided his barn, stealing his donkey and thirty sheep. After the settler attack Israeli soldiers raided his tent and assaulted him. He has been offered emergency help from the Wall and Settlement Resistance Commission

On Friday, the 10th of March, Israeli soldiers detained a young boy from Hebron on the charge of throwing stones. Abdul Shakeen from the Tal Rumeida neighbourhood was arrested, taken to a military post, beaten, verbally abused and released some hours later.

 Five hundred Gazan school pupils gathered together in the Khan Younis neighbourhood to fly Japanese-inspired kites to mark seventy years of partnership between Japan and the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestinian Refugees in the Near East. During 2023 the partnership will be celebrated with events based on a shared theme of ‘tsumugu’ (meaning ‘connect, spin, weave’).

Next week Kumi Now will highlight how the blockade has affected Gaza since it was fully  enforced by Israel and Egypt in 2007. The people have been denied access to most of the natural resources needed for their sustenance. It has been called the biggest prison on Earth.

March 14, 2023

Haaretz, Mar 7, 2023,  Four Palestinians, including one girl, were evacuated to hospital after settlers hurled stones at them in the Palestinian village of Hawara that saw a settlers’ rampage last week. Human Rights group Yesh Din says that some were wounded by stones and some by tear gas used by the army.  ‘The pogroms in Hawara continue also as part of the settlers’ Purim celebrations, backed by the government and lack of enforcement by the authorities,’ the Yesh Din xorganization says.

An Israeli court shortened the administrative detention on Monday of a minor who is being held without trial after being arrested on suspicion of involvement in the rampage on the Palestinian town of Hawara last Sunday.  The administrative detention of another settler involved in the rampage on the Palestinian town of Hawara was also shortened by a month on Sunday night.

Over 200 Israeli reservist military doctors say they won’t show up to duty over Judicial Coup, The doctors’ announcement adds to a growing number of cases involving military reservists who have said they will refuse to serve if the government does not halt the legislative process related to the judicial coup.

Palestine Electronic Forces, A Palestinian young man got killed and others were injured by the occupation forces in Jenin refugee camp.

Israeli soldiers arrested today elderly Palestinian man Daoud Safadi while he was working his land in Urif village, south of Nablus.

Haaretz Analysis | As Israel raids Jenin again, and settlers again rampage in Hawara, local Palestinian militias are forging new connections. The cycle of bloodshed in Jenin and Nablus continues, alongside growing ties between the armed Palestinian operatives in the two northern West Bank cities.

Reported by B’Tselem, March 7
About a month ago, a 10-year-old boy named Nayef al-‘Odat died of his wounds. Nayef, who lived his short life in a-Nuseirat Refugee Camp in the Gaza Strip, was severely wounded in the head by an Israeli attack on 6 August 2022. For half a year he was transferred from one hospital to another, sedated and ventilated, until he died at midday on 6 January 2023. Nayef was the 33^rd person to die as a result of Israel’s latest attack on Gaza, which it dubbed – with no hint of sarcasm – Operation Breaking Dawn. 
In the three days of fighting last August, Israel killed 33 Palestinians. Our investigations show that at least 17 of them, including eight minors and three women, were not participating in the fighting. Their deaths were no “accident”, but a result of Israel’s policy of bombing a densely populated area from the air, even though it means killing civilians on a massive scale.

Haaretz, March 8, 2023, Israel attacked a Hamas site in southern Gaza with artillery fire on Wednesday after an Israel Defense Forces vehicle was hit by an explosive device, according to the IDF spokesperson.

Israeli settlers were recorded throwing stones at Palestinians and their homes in the West Bank city of Hebron on Wednesday in front of soldiers.  Three videos handed over to Haaretz show young men, several wearing kippot, throwing stones at buildings and houses in the West Bank city of Hebron. Two of the videos show soldiers trying to dissuade and evacuate them from the scene.

WASHINGTON – Forty-five progressive NGOs urged U.S. President Joe Biden to disavow remarks from U.S. Ambassador to Israel Tom Nides, where he stated the U.S. would support Israel no matter what action it took concerning Iran.

Palestine Online, March 8, 2023, Israeli occupation forces assaulted yesterday Palestinians while demolishing a residential structure in Masafer Yatta, south of Hebron.

Haaretz, March 9, 2023,  Three Palestinians were killed on Thursday in an exchange of fire with Israeli border police near the West Bank city of Jenin, the Palestinian Health Ministry reported.  The Palestinians had shot toward Israeli Border Police officers operating in the Palestinian village of Jaba’ near Jenin ■ 14-year-old Palestinian shot in Jenin on Tuesday also succumbs to wounds.

Three Israelis were wounded in a shooting attack in the heart of Tel Aviv at the end of a day of protests ■ One of the victims is in critical condition, while the other two sustained serious and moderate wounds ■ Defense minister orders immediate demolition of assailant’s family home.  Hamas claims responsibility for the shooting.

Analysis Israel’s government is a clear and present danger for its Arab and Palestinian citizens  Even taking into account Israel’s history of discrimination against its Arab citizens, the measures that Netanyahu’s government is advancing still stand out for their horrifyingly explicit persecution of the country’s Arab minority.

Reported by B’Tselem, March 9, 2923,  The world took notice of the Pogrom in Huwarah a few days ago, when hundreds of settlers backed by soldiers attacked Huwarah and other Palestinian villages near Nablus. Sameh Hamdallah Mahmoud Aqtash (36), a Palestinian blacksmith, and father of five was killed. More than 240 others were injured. Homes and property were set on fire.
But almost no attention is given to smaller attacks, which happen daily all over the occupied West Bank.

Palestine Electronic Forces, March 9, 2023,  Three Palestinian youths were shot and killed in cold blood by an Israeli special forces unit while sitting in their car during a military raid into the town of Jaba’, south of Jenin city, earlier today.

Haaretz, March 11, 2023, Humanitarian aid worker Sameh Aqtash had just returned to his tiny West Bank village from Turkey after organizing truckloads of food for earthquake survivors. He was shot dead when pogromist settlers heading for the town of Hawara passed by. An armed Israeli – perhaps a settler, but possibly a soldier – shot 37-year-old Sameh to death. “Murder” is the best way to define that horrific act. (Gideon Levy)

The Washington Post found that Israeli forces fired at least 14 times at unarmed Palestinians huddling between a mosque and a clinic during the daytime Nablus raid last month. The civilians would have been visible to them.

March 12, Three Palestinian gunmen were shot and killed by the Israeli army early on Sunday near the West Bank city of Nablus, and a fourth individual was arrested.   The incident near Nablus comes days after the Palestinian Health Ministry reported that three Palestinians were killed in an exchange of gunfire with Israeli border police near Jenin.

March 13, Two weeks after Israeli settlers rampaged through the West Bank town of Hawara, many Israeli army officers and higher-ups have drawn their own conclusions: ‘No one wants to act against it, and no one really wants to bring these criminals to justice… We know who led this disgrace in Hawara. We could go to their homes right now and get them.’

Palestine Online, March 13, 2023, Israeli occupation troops arrest Palestinian youth Ibrahim Dirbas after brutally assaulting him in occupied Jerusalem.

The occupation demolishing a factory in Wadi Al-Joz neighborhood after confiscating its goods and materials.

Reported by Sabeel, Jerusalem, March 14, 2023,  For the past ten weeks large protests have been taking place across Israel against the judicial reforms proposed by the new right-wing Israeli government. The protestors are focused on the government plans to politicise the judiciary. However there are few Israeli voices raised in protest against the escalating violence that is being unleashed by the Israeli authorities and the illegal settlers against the Palestinians. Last week hundreds of Israeli settlers torched Palestinian homes in four occupied villages.

International runners from more than ninety different countries joined Palestinian runners for the Ninth International Palestinian Marathon held in Bethlehem on Friday, the 10th of March. The Palestinian Olympic Committee sponsored the event to raise greater awareness about the circumstances of the Palestinians. Competitors aiming to run the full marathon have to complete the 11km stretch four times over to avoid having to pass through Israeli checkpoints.

Last week the Palestinian Ministry for Education made an appeal to international human rights and humanitarian organisations to defend the rights of Palestinian children to an education. The Jibb al-Deeb School in the Bethlehem area, which serves forty primary school pupils, is once again under threat of destruction. It was demolished and rebuilt in 2017.

A report entitled, ‘Can’t even be a widow’ has just been published by Euro-Med Monitor. It is based on interviews with family members of missing Palestinian migrants and asylum seekers who have attempted to leave the Gaza Strip. Some grieving relatives have been contacted by gangs claiming to have information about the missing persons and demanding large sums of money to release it.  The pitiless blockade of Gaza over the past seventeen years has led many Palestinians to risk their lives by trying to escape. We pray for an end to the Israeli blockade which is condemning Palestinians to poverty, unemployment and despair.

Pope Francis welcomed participants from the Palestinian Commission for Inter-religious Dialogue to the Vatican last week. The delegation focused their discussions on the spiritual significance of Jerusalem. The Pope expressed his hope that the city would remain a place of encounter and a symbol of peaceful co-existence for the followers of the three monotheistic faiths.

Next week Kumi Now will focus on the water scarcity in the West Bank, as we remember World Water Day on Wednesday, the 22nd of March. Palestine is generally rich in water resources, but those water resources are being exploited by Israeli interests while being denied to the Palestinians on the land. 

March 6, 2023

Haaretz, Feb 28, 2023,  Opinion,  On February 14, the Public Housing Law (Purchasing Rights) expired. Housing Minister Yitzchak Goldknopf decided not to renew it, thus eliminating one of the “most important mechanisms created to close gaps in society and lift families out of poverty,” in the words of attorney Gil Gan-Mor of the Association for Civil Rights in Israel. Israeli’s government starves the poor of public housing and feeds the settlers generously. (Amira Hass)

While an estimated 400 Israeli settlers took part in the violent rampage in the West Bank town of Hawara on Sunday, two days later, only one suspect remains detained under house arrest.  Six Israelis were detained on the night of the rampage in the West Bank town of Hawara. After a court hearing, five of them were released and one was sentenced to four days of house arrest.

The day after Sunday’s rioting in Hawara in which hundreds of settlers set fire to homes and cars and threw stones, it was obvious to anyone on the road leading into the West Bank Palestinian town that the rioters were still in control. Scores of young Jews, many of them masked, were gathered there on Monday morning checking vehicles in search of Palestinians. There were Israeli soldiers a distance away, but the young men were doing as they pleased. The reports of a large Israeli army presence in the town existed only on paper.

Haaretz, March 1, 2023, WASHINGTON – The United States on Wednesday sharply condemned Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich’s call for the destruction of a West Bank Palestinian village on Wednesday, days after it was attacked by a mob of settlers who torched dozens of homes and reportedly killed one resident.

The army should have prevented the rampage by Jewish settlers in the West Bank town of Hawara this week, Israel’s army chief said, adding that Israelis should halt the “internecine struggle” that has plagued the country since Benjamin Netanyahu’s hard-right government took over two months ago.

Mar 2, Haaretz Opinion, When you stand on Hawara’s main street, now under a sort of curfew – the settler thugs pass by, stopping only to provoke the residents, and the alarmed, frightened faces of women and children peep through the barred windows – your heart knows exactly who you’re with. There’s no dilemma. In your heart, your soul and your values, you’re with the victims. (Gideon Levy)

Mar 3, 2023,  The Israeli military threw stun grenades at hundreds of left-wing activists on Friday who were taking part in a solidarity visit to Hawara in the shadow of the deadly settler rampage through the town on Sunday.  The IDF informed the left-wing groups that they would not be allowed through to the West Bank town despite the visit being coordinated with the local governing council ■ ‘It is ridiculous that the army allows settlers to enter, but we, Israeli Jews and Arabs who wish to show our solidarity, are told that there is no entry’ one organization said in a statement.

The five hours during which hundreds of Jews rampaged unhindered through Hawara, attacking people and property and setting fires, encapsulated decades of encouragement of settler violence and the calculated disregard and leniency on the part of the Israeli military, police, state prosecutors, courts and successive governments. But those five hours also proved yet again how compliant the Palestinian Authority is with the artificial division of the West Bank into categories A, B and C, set by the Oslo Accords – a division that was supposed to be temporary and expire by 1999. (Amira Hass)

A 15-year-old Palestinian was shot dead and another teenager is critically wounded by Israeli army gunfire in the West Bank on Thursday, the Palestinian Health Ministry reported.  Another teenager was critically injured in a village near the West Bank city of Qalqilyah, the latest in a series of deadly encounters this week.

March 4, 2023, Israeli settlers posted warnings on social media that they would once again attack the West Bank town of Hawara on Saturday evening, in a repeat of Sunday’s pogrom that killed one Palestinian dead and injured nearly 100 others.

A town in lockdown, deserted streets, residents closeted in their homes – frightened and furious. Settlers on the prowl in their cars, soldiers at every corner, scorched buildings and blackened skeletons of cars.  The army had indeed prohibited Palestinians from driving in the streets or opening their businesses. (Gideon Levy)

Israeli settlers were documented throwing stones at Palestinian houses in the West Bank village of Burin on Friday, as IDF soldiers were present and stood by.  In a video documenting the incident, the rioters are seen vandalizing trees and throwing stones, as soldiers stand by without trying to stop or detain them. According to Israeli NGO Yesh Din which published the video, three Palestinian houses were damaged.

March 5, Less than a week after they failed to prevent an unbridled mob of rioters from attacking the Palestinian town of Hawara in a lust for revenge and setting it on fire, Israeli security services did manage to prevent hundreds of left-wing activists from entering the town, in part through the use of stun grenades.  Where were the IDF and police during the program?

The fatal shooting of Sameh Aqtash in the village of Za’tara, on the evening that hundreds of settlers rioted in the nearby town of Hawara, took place in front of soldiers who were standing next to a group of settlers.

Haaretz, March 6, 2023, The Knesset has voted Sunday night to extend the controversial citizenship law, which bans Palestinians who marry Israeli nationals from resident status in Israel.  The law was originally approved as a temporary cabinet resolution during the second intifada, but was extended every year since. In 2021, then-Foreign Minister Yair Lapid said it is ‘one of the tools aimed at ensuring a Jewish majority in Israel’.

A plan to expand Nof Zion, a settlement within the East Jerusalem neighborhood of Jabal Mukkaber, was approved last week by the Jerusalem municipal planning and building committee.  Plan includes construction of 100 residential units and 275 hotel rooms in Nof Zion, a settlement inside an Arab neighborhood.

The Israeli military announced that it would impose a general closure on the West Bank and Gaza during Purim on Monday night and Tuesday, as it generally does during Jewish holidays. 

 Reported by Sabeel, Jerusalem, March 6, 2023, The Popular Palestinian Conference was forced to issue a press release and abandon their television press conference in Ramallah last week. The Wattan TV offices were shut down by security officers from the Palestinian Authority. The conference was going to broadcast the text of a document signed by one hundred and fifty prominent Palestinians. They are challenging the Palestinian Authority’s decision to withdraw a plan to propose a UN resolution objecting to recent Israeli violations.

 Last week Israel’s National Security Minister, Ben-Gvir and Smotrich, the Finance Minister and Minister in charge of civilian affairs in the West Bank announced their decision to seize the bank accounts of 87 freed prisoners living in East Jerusalem. Since then two freed prisoners from Jerusalem, Mohammad Dirbas and Ayoub Afanah have had the funds in their bank accounts confiscated. While  the parents of Bashar al Obaidi, a prisoner from East Jerusalem have undergone punishment by the Israeli authorities. His mother was arrested and interrogated, while his father’s car was seized and confiscated.

Recently the Chelsea Community Hospital School at the Chelsea and Westminster Hospital took part in a collaborative art project with school children from Gaza.  Plates decorated by the Palestinian children were put on display at the hospital. However the display was removed after the hospital received a complaint from the UK Lawyers for Israel which stated that the display made Jewish patients feel ‘vulnerable, harassed and victimised’.

Next Tuesday Kumi Now will consider how peace building opportunities are opening up to Palestinian and Israeli women in spite of the occupation. We have just celebrated International Women’s Day and we think of the women activists involved in the nonviolent campaign of resistance against the Israeli occupation.

February 27, 2023

Haaretz, Feb 21, 2023,  Four minutes of shower time for every Palestinian prisoner, Ben-Givr has ordered, and in doing so he has opened an old-new front in our war for Jewish supremacy.  The restriction is another move by the pyromaniac Israeli national security minister against the inmates and their families. (Amira Hass)

Feb 22, 2023. Israeli forces entered Nablus’ old city in an attempt to arrest two wanted Palestinians, killing ten Palestinians and wounding 102 others in the intense confrontations with residents that ensued.  Israeli bracing for revenge attacks.

Hundreds of Reform rabbis from the United States, on a procession to protest legislation aimed at effectively blocking the monthly prayer services in the women’s section, were taunted and cursed on Wednesday morning by ultra-Orthodox protesters as they entered Jerusalem’s Western Wall, where they joined Women of the Wall, the feminist prayer group, for its monthly prayer service.

One in six Bedouin teens between the ages of 16 and 17 years old do not attend school, and in unrecognized Bedouin villages the comparable dropout rate is as high as 25 percent.  The new data also shows that the Bedouin dropout problem is greater than the Education Ministry is reporting – running as high as 25% in Bedouin villages that the state refuses to recognize, compared to 3% for Israeli Jews.

Israeli police are employing the unit that generally deals with serious crimes and criminal organizations to investigate – and surveil – leading activists in the protest movement against the Israeli Judicial overhaul.

Feb. 23, Nablus is in shock, once again. Wednesday afternoon this city in the northern West Bank buried 11 of its sons, while 100 others have been injured, more than half of them wounded by gunfire, with four believed to be in critical condition. Israel’s raid on Nablus proves willingness of more young Palestinians to die in an unwinnable battle.  The Israeli army provides a distorted picture of equal military forces, while Palestinians believe that the young fighters are sending a message: Death is preferable to life in prison or surrender to the occupier.  Ten Palestinians were killed when Israeli forces infiltrated the Jenin refugee camp last month — and not all of them were militants. One 61-year-old woman was shot while peeking through her blinds, and residents of the camp know that her family will not receive any answers. (Amira Hass)

The State Prosecution on Thursday charged a 13-year-old Palestinian boy with murder after he stabbed an Israeli Border Police officer last week.  Twenty-two-year-old Asil Suad died after he was also accidentally shot by an Israeli civilian guard at the site of the stabbing.

A member of the European Parliament was turned around at Ben Gurion Airport in Tel Aviv on Tuesday and sent back to her native Spain after attempting to enter Israel on a diplomatic mission to the Palestinian Authority.  Ana Miranda was denied entry to Israel and sent back to Spain due to her past participation in a flotilla to break the Gaza blockade, despite prior approval to visit the country. ‘It’s intolerable that Israel exerts control over members of a delegation that’s going to Palestine, not to Israel,’ she said.

Israel’s Civil Administration’s Higher Planning Council advanced on Wednesday plans to build 3,612 housing units in the settlements, of which 950 are expected to receive final approval.  In just two days – and despite international condemnation – Israel is advancing more plans for housing units in the West Bank than the total approved in previous years and is legalizing numerous outposts.

A teacher in central Israel was dismissed from his position after holding a discussion with his students on the judicial overhaul bills currently being advanced by the Netanyahu government.  Amir Klinger, who taught middle schoolers a course on critical thinking, was dismissed after showing his class a video lecture on the Netanyahu government’s plan to weaken Israel’s court system. ‘How can educating students on humanism, tolerance, equality and the rule of law be considered ‘incitement’?’ he asks.

Feb. 24, Two Palestinians were shot and seriously wounded by settlers near the West Bank city of Nablus early Friday, according to the Palestinian Health Ministry. A spokesperson said that the two people were rushed to Rafidia Hospital on the outskirts of the city.

Feb. 25, The IDF entered Nablus to secure yet another visit by settlers to Joseph’s Tomb. Palestinians threw stones at the soldiers, who arrested Yazid Amer, a 24-year-old with epilepsy. They left him outside overnight, blindfolded and cuffed, then released him without questioning him. His health has since deteriorated. (Gideon Levy)

Feb. 26, Senior Israeli defense officials are set to attend a summit meeting in Jordan on Sunday with Palestinian officials aimed at preventing further escalation in the West Bank, where the Palestinian Authority is expected to issue a list of critical demands under public pressure in the wake of a bloody Israeli raid that killed 12 people in Nablus last week.

Amos Harel and Yaniv Kubovich reported Friday in Haaretz that talk among Israel Air Force reserve pilots of refusing to comply with call-up orders or certain directives “is topping the list of the concerns of the General Staff of the Israel Defense Forces.”  indicating their sudden support for conscientious objection. (Gideon Levy)

Palestinians reported on Saturday that settlers attacked homes and set cars ablaze in the village of Burin, near Nablus.  Witnesses say that about 40 settlers from nearby Har Bracha attacked Palestinians and property with stones, clubs and firebombs.

Israeli settlers rampaged through the West Bank town Hawara, burning dozens of cars and buildings, houses with the residents still in them. At least one Palestinian has been reported killed and dozens wounded.  The British ambassador to Israel: “Terrible scenes in Hawara! Israel should tackle settler violence.” State Department spokesperson Ned Price commented on the events that occurred earlier on Sunday in the West Bank, saying that the U.S. “condemns today’s violence, including the terrorist attack that killed two Israelis and settler violence, which resulted in the killing of one Palestinian, injuries to over 100 others, and the destruction of extensive

property.”  Daniella Weiss, a leading figure in the settlement movement, commented on the violent events in Hawara to Israel’s Kan public broadcaster on Monday, saying that “Why should we stop? We’re protecting the lives of Jews… It’s a shame that the army even arrived here. Weiss added that as the settlers “Have a lot of guns” so there is no need for a military presence in the sector. ”  Israeli security sources told Haaretz that the situation in the Hawara area is under control and that the clashes have ended.  The sources added that according to their estimation, about 400 settlers took part in the rampage.

Sources in the Israeli security establishment told Haaretz that in recent hours, settlers have also set fire to vehicles and houses in the Palestinian village of Burin, north of Hawara in the West Bank. The sources added that the settlers set fire to a pen with dozens of sheep. IDF soldiers managed to rescue some of the livestock.

Haaretz, February 27, 2023,

Israeli leaders, including Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, vehemently denied agreeing to any settlement freeze on Sunday, after Washington published a joint communique stating that Jerusalem had agreed “to stop discussion of any new settlement units for 4 months and to stop authorization of any outposts for 6 months.”

The German city of Frankfurt cancelled former Pink Floyd frontman Roger Waters’ upcoming concert, calling him one of the “most widely-known antisemites” in the world.

Sunday’s shooting attack south of Nablus in which two brothers from the West Bank settlement of Har Bracha were murdered and the subsequent riots by dozens of settlers in the Palestinian town of Hawara have brought the West Bank to the boiling point.

Zamleh reported on February 27, 2023, 7amleh was awarded consultative status at the United Nations Economic and Social Affairs Council (UN ECOSOC), which will enhance our work aimed at highlighting Palestinian digital rights on a global level, as well as human rights violations that Palestinians are exposed to, such as surveillance, online censorship and online hate speech. We became part of the Global Network Initiative (GNI), to protect and promote freedom of expression and privacy in the information and communication technology sector.

February 20, 2023

Haaretz, Feb 13, 2023 An Israeli soldier was sentenced to 10 days in military jail after he was documented attacking a well-known Palestinian rights activist in Hebron, the army spokesperson said on Monday.  In a video of the event, the soldier is seen pushing Issa Amro to the ground for no apparent reason and later kicking him as he lies on the ground.  Feb. 14, National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir lent his full backing to the soldier who was sentenced to ten days in jail for assaulting a Palestinian human rights activist.

Thirty Palestinian protesters were injured in clashes with Israeli security forces in Jabel Mukaber Monday morning, after police entered the East Jerusalem neighborhood to demolish three homes, the Red Crescent reported.   Dozens of Palestinians protested far-right MK Itamar Ben-Gvir’s order to demolish homes in the neighborhood under the claim that they were built illegally as part of his policy of collective punishment.

Haaretz, Feb 14, 2023,  A 17-year-old Palestinian was killed Tuesday morning by IDF fire in the Faraa refugee camp near Nablus, the Palestinian Health Ministry reported.  According to the Palestinian Health Ministry, Mahmoud Majed al-Aydi was gravely wounded after being shot in the head with live fire and later succumbed to his wounds. The army claims the teenager was approaching soldiers with an explosive device.

A Border Police officer who was stabbed Monday by a 13-year-old Palestinian and then shot by a security guard working alongside side him has died of his wounds. The incident happened on a bus at a checkpoint at the Shuafat refugee camp in East Jerusalem.   Police say the Border Police officer was shot when a civilian security guard opened fire at the assailant. This is the second attack by a Palestinian teenager in Jerusalem on Monday amidst increased tensions between Israel and the Palestinians.

WASHINGTON — U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken on Monday harshly condemned the Israeli security cabinet’s steps to legalize nine West Bank outposts, construct thousands of new settlement housing units and connect outposts to water and electricity — all despite previous explicit opposition from the Biden administration. His remarks were followed by a statement by the European Union also rejecting the authorization.

Even in the midst of the furious right-wing attacks on the Israeli Supreme Court as “leftist” and “elitist,” which have escalated into the current government’s offensive against the entire judicial system, the Court continues to authorize nearly every assault on Palestinian rights in the West Bank.

Palestine Electronic Forces, Feb. 15, 2023, The Palestinian teen Mahmoud Al-Ayedi, was shot and murdered by Israeli occupation forces in Tubas city.

Israeli occupation forces brutally assault and detain Palestinian youths near Shu’afat camp checkpoint in occupied Jerusalem, today.

Palestine Online, Feb, 15, 25-year-old young Palestinian man Harun Abu Aram was shot in the neck by Israeli soldiers in Masafer Yatta while trying to save his own generator from being stolen in January 2021, paralyzing him. This morning, Abu Aram died of his wounds.

Haaretz, Feb 15, 2023, When Noam (not his real name) got an email from the Housing Ministry a little over a year ago notifying him that he had won the lottery for an apartment in Ariel under the government’s subsidized home ownership program, he thought it was a miracle. “Without this program, I’d never be able to afford my own apartment,” he says.  Israel’s housing lottery plan turns “lucky” Israelis who cannot afford to buy a home into new settlers, in clear violation of international law.

Despite pressure from far-right ministers, Israeli security forces uprooted dozens of olive trees in a settlement farm in the West Bank on Wednesday morning, two years after Israel’s Supreme Court ordered that the farm cease operations.  After 15 years of litigation, olive trees planted by a West Bank settlement farm are uprooted on land claimed by Palestinians on the High Court’s orders ■ Far-right MKs deride Defense Minister Yoav Gallant for not halting the eviction of the farm.

The Biden administration has withdrawn its pick of a human rights activist,  James Cavallaro,  for a post at the Organization of American States for calling Israel an “apartheid state” and blasting a top House Democrat as being “Bought. Purchased. Controlled” by pro-Israel groups.

From a small office building, a group of Israelis is spreading global disruption.Tal Hanan and Team Jorge, with no qualms and no borders, have turned chaos into business.  In a jaw-dropping presentation to the clients, Jorge revealed the array of tools at his disposal to achieve the ends for which the clients had approached him: cyberattacks; transnational disinformation campaigns; forged documents; incrimination of political adversaries; dissemination of fake reports; theft of bank documents.  A campaign that uses old and new media to manipulate public discourse, a military term originally, this psychological warfare service is now offered privately.

Haaretz Feb 16, 2023, Opinion, The disgraceful death of Harun Abu Aram:  It was one of the most horrible sights I’d encountered under the Israeli occupation. On the floor of a dim cave lay a good-looking young man, his very thin legs raised on a plastic chair, a phlegm drainage tube pipe stuck in his neck, his head wrapped in a towel, his eyes closed, a diaper on his loins. His father stood over him wiping the sweat from his face, his mother sat in the corner of the cave, her face said it all. He lay like that without moving, with no bed, no electricity and no running water – for two years. Two years and 43 days, to be precise. (Gideon Levy)

In Jenin, even helping the wounded means risking your life.  Since early January, residents of the Jenin refugee camp and Palestinian rescue teams in the city have known that the Israel Defense Forces bars ambulances from accessing the area of its military raids in real time to extricate the wounded. The army ordered Palestinian Authority employees to send a message to this effect to rescue teams during the January raids in Jenin, camp residents told Haaretz. (Amira Hass)

The Israel Defense Forces demolished early Thursday morning the home of a Palestinian gunman in Hebron who was responsible for killing an Israeli last October, according to Palestinian media reports. Clashes between Palestinians and Israeli forces were reported as well.  In an unusual move, the Israeli army gave advance notice of the demolition intentions because of its proximity to homes belonging to Israeli settlers.

Editorial | Israel’s collective punishment law could be a war crime.  The Knesset on Wednesday passed a bill to deny terrorists citizenship or residency in Israel, giving a legal guise to an act that could be categorized as a war crime. The bill was passed with the sweeping support of the coalition and some of the opposition, with a majority of 94 MKs.

Palestine Online, February 16, 2023, Colonial Israeli settlers backed by Israeli forces uproot olive trees owned by the Palestinian residents in the Shabaka area located between the villages of Qaryut and Jalud, in Nablus.

Reported by DCIP (Defence of Children International Palestine) On Monday, an Israeli sniper shot and killed 14-year-old Qusai, right, from around 550 meters (1804 feet) away near Jenin refugee camp. Not even 24 hours later, another Israeli sniper shot and killed 17-year-old Mahmoud, left, in Al-Far’a refugee camp, northeast of Nablus.

Palestine Electronic Forces , February 17, 2023, Israeli occupation forces raided the Bedouin Palestinian village of Al-Araqib in Al-Naqab in 1948-occupied Palestine, this morning, in preparation to demolish it for the 213th time.

Haaretz, Editorial, February 17, 2023, An investigative series by TheMarker, Haaretz and scores of other media outlets from around the world documenting the “agents of chaos,” the brothers Tal and Zohar Hanan (“Team Jorge”) and the false-identities business of Percepto International, a firm owned by Lior Chorev, a media consultant, and Royi Burstien, a retired intelligence corps officer, once again exposes Israel as a world power in the field of dubious high-tech services that exact a heavy price on human rights.  (See Haaretz, Feb 15m above.)

Armed settlers swarmed a Palestinian village and ordered builders to stop working. A Palestinian man was shot dead. No one has been questioned yet. (Gideon Levy)

Haaretz, Feb 18, 2023, Four East Jerusalem neighborhoods have called a general strike for Sunday to protest increased Israeli police activity in that part of the city in recent days.  Aside from refusing to go to work, Palestinian residents of four neighborhoods will also barricade entrances to the neighborhoods and refuse to pay taxes or debts to any Israeli agency, including the Jerusalem municipality.

Palestine Online, February 20, 2023, US senator Bernie Sanders calls Israel’s government ‘racist’. 

 Reported by Sabeel, Jerusalem, February 20, 2023,  Last week, Issa Amro , the Palestinian activist and founder of Youth Against Settlements, was assaulted by an Israeli soldier as he was conducting a tour of his home city of Hebron.  Lawrence Wright, a journalist for the weekly New Yorker magazine, filmed the incident.      It showed an Israeli soldier grabbing Amro by the neck and throwing him to the ground and kicking him, before another soldier pulled him away. (See Haaretz, Feb.13, above.)

The Jerusalem Union of Christian Scouts undertook three days of events to raise funds for Syrian families who have been caught up in the recent devastating earthquakes. They managed to raise over 60,000 dollars.  

On Wednesday, the 15th of February, the Knesset approved legislation that states that Palestinian citizens of Israel and Palestinian residents of East Jerusalem sentenced to prison on offences that breach ‘trust to the State of Israel’ can have their citizenship or residency revoked and be deported to the occupied West Bank or to Gaza. The new law is discriminatory as it only applies to Palestinian citizens of Israel and permanent residents of East Jerusalem; it does not apply to Israeli Jews.

 Last week Hassan Muheisin had to destroy a build extension on his home with his own hands, after a court appeal failed. The Jerusalem Municipality claimed he had built onto his home without a building permit and was going to charge him excessive costs for demolishing his extension. While building permits are extremely difficult to obtain to Palestinians, the Jerusalem Municipality grants permits for thousands of housing units to be built for the illegal Israeli settlers. 

More than seventy UK Members of Parliament and the House of Lords, representing different political parties, have just written to the Foreign Secretary, James Cleverly, to condemn Israel’s plans to forcibly evict Palestinians in the South Hebron Hills. More than one thousand Palestinians living in the Masafer Yatta area are at imminent risk of being forcibly displaced from their homes.

Next Tuesday Kumi Now will consider how Palestinians are impacted by the restrictions imposed on their freedom of movement by the Israeli authorities. More than 70,000 Palestinians face the dehumanising experience of being processed every day at the 500 permanent checkpoints and countless ‘flying’ checkpoints set up to control their journeys to school, hospital or work.

February 13, 2023

Haaretz, February 7, 2023, U.S. Central Intelligence Agency Director William J. Burns warned Thursday that Israel appears to be on the brink of another intifada following his visit to the country just two weeks earlier.

Under intense diplomatic pressure, Israel announced Monday that it was freezing the planned demolition of an East Jerusalem building that is home to around 100 people. Although the decision was made at the request of the Prime Minister’s Office, the demolition order remains in force, which means that Jerusalem Municipality or the Israel Police could execute it in the coming weeks.

The central Israeli city of Kfar Sava has canceled a meeting with a prominent forum that brings together bereaved Israeli and Palestinian families, originally planned for Tuesday at a local high school in the city. The move follows pressure by a right-wing activist which led to the cancelation.

Thirty Palestinians have been confirmed dead from the devastating earthquake that rocked Turkey and Syria on Monday, the Palestinian Foreign Ministry said.  The death toll across Syria and Turkey from the powerful 7.8 magnitude earthquake has surpassed 5,000, injuring thousands more and toppling thousands of buildings.

Israel is overdue for “a major and a disastrous earthquake,” a prominent Israeli geologist told Haaretz on Monday, only hours after a powerful 7.8 magnitude quake hit southern Turkey and northern Syria, toppling hundreds of buildings and killing at least 3,500 people.  Israeli geologists are warning that Israel is overdue for a ‘disastrous earthquake’ – but the country is dramatically underprepared. Schools and hospitals built before the 1980s would likely be wiped out.

A 17-year-old Palestinian youth was shot and killed during clashes with Israeli forces in a refugee camp in the West Bank on Tuesday morning.  Lion’s Den militant organization says IDF troops entered Nablus to make arrests, and that the 17-year-old was killed during subsequent exchanges of fire.

At least five Palestinians were killed and another two seriously wounded in an exchange of fire with Israeli forces near Jericho overnight into Monday, following a week of increased Israeli raids and roadblocks on the generally quiet city.

Feb. 8, The fact that a Hamas cell was operating near Jericho – as became clear Monday morning through an exchange of fire between Israeli soldiers and armed Palestinians in a nearby refugee camp – came as a surprise not just to the Israeli security services, but also to the Palestinian Authority’s leadership and security services.

Palestine Online, February 7, 2023, BREAKING: An earthquake measuring 4.8 on the Richter Scale was recorded in the occupied West Bank, Palestine, between Janin and Nablus.

Palestine Electronic Forces reported on Feb. 7, A Palestinian teen, Hamza Al-Ashqar, was murdered by Israeli occupation forces in Nablus.

Much senseless destruction was left by the occupation mechanisms today following the demolition of an agricultural room in Al-Thawri neighborhood belonging to Ahmed Oweida.

“I cannot be indifferent to the systematic violation of the fundamental rights of the Palestinians.” Barcelona’s Mayor announces that the city has suspended its institutional relations with ‘Israel’, including the Catalan capital’s twinning agreement with ‘Tel Aviv’.

Haaretz, February 8, 2023, An 18-year-old resident of Bir Hadaj, a Bedouin town located in Israel’s southern Negev region, was arrested Tuesday on suspicion of threatening to kill National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir. The Be’er Sheva Magistrate’s Court decided to extend his detention until Sunday.

 Feb. 9. Four Israelis were questioned by police on Tuesday on suspicion of forming an armed vigilante group to look for Palestinian laborers , following the alleged rape of a local woman by a Bedouin man in the city of Gedera earlier this month.

Palestine Electronic Forces, February 9, 2023,  Palestinian firefighters are on their way to the disaster-stricken areas in Turkey and Syria to provide assistance.

Gazan children expressed their solidarity with victims of Syria-Turkey earthquake.

Feb. 10, Palestinians in Gaza donate blood for the injured people in Turkey-Syria earthquakes.

BREAKING: The 21-year-old Palestinian youth Sharef Rabaa was shot and murdered by Israeli occupation troops at Al-Fawar refugee camp in Hebron.

Palestine Online, February, 10, 2023, Israeli occupation forces attacked Palestinian worshipers while heading to occupied Jerusalem’s Al-Aqsa Mosque at dawn today.

Haaretz, February 10, 2023, The Palestinian terrorist who rammed a vehicle into a bus stop in East Jerusalem on Friday and killed two people, including a 6-year-old, was released from a psychiatric ward a day earlier despite going through a psychotic episode only 24 hours prior, his family and a director of a medical center said. Israeli security officials with knowledge of the investigation told Haaretz that these statements are credible.  ‘I’m sorry for what happened. It’s a tragedy, but it’s not a terror attack,’ a relative said.

Yousef Muhaisen was killed two days before his 23rd birthday during a protest outside Jerusalem.  This Palestinian protester wasn’t endangering anyone.  Israeli police shot him dead. (Gideon Levy)

Haaretz, Feb 13, 2023, The security cabinet approved the immediate legalization of nine West Bank settlement outposts on Sunday, and started processes to legalize additional settlements.  Israel updated the U.S. government regarding the move, which follows two terror attacks in East Jerusalem in past weeks, according to a government official.

The Israeli institution that oversees the West Bank is prohibiting Palestinians under the age of 22 from entering Israel to participate in organized peace-building activities. The new policy is expected to hamper the efforts of organizations which, among other goals, seek to foster encounters between Palestinian and Israeli youth.  Until now, Palestinians were allowed to enter at any age to participate in face-to-face ‘peace-building’ meetings, provided there was no specific cause to ban them ‘The policy was changed now, of all times, when there’s more need than ever to expand our joint Israeli-Palestinian activities,’ says peace activist Doubi Schwartz.

The Israeli air force on Monday launched overnight strikes on rocket manufacturing sites in Gaza belonging to Hamas, in response to a rocket fired on Saturday from the coastal enclave, the IDF spokesperson confirmed.

A Palestinian man was killed by Israeli military fire in Nablus in the early hours of Monday, according to the Palestinian Red Crescent. The IDF says it entered the city to arrest suspects involved in the killing of a military sergeant back in October.

Palestinian Electronic Forces, Israeli occupation troops fired gas bombs at Palestinians in Al-Ram town in occupied Jerusalem.

Israeli occupation troops demolish a Palestinian house owned by Adham Bashir in Jabal Al Mukaber town in occupied Jerusalem.

Israeli occupation forces demolished a water well in Birin village in Masafer Yatta, south of Hebron. 

Reported by Sabeel, Jerusalem, February 13, 2023, A car ramming incident took place in the East Jerusalem neighbourhood of Ramot on Friday, the 10th of February. A six-year-old child, Yaakov Pelli and his brother eight-year-old Asher along with twenty-year-old Alter Liderman, were killed and several other people were seriously injured while waiting at a bus stop when a car drove into them. The driver, Hussein Qaraqe, a 31-year-old Palestinian, was shot dead at the scene by an off-duty Israeli police officer. Qaraqe had just been released from a psychiatric ward after receiving treatment following an injury he had received on a construction site six months previously. After the incident a large number of Israeli police raided Qaraqe’s home in Isawiyah and arrested members of his family. (See Haaretz, Feb. 10, above.)

The Mayor of Barcelona, Ada Colau, has severed her city’s official ties with Israel, charging the country with ’the crime of apartheid against the Palestinian people’. In a letter to the Israeli Prime Minister, she cited a number of Israeli policies in her charge, including the military occupation of the West Bank, the annexation of East Jerusalem and the construction of illegal settlements on Palestinian land. 

National Security Minister Ben Gvir has accused police in Jerusalem of, ‘losing control of the city to a group of anarchists’, after they held back from using force to disperse anti-government protestors last Thursday night. The Police Commissioner gave public support to the way the protest was handled, as tensions rise between the minister and the police authorities. For the past five weeks thousands of Israelis have been demonstrating across the country against the controversial legal reforms planned by the right-wing government to weaken the judiciary. 

Naseem Alatrash, a Palestinian cellist, was nominated for a Grammy Award in the recent ceremony in Los Angeles. He has been recognised for his work on ‘Crisalida’ a Latin Jazz album by Danilo Perez and the Global Messengers. He gives soloist concerts around the world and works as a professor at the Berkelee College of Music in Boston. Naseem was born in Beit Sahour and began studying the cello at the age of 12 years at the Edward Said National Conservatory of Music.

Next week’s Kumi Now will consider the issues of Israeli illegal settlements and settler violence. According to B’Tselem more than two hundred settlements were established between 1967 and 2017 on land annexed from the occupied West Bank. These settlements depend on water and resources stolen from Palestinian villages. The settlers now living there routinely harass and assault Palestinian villagers and destroy their crops and property. This activity takes place under the protection of Israeli soldiers and without fear of prosecution by the Israeli authorities.

February 6, 2023

Haaretz, January 31, 2023, Hamas and Islamic Jihad-affiliated security prisoners are refusing to exit their cells in several prisons across Israel in protest of the decision to transfer an Islamic Jihad-affiliated female prisoner to solitary confinement in the Damon Prison in northern Israel.

Reported by Samidoun (Palestnian Solidarity Network), January 31, 2023, There is a high state of tension and escalating action within the occupation prisons, as the Palestinian prisoners’ movement is rising up to confront attacks by repressive Israeli occupation forces. In the past several days — particularly since the Jenin massacre and the Palestinian resistance operation in Jerusalem that came in response — occupation forces have stormed sections in various prisons, initiated mass arbitrary transfers from one prison to another, blocked family visits and isolated dozens of Palestinian political prisoners. Today, 31 January, this attack intensified with a violent raid on Palestinian women prisoners in Damon prison, sparking further outrage

Haaretz, February 1, 2023,  A bill to strip Israelis of their citizenship if they committed an act of terrorism and then received money from the Palestinian Authority passed its first of three Knesset votes on Monday by an enormous margin of 89-8. This is another step in the process of dismantling the already shaky civic status of Palestinians citizens of Israel. Following the Citizenship and Entry to Israel Law, which prevents Palestinian citizens from living in Israel with their non-Israeli spouses, and the nation-state law, which declared them to be second-class citizens, we now have a bill that would make it easy to strip the citizenship of people who committed terror attacks.

Palestine’s baseball team won the silver medal in the West Asia Cup.  Team Palestine made an impressive run in its debut in international men’s baseball, ultimately falling on Wednesday to heavily favored Pakistan 11-3 in the West Asia Cup championship game.

Reported by CTIP (Canada Talks Israel Palestine) February 2, 2023, Honest Reporting Canada (HRC) renewed its ongoing campaign against the CBC with an attack on CBC’s Day 6 host Brent Bambury. Bambury interviewed Israeli film maker Alon Schwartz over his disturbing documentary “Tantura” which documents a massacre of Palestinians committed by Zionist forces in 1948 – and the extraordinary efforts made by Israel to suppress and defame the Israeli academic who first exposed it.  A problematic objective of HRC seems to be to tie up CBC resources, forcing them to spend countless hours defending themselves against charges of biais and ‘antisemitism’. anytime they say anything remotely critical of Israel. Antisemitism is a very serious charge of course, and CBC cannot ignore it even if the accusation is frivolous or without foundation.  Each time HRC launches a complaint, the CBC ombudsman has to contact whichever program is being attacked and ask that it justify what it has said or done.

“The net effect, is to make it so difficult for CBC to say anything critical of Israel that it prefers to stay away from the topic altogether”, a former senior CBC journalist confided to CTIP.

Reported by 7amleh on February 2, 2023, 7amleh documented 1119 violations of Palestinian digital rights during the past year, and 7amleh, as a trusted partner for social media companies, was able to recover about one – third of the deleted content from the platforms, which was reported to the Palestinian Digital Rights Observatory.

Reported by OFIP (Ottawa Forum Israel Palestine), February 1, 2023, Amnesty International, in a press conference on the anniversary of its report on Israeli Apartheid,
 pointed to Israel’s apartheid system as the source of the recent violence and blamed the international community for allowing it to continue.  ‘Apartheid is a crime against humanity, and it is frankly chilling to see the perpetrators evade justice year after year’ – Agnès Callamard

Haaretz, February 4, 2023, A Palestinian youth takes part in a violent demonstration and a policeman shoots and kills him. Israel refuses to hand over the body, and then Border Police arrive and tear down Palestinian flags and mourning posters. (Gideon Levy)

Six Palestinians were wounded, two seriousy, Saturday in a gunfire exchange between Israeli soldiers and Palestinians in a Jericho refugee camp in the West Bank, according to the Palestinian Health Ministry.  The Israeli military is said to be surrounding a house in the area, according to Palestinian media reports.

Haaretz, February 6, 2023, Opinion, The present government is dangerous to many Jews, also those who voted for the parties in the government coalition. But first and foremost it is dangerous for all Palestinians, on both sides of the Green Line. It could carry out various expulsion plans, which its senior ministers – Bezalel Smotrich and Itamar Ben-Gvir – have been advancing openly. (Amita Hass) 

Reported by Sabeel, Jerusalem, February 6, 2023, The Church of England has imposed a twelve year ban on the Rev. Dr Stephen Sizer from fulfilling any priestly role. Dr Sizer has spoken out against Zionist policies used by the Israeli government against Palestinians. A case was brought against him by the president of the Board of Deputies of British Jews, accusing him of antisemitism. He was acquitted of all the charges in the case except one, for which he had already issued an apology to the Jewish community. 

An American Jewish tourist was arrested for pulling over a large statue of Jesus in the Church of the Flagellation, along the Via Dolorosa in Jerusalem on Thursday, the 2nd of February. This incident took place amid high tension in the city and region following a week of violence. 

B’Tselem has documented 48 incidents of settler violence against Palestinian farmers and their properties during the last olive harvest in the West Bank which took place from September to November 2022. The attacks were carried out with full state support and sometimes Israeli soldiers also took part in them. Many farmers were left without an expected income or even enough olive oil for their own domestic use. 

Israeli prison authorities assaulted Palestinian women prisoners in Damon jail on Tuesday, the 31st of January. Ben-Gvir, Minister of National Security, has enforced new measures in Naqab and Damon jails by imposing more raids and punitive measures, as well as solitary confinement for a week on more than one hundred prisoners.  (See Haaretz and Samidoun reports of Jan 31, above.)

Khan al Ahmar, on the eastern outskirts of Jerusalem, is under threat of imminent demolition by the Israeli authorities. It is located between two major illegal Israeli settlements in the occupied West Bank and the Israeli government plans to expand those settlements and link them with the Jordan Valley. Over two hundred residents of Khan al Ahmar are determined to stay in their village despite constant harassment and surveillance and demolition threats from the Israeli authorities.

Next Tuesday, Kumi Now will focus on the ways in which the Israeli government denies Palestinians their human rights and fundamental freedoms. We will remember the World Day of Social Justice on February 20th and consider the UN statement that ‘social development and social justice are indispensable for the achievement and maintenance of peace and security within and among nations’. We will consider how peace can be achieved for Israelis and for Palestinians living under occupation.

January 30, 2023

Haaretz, January 24, 2023, An Israeli group raising funds for Jewish extremists convicted in some of the country’s most notorious hate crimes is collecting tax-exempt donations from Americans, according to findings by The Associated Press and the Israeli investigative platform Shomrim.  The records in the case suggest that Israel’s far-right is gaining a new foothold in the United States. The amount of money raised through a U.S. nonprofit is not known, but the AP and Shomrim have documented the money trail from New Jersey to imprisoned Israeli radicals who include Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin’s assassin and people convicted in deadly attacks on Palestinians.

Jan 25, 2023, National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir said Wednesday he intends to continue visiting the Temple Mount/Al-Aqsa compound in Jerusalem, despite reports that Prime Minister Netanyahu assured the Jordan’s King Abdullah II that the status quo at the holy site would not be changed.  In a surprise meeting between Benjamin Netanyahu and King Abdullah II of Jordan on Tuesday, the Israeli PM reportedly assured the king that the status quo in the Al-Aqsa Mosque compound would be maintained.

Jan, 26, 2023, Nine Palestinians were shot and killed during a clash with the Israeli army in the West Bank city of Jenin, the local health ministry reported on Thursday. Following the deadly incident, a general strike was announced in the West Bank. 

Reported by the BDS National Committee on Jan 26,  Apartheid Israel’s occupation forces murdered at least 10 Palestinians, including an elderly woman and two children, in a massacre in Jenin refugee campearlier today. Many more were injured, including children suffering from teargas reportedly fired in a hospital.  Israel’s massacre in Jenin today included violent attacks on a hospital, ambulances, and many homes.

Haaretz, Jan. 26, 2023, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was warned on Tuesday by senior legal advisers from the defense establishment against granting Bezalel Smotrich, the finance minister who also holds a portfolio in the defense ministry, authority over the Civil Administration in the West Bank and the Coordinator of Government Activities in the Territories.  It is de facto annexation.  Israel’s Military Advocate General and Defense Ministry legal adviser warn Netanyahu against international response, including in the International Criminal Court.

A new condition added by the Education Ministry on Monday for operators of external programs in schools, that requires them not to degrade or shame the Israel Defense Forces seems tailor-made for one specific organization: The Parents Circle – Families Forum for Israeli and Palestinian bereaved families.  (This was also reported the same day by the Parents Circle.)

As Benjamin Netanyahu’s new government places the Israeli Supreme Court in the crosshairs, concerned supporters of Israel, from the Biden administration to American Jewish communal organizations, are raising the alarm about the implications that attackss on Israel’s independent judiciary carry for the country’s democracy, and for the persistence of a bilateral relationship built on shared values.  Netanyahu’s all-out assault on judicial independence and democracy can’t be understood without recognizing what first fueled right-wing hostility towards Israel’s Supreme Court: Its critique, even if inconsistent, of illegal settlements.

The Palestinian Authority announced it was halting its security coordination with Israel on Thursday following a deadly raid in the Jenin refugee camp that killed 10 Palestinians.

ISF shot and seriously injured two Palestinians during clashes in Silwan neighborhood E of Jerusalem City (Reported by Local Focus)

Haaretz, Jan 27, 2023, Seven Israelis were killed and three were wounded on Friday evening in a shooting attack near a synagogue in the East Jerusalem settlement of Neve Yaakov, in the deadliest terror attack Israel has seen in years. The gunman was shot and killed by police.  Police say gunman fired at passersby and worshipers exiting the East Jerusalem synagogue, before being chased and shot dead by police ■ Hamas praises attack, deadliest in years ■ IDF chief bolsters forces in West Bank.

Jan 28, 2023, Two people were wounded in a shooting attack in East Jerusalem on Saturday, police said, less than a day after one of the worst shooting attacks in Israel in years. The 13-year- old Palestinian assailant was shot at the scene, security sources said.

The Palestinian Authority is blaming Israel for escalating the security situation, following two terror attacks in Jerusalem which claimed the lives of seven people.  The statement released by the office of PA President Mahmoud Abbas blamed Israel’s policy in the West Bank, including ‘ continued criminal activity against the Palestinian people,’ for the escalation.

Jan 29, 2023, Israel Police and military forces working overnight Saturday sealed off the home of the Palestinian assailant who killed seven Israelis and wounded three in a shooting spree in East  Jerusalem on Friday, in preparation for its demolition, police said.

Predictably, this weekend’s terror attacks led to calls to suspend or soften the public protests against the government, alongside calls urging the opposition leaders to give Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu a “political safety net.” It would be one thing if these calls came only from supporters of the government, who will cynically exploit any opportunity to delegitimize the protestors and suppress the demonstrations, but strangely enough, some were voiced by supporters of the protests.

A private house and a car were torched and another house was damaged with stones in a Palestinian village northeast of Ramallah on Sunday night, while six cars were torched in a nearby village in suspected revenge attacks by Israelis.

Armed with banners, protesters once again took to the streets in droves across Israel on Saturday night to demonstrate against the far-right government’s planned judicial overhaul – with a number of notable figures in attendance.

Six demonstrators were arrested on Friday evening for waving Palestinian flags at a protest in Haifa – including a human rights lawyer who had arrived to advise attendees that flying the flag was legally permissible.  ‘The arrest of an attorney carrying out his work as a defender of human rights is another crossing of red lines by the police,’ Adalah, the Legal Center for Arab Minority Rights in Israel, says.

Suspected as a Palestinian assailant, an 18-year-old Palestinian was shot dead by a security guard near the West Bank settlement of Kedumim Saturday night, the IDF said.  Residents of the settlement of Kedumim have been asked to stay indoors as Israeli forces search the area for Palestinian assailants.

An angry mob, shouting ‘leftists go home’ on Saturday stormed a makeshift television studio outside the scene of this weekend’s shooting attack in Jerusalem, menacing journalists reporting on the tragedy.

Haaretz, Analysis, The cycle of bloodshed has never been more tangible than over the weekend. One can pick up the thread and follow how one killing leads to another, how blood follows blood. The moves the government is planning are a foolproof recipe for a continuation of the violence.   The sequence of events, which began with an Israeli raid on the Jenin refugee camp on Thursday morning, followed by two shooting attacks in Jerusalem over the weekend, demonstrate that this is not a usual “one-off occurrence,” but rather an escalation which could spiral in several directions.  From Jenin to Jerusalem, the fronts for the recent escalation have taken place outside the sphere of the Palestinian Authority’s control or influence. Israel’s hardline government, meanwhile, is only adding fuel to the fire.

Haaretz, Opinion, by Gideon Levy, Israel’s Jenin raid created the terror attack it proclaimed to thwart. What were you thinking? That the killing of 146 Palestinians in the West Bank in 2022, according to B’Tselem, most of them noncombatants, would be meekly accepted? That the killing of about 30 people in the month to date would pass quietly?

Reported by Samidoun (Palestinian Prisoner Solidarity Network), on January 29, 2023, Just days ago, on January 26, the credit card processor for our fiscal sponsor, the Alliance for Global Justice, cut off AfGJ’s access to credit card processing for online donations after a slew of far-right and Zionist attacks in the media, including a demand from the Zionist Organization of America. AfGJ is the fiscal sponsor not only for Samidoun and multiple other organizations working for justice and liberation in Palestine, but for a wide array of anti-racist, Latin America solidarity, political prisoner support and environmental justice organizations. It is an essential hub for the movement. 

Haaretz, Jan 30, 2023, A car was set on fire, and an inscription reading “Jews wake up” was spray-painted Sunday night in the Palestinian village of Jalud as part of a wave of 35 suspected revenge crimes against Palestinians following last weekend’s string of shooting attacks in East Jerusalem and West Bank. After last week’s shooting attacks in East Jerusalem which followed the deadly IDF raid in Jenin, Israeli Police are investigating these incidents as revenge attacks by settlers, but have made no arrests so far.

The Israeli military, acting for the first time under a new regulation allowing terrorists’ residences to be “temporarily” sealed immediately after an attack, sealed the home of the assailant behind the fatal East Jerusalem shooting on Sunday.

Israeli forces killed a Palestinian man, 26 years old, in Hebron, a flashpoint city in the occupied West Bank on Monday, the Palestinian Health Ministry said. The killing marks the latest bloodshed in spiraling violence that comes as U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken visits the region.

Times if Gaza, Jan, 30, 2023, lsraeli occupation authorities leave a Palestinian family homeless after forcefully demolishing their house in Jerusalem earlier today. 

 Reported by Sabeel, Jerusalem, January 30, 2023, The US government has raised concerns over the recent escalation in violence used by Israeli forces. Ten Palestinians were killed during the Israeli raid on the Jenin refugee camp in the early hours of Thursday morning. This was the deadliest attack by the Israeli forces in the occupied Palestinian territory for decades. Several rockets were fired into southern Israel from Gaza in response to the Jenin raid. Israel then hit back with three ground strikes in Gaza. 

This week the Forum of Palestinian Journalists, based in Gaza, has criticised the dismissal of the cartoonist, Mohammad Sabaaneh. They stated that his dismissal ‘reflects the Palestinian Authority’s strange insistence on suppressing freedom of opinion and expression’. Sabaaneh’s recent cartoon was critical of the Palestinian Authority’s apparent lack of response to the heightened level of Israeli violence.

The Israeli government has just issued new guidelines which will make it even more difficult for foreigners to study or work in the occupied West Bank. These restrictions will further isolate Palestinians living in the West Bank from foreigners and from their own family members who do not hold West Bank ID. 

On Thursday, the 26th of January, Israeli forces informed Palestinian landowners in Khallet Ad-Dabi, one of the nineteen hamlets making up Masafer Yatta in the South Hebron hills, that they are about to uproot their saplings. The Dababseh family had planted a hundred fruit trees on the old site of the local school, which had been demolished  by the Israeli army two years previously. 

This month Ben Gvir, the National Security Minister, has ordered Israeli police to remove all Palestinian flags from public places. In response to this order an Israeli artist living in Tel Aviv drew himself in the colours of the Palestinian flag. Michael Rosanov then made his artwork into his Facebook profile picture and this has caught on with other disaffected Israelis. Last Saturday, 100,000 Israelis turned out in Tel Aviv to protest against the policies of the new right-wing Israeli government. 

This week the Assembly of Catholic Ordinaries in the Holy Land spoke out in strong condemnation of Israeli settler attacks which have taken place in the Christian Quarter of Jerusalem. In the most recent attack a large group of settlers entered the New Gate and started shouting and chanting while waving flags. They then started to throw around tables and chairs at local restaurants, terrorising tourists and shopkeepers.

Next Tuesday Kumi Now will consider how the Israeli blockade of Gaza impacts those who need to travel within the Palestinian territory for medical treatment. Many patients are unable to attend medical appointments for chronic illnesses as they are denied permits by the Israeli authorities.

January 23, 2023

Haaretz, Jan 17, 2023,  More than 90 United Nations member states on Tuesday rejected Israel’s punitive measures imposed against the Palestinian Authority, which were enacted earlier this month in response to a resolution which requested an advisory opinion from the International Court of Justice on Israel’s occupation.

Israeli citizens currently being held hostage in the Gaza Strip have remained a low priority for the public on account of their race, a former IDF official who oversaw prisoners alleged on Tuesday, following the release of rare footage purporting to show Ethiopian-Israeli prisoner Avera Mengistu, who has been held by Hamas since 2014.

Israeli soldiers shot a Palestinian dead in the southern West Bank on Tuesday, who the army said opened fire at soldiers operating a checkpoint.  40-year-old Hamdi Abu Deiaa left a will before he set out to try to carry out the attack at an Israeli checkpoint near Hebron.

Israel’s Culture and Sports Minister Miki Zohar’s office approved a proposal from a fringe, right-wing group to investigate the funding sources for an Israeli documentary about the occupation of the West Bank city of Hebron.

Haaretz, January 18, 2023, Israel’s High Court announced on Wednesday that it has disqualified Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s key ally, Shas chair Arye Dery, from serving in a ministerial position, following the latter’s criminal conviction last year and subsequent suspended sentence, a move that could jeopardize the coalition’s chance of survival.

Jan 19, 2023, Israeli forces killed two Palestinians in an overnight raid in the West Bank, according to the Palestinian Ministry of Health.  Exchanges of fire in Jenin killed two Palestinians, one armed. IDF arrests two sons of an Islamic Jihad operative, say sources.  Reported by Times of Gaza,  lsraeli occupation forces kill 2 Palestinians and injure many others during a military raid in Jenin camp.

Harvard University announced Thursday that it plans to offer a fellowship to a leading human rights activist after its initial denial sparked widespread criticism.  Kenneth Roth, who was the executive director of Human Rights Watch, or HRW, until last year, was recruited by the Harvard Kennedy School’s Carr Center for Human Rights Policy to become a fellow and he accepted. But a few weeks later, in July, Roth said the center called and told him that the dean of the school, Douglas Elmendorf, had not approved it.  Roth said he wasn’t given a reason but believes it was due to his and his group’s criticism of Israel.

Reported by the Evangelical Lutheran Church in Canada, January 20, 2023, The ELCJHL is making history by ordaining the first woman pastor in Palestine, Sally Azar.  Bishop Michael has joined the other National and Synodical Bishops in a pilgrimage to the Holy Land to participate in this historic event in the life of our partner church. 

Times of Gaza, January 20, 2023, Despite all the lsraeli restrictions, 75.000 Palestinian worshippers perform Friday Prayer in the Al-Aqsa Mosque Compound.

Haaretz, Jan 21, 2023, The following report appeared this past Monday in Yedioth Ahronoth: “IDF fighters yesterday morning shot to death a Palestinian armed with a knife who tried to snatch a weapon from one of the members of the force… The terrorist, who was shot to death… , [was a] resident of the village of Rammun.”   Driving to work with his son, Ahmed Kahla was stopped at an army checkpoint, where he was shot dead. The army claimed he tried to grab a soldier’s weapon. His son insists that he was slain for no reason. (Gideon Levy)

Bezalel Smotrich on Friday ordered a halt to the evacuation of an illegal West Bank outpost that was established overnight on privately held Palestinian land by Israeli settlers –after the demand was ignored by Defense Minister Yoav Gallant, who ordered the eviction “in contradiction to the coalition deals that form the basis for the government’s existence.”  

Reported by Sabeel, Jerusalem, January 23, 2023, This week Palestinians disrupted the plans of the Israeli authorities to start demolishing their homes in Jabel Al-Mukkaber in East Jerusalem by pouring oil on the streets. The Israelis had to get their vehicles towed away from the area. They plan to demolish 800 Palestinian homes in the neighbourhood to make way for a commercial centre and 500 Israeli housing units. During the incident the Israeli authorities assaulted two local Palestinian men.

Sabeel Jerusalem has just hosted a group of students from the Pittsburgh Theological Seminary based in the US state of Pennsylvania. The group of Presbyterian students were able to witness for themselves the restrictions imposed on Palestinians living under Israeli occupation and learned about Palestinian Liberation Theology.

 The Israeli army shot two Palestinians during a heavy army raid in Jenin refugee camp in the early hours of Thursday, the19th of January. Jawad Bawaqneh, a 57-year-old father of six and local teacher, and Adham Jabareen, a young fighter in the Jenin Brigade were both shot and killed. A local journalist reported that Jawad was killed as he tried to bring Adham into his home to give him first aid treatment.  (See Haaretz report of Jan 19, above.)

On Wednesday, the 18th of January, the Orthodox Armenian Patriarch of Jerusalem, Nourhan Manougian arrived in Bethlehem’s Manger Square at the head of a long procession. The procession, which starts in the Armenian Patriarchate of the Old City in Jerusalem, marks the celebration of Christmas and Epiphany for Armenian Christians.

Next Tuesday Kumi Now will consider the discrimination faced by Palestinian citizens living in Israel where they make up over 20% of the whole population. Almost every aspect of their daily lives is affected by discrimination and over half of all Arab families in Israel are living below the poverty line.

January 16, 2023

Haaretz, January 10, 2023, Israel’s new culture minister Miki Zohar ordered his ministry on Tuesday to look into slashing funding for the film “Two Kids a Day,” which deals with detention of Palestinian minors in the West Bank, on the grounds that it “tarnishes” Israel’s image.

The Israeli Prison Service on Monday transferred Palestinian political leader Marwan Barghouti to the Nafha prison as part of a larger plan to relocate over 2,000 security inmates in an attempt to sever connections between them.

Haaretz, January 11, 2023,  Senior Israel Defense Forces officers, headed by chief oftheCentral Command, Maj. Gen. Yehuda Fuchs, have begun to prepare for the eviction of hundreds of Palestinians from the area of Masafer Yatta in the southern Hebron Hills, so it can be turned into a regular training ground for the army.   The IDF prepared the plans to evict the villages without being ordered to do so by the government, and only presented the plan after Benjamin Netanyahu was sworn in.

24 European Parliament members wrote to the EU’s Commission for Crisis Management following Israel’s intention to demolish dozens of houses in the West Bank villages of the Masafer Yatta area that were built with financial aid from the European Union or its member states.  The European Commissioner for Crisis Management, Janez Lenarcic, said this weekend that Israel must pay reparations for structures it demolishes in the West Bank that were built with EU funding.

A little over half of the Israeli public would like to see a meeting between Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, according to a poll commissioned from the Midgam polling firm by the NGO Geneva Initiative Israel. Most of the Israeli public would also support a freeze in settlement plans in favor of normalization with Saudi Arabia, the poll shows.

On December 30th, the UNGA adopted by 87-26 the resolution “Israeli practices,” which requests an advisory opinion from the International Court of Justice (ICJ) regarding the legal implications of Israel’s “prolonged occupation, settlement and annexation of the Palestinian territory.” Canada previously opposed the draft resolution in committee, and once again voted against the resolution at the final stage.   

Therefore, today CJPME  (Canadians for Justice and Peace in the Middle East) issued a letter to Minister Joly which 1) requests an explanation for Canada’s vote; 2) asks whether Canada intends to respect the work and findings of the ICJ on Israel’s occupation, now that the resolution has been adopted; and 3) asks how Canada intends to protect Palestinian civil society from Israeli retaliation.

Haaretz, January 12, 2023,  Israel’s poverty rate has risen moderately in 2021, according to the National Insurance Institute’s report, keeping Israel as one of the most impoverished states in the developed world. The elderly and Arabs are the hardest hit as the report shows almost 2 million Israelis live below the poverty line.

In the Jenin refugee camp, I saw many beautiful things. Not books of poetry by Rachel or by Natan Alterman, as the narrator of a Naomi Shemer song once described finding at Israeli army outposts in Sinai, but a courageous, determined, well-organized camp imbued with warmth and fighting spirit perhaps unparalleled in history. (Gideon Levy)

With only days left in his four-year term as leader of the Israel Defense Forces, Aviv Kochavi speaks out against plans for defense and security by Israel’s most extreme government ever.  Commanders won’t want to serve in an unethical army, he warns.

Haaretz, January 13, 2023, Editoral, The draft legislation the justice minister unveiled Thursday revealed the truth: Yariv Levin seeks to ax every check or balance in Israel’s democracy with a single blow. Not in a balanced manner, not gradually, but all at once, and in the most radical way possible. This document’s provisions, if enacted, would destroy all potential oversight of the legislative majority’s power and turn Israel from a liberal democracy into an authoritarian state with no protections, however minimal or theoretical, for human rights, good governance or even the electoral process.

 Haaretz, Analysis, The first and most tangible achievement of the new government has been the restoration of the opposition camp and its seemingly miraculous transformation from a political cadaver into a hungry civil beast, fully intent on fighting for its life, upright and fearless.

Haaretz, Jan 14, 2023, A group of Palestinian and foreign tourists were attacked Friday while on a hike near the village of Mu’arajat near Jericho in the West Bank, Haaretz has learned. The assailants reportedly used pepper spray and batons to attack the hikers, who had to wait two hours before soldiers came to escort them back to their bus.

Two Palestinians were shot dead by IDF soldiers on a demolition mission – to destroy the houses of families of two other young men, who had killed an officer. Collective punishment was thus compounded by more killing. (Gideon Levy)

Haaretz, Jan 15, 2023,  According to the Israeli military, a 45-year-old Palestinian was shot dead by Israeli soldiers near the West Bank city of Ramallah after approaching a soldier’s post and pulling out a knife.  Israel military source says soldiers opened fire on the man after he attempted to snatch one of their weapons.

A crowd numbering about 80,000 people by police estimates braved rain to protest the new Israeli government’s slate of planned changes to the judiciary, which would severely curtail the Supreme Court, in Tel Aviv on Saturday evening.  Saturday’s protest in Tel Aviv against the far right’s planned judicial overhaul saw a four-fold increase in numbers from last week, despite occasionally heavy rainfall, with smaller but sizeable showings in Jerusalem and Haifa too.

An Arab Israeli doctor who was suspended three months ago from Jerusalem’s Hadassah Medical Center following allegations that he gave food to a 16-year-old Palestinian patient suspected of committing a stabbing attack will return to work following the end of a mediation process with his employers conducted over the last weeks.

An Israeli court ruled on Sunday that a mother and her 8-year-old son who was taken intro custody during a school day in Tel Aviv last week are to be released on bail from a holding facility they were held in over the weekend.  The second grader was arrested last Thursday at his school in violation of an agreement with the Tel Aviv municipality and taken to a holding center.

Jan. 16, A 14-year-old Palestinian was fatally wounded Monday morning by Israeli army gunfire near Bethlehem.  According to the Palestinian Health Ministry, the young Palestinian suffered a shot to the head. The Israeli military has yet to comment on the incident.

The country is in turmoil over the fast-track legislation submitted last week by Justice Minister Yariv Levin to give the Knesset the power to override Supreme Court decisions, give politicians a majority of votes on the judicial selection committee and do away with the courts’ reasonableness standard.  Justice Minister Yariv Levin’s judicial overhaul was apparently written by the Kohelet Policy Forum, one of the best-funded research institutes in Israel, which advances nationalist, libertarian policies – and is funded by two American billionaires.

An open letter from seven reserve-duty generals

Haaretz, Jan 16, 2023,  The agreements and legislative initiatives preceding the establishment of the new government, in particular the “Smotrich Law,” give political actors an opening to intervene in operative security matters. The law will enable them to initiate operations in Judea and Samaria and against the Gaza Strip aimed at shaping a new reality that will lead to a security, diplomatic and social crisis. The cost of de facto annexation will be paid in blood.

Times of Gaza, January 16, 2023, lsraeli occupation forces executed Palestinian man Ahmad Kahleh in front of his son this morning near Ramallah.

Reported by Sabeel, Jerusalem, January 16, 2023, On Thursday, the 12th of January, three Palestinians were shot and killed by Israeli soldiers. Habib Kamil ,25 years old, and Abdulhadi Nazal ,18 years old, were shot dead by live fire from Israeli troops during a raid in the town of Qabatiya, near Jenin. Earlier in the day an Israeli sniper shot Samir Aslan, a 41-year-old father of eight, when he was on the roof of his house with his family in Qalandiya refugee camp. 

Last week the US Court of Appeal in Washington dismissed the allegations brought by the Jewish National Fund, (JNF) against the United States Campaign for Palestinian Rights, (USCPR). The JNF are seeking to prove that the USCPR are liable for militant attacks against Israelis and Americans because of their support for Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions and for the Great March of Return. The judge deemed the allegations were ‘insufficient’ and the attorney representing the USCPR stated that the lawsuit was an attempt to ‘smear human rights advocates as terrorists’. 

A health clinic in Kiryat Malakhi in southern Israel refused to give first aid treatment to Hamoudi Tarboosh a 23-year-old Palestinian on Wednesday, the 11th of January. He had cut his hand on a broken glass door while at work in a local store. Even though he was losing a lot of blood from the wound, the manager of the nearby clinic refused him entry and he had to travel to a hospital in Ashkelon to receive treatment. Recently the Israeli Medical Association declared that Israeli doctors ‘will never discriminate in the care they provide’. This declaration was issued in the media after the new far-right National Missions Minister had earlier stated that Israeli doctors should be allowed to refuse to provide treatments that contravene their religious faith.

Israeli authorities are preparing to carry out the collective eviction of eight of the 28 neighbourhoods in the Masafer Yatta area in the South Hebron Hills.

 Late on Thursday, the 12th of January, extremists wrote racist slurs in Hebrew on the stone walls of the Armenian Church in occupied East Jerusalem. The High Presidencia Committee of the Palestinian Authority for the affairs of Churches reported that the graffiti threatened death to Arabs, Armenians and Christians. They also warned that the racist expressions of far-right Israeli government ministers are giving rise to an outbreak of ‘hate speech and ugly provocation’.

Kumi Now will focus on the city of Jerusalem on Tuesday, the 24th of January. The United Nations’ Partition Plan in 1947 resolved that the city of Jerusalem would be an internationally administered city. However the Israeli government has taken steps to gain full Israeli sovereignty over the city, especially since the 1967 annexation of East Jerusalem.

January 9, 2023

Haaretz, January 3, 2023, WASHINGTON – Dozens of liberal American Jews on Monday demonstrated outside the Israeli Embassy in Washington against Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s new extremist coalition, warning of the dangers it poses for U.S. Jewry, the two-state solution and Israeli democracy.

A group of young, army-bound Israelis huddle in a cold room in a remote village in the northern Galilee. They are about to partake in an activity that might be considered subversive by the powers that be in Israel these days: a frank discussion about the occupation.  Nir Avishai Cohen travels around Israel speaking to youngsters on pre-army programs, seeking to educate them about the realities in the occupied territories. ‘As far as most of them are concerned, this is just a term that crazy leftists use,’ he says.  ‘They are clueless about the occupation’.

A 15-year-old Palestinian was shot dead by Israeli forces during confrontations in the West Bank late on Monday night, the Health Ministry in Ramallah reported.  The teenager was killed during confrontations with Israeli forces who were preparing to demolish a Palestinian home near Bethlehem, according to the Palestinian Health Ministry.

Far-right National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir arrived at the Temple Mount/Al-Aqsa compound on Tuesday morning during his first week in office, in his first visit to the contested Jerusalem holy site since he assumed office last week. The far-right National Security Minister arrived at the compound amid Hamas threats that his visit would ‘lead to an explosion’ ■ U.S., France and Arab states line up to condemn the ‘unacceptable’ move.

Reported by AJP (American Muslims for Palesrine), January 3, 2023, Yesterday, Israel’s new far-right national security minister Itamar Ben-Gvir invaded the Al-Aqsa mosque compound in occupied East Jerusalem, asserting a Zionist claim to the Muslim Noble Sanctuary. This grotesque act violates international law, as Israel has no legal claim over East Jerusalem at all, and is a clear provocation intended to undermine the status quo and aggravate religious tensions that are already charged following repeated Israeli assaults on Al-Aqsa in the last two years. Earlier this year, the U.S. State Department said “Secretary Blinken emphasized the importance of upholding the historic status quo at the Haram al-Sharif/Temple Mount, and appreciation for the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan’s special role as custodian of Muslim holy places in Jerusalem.”

Reported by Addameer Prisoner Support and Human Rights Association, January 3, 2023,  In 2022, the Israeli occupation forces arrested in total around 7,000 Palestinians, with April 2022 recording the highest number of arrests reaching 1,228 cases, followed by May and October 2022, with 690 cases. The number of Palestinians arrested from occupied Jerusalem remained the highest among other Palestinian cities, with more than 3,000 cases of arrests, including 600 cases of house arrests. Notably, around 106 Palestinians from the Gaza Strip were arrested, including 64 Gazan fishermen. The Israeli occupation authorities systematically utilized administrative detention to indefinitely hold Palestinians without charge or fair trial based on “secret information,” issuing around 2,409 administrative detention orders during the year 2022 alone, including new orders and renewal orders as well.

 There are currently 4,700 Palestinians held in Israeli occupation prisons, including 29 women, 150 children, five Legislative Council members, 15 journalists, and around 860 administrative detainees, including seven children, two women, and two PLC members.

Times if Gaza, January 3, 2023,  Palestinian families sleep on the floor as the lsraeli occupation forces demolished their houses in Kafr Dan village, west of Jenin.

The two Palestinians were killed by the lsraeli occupation forces in Kafr Dan, west of Jenin last night.

A Palestinian child bursts into tears while mourning his friend Adam Ayyad, who was killed by the lsraeli occupation forces this dawn in Bethlehem.

Reported by Defense of Children International Palestine on January 3, 2023,  We are just days into 2023 and Israeli forces have already shot and killed two Palestinian children.  17-year-old Fuad Mahmoud Ahmad Abed was shot by an Israeli sniper during an Israeli military raid in Kafr Dan, a village west of Jenin, and died around 1 a.m. on January 2. And early this morning, Israeli forces shot and killed 15-year-old Adam Issam Shaker Ayyad in Dheisheh refugee camp outside of Bethlehem. 

Reported by Friends of Hebron, January 4, 2023,  In the first hour of the new year, Israeli settlers broke into Youth Against Settlements’ community center and stole seven CCTV security cameras.  Earlier, on New Year’s Eve, our volunteers were similarly attacked by settlers hitting and kicking them. The day before, settlers had seriously damaged the wall that we had built for our protection.

Haaretz, January 4, 2023, The Protestant Christian cemetery on Mount Zion in Jerusalem was vandalized on Sunday. Two men broke into the area and desecrated more than 30 graves, said the Jerusalem University College (formerly the American Institute of Holy Land Studies) in a statement.  ‘Our hope is that the police and political system will take this incident seriously and do everything they can to protect the communities’ says member of Protestant community after the desecration of the Mount Zion cemetery.

Times of Gaza, January 4, 2023, Scores of lsraeli settlers break into the courtyards of the Al-Aqsa Mosque under the protection of occupation forces earlier today.

Adam Ayaad, a 15-year-old Palestinian, was killed by the lsraeli occupation forces this dawn in Dheisheh camp, Bethlehem.

Jan. 5, lsraeli occupation forces demolish a Palestinian-owned house in occupied Jerusalem.

Haaretz, January 5, 2023. WASHINGTON – The United States on Wednesday set an indisputable red line on the illegal West Bank outpost of Homesh, setting up a potential clash with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s far-right coalition that could spark conflict within the nascent Israeli government.  State Department says ‘Homesh is illegal under Israeli law,’ urges new government to refrain from settlement activity ‘of any kind’.

A 16-year-old Palestinian was killed Thursday overnight by Israeli army fire in the Balata refugee camp near Nablus, the Palestinian Health Ministry reported.  The youth was fatally wounded by a gunshot to his head, according to the Palestinian Health Ministry. Clashes reportedly broke out as Israeli forces entered the Balata refugee camp to arrest wanted persons.

144 Palestinians were killed by Israeli forces in the West Bank over the past 12 months. It is the highest number in 18 years, since the Second Intifada.

Karim Younis, who murdered the soldier Avi Bromberg in 1980, was a symbol among the prisoners. He wrote articles favoring dialogue but was turned down for parole despite repeated requests. With his release Thursday, after 40 years in prison,  he now faces calls for his citizenship to be taken away and an investigation into his accepting money from the PA.

Times of Gaza, After 40 years in the lsraeli jails during which both of his parents had died, Karim Younis, the longest-serving Palestinian prisoner, embraces the graves of his late beloveds.

Stealing the joy of Palestinians; lsraeli occupation forces storm into a tent set for celebrating the freedom of Karim Younis, who spent 40 years in the occupation jails, to take down flags of Palestine.

Haaretz Opinion, Netanyahu’s new government, the most far-right, racist, and homophobic in Israel’s history, has barely been in office for a week, and we were already so close to disaster by Tuesday, as Israel’s messianic Itamar Ben-Gvir, who’s been convicted of racist incitement and support for terrorism, visited the Al-Aqsa Mosque compound that morning.  Hamas is keeping its militants, missiles and demagogues in Gaza on a short leash. But its efforts to maintain calm are under increasing pressure from far-right provocateurs like Itamar Ben-Gvir inside Israel’s government.

Former Defense Minister Moshe Ya’alon on Wednesday accused Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of sacrificing Israeli democracy in order to avoid prosecution in his ongoing corruption trial.  The former Likudnik and cabinet member Moshe Ya’alon said that the legislative proposals to overhaul Israel’s judicial system reveals the true intentions of a man ‘ready to burn down the country and its values…in order to escape’ trial.

Haaretz, Jan 6, 2023. Israel’s security cabinet approved on Friday a series of sanctions against the Palestinian Authority in response to its request for an advisory opinion from the International Court of Justice in The Hague on Israel’s occupation of the West Bank.  Israel’s newly appointed security cabinet also decided to freeze a Palestinian construction plan in Area C in the West Bank, offset funds from the PA and ‘take action against organizations that promote hostile activity’.

Haaretz, January 7, 2023, Five Palestinian teenagers went on an outing in nature, maybe just to hike, as they say. Or maybe to throw stones at cars. Israeli soldiers ambushed and rained heavy fire on them, killing one and wounding the others, one seriously. (Gideon Levy)

Police broke up an East Jerusalem parent-teacher association meeting in the neighborhood of Isawiyah on Saturday, saying the gathering was funded by the Palestinian Authority, while the chairman of the association said it had no relation to the PA at all.

Three top Palestinian officials will be barred from entering the country after newly-appointed Defense Minister Yoav Gallant ordered their permits revoked on Saturday. Members of Palestinian president’s party will have their entry permits revoked after their meeting with Karim Younis, imprisoned until recently for the murder of a soldier.

Times of Gaza, January 8, 2023, lsraeli navy attacked Palestinian fishermen in the sea of Gaza, appearing to attempt to drown them.

Huge lsraeli forces storm into Hebron city in a pre-dawn raid today.Haaretz, Jan 9, 2023,  Defending proposed legislation which would allow the government to revoke the citizenship and deport the families of convicted terrorists, Likud lawmaker Hanoch Milwidsky on Monday declared that he preferred Jewish murderers to Arab ones.

On the instructions of National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir, Israel’s police commissioner ordered commanders to confiscate Palestinian flags in public spaces. The order from Police Commissioner Kobi Shabtai comes after celebrations of the release of Palestinian security prisoner Karim Younis in the village of ’Ara last weekend, during which the flags were displayed.

One of the most striking paradoxes that the Israeli-Palestinian conflict periodically produces is a knee-jerk Israeli decision to impose sanctions on the Palestinian Authority. The latest is ostensibly a punitive action, in response to the Palestinians (successfully) petitioning the UN  General Assembly to ask the International Court of Justice to give an opinion on the legal consequences of Israel’s occupation of Palestinian territories. Israel’s security establishment has long warned of a doomsday scenario in which the Palestinian Authority dissolves itself and seeks a binational state. Israeli actions may hasten the process.

Palestinian Prime Minister Mohammad Shtayyeh has warned that Israeli sanctions on the Palestinian Authority “will promptly lead to its collapse.” Speaking to Haaretz, Shtayyeh was referring to the retaliatory sanctions the Israeli cabinet imposed over the weekend on the PA in response to the Palestinian request for an advisory opinion from the International Court of Justice in The Hague on Israel’s occupation of the West Bank.

Reported by Sabeel, Jerusalem, January 9, 2023,  The United Nations’ Security Council held an emergency meeting on Thursday, the 5th of January, to discuss Ben-Gvir’s recent provocative walk around the Al Aqsa Compound, flanked by Israeli security guards. The UN stated that his first public act since taking office, ‘reflected a lack of commitment to existing historical and legal status of the holy sites in Jerusalem and could further destabilise the fragile situation in the occupied Palestinian Territories.’ 

B’Tselem reported that the Israeli authorities have just given notice that a thousand residents of Masafer Yatta in the South Hebron Hills will soon receive orders of forcible eviction from their homes. Their land has been designated as ‘Firing Zone 918’ and is a closed military zone. B’Tselem has written to the Prosecutor of the International Criminal Court in the Hague to protest that this forcible transfer of protected persons in occupied territory constitutes a war crime.

 The Israeli army shot Adam Ayyad, a 15-year old Palestinian teenager in the chest and killed him on Tuesday, the 3rd of January. The pre-dawn raid, involving dozens of armoured vehicles and many fully-armed Israeli soldiers led to confrontations with young Palestinians at Dheisheh refugee camp in Bethlehem. Since the start of the year three Palestinians have already been killed as a result of the continuing campaign of intensified Israeli raids that have lasted almost a year. 

 The vicar for migrants and asylum seekers in the Latin Patriarchate of Jerusalem,  Fr Nikodemus Schnakel, held a special early morning Christmas service for the Indian community in St. Catherine’s Chapel at the Basilica of the Nativity in Bethlehem. Although the community had to gather at 4:30am and worshipped in the dark, due to a power cut, there were no complaints as they were so happy to celebrate Christmas in Bethlehem.

 Security camera footage caught two young men wearing religious Jewish clothing desecrating more than thirty graves at the Protestant Cemetery on Mount Zion during the afternoon of Sunday, the 1st of January. This act of vandalism has shocked church leaders around the world and they have called on Israel to crack down on extremist Israeli groups.

 Next Tuesday Kumi Now will consider Israel’s policy of denying building permits to Palestinians living in East Jerusalem and the West Bank. As a result Palestinians have to build homes and businesses that are under constant threat of demolition or confiscation.

January 1, 2023

Haaretz, December 27, 2022, The Knesset approved on Tuesday amendments to the Basic Law on the Government which would allow for two ministers to serve in one government office. The legislation paves the way for Religious Zionism leader Bezalel Smotrich to appoint a minister in the Defense Ministry who will oversee the West Bank, including responsibility over the civil administration and coordination of government operations there, as agreed between him and incoming prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu. The so-called Smotrich law grants Religious Zionism control over the Civil Administration in the West Bank ■ ‘I have already instructed the IDF to prepare for possible escalations’ says outgoing defense minister.

Haaretz, December 29, 2022, As incoming Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu finalizes Israel’s most right-wing coalition ever, Jordan’s king says he is prepared for conflict should the Temple Mount status quo change.

Benjamin Netanyahu’s incoming government’s coalition agreement begins with a declaration that the Jewish people have a “natural right” to the Land of Israel. Regarding annexation of the West Bank, the agreement remains vague but says the prime minister will advance policies within whose framework the West Bank will be annexed, taking into consideration timing and both international and national interests.

Likud is trying to send official and unofficial soothing messages as LGBTQ persecution intensifies and blacklists emerge singling out people whose sole crime is their sexual orientation. Even before it takes office, Israel’s extreme-right coalition is persecuting gays, Arabs and women.
Haaretz, Dec 31, 2022, The UN General Assembly voted on Friday night in favor of submitting a request for an advisory opinion from the International Court of Justice in The Hague on the consequences of the Israeli occupation of the West Bank. Although the approval of the proposal initiated by the Palestinian Authority was expected, in recent days Israel tried to expand the list of countries that would oppose it. Israel’s UN ambassador Gilad Erdan attacked the initiative even before the vote, stating that it is ‘a disgrace to any country that supports it’.

Members of the Dar-Mohammed family from the village of Tarrama were astounded to find one day that settlers had planted grapevines on their land. When younger members of the family began uprooting them, soldiers assaulted them. (Gideon Levy)

Qatar’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs wasted little time in warning Israel’s new government over its expected policies, issuing a strong “condemnation and denunciation of the Israeli government’s plans for settlement expansion” on Friday.

Haaretz, Jan 1, 2023, In the wake of a United Nations vote over Israel’s occupation of the West Bank, a newly elected far-right lawmaker stated that Israel’s occupation is permanent, at least “as of right now.”

The UN General Assembly voted Friday to ask the International Court of Justice in The Hague for an advisory opinion on the legal consequences of Israel’s occupation of the West Bank and East Jerusalem. In other words, the United Nations is asking the co

urt to help it decide whether it is still possible to define Israel’s control in the territories as “occupation” – which is temporary – or whether it is in fact annexation.

Jan 2, 2023, The nominally ultra-Orthodox Netzah Yehuda Battalion, is being reassigned from the West Bank to the Golan Heights for what the Israel Defense Forces calls extended operational deployment. The battalion was placed last week under the Northern Command for what is expected to be an 11-month assignment. The move is presumably aimed at giving the Haredi unit – which has drawn the scrutiny of the U.S. State Department in light of its numerous incidents of violence against Palestinians – a chance to cool off.
Two Palestinians were killed and three were wounded during an exchange of gunfire with Israeli security forces in the northern West Bank early on Monday, according to the Palestinian Health Ministry. An exchange of gunfire broke out while IDF forces operated in the Palestinian village of Kafr Dan to demolish the homes of militants who killed Israeli Major Bar Falah in September.
According to reports from Lebanon, Hamas has threatened Israel with “explosive violence” following reports that National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir is planning on visiting the Temple Mount in Jerusalem later this week.

Reported by Sabeel, Jerusalem, January 2, 2023, Nora Abu Nab, a member of the Palestinian national kickboxing team, won the gold medal in her class at the Asian Kickboxing Championship held in Bangkok on Monday, the 19th of December. She will be the first Palestinian athlete to qualify for the World Martial Arts Games to be held in Riyadh in 2023.

In the early hours of Tuesday, the 24th of December, Israeli settlers seized a plot of land which belongs to the Greek Orthodox Monastery in Silwan, in occupied East Jerusalem. They fenced off the land and installed surveillance cameras under Israeli police protection. When Silwan residents rushed to try and stop the land confiscation, they were assaulted by the police.

Next week’s Kumi Now will consider the difficulties Palestinians experience trying to run businesses or find jobs living under the Israeli occupation. So many restrictions and barriers prevent Palestinian businessmen, entrepreneurs and farmers from gaining access to the global marketplace.

Week of December 26, 2022

Haaretz, Dec 19, 2022,  With the deportation of lawyer Salah Hammouri, born in Jerusalem to a Jerusalemite family, to France on Sunday, Israel is effectively warning all Palestinian residents of the city, present and future, that if they are not submissive, silent and obedient, their permanent residency status will be revoked. (Amira Hass)

Reported by B’Tselen, December 23, 2022, Now, killing is a daily routine. In 2022, Israeli forces killed the most Palestinians in the West Bank since 2004 – the year I joined B’Tselem. In total, Israel killed more than 180 Palestinians this year in all the territories it controls. State-backed settler violence is on a sharp, steady rise. The apartheid regime is increasing its pressure on the most disadvantaged communities living under its control, to drive them out of their homes and take over their land.  The coming year will see a new Israeli government that is more extreme than ever.

Reported by Defence of Children International Palestine, December 23, 2022, Ramallah, December 23, 2022—This year was particularly deadly for Palestinian children in the occupied West Bank, including East Jerusalem, and the Gaza Strip. In addition to killing Palestinian children with impunity, Israeli forces systematically detained and ill-treated hundreds of Palestinian children in the Israeli military detention system, threatened to demolish dozens of Palestinian schools, and escalated efforts to silence and eliminate Palestinian civil society and human rights organizations.

Haaretz, December 26, 2022, Attacks be masked cops and fears of reprisal: the reality of Bedouins in Israel’s Negev Desert.  Masked Border Police officers recently stopped a father driving on a Negev road with his 2-year-old child, beating him up in front of her; earlier that day two other Bedouin suffered a similar fate. Unlike them, however, many victims are too cowed to speak out.

The Israeli defense establishment suspects that Israeli settlers set fire to a car on Monday and threw stones at the house of a Palestinian family in the northern West Bank village of Urif, near Nablus, during another night of escalating violence near Nablus.

They would call him “the Christian” to insult him. They would repeatedly beat and humiliate him in jail. In the course of his abduction at the break of dawn from his East Jerusalem home, the black-clad police officers beat him until he bled. They broke his nose and a tooth, after he refused to undress in their presence. Then they dragged him by force, bound and blindfolded, to their van. After 41 beatings and questioning about his alleged role in a stone-throwing incident, a 16-year-old Shadi Khoury is finally released to house arrest – by order of the Supreme Court.  (Gideon Levy)

When Ula Baka signed a document called a “declaration of settlement in Gaza,” she had no idea it would change her life. Baka, a 42-year-old Palestinian from the West Bank city of Nablus, married a man from the Gaza Strip 20 years ago. Because Israel doesn’t allow Gazans to move to the West Bank, she had to move to Gaza in order to live with her husband and start a family.  Israel is increasingly forcing Palestinians from the West Bank who moved to the Gaza Strip to waive their right to ever return, a practice which has only gained steam in the last ten years.

Tamer Nafar was performing at a Christmas market in the northern Israeli Arab town of Kafr Yasif last Saturday when a police officer approached the Palestinian rapper and ordered him off the stage. Nafar refused, saying he hadn’t finished performing, but the officer persisted.  Whether in music, film, theater or art itself, the incoming government seems determined to silence dissenting narratives like those of the Palestinian community.  

 Reported by Sabeel, Jerusalem, December 26, 2022, Two-year-old Faris Banura and his sister Maya from the village of Beit Sahour, traditional place of the shepherds field, near Bethlehem – died on Wednesday the 21st of December. The death was as a result of inhaling a dangerous pesticide that was spread in a different apartment in their residential building.

 Ahmed Daraghmeh a 23-year-old footballer in the West Bank Premier League Club of Thaqufi Tulkarem was shot and killed by Israeli soldiers on Thursday, the 22nd of December in Nablus. It is not yet clear whether he was involved in clashes between Palestinians and Israeli soldiers who were escorting a group of settlers visiting Joseph’s Tomb. 

Nasser Abu Hmeid, a 50-year-old Palestinian political prisoner died of lung cancer in Israeli custody on Tuesday, the 20th of December. Abu Hmeid was a leader in the Fatah movement and had been imprisoned for his part in armed resistance in the First and Second Intifadas. A Palestinian prisoner rights’ group maintain that his death occurred after months of medical negligence following his diagnosis in August 2021.

 Palestinian schoolchildren from the village of Tuqu’, southeast of Bethlehem, were prevented from travelling along the main road to their school by Israeli soldiers on Wednesday, the 21st of December. Armed soldiers blocked the road so that the children were forced to take a much longer circuitous route to school.

 The Greek Orthodox Patriarch of Jerusalem, Theophilos III spoke out at the Christmas tree lighting at Jerusalem’s Jaffa Gate on Saturday, the 17th of December. Addressing a crowd from the balcony of the Imperial Hotel in the Old City, he warned that Christians in the Holy Land have become the target of repeated attacks by radical Israeli groups in a deliberate attempt to expel them.

 This week’s Kumi Now focuses on the launch of Xavier Abu Eid’s book entitled, ‘Rooted in Palestine: Palestinian Christians and the Struggle for National Liberation 1917-2004’. The book charts the crucial role Palestinian Christians have played through the years of the British Mandate, the Nakba and the Israeli occupation and marks the dwindling numbers of Christians now living in Palestine.

Week of December 19, 2022

Haaretz, December 12, 2022,  Two Twitter accounts that are registered under fake names and were used to harass left-wing activists and Israeli journalists since November appear to be run by Israeli soldiers deployed in the West Bank.

Reported by Defense of Children International Palestine, December 13, 2022, Late Sunday night, Israeli forces shot and killed 15-year-old Jana Majdi Issam Assaf in Jenin. Jana was on her family home’s rooftop as Israeli forces conducted arrest operations in her neighborhood, and she sustained three gunshot wounds: two to her chest and one to her head.  Israeli forces have killed 14 Palestinian children in the occupied West Bank since the beginning of October and are raiding Palestinian cities and neighborhoods nearly every day. Not a single Israeli soldier has been held accountable for killing these Palestinian children.

Haaretz, Dec 15, 2022  Israel began on Wednesday to dismantle an illegal encampment in the Galilee established by Jews claiming to stand for “Jewish sovereignty” and against Bedouin presence in the area.  State removes two of four caravans from the site once slated for the settlement of Mount Arbel, on land claimed by both local Bedouin and the Jewish National Fund.

Reported by Combatants for Peace, December 15, 2022, The first Palestinian Freedom School classwill graduate tomorrow, December 16, 2022! As a counterpart to the Israeli Freedom School, the Palestinian Freedom School (Madraset al-Huriyya) launched this year as a new Combatants for Peace program.   Our first graduating class is composed of 24 emerging young activists (ages 17 to 28) from across the West Bank. For the past six months, these incredible participants received intensive training to grow support for non-violent resistance in their communities, organize mass actionsof Nablus, and advocate for human rights.

Haaretz, December 16, 2022, , One October night, Border Police killed five people and wounded a number of others in the West Bank city of Nablus.  Two of those killed were barbers, shot at the same time in different places. One now-paralyzed man had worked for 13 years in Israeli restaurants without a permit and was making a quick trip home to see his family. A local businessman was blinded in one eye. (by Gideon Levy)

In the story of the Judgment of Solomon, the Israelite king is asked to rule between two women both claiming to be the mother of the same child. The wise king suggests cutting the baby in two, handing half to each woman. To many Palestinians today, it is an ironic parody of a famous Biblical story, played out over the last 75 years, that best describes their tragedy – and their undiminished quest for statehood and justice.  (by Seraj Assi)

Reported by B’Tselem December 16, 2022,  In mid-June, I went to visit Hajar Ka’abneh in hospital. The 48-year-old mother of nine was lying in the ICU with a fractured skull, a brain hemorrhage and a broken arm. Her face was pale and swollen. Her head was bandaged, her left arm was in a cast and she was hooked up to medical devices. Why? All because of a brutal assault by a group of settlers, who showed up one evening at her home in one of the Bedouin communities in Ras a-Tin. They burst into the family’s tent, holding clubs and pepper spray and with their faces covered, they beat Hajar, her husband Mustafa and their sons. Soldiers who then arrived fired shots in the air and chased two of the couple’s sons, eventually arresting them. A few hours later, they came back and arrested Mustafa, after he was discharged from hospital.  Settler violence has never been a private initiative; it is situated within the broader context of Israel’s apartheid regime. While the actions are carried out by individuals, they are deeply rooted in the nature of the regime and in its strategic goal: to drive Palestinians out of their land, so Israel can take over and use it for its needs. (Iyad Hadad, B’Tselem field researcher)

Haaretz, December 17, 2022, Israeli police detained three protesters who were waving Palestinian flags in the northern city of Haifa on Saturday, while protesting the disproportionate punishments handed down to Arabs over Jewish-Arab riots that rocked the country last May.   According to police, the protesters were detained for failing to follow police orders and “violating public order” after refusing to put the flags away, even though the waving of Palestinian flags has been ruled as a protected form of free speech by Israel’s Supreme Court in the past.

Dec. 18, Two Palestinians brothers in their thirties died late Saturday in a traffic accident in the West Bank, just south of Nablus. Numerous Palestinian organizations claim that the incident was an intentional ramming by a Jewish Israeli driver.

Reported by Sabeel, Jerusalem, December 19, 2022, On Thursday, the 15th of December, the United Nations passed a resolution in favour of the Palestinian people’s sovereignty over their natural resources. The UN stated,’ the Assembly demanded that Israel, the occupying power, cease the exploitation, damage, cause of loss or depletion and endangerment of the natural resources in the occupied Palestinian territory, including East Jerusalem and the occupied Syrian Golan’.

Israeli settlers attacked a school in Urif, a Palestinian village south of Nablus in the early hours of Thursday morning, the 15th of December. Surveillance cameras showed that about forty settlers stole into the village under cover of darkness and hurled stones at the local secondary boys’ school, smashing the solar panels used to supply the school with electricity.…

 Sama Aweideh received the Franco-German Prize for Human Rights and the Rule of Law in Jerusalem on Wednesday, the 14th of December. For decades Sama has campaigned to ensure respect for women’s rights in Palestinian society. She was one of the founders of the Palestinian Federation of Women’s Action Committees in1978. She also set up the Women’s Studies Center in East Jerusalem in 1992.

 The US has called for accountability from Israel after the recent killing of 16-year-old Jana Zakarna during an Israeli military raid in Jenin. An initial probe into the incident has shown that Jana was most likely killed  by an Israeli Border Police sniper as soldiers  were attempting to arrest three Palestinians. Her family stated that Jana had gone up onto the roof to retrieve her cat when the shooting suddenly started. She was shot in the head and chest and died on the rooftop.

 The focus of this week’s Kumi Now session will be the launch of Rev. Naim Ateek’s booklet on Religious Extremism.  The booklet is a helpful and pertinent resource at a time when politicians with extremist religious views are about to take office under the newly formed Israeli government.

Week of December 11, 2022

Haaretz, December 6, 2022, Bethlehem is brimming with optimism this Christmas season.  The hotels are inexpensive, the food is excellent and the Church of the Nativity has recently been renovated. Despite forecasts of an upsurge of violence in the occupied West Bank, the atmosphere in Jesus’ birthplace is forward-looking.

Analysis: Smotrich can’t annex the West Bank, so he annexed the defense establishment. Internally, Israel has sold off the army and judicial system to the settlers. Externally, it still maintains the perception that the territories are a deposit it received for a limited time, until an agreement is reached with the Palestinians.

Israeli police and Border Police arrested three people Monday evening at a restaurant in the predominantly Arab city of Baka al-Garbiyeh, including the restaurant’s owner, using drawn guns and pepper spray. In search of permitless Palestinians, Police forces raided a restaurant and arrested the owner, who they say attacked them, alongside two others. ‘The manner in which they entered was threatening, for a moment I thought they were going to shoot him,’ his brother tells Haaretz.

Al Jazeera on Tuesday said it filed a lawsuit at the International Criminal Court against Israel over the killing of Palestinian journalist Shireen Abu Akleh, who was shot during an Israeli raid in the West Bank in May. The Qatari news agency says it has unearthed ‘new evidence’ disputing the claim that Israel killed veteran journalist Shireen Abu Akleh ‘by mistake’

The European Union informed the Israeli ambassador to the organization that it will not continue to advance the draft agreement for intelligence cooperation between the Israel Police and the Europol Agency. ‘There’s pressure to be less forgiving with Israel, now that the government is changing,’ one source told Haaretz

The coalition agreement between the Likud and Religious Zionism parties may have some ramifications in addition to awarding nearly unlimited powers in the territories to an extremist coalition partner with a distinct ideological agenda.  Over the past 55 years, Israel succeeded in avoiding international sanctions despite its control of the West bank ■ With the incoming far-right government’s steady hold on the levers of the settlement enterprise, Netanyahu is openly playing with fire.

Haaretz, Dec. 8, 2022, A presenter of a children’s television show in Germany was dismissed this week over his attendance of a demonstration in the West Bank village of Beit Dajan, against land confiscations, in the latest of a spate of sackings in the German media over alleged Israel-related antisemitism.

Haaretz Editorial, The Netanyahu and Ben-Gvir government isn’t yet formed, but the public mood is already fully dictated by the far right and its culture of political persecution and silencing. The student union at Be’er Sheva’s Ben-Gurion University was scheduled on Tuesday to hold an event for Arab students marking the new academic year. It was canceled, however, after the school banned key elements of the celebration, citing concerns about incitement, risk to public safety and bureaucratic difficulties. When the student union realized that many students would refuse to attend as a result, it scrapped the entire event.

Three Palestinians were killed early Thursday morning by Israeli military gunfire fire in Jenin, according to the Health Ministry in Ramallah. According to Palestinian reports, a gunfire exchange ensued after the Israeli forces entered the northern West Bank city to arrest wanted men.

Hundreds participated on Thursday in an inauguration ceremony for a Torah scroll at the yeshiva of the illegal Israeli settlement of Homesh in the northern Samarian hills of the West Bank. which was evacuated by Israel in 2005, was not approved by the army.

Haaretz, December 9, 2022, Gidoen Levy, Three young Palestinians return from working a night shift and Israeli soldiers rain fire on their car, killing two and wounding the third, who’s hospitalized and detained. His parents think he’s dead, however, and the authorities see no reason to tell them otherwise.

Haaretz, December 11, 2022, Opinion, The three key figures of the far-right Religious Zionist party, soon to sit in Netanyahu’s government, are not only a noxious mixture of fundamentalism, mob rule and messianic machismo. They, and the community that propelled them to power, are a stain on our Jewish faith.

The United Nations representative for dealing with children in conflict zones is slated to arrive on Sunday for her first visit to Israel and the West Bank to examine evidence of harm against children in clashes between the Israeli army and Palestinians during the past year.

Two images that made headlines recently tell an interesting story about Israel’s place in the Middle East. The first shows the ambassador of the United Arab Emirates to Israel welcoming Itamar Ben-Gvir, the far-right leader set to become Israel’s national security minister. The second shows the players of Morocco’s national team celebrating their incredible World Cup achievement by waving a Palestinian flag to the cameras.  Israel’s problem is not the rich Gulf monarchs, but the hundreds of millions of Arabic-speakers across the Mideast.

In Tel Aviv, a man in a black kippah and a woman in a hijab celebrate the victory of the Moroccan team at the World Cup in Qatar. This is the new Middle East

Haaretz, Dec. 12, 2022, An internal spreadsheet shows how the settlers harness the state to dispossess Palestinians. (reported by Amira Hass)

A Palestinian girl was killed Sunday night by Israeli army gunfire in the West Bank city of Jenin, according to the Palestinian Health Ministry.  Clashes between Israeli forces and Palestinians reportedly broke out in the West Bank city of Jenin, where the IDF arrested three Palestinians. The IDF says it was aware of the teenager’s death and that an investigation was underway.

Reported by Sabeel, Jerusalem, December 12, 2022, Last week Israeli soldiers broke into the Al Lubban Secondary Girls’ School in the early hours of the morning. They tore down the Palestinian flag and replaced it with an Israeli flag. Apparently this was not the first time they had torn down the Palestinian flag, however it was the first time they had hoisted an Israeli flag.  

The third Annual Conference on Gender Justice took place in Ramallah on Wednesday, the 7th of December. The conference is one of the many events over a period of sixteen days sponsored by the Evangelical Lutheran Church in Jordan and the Holy Land.The various events seek to promote gender justice and equality by developing strategies for ways to promote women’s rights. It also aims to encourage women to lead and participate in decision-making processes.

The Israeli authorities have withheld entry visas for United Nations staff. There are twenty international employees in the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs,(OCHA), who monitor Israeli human rights violations in the occupied Palestinian territories. Fifteen staff had to leave in 2020 and since then requests for visas or visa renewals have gone unanswered. A UN spokesman has warned that the blocking of visas is already impacting OCHA’s work in planning the humanitarian response for 2023.

 About two hundred Palestinian Christians living in Gaza have been denied permits to worship at the Church of the Nativity in Bethlehem this Christmas. There are more than a thousand Christians in Gaza, most of whom are Greek Orthodox and some are Roman Catholic. When Christian families apply for travel permits the Israeli authorities do not always grant them to all family members, so they cannot worship and celebrate together.

Sabeel will be hosting the launch of Don Wagner’s new book during next week’s Kumi Now session on Tuesday, the 13th of December. His book is entitled, ‘Glory to God in the Lowest. Journey to an Unholy Land’.

Week ending December 5, 2022

Haaretz, November 28, 2022,  Three Israeli-Druze soldiers were arrested on Monday for allegedly throwing an explosive makeshift device on a Palestinian house in Bethlehem in retaliation for the abduction of the body of Tiran Ferro, an 18-year-old high-school student who was injured in a car crash in the West Bank.

The Jerusalem Magistrate’s Court this month approved the police gathering information from the cellphones of three left-wing activists, after they were detained and questioned on suspicion of entering a closed military zone declared by the army. Shortly after that, a Palestinian from the South Hebron Hills was detained for three days because the army had issued a similar order for land he owns.

After successfully securing promises to make the Public Security Ministry responsible for “national security,” subordinate the Border Police in the West Bank and other enforcement agencies to the newly-expanded ministry, and amend the law to make the police commissioner subject to the minister’s policy, Itamar Ben-Gvir has his sights on his next target – changing the status quo on the Temple Mount.  As national security minister, the far-right leader is set to make good on his promise to permit Jewish visitors to pray on the Mount.

In the shadow of the political tumult surrounding the formation of the next government, the IDF decided on Monday to send a message to Netanyahu and his partners. The official statement of opinion that is now being quoted at length in the media contends that the situation in the West Bank is growing worse. Out in the field, the Palestinian Authority’s control is growing weaker, and there has been a steady rise in the number of terror attacks ever since the current wave began this past March.

About a third of women soldiers doing their mandatory service in the Israel Defense Forces have experienced sexual harassment at least once in the past year, according to a State Comptroller report released on Monday.  A report by the State Comptroller found that less than half of the Israeli female soldiers who experienced sexual harassment filed a complaint, and out of those who did report, 44% said it was not handled properly and 26% reported that their complaint was not handled at all.

Haaretz, November 29, 2022,  Four Palestinians were killed by the IDF on Tuesday in separate incidents across the West Bank, according to the Palestinian Health Ministry.  One Palestinian killed and eight wounded by Israeli military forces in clashes near Hebron ■ Additional three Palestinians reportedly killed by IDF in separate incidents near Ramallah.

A 20-year-old soldier was moderately injured in a ramming attack near the settlement of Kochav Ya’akov just north of Jerusalem on Tuesday, and was evacuated to a nearby hospital in Jerusalem.  The Palestinian driver, who has been identified as 45-year-old Ghani Maamoun Faiz Abu Ali, from the West Bank city of Beitunia, saw the soldier at a gas station, turned around and ran her over. He was shot by Israeli police after a chase, and was later declared dead at the hospital.  Abu Ali is married with five children and has a permit to work in the West Bank settlement of Ariel, where he was employed at the supermarket Rami Levi.

Prime Minister Yair Lapid addressed a letter on Monday to more than 50 heads of state, in which he calls on them to exert their influence over the Palestinian Authority in order to prevent the vote in the UN Assembly to request an advisory opinion from the International Court of Justice (ICJ) on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.  Despite Lapid’s efforts, Israeli sources are saying that the Palestinian Authority’s proposal will certainly pass at the UN assembly.

Haaretz, November 30, 2022,  Jewish organizations that have supported and fundraised on behalf of Israel for generations are deliberating how to handle an extremist government that rejects their liberal values.

Scores of settlers entered al-Mufaqarah a year ago, threw stones, injured a toddler and killed farm animals ■ Despite eyewitnesses and videos, only two of the attackers were indicted.  Witnesses weren’t questioned, cases were closed A year after the attack, Palestinian villagers still seek justice.

Times of Gaza,   Two Palestinian brothers, Jawad and Thefer Rimawi, were killed by the Israeli occupation forces this morning near Ramallah.

Haaretz, December 1, 2022, Two Palestinian militants were killed overnight Thursday in an exchange of fire with Israeli forces near Jenin’s refugee camp during an operation that led to the arrest of three terror suspects, the IDF Spokesperson reported.  Medical officials in Jenin say that the fatalities are 26-year-old Mohammed Asaadi, one of the commanders of the Jenin Brigade which is associated with Islamic Jihad, and 27-year-old Nayyim Zubeidi, the cousin of long-term Palestinian detainee Zakaria Zubeidi. The two men have previously served time in Israeli prisons and were viewed by the Israeli security forces as wanted terror suspects.

The General Assembly of the United Nations has approved a resolution calling for the establishment of an official commemorative event to mark the 75th anniversary of the Nakba, the Palestinian name for the establishment of the State of Israel in 1948.   Israel’s ambassador to the UN, Gilad Erdan, slammed the vote, asking delegates at the General Assembly. “What would you say if the international community celebrated the establishment of your country as a disaster [the meaning of Nakba in Arabic]? What a disgrace,” he added.

Israel’s Prison Service is preparing for a general hunger strike by Palestinian prisoners, as well as for a rise in the number of disturbances and strikes within prisons, following the expected appointment of far-right lawmaker Itamar Ben-Gvir as National Security Minister.  As National Security Minister, Ben-Gvir will have control over the prison service, and has voiced his desire to worsen the living conditions of Palestinian security prisoners.

Haaretz, December 2, 2022, Senior White House officials recently warned Israel that transferring responsibility for the Civil Administration, the governing body in over 60 percent of the West Bank, from the defense minister could hurt bilateral relations.  The officials said the move could also endanger cooperation between Israel and the United States on dealing with regional challenges, including the threat posed by Iran.

Interior Minister Ayelet Shaked ordered on Thursday the deportation of Salah Hammouri, a Palestinian lawyer from Kafr Aqab in East Jerusalem, arguing that he worked “tirelessly to promote terror against Israel.”  Interior minister says Salah Hammouri – a Jerusalem native who defended a number of prisoners and was active in a Palestinian human rights NGO – held a senior position in a terror organization.

A 22-year-old Palestinian militant with ties to the Lion’s Den organization was arrested overnight by the Israeli army.  According to the army, the suspect arrested in Nablus was involved in multiple shooting incidents aimed at IDF troops in the region.

Born in Gaza, he has spent most of his life in Israel.  Mohammed Abu Sharb studied film, and now works as a sous-chef in a popular restaurant in Tel Aviv, where he lives. But his mother is in Gaza, and despite the proximity, for the past 20 years Israel has prevented the two from meeting.Haaretz Editorial

Dec 4, 2022, Around 300 people went to Hebron Friday for a tour organized by 30 human rights organizations, including Breaking the Silence, the Association for Civil Rights in Israel, Peace Now and B’Tselem, in the wake of several recent incidents of violence against Palestinians and left-wing activists in the city. But the people who sought to protest the violence against themselves and Palestinians found that the army had declared Hebron a closed military zone.

Reported by Sabeel, Jerusalem, December 5, 2022,  Issa Amro, a human rights’ activist from Hebron, organized a solidarity visit for Israeli activists to come and visit Palestinian families who have suffered attacks from Israeli settlers. During the visit one of the Israeli activists was attacked by an Israeli soldier. Issa was arrested for filming this attack, charged with obstructing the soldiers and sent away from his home in Hebron for a week of house arrest.  

Last week the UN General Assembly approved a resolution to commemorate the 75th anniversary of the Nakba, with a special event to be held on the 15th of May 2023.

The UN Envoy to the Middle East, Tor Wennesland, warned that tensions in both Israel and Palestine were, ‘reaching a boiling point’. This year is set to be the deadliest for Palestine in the West Bank since the UN first started recording deaths 2005. 

As temperatures rise due to climate change Palestinians are experiencing more acute water shortages. The Israeli authorities now control more than 85% of water resources in the occupied West Bank. Palestinians are forced to buy water from Israel at high prices.  According to Amnesty International Palestinians living in the West Bank can only access 73 litres of water daily, which is less than the internationally recommended rate of 100 litres. This compares to 240 litres of water for the average Israeli citizen. While in Gaza residents have to draw from an over-exploited coastal aquifer which is now polluted.  

Friends of Sabeel North America are calling on Christian leaders across the United Staes to commit their congregation to Preach Palestine during Advent. 

The third Annual Conference on Gender Justice took place in Ramallah on Wednesday, the 7th of December. The conference is one of the many events over a period of sixteen days sponsored by the Evangelical Lutheran Church in Jordan and the Holy Land.  The various events seek to promote gender equality and to encourage women to lead and participate in decision-making processes.

Next week Kumi Now will consider the right of return for Palestinians.  The UN Resolution 194 was passed on the 11th of December, 1948. It stated, ‘refugees wishing to return to their homes and live at peace with their neighbours should be permitted to do so at the earliest practicable date.’ After seventy years Palestinians are still waiting on that earliest practicable date.

Week ending November 28, 2022

Haaretz, Nov 19, 2022,  Israelis threw rocks and vandalized Palestinian property in Hebron on Saturday while more than 30,000 Jews marched in the city during an annual pilgrimage. Several Palestinians have been wounded, including a 17-year-old girl.  The Israeli army closed off a significantly larger area this year than in previous years to allow settlers to march in Hebron during an annual Jewish pilgrimage, a Palestinian activist said.

Reported by Combatants for Peace, on November 22, 2022,  Less than four weeks ago, a Jewish Israeli woman named Hagar Geffen was accompanying a Palestinian farmer in his olive harvest just south of Bethlehem. A group of masked settlers approached and sprayed toxic chemicals on the elderly farmer’s 180 olive trees.

 Hagar was documenting the incident on camera, when she was attacked by the settlers. They carried machetes, knives, and axes. They held her down, brutally beat her head with clubs and dropped large rocks on her until she bled. Hagar is 70 years old. 

Today, (Non. 22, 2022) CJPME is publishing a 20-page report with stark observations on the grave situation in Israel and the occupied Palestinian territories (OPT). The report is authored by CJPME’s VP, Michael Bueckert, who returned on Nov. 11 from a two-week trip to the OPT and Palestinian communities within Israel. Bottom line: the brutal status quo in Palestine-Israel is untenable; Canada’s position is totally out of touch with reality; and Palestinians on both sides of the Green Line desire equality and an end to Israeli apartheid

Haaretz, Nov. 21, Several dozen right-wing activists attended a demonstration on Sunday in Haifa to protest a Palestinian culture event sponsored by the city’s Beit Hagefen Jewish-Arab culture center.   After trying to disrupt the event by purchasing hundreds of tickets in advance, right-wing activists arrived at the venue, saying ‘there is no Palestinian culture’, and called the participants ‘terrorists.’

Reported by the Adalah Justice Project, November 23, 2022, Izzy Mustafa, “There seems to be no limit to the violence Israel wages on the Palestinian people.  I live near the place where 10 days ago, Israeli soldiers shot and killed Fulla Malsameh, a Palestinian girl about to celebrate her 16th birthday. Whenever I drive past this spot, I am reminded of the countless lives the occupiers have taken this year. Last night in Nablus, 16-year-old Ahmed Shehadeh was shot with a bullet to the heart and died instantly. He is the 200th Palestinian and 55th child murdered by Israeli occupying forces in 2022.  Driving across the West Bank, I see the intensification of settler colonialism and occupation. More soldiers, more flying checkpoints, more harassment, and more settler attacks.  No Palestinian is untouched. We are losing our land, our homes, our children, our brothers and fathers, and quite frankly, our minds.

Haaretz, November 23, 2022,  A 16-year-old boy was killed and 22 people were wounded in two separate explosions that occurred near bus stops at the entrance to Jerusalem, in the Gival Shaul neighborhood and at the Ramot Junction, on Wednesday morning.  Of those wounded, one is in critical condition and two others are seriously wounded.   Sigal Bar Zvi, the head of the police’s operations division, said that the explosive charges were very powerful and of “high quality,” and indicate that the attacks were masterminded by an organized cell. The devices, she added, were placed in a bush and behind a wall near the bus stop.

The head of the yeshiva attended by 16-year-old Aryeh Shechopek, who was killed in Wednesday morning’s double bombing in Jerusalem, described his former student as a “charming boy” who was “gentle and tender” and beloved by all.   Shechopek was a Canadian, and Trudeau sent his condolences to the family and condemned the attack.

Haaretz, Nov 24, 2022. Israel’s Arab community is bracing for the appointment of Itamar Ben-Gvir as public security minister, fearing what might happen when the Otzma Yehudit leader – whose racist election campaign was directed against Arabs – assumes the post.  An Arab mayor of a northern Israel town vows to ‘fight against racist policies’ as Benjamin Netanyahu prepares to assemble a government with his far-right allies in key security positions.

Israelis have given up on a two-state solution for the long-running conflict with the Palestinians and instead have largely embraced the establishment of a multi-tiered class system with Jews on top, Yuval Noah Harari, one of Israel’s most prominent public intellectuals claimed on Wednesday.

Haaretz, Nov 25, 2022,  An IDF solider was filmed attacking a left-wing activist in the West Bank city of Hebron on Friday, as another soldier was shown telling one of the activists that “Ben-Gvir is going to bring order, you’ve had it,” in reference to the Kahanist lawmaker who today was named as National Security Minister in the upcoming government.

One of Bezalel Smotrich’s demands in the ongoing talks to form a government is to be put in charge of the Civil Administration, the military agency responsible for approving construction in settlements and demolishing buildings that were built illegally. If this demand is met, it could have a dramatic impact on life in the West Bank.

Haaretz, November 26, 2022, Gideon Levy,  After working briefly at a Jaffa restaurant, Rifat Eissi returned to his West Bank hometown to renew his entry permit. As he climbed through a breach in the separation barrier on the way back to Israel, a soldier shot him to death – even though he was standing still.

Haaretz, Nov. 27, 15-year-old Fulla al-Masalmeh was riding in a car driven by 26-year-old Anas Hassouna, who, according to the army, sped up toward soldiers who then opened fire killing Masalmeh and wounding Hassouna. Al-Masalmeh’s family only found out about her death the next day, while Hassouna was released from custody a few days later.

The Environmental Protection Ministry’s enforcement agency, the Green Police, will be reassigned to the far-right leader’s newly renamed ‘National Security Ministry,’ which raises fear that it will be used to employ police forces against the Bedouin population in Israel’s south.

Haaretz, Analysis: The police won’t become a more efficient or disciplined law enforcement agency under new boss Itamar Ben-Gvir. But it will become more aggressive, violent and lawless.

Reported by Sabeel, Jerusalem, November 28, 2022,  Shadi Khoury attended a court hearing on Wednesday, the 23rd of November. His family were hoping for his release to return home and celebrate his grandmother’s 89th birthday on the following day. Sadly, this was not to be. His grandmother, Samia writes, ‘Despite the judge’s ruling later on in the day to release Shadi and the other children for ‘house arrest’ the Attorney General appealed against the judge’s decision. Shadi’s lawyer succeeded in his appeal against the ruling of the Prosecutor and Shadi is now under house arrest till the end of his trial.

Friends of Sabeel North America is holding a ten day witness visit to Israel in support of the Palestinian civil society organisations which have recently been raided and closed down by the Israeli authorities. The group will remain in the country from the 26th of November until the 6th of December.

Violent incidents in Israel this week have brought suffering on the same day to the families of two teenagers, one Israeli and the other Palestinian. Aryah Shechopek, a 15-year-old yeshiva student was killed by one of the bomb explosions carried out in Jerusalem early on Wednesday, the 23rd of November. While Ahmed Shehadeh was a sixteen-year-old Palestinian caught up in the clashes at Joseph’s tomb in Nablus. He was one of two Palestinians shot dead by Israeli soldiers while they were protecting a monthly pilgrimage of Orthodox Jewish worshippers to the shrine.

On Wednesday, the 23rd of November Israeli forces demolished a recently built Palestinian primary school in the Masafer Yatta region of the South Hebron Hills. Residents in the area continue to face the threat of forced displacement as the Israeli army have designated their land as a military firing zone. Witnesses report that the Israeli army used sound bombs to scare the pupils and staff and to make them leave the building before demolishing it. It had only just been built with the help of European funding to enable twenty two children from four villages to attend without having to walk long distances to reach other schools.

Next week Kumi Now will be marking Human Rights Day which is celebrated annually around the world on the 10th of December. On this day in 1948 the UN adopted the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. For decades human rights abuses have been documented in Israel/Palestine by the UN, Human Rights Watch and Amnesty International, but the violations are intensifying.

Week ending November 21, 2022

Haaretz, Nov 15, 2022,  Three Israelis were killed and three others were wounded in a stabbing attack in two separate sites in the West Bank on Tuesday, before the Israeli army shot dead the Palestinian assailant.  The assailant was identified as 18-year-old Muhammad Murad Sami Souf from the village of Hares in the northern West Bank.  Two Israelis are also in serious condition and one is moderately wounded in a combined stabbing and ramming attack near the West Bank settlement of Ariel.

The United States has informed Israel that it has decided to investigate the killing of Shireen Abu Akleh, the Palestinian-American Al Jazeera reporter who was shot to death during an IDF raid in the Jenin refugee camp in May this year.  Israeli rights group welcomes news of U.S. investigation into the death of veteran Al Jazeera journalist Abu Akleh, who was killed during an Israeli military raid in the West Bank last May. Defense Minister Gantz said Israel will not cooperate with the investigation, calling it ‘a grave mistake’

Ahmad Zahi Bani-Shamsa was the first fatality in the West Bank village of Beita, in its confrontation with the settlement of Evyatar under the watch of the outgoing government. He was killed before he got to celebrate his 16th birthday, after being shot in the head from behind.

In Deheisheh, a refugee camp southwest of Bethlehem, a dream was born nine years ago: 13 Palestinian girls striving to make their voices heard through hip-hop. It began at a cultural center in the crowded camp, where the girls took lessons and honed their craft and songwriting skills.  The three-woman hip-hop group Ettijah faces pushback in the conservative Deheisheh refugee camp. A new documentary on the band shows how rap can help you fight the occupation – and your own society’s social constructs.

WASHINGTON – Ben & Jerry’s disavowed products sold under its brand in Israel after parent company Unilever formally moved to allow sales in West Bank settlements via a third party.

Last week’s vote at the United Nations marked a watershed. For the first time, the UN’s principal judicial organ was asked to give an opinion on the legality of Israel’s 55-year occupation of Palestinian territory – namely East Jerusalem, the West Bank, and the Gaza Strip.  The world has finally recognized the need to interrogate Israel’s 55 year-old occupation of Palestinian territory. And the advice given by the ICJ to the UN General Assembly will have repercussions not only for the Israel-Palestine conflict, but for Russia’s war on Ukraine.

WASHINGTON – Leading Israeli human rights organizations and activists are urging the United States to add far-right lawmakers Itamar Ben-Gvir and Bezalel Smotrich, as well as activist Ben-Zion Gopstein, to its U.S. sanctions list for encouraging human rights violations and inciting terror.  The letter, signed by more than 200 Israeli activists and human-rights organizations, accused incoming coalition lawmakers and their far-right allies as, among other things, inciting genocide against the Palestinian people and advocating for racial segregation.

Haaretz, Nov 16, 2022. Israel will revoke work and entry permits for 500 Palestinians related to the Palestinian assailant who carried out an attack near the settlement of Ariel on Tuesday. The move follows Tuesday’s rampage near the West Bank settlement of Ariel, that left 3 Israelis dead and 3 others wounded ■ Israel can now deny work permits from friends and neighbors of suspected terrorists, after the security cabinet decided to widen the ‘circle of deterrence’ earlier this year.

Prime Minister-elect Benjamin Netanyahu and Otzma Yehudit chairman Itamar Ben-Gvir agreed on Wednesday to amend the Disengagement Law in order to enable Jews to settle in the evacuated settlement of Homesh in the northern West Bank.  The agreement would mark a dramatic reversal of the 2005 disengagement law which forbids Israelis from staying in the area and comes after US concern over the appointment of a far-right leader as defense minister.

Some 20 incidents of violence against Palestinians and Israeli soldiers in the West Bank have been reported since the deadly terror attack on Tuesday morning which saw three Israelis murdered over a span of 25 minutes.

Opinion: Gideon Levy, Here’s another national record for chutzpah: One of the main banners that the right, especially the settlers, are now waving on every hill is “governance.” The right wants governance. That’s so nice. An outstanding keeper of law and order, the right is appalled by the lawlessness prevailing in the north and south of the country. Yet the ‘pro-governance’ Israeli right is blind to West Bank Settlers’ organized crime

DCIP (Defense of Children International Palestine), November 17, 2022, Early Monday morning, Israeli forces shot and killed a 14-year-old Palestinian girl. Fulla Rasmi Abdulaziz Mallouh is the first Palestinian girl shot and killed by Israeli forces in the occupied West Bank since January 2019.  Fulla was in the passenger seat of a car driving through Beitunia, a town west of Ramallah, when Israeli forces opened fired on the car. She sustained gunshot wounds to her chest and head, and was pronounced deadly shortly after.  A staggering 49 Palestinian children have been killed in 2022, including 32 Palestinian children shot and killed by Israeli forces in the occupied West Bank. Israeli forces have sent a clear message: No Palestinian child is safe.Haaretz Editorial  Nov 17, 2022, Last Friday, a UN committee approved a Palestinian Authority resolution that asks the United Nations to seek a legal opinion from the International Court of Justice in The Hague on two issues. One is Israel’s ongoing violation of the Palestinian people’s right to self-determination. The other is how the ongoing occupation of the West Bank should affect its legal status as occupied territory and the international community’s treatment of Israel.

Haaretz, Amira Hass, Nov 18, 2022, Ali Antar, a 26-year-old single man, liked to ride motorcycles and was a barber by profession. Hamdi Sharaf, a 36-year-old father of two, was also a barber. Neither of them were armed nor connected to the Lion’s Den, but were killed nonetheless by Israeli forces in two different locations in the West Bank city of Nablus. Their sin was being on the street during the night of 24-25 October where a combined force of the army, the police, and the Shin Bet invaded Nablus and encircled it’s Old City.
The IDF’s spokesperson later released a statement naming their primary target, 31-year-old Wadi al-Hawwah, who was killed in the operation.  Four weeks have passed since the IDF and police’s incursion into Nablus’ Old City that left 5 Palestinians dead. Evidence collected by Haaretz shows a grave breach of protocol by Israeli forces that left two civilians killed, PA forces attacked, and a reported ‘safe house’ that was in fact well known.

Gideon Levy, A Palestinian family was harvesting olives when a group of settlers swooped down and attacked them with clubs, pipes and stones. Five members of the family were hospitalized, including the 65-year-old father of the household and one of his sons, whose shattered leg will need costly, ongoing rehab. The 8-year-old grandson hid under the family’s pickup.

Haaretz, Nov 20, 2022, Commanders and soldiers within an elite unit stationed in the Jenin area of the West Bank have independently distributed leaflets over the last several days threatening to shoot Palestinians who cross the separation barrier.  Palestinian residents were warned that if they made ‘any mistake,’ the soldiers would harm them. The IDF renounced the act, calling it an ‘error’.

Some 30 Palestinian families are facing expulsion from their East Jerusalem homes even though an Israel Lands Administration document from the 1980s showed that the land is owned by Palestinians.

The hundreds of Israelis who rioted in Hebron on Saturday did so in the clear knowledge that they are the landlords and that now is “Itamar Ben-Gvir’s moment.” Some 32,000 Jews came to the city to mark the Torah portion Chayei Sarah in prayer.

Nov 21, 2022,  Two suspects, including an off-duty Israeli soldier, were arrested on Sunday over attacks on a Border Police officer and MK Itamar Ben-Gvir’s bodyguard during violent riots across the West Bank city of Hebron Saturday.  Riots erupted across the West Bank city as tens of thousands of Jews visited Hebron over the weekend to mark the Torah portion Chayei Sarah.

Two residents of the Bedouin village Bir Hadaj in the northern Negev desert filed a complaint on Friday with the Police Investigation Unit, stating that eight men in security services uniforms brutalized them and vandalized their property after stopping their vehicle as they were driving near the village. Some 500 village residents protested the incident.  Police claims that the men  are soldiers, but the IDF denies.

A 17-year-old Palestinian was killed and four others wounded during an exchange of fire with Israeli forces in Jenin’s refugee camp on Monday, the Palestinian Health Ministry reported.  According to reports from the camp, IDF soldiers raided the house of Adham Jabrin, a member of the Jenin Battalion militant group, and left the city without having managed to arrest him.

Religious Zionism head Bezalel Smotrich said on Monday that human rights organizations are an existential threat to Israel and the incoming government must deal with them by “seizing their funds” and acting against them with legal and security measures.

Reported by Sabeel, Jerusalem, November 21, 2022,  Shadi Khoury’s court hearing has been postponed yet again until Thursday, the 24th of November. Churches and individuals around the world have been writing to their representatives urging the immediate release of Shadi. They are also calling into question Israel’s annual prosecution of 500-700 Palestinian children in military courts which lack fair trial rights and protection. 

The Nassar family have suffered  another postponement of the re-registration of their Tent of Nations farm. Their hearing is now set for Monday, the 21st of November. They have been trying to complete the re-registration since 2007. In the meantime the Nassar family are continuing to host international volunteers who are helping with the olive harvest and repairing the extensive damage caused to their crops  and property by vandals. 

This week Israeli soldiers shot dead a 15-year-old Palestinian girl when they were carrying out a raid in the town of Beitunia, near Ramallah. Fulla Masalmeh was travelling in a car driven by 26-year-old Anas Hassouneh, who was injured and arrested in the shooting. A local witness reported that the driver had tried to turn his car around when he spotted the soldiers along the street, but the soldiers opened fire without warning. 

 B’tselem has carried out a full investigation into an attack by Israeli soldiers and Border Police on the Hajeriyah Boys’ School in the centre of Hebron, which took place on Thursday, the 29th of September. Soldiers had been chasing some Palestinian youths who had thrown stones at the nearby Abu a-Rish checkpoint when one of the youths ran through the school grounds and out of the back gate. Fifteen soldiers then broke into the school , still in pursuit of the youth. They searched classrooms, attacked staff and dragged two 14-year-old pupils out of their lessons, beat them and detained them. They released them after questioning. 

On Wednesday, the 16th of November, the Israeli authorities issued a military order declaring its intention to seize 320 dunams,(79 acres), of Palestinian land to extend the boundaries of the illegal settlements of Neve Daniel, Elazar and Efrat, south of Bethlehem. The Israeli human rights’ organisation, Peace Now, estimates that there are now 145 large settlements and 140 outposts, with more than 666,000 illegal settlers living in the occupied West Bank and East Jerusalem.

Next week the Kumi Now community will focus on spreading the message of the 2009 Kairos Document written by Palestinian theologians and inspired by the original document written in apartheid South Africa in 1985. We will also remember the International Day of Solidarity with the Palestinian people on Tuesday, the 29th of November.

Week ending November 14, 2022

Haaretz, November 8, 2022,

The Elad Association, which promotes Palestinian displacement by Jewish settlers in East Jerusalem, has received double its original public funding for its tourism projects in the Hinnom Valley, next to the Old City.

The State Prosecutor’s Office filed an indictment on Monday against a Jewish settler for assaulting a Palestinian in the Sheikh Jarrah neighborhood in East Jerusalem about a month ago.

Times of Gaza, November 9, 2022,  Palestinians in Nablus bid farewell to slain Mahdi Hashash who was fatally shot at dawn by the lsraeli occupation forces during a military raid.

Haaretz, Nov 10, 2022, Amira Hass, Two separate and seemingly unrelated steps taken recently by the Palestinian Authority and its leader, Mahmoud Abbas, are indicative of the increasingly authoritarian and autocratic nature of the regime in the Palestinian enclaves in the West Bank.  Mahmoud Abbas established a new council to strengthen his hold on the justice system, and continues his oppressive legacy while remaining loyal to the Oslo Accords.  He opposes rehabilitating the PLO, and plays right into Israel’s hands.

Israeli soldiers raided the city of Jenin in the northern West Bank on Thursday, arresting and surrounding the house of a Palestinian wanted for involvement in the killing of an Israeli officer last May.  The wanted Palestinian, 23-year-old Sadiqi Ahmad Ma’ari, is suspected of involvement in killing 47-year-old officer Noam Raz during a raid in May.

Israel imposed a ban on fish and seafood export from the Gaza Strip to the West Bank earlier this week, a move Gazan fishermen and merchants fear will inflict a harsh blow to the Strip’s economy and the livelihoods of thousands of families.  Gazan merchants say the move amounts to collective punishment, since Israel imposed the ban following a smuggling attempt of fish from the West Bank into Israel.

The shock success of the far right in Israel’s elections has triggered a schism in the UK Jewish community, fears about a surge in antisemitism and a sharp, painful dissonance between Zionist dreams and Israeli reality.

Times of Gaza, November 10, lsraeli occupation forces kill a Palestinian youth, Mahdi Hashash, during a pre-dawn military raid in Balata refugee camp, east of Nablus city.

Haaretz, Nov 11, 2022,  Jerusalem Deputy Mayor and right-wing activist Arieh King is helping an anonymous Jewish philanthropist to launch a program to encourage the emigration of non-Jewish citizens outside of Israel, King announced on Facebook on Wednesday.  ‘If we’ll manage to get a quarter or half a million Arabic speakers out of the country, that will be enough,’ King said in an interview to an Israeli news outlet after he published a job offering in the name of a Jewish philanthropist exposing a plan to ‘encourage a non-Jewish immigration for work purposes’

Haaretz, Opinion. AIPAC’s version of what ‘pro-Israel’ means – a reckless enabling of the most abhorrent currents in Israeli politics, its total embrace of the GOP and evangelicals, its smearing and spending against good faith criticism – isn’t doing Israel any favors

WASHINGTON—Three out of four Jewish Americans voted for Democrats in the U.S. midterm elections, significantly motivated by rising antisemitism and extremism fostered by former president Donald Trump’s influence on the Republican Party.  American Jewish voters overwhelmingly supported Democratic candidates in the U.S. midterms on Tuesday, with democracy and abortion being the key issues of concern.

Twenty years ago, when MK Ayman Odeh (Hadash) was a member of the Haifa city council, he lobbied vigorously to have the name of Hatzionut (Zionism) Avenue changed to Street of the Mountain (Al-Jabal), which had been its name prior to Israel’s establishment in 1948. He also talked about his dream: that anybody who came to Haifa in the future, and who ask where a particular place was situated, could very well receive a response along the lines of: “It’s on Gamal Abdel Nasser Street, between Edward Said and Land Day streets.” Streets, squares and institutions in Israel’s Arab towns are increasingly – and sometimes controversially – being named for personalities and traumatic events from Palestinian history.

Haaretz, Nov. 12, Gideon Levy, When the news broke that five Palestinians had been killed that evening by soldiers in Nablus, he went with some friends to protest near the army guard tower that looms over his village. He set a tire ablaze – and then snipers shot and killed Qusai Tamimi, 19, from a distance of dozens of meters.

Haaretz, November 13, 2022,  Bedouin kids are kept from school for months.  Nobody is taking responsibility.  Transport companies refuse to drive the children of the unrecognized Bedouin village Ramat Tziporim because of the dire condition of the roads, and the state refuses to fund the repairs.

Sources in Israel have said that Israel’s occupation of the West Bank will almost certainly be referred to the International Court of Justice in The Hague for its opinion, following a draft resolution passed by a special UN committee on decolonization.

Israel’s new Arab allies voted unanimously in favor of the United Nations resolution requesting an opinion from the International Court of Justice on the legal status of Israel’s “prolonged occupation, settlement and annexation of the Palestinian territory occupied since 1967.”

The Netanyahu-Ben Gvir-Smotrich government may soon find itself on a collision course with the International Court of Justice in The Hague.  The proposed reforms to the justice system and the further entrenchment of the settlements are expected to aid Palestinian diplomatic efforts against the occupation.

Haaretz, Nov 14, 2022,  A 15 year-old Palestinian was killed early Monday morning by Israeli military fire directed at a vehicle in the West Bank town of Beitunia, near Ramallah, the Palestinian Health Ministry reported. Another passenger in the car was moderately wounded.  IDF spokesperson says soldiers spotted a suspicious vehicle accelerating towards them during an operation by security forces. Palestinian witnesses say the car was moving slowly, and tried turning back before soldiers opened fire.

An Israeli soldier shot a man to death at a bus stop outside the central Israeli city of Ra’anana whom he suspected was a terrorist. Police said the slain man had a knife on his person.   

Reported by Sabeel, Jerusalem, November 14, 2022, In October the new Australian Foreign Minister, Penny Wong, stated that the Australian Embassy will remain in Tel Aviv and not move to Jerusalem as planned by the former administration. However, she declined to commit to a timetable for recognising Palestinian statehood.

Violence broke out in the city of Nablus at the site of Joseph’s tomb in the early hours of Wednesday, the 9th of November. Armed Israeli forces entered the Balata neighbourhood, near the refugee camp, to escort a party of visiting right-wing Israeli members of the Knesset. During armed clashes Mahdi Hashash, a fifteen-year-old Palestinian youth was wounded by shrapnel and later died in Nablus hospital. It is not clear if he died from the Israeli gunshot wound or from an explosive devise he was reportedly carrying at the time.  

On Thursday, 17th November, Xavier Abu Eid’s new book entitled, ‘Rooted in Palestine’ will be launched in the American Colony Hotel. This book highlights the role of Palestinian Christians. Miguel Moratinos, the former EU Special Representative for the Middle East Peace Process and the Foreign Minister of Spain, says that this book is, ‘a gripping account of the Christian-Palestinian community completed with great documentary rigour, and an excellent historiographical piece on the development of Palestinian history from the Balfour Declaration to the present day.’ Xavier is a Palestinian who grew up in Chile, has pursued his academic career in Europe and now lives in Beit Jala. He serves on the Sabeel General Assembly. 

This week the ‘Palestine Cinema Days’ film festival opened with the screening of Maha Haj’s acclaimed film, ‘Mediterranean Fever’. This film won a prize for its screenplay at the Cannes Film Festival and will be Palestine’s official Oscar entry in 2023. 

Next week’s Kumi Now will consider the topic of gender-based violence. Women in the occupied Palestinian territory face persistent gender-based violence through night raids, settler violence, collective violence towards their families, humiliation and assault from occupation forces, and the restrictions of a patriarchal society. This week, the United Nations observes the International Day for the Elimination of Violence against Women on Friday, the 25th of November. 

Week ending November 7, 2022

Haaretz, November 1, 2022, Settlers fired shots into Palestinians’ homes and threw stones at their cars Sunday night in Hebron, local residents said the day after a Palestinian shot dead an Israeli in the West Bank settlement.  ‘Every time there’s an attack there’s a night of terror here,’ a local resident says. After the fatal attack, an Israeli checkpoint that had been opened for six months is now closed to cars again.

Haaretz, November 2, 2022, We need to wait for the final results in order to know the ultimate split between the blocs, but based on the exit polls published by Israel’s three main TV news stations on Tuesday evening, it’s already clear that the big winner in the country’s 25th Knesset elections is the chairman of Otzma Yehudit, Itamar Ben Gvir, and that the big loser is Israel.  Religious Zionism, the Knesset list that distorted the Zionist project and transformed it from the national home of the Jewish people into a project of conservative, right-wing, racist, religious Jewish supremacism in the spirit of Ben Gvir’s teacher and rabbi, Meir Kahane, is now the third largest political force in Israel. That is the true, chilling significance of the election held on Tuesday.

An Israeli police officer shot and wounded a 16-year-old teen in the neck early Wednesday morning in the Bedouin town of Ar’arat an-Naqab in the Negev.  The teen, who has been identified as Issa al-Talakat, is reportedly in moderate to serious condition. The police said the officer fired while motorists drove wildly through the town and endangered police officers, accidentally shooting the teen, who was a bystander on the street. His life is not in danger, according to a source on the town’s council.

Times of Gaza,  The lsraeli occupation forces suppress a Palestinian disabled man who was trying to pass through Huwara checkpoint during a peaceful demonstration in protest of the ongoing lsraeli blockage on Nablus city.

Haaretz, November 3, 2022,  WASHINGTON – A U.S.-based NGO founded by the late Saudi dissident Jamal Khashoggi on Monday filed a complaint with the International Criminal Court against a senior Israeli military prosecutor for alleged war crimes and crimes against humanity over his role in the Israeli occupation.  The move by Democracy for the Arab World Now marks an extremely rare, if not unprecedented, instance where an ICC complaint is directed at an individual from the professional echelon.  The submission, which cites Col. Eyal Toledano as the “de facto attorney general of Israel’s military occupation,” follows a months-long investigation from the NGO over incidents in the West Bank between 2016 and 2020. It falls under the scope of the existing ICC investigation into the situation in Palestine, which was opened in March 2021.

A Palestinian who was apprehended in Jaffa in September carrying an automatic weapon and explosives, had planned to attack a Bnei Brak synagogue on orders of the Lion’s Den militant group – according to an indictment against him at the Salem Military Court in the West Bank.

According to police, officers shot and killed 20-year old Amer Husam Halabiya, after he stabbed a policeman while being searched at Damascus Gate. Two other officers were lightly wounded as a result of the shots fired by police.

Israeli army entered Jenin, and three Palestinians were kicked across the Wesr Bank.  Two Palestinians were killed in Jenin refugee camp from Israeli army fire, one of them was an Islamic Jihad operative. Earlier in the day, 42 year-old Daud Rian was shot and killed by Israeli soldier fire near Nablus.

November 3, Israel lifts all movement restrictions on Nablus and opens entrances to the city after a three week closure.

Haaretz Opinion, Gideon Levy, The aftermath of the elections have shown that Israeli society has become partly religious and largely racist, with hatred of Arabs being its main fuel, with no one to stand against it.

Haaretz, editorial, The recent Knesset election brought the Benjamin Netanyahu-Itamar Ben-Gvir-Bezalel Smotrich axis to power. Despite the understandable disappointment, the center-left camp cannot stand idly by or sink into despair. Instead, in the coming days it should already formulate a plan of action to rein in this dangerous alliance, which is expected to cause irreversible damage to Israeli democracy.

Times of Gaza, November 3, 2022, Mohammad Khloof (16), is one of the Palestinians killed by the lsraeli occupation forces today in Jenin camp.

Haaretz, Nov 4, 2022.  Britain has no plans to move its embassy in Israel from Tel Aviv, a spokeswoman for Prime Minister Rishi Sunak said on Thursday, after his predecessor ordered a review into a possible move of the embassy to Jerusalem.  The move was touted by Rishi Sunak’s predecessor Liz Truss, but was condemned by the Palestinian Prime Minister along with other prominent British organizations and foreign diplomats.

The Israeli army says it attacked an underground military facility in the central Gaza Strip overnight Friday, in response to earlier rocket fire from the Palestinian enclave. According to the IDF, the Hamas facility was used to “develop and manufacture missiles.”  Palestinians say that Israel is targeting Hamas and Islamic Jihad positions in northern and central Gaza.

Haaretz, Opinion, This hasn’t been a good week for Israel’s fragile and limited democracy. It has seen the return to office of Benjamin Netanyahu, a prime minister who is on trial for bribery and fraud, and incited during the campaign against the Arab minority. Furthermore, on Election Night, he embarked on a totally false series of accusations of voter fraud that he claimed – without any basis in reality – were taking place at polling places in the Arab community. Over numerous election campaigns, Benjamin Netanyahu has continually used Jewishness as a dividing and binding means to ensure his own political success.

Times of Gaza, November 4,  Farouq Salameh was killed by the lsraeli occupation forces earlier today in Jenin camp, two days before his weddi

Haaretz, November 4, Gideon Levy, Israeii troops shoot, wound, kill, and delay medical care for casualties.  Palestinian villagers protest theft of their land and incessant harassment by settlers from an illegal outpost. The army and the Border Police set ambushes for the protesters and shoot at them. A 17-year-old is killed and a 16-year-old, who is left by the troops to languish on the ground, is seriously wounded,  A wounded teenager lies on a stretcher placed on the road. He’s partially disrobed, his stomach is covered with a bloodstained white cloth, he is also bleeding. It doesn’t look as if he is conscious. A Palestinian man tries to tend to him, then a few others, including an elderly man, lend a hand. As they make an effort to pick up the stretcher and get the wounded youth to a hospital, Israeli soldiers push them away brutally, barking at them and striking them with their rifle butts. One soldier fires in the air in order to disperse what he apparently perceives as a pack of stray dogs – in reality, distraught local residents trying to save their fellow villager and relative, who lies bleeding on the road. Anguished cries are heard in the background.

Haaretz, Nov.5, 2022, A Palestinian was shot and killed by Israeli military fire near the town of near Ramallah in the West Bank on Saturday evening, according to Palestinian reports.

Times of Gaza,

Family and friends of Mos’ab Nafal bid farewell to the slain 18-year-old youth who was killed by the lsraeli occupation forces near Ramallah.

The lsraeli occupation forces caused a huge fire to break out last night in Abu Dis, near Jerusalem, due to randomly firing tear gas bombs in the area.Haaretz, Nov 6, 2022,  Hamas’ security forces in the Gaza strip arrested two Palestinians on Sunday who fired four rockets towards Israeli territory on Thursday, thereby violating ceasefire and leading to a retaliatory attack by Israel, according to Palestinians sources in Gaza. Palestinian factions in the Gaza strip reportedly see such uncoordinated firing of rockets towards Israel as serving Israeli interests by providing it cause to harm Hamas infrastructure in the coastal enclave.

Haaretz, Nov. 7, 2022,Legal experts are voicing alarm over a proposal to allow 61 of the Knesset’s 120 lawmakers to override Supreme Court rulings – a move they warn would essentially abolish the separation of powers, eliminate protections for minority rights and enable the government to do as it pleases with no oversight.

Police forces arrived to secure the resumed construction of a Jewish town on Monday planned over the ruins of a yet-to-be-demolished Bedouin village as dozens of protestors gathered near the site.  The unrecognized Bedouin village of Umm al-Hiran in the Negev desert has been fighting state-ordered demolitions for two decades, which Israeli land authorities hope will clear the way for the planned Jewish town of Hiran.  

Reported by Sabeel, Jerusalem, November 7, 2022, Shadi Khoury remains in prison without any charges for a third week. Conditions in Israeli prisons are tough and Shadi was hit by guards for daring to sing in prison. He is due to appear in court on the 14th of November, after his trial was postponed. His classmates at the Quaker School in Ramallah have rallied to his support. They have had T-shirts printed with Shadi’s photo on them and a hashtag in Arabic saying, ‘Shadi is our pride’. They reject any attempt by the Israeli authorities to criminalize him. Since the start of the year, 630 Palestinian children have been arrested by the Israeli authorities, most of them from Jerusalem.

 Benjamin Netanyahu’s alliance won 64 seats to claim victory in Tuesday’s election in Israel. He will form a right-wing government having allied the Likud party to the Jewish Power Party, led by the extremist religious Zionist leader, Ben Gvir. This election was the fifth election in Israel in less than four years.  Sabeel prays that the appointment of Israeli ministers with openly stated racist views will not lead to a period of even darker harassment and oppression for the Palestinian people. 

A Palestinian father and his three sons were attacked by Israeli settlers while they were harvesting their olive trees near the village of ash-Shuyukh, northeast of Hebron, on Thursday, the 3rd of November. The settlers beat the  Palestinian farmers with sticks and set dogs on them and the farmers needed hospital treatment for their wounds.

 An Israeli court has now approved a decision by the Israeli authorities to demolish Ein Samiya school, near Ramallah, in the occupied West Bank. It was opened last January after receiving funding from the Palestinian Ministry of Education and the European Union. The villagers had protested against the demolition and are now required to pay a fine, as well as having to demolish the school themselves or else pay inflated prices for Israeli bulldozers to do the job.

Next week Kumi Now will mark the Universal Children’s Day on the 20th of November, by reminding us that Palestinian children are denied the human rights and the opportunities of children elsewhere in the world. Nearly 200 countries around the world, including Israel, have signed up to the Conventions of the Rights of Children Treaty, which requires governments to act in the best interests of children. The treaty states that all children have rights to safety, health, access to education and opportunity and a stable family life.

Week ending October 31, 2022

Nablus during intense clashes that broke out in the northern West Bank city on Tuesday after IDF forces were spotted entering Nablus’ Old City.  Twenty other Palestinians were injured and a sixth died in a separate incident near Ramallah overnight. The Israeli army says it was targeting a site for manufacturing explosives, while the spokesman for Palestinian President Abbas calls the raid a ‘war crime’.

The Israeli army suspended on Monday a soldier who attacked a Palestinian police officer in Hebron last week, as well as an officer and another soldier who did not act to prevent the attack. Video footage shows a soldier kicking and slamming a Palestinian police officer against a wall in Hebron for no apparent reason while the other two stand idly by ■ IDF chief calls the attack a ‘serious incident that blatantly deviates from the values of the army’.

An organization for Arab doctors has called for the immediate dismissal of a cardiac surgery director in Be’er Sheva over his racist comments on Arab birthrates and “the Arab womb.”

Times of Gaza, October 26, 2022, lsrael has killed 183 Palestinians so far this year.

Reported by Palestinian and Israeli Bereaved Families for Peace, October 28, 2022, According to the data of the Central Bureau of Statistics, in the past year there was a 43% increase in construction in the settlements.
According to data from B’Tselem organization, 379 Palestinians were killed by the Israeli security forces, 85 of them minors.
The Peace Now report reveals that Israel destroyed more than 800 Palestinian buildings in the occupied territories.

October 28, 2022, B’Tselem declares Israel “not a vibrant democracy”.  Ahead of the upcoming elections, we are issuing a new position paper focusing on one of these aspects: the right to political participation, and the way in which the regime organizes or denies this from different parts of the population under its control.

Haaretz, Oct 28, 2022,  Two Palestinian men were killed and another was seriously injured in a shooting incident in the Hawara checkpoint in the West Bank on Thursday night, the Palestinian Health Ministry said.  Israeli soldiers fired at two suspicious vehicles at the Hawara checkpoint in the West Bank killing two Palestinian men, one of which was a first responder for the Palestinian Authority, after shots were fired toward soldiers stationed at the checkpoint.

Haaretz, Opinion,  Settler attacks against Palestinians are surging, but the IDF’s lethargic response, veering towards acquiescence, is not only a violation of Israeli and international law. It is also a horrific debasement of Jewish history.

Haaretz, Gideon Levy, Mahmoud Samudi sold bottles of water in the Jenin refugee camp to earn pocket money. A jeep stopped opposite him during an army raid there and a soldier inside the vehicle began shooting at a group of stone-throwers. Samudi, just 12 years old, was critically wounded and died two weeks later. He is the youngest person to be killed in Jenin this year.

Times of Gaza, October 29, 2022, lsraeli settlers attack Palestinian families who were peacefully harvesting olives in Tel Rumeida area in the city of Hebron.

Haaretz, October 29, 2022,  The year 2022 is on track to be the deadliest year in the West Bank since 2005, when the organization began systematically collecting data, according to UN’s Middle East envoy Tor Wennesland.  In the 34-day period he reviewed, Tor Wennesland said 32 Palestinians were killed by Israeli security forces, and over 300 were injured. ‘Unless the core political issues are addressed, the deep-rooted mistrust and hostility will continue to grow,’ he said to the UN Security Council

One Israeli man was killed and three others were injured, including a Palestinian paramedic, in a shooting attack in the West Bank settlement of Kiryat Arba on Saturday night.

Haaretz, October 31, 2022, Security coordinator caught on camera for allegedly helping Israeli settlers throw tear gas at Palestinians during clashes earlier this month was suspended by the army, but is now back at his post.

Times of Gaza, October 31, 2022, lsraeli occupation forces detain two Palestinian children while their father was taking them to the doctor in Hebron city.

lsraeli occupation forces demolish two Palestinian-owned houses in al-Baqa area, east of Hebron city. 

Reported by Sabeel, Jerusalem, October 31, 2022,  Tareq Al-Araj, a Palestinian from the national youth football team has been sentenced to four years’ imprisonment and accused of being a member of a banned group. He was arrested two years’ ago at a temporary checkpoint in Jenin and has had his trial postponed seventeen times. 

Twenty two Palestinian children achieved outstanding results, winning six medals at the recent Arab Chess Championship held in Syria. Randa Sedar won a gold medal in her ten-year-old age group matches, as well as the Woman Candidate Master title. 

The US company called Meta, which owns Facebook, Instagram and WhatsApp, has had to conduct a review of its moderation policies for Arabic and Hebrew language content across all three platforms after complaints received over its coverage in Palestine/Israel during May 2021. The human rights due diligence report states that at that time the Arabic content was overly moderated, while the Hebrew content, even hate speech, was left untouched. 

Israeli forces stormed the village of al-Jawwaya, east of Yatta in the south Hebron hills on Tuesday, the 25th of October. They attacked residents, threw tear gas canisters at them and tore down and seized two family tents. There are 1200 Palestinians living in small communities on their agricultural land in the Masafer Yatta area. They have endured attacks from the Israeli army for over forty years as the army wants to turn the land into a firing zone. Recently these attacks have escalated and the residents suffer repeated harassment, home demolitions and the deprivation of basic resources.

 This week we remember the British Balfour Declaration, issued on the 2nd of November 1917. In the words of the Palestinian academic Edward Said it was ‘made by a European power…about a non-European territory in flat disregard of both the presence and wishes of the native majority residents in that territory.’ The British pledge is viewed as one of the main catalysts of the Nakba, the ethnic cleansing of Palestinians in 1948 by the state of Israel.

Next week’s Kumi Now will consider the issue of antisemitism, as we mark the International Day against Fascism and Antisemitism across Europe on Wednesday, the 9th of November.

Week ending October 24, 2022

Haaretz, Oct 18, 2022  Hundreds of Palestinians marched through West Bank cities and refugee camps in the early hours of Tuesday morning, in solidarity with the Lion’s Den militant group, which has been heavily involved in recent clashes in Nablus. The group called for mass protests against Israeli decision to deny family members entry permits.

Israeli security forces arrested on Monday eight Palestinians suspected of assisting Udai Tamimi who shot and killed an Israeli soldier and seriously wounded a security guard at a military checkpoint near the Shoafat refugee camp in East Jerusalem two weeks ago. The police said that searches of the suspects’ houses in the Shoafat refugee camp and nearby town of Anata found different weapons and weapon accessories. Clashes reportedly broke out between residents and Israeli forces during the arrests.

Israel summoned Australia’s ambassador and is weighing up retaliatory measures against Canberra, the Foreign Ministry said on Tuesday, following Australia’s sudden decision to reverse its recognition of West Jerusalem as Israel’s capital.

Palestine Online, Israeli occupation forces assault and arrest Palestinian activist Hanadi al-Halawani in Bab Al-Silsila area in the old city of occupied Jerusalem

Palestine Culture

Neturei Karta is a Haredi Jewish movement that rejects Z!on!sm in all its forms, opposes the existence of the State of isr*el, and recognizes Jerusalem as the capital of Palestine.

Haaretz, Oct 19, 2022, A delegation of representatives of Palestinian factions, including senior Hamas officials, arrived in Damascus on Wednesday for the first time since 2012, according to the Arab news channel, al-Mayadeen. The meeting comes 10 years after the Syrian authorities expelled Hamas’ leaders for not supporting the regime, though the organization says it does not plan to return to Damascus on the same scale as before.

Times of Gaza, Oct. 19, lsraeli occupation forces confiscate a bicycle from a Palestinian kid and prevent him from playing in Jabir neighborhoud, south of Hebron.

Hundreds of lsraeli settlers broke into Al-Ibrahimi Mosque in Hebron last night and held a dancing a concert violating the sacredness of the place.

Haaretz, October 19, 2022, Two left-wing activists were injured by settlers armed with stones and clubs while helping Palestinians harvest olives on Wednesday, according to testimony from the volunteers.  Two volunteers, including a 70-year-old human rights activist, were reportedly injured in an attack by Israeli settlers carrying stones and clubs.

Haaretz, October 20, 2022, An Israeli soldier from a West Bank settlement near Nablus was arrested on Thursday on suspicion of participating in a widely-condemned settler attack on an IDF unit earlier in the day. The suspect has been handed over to the Shin Bet unit dealing with Jewish extremism.  Israeli army chief and PM Lapid slam ‘criminal’ behavior from the settlers, who threw stones at Palestinian vehicles and attacked soldiers with pepper spray, injuring a general and another soldier.

Leila Fadel, October 20, 2022, Lina Abu Akleh is the face of a global campaign to get justice and accountability for her aunt, Shireen Abu Akleh, a journalist killed while covering an Israeli raid. She spoke to us after being named one of Time’s 100 emerging leaders for her advocacy.

Time of Gaza, Oct.20, lsraeli settlers stab and torture a foreign pro-Palestinian who was helping the local people harvest their olive trees in Kisan village, south of Bethlehem.

lsraeli occupation forces assault a number of Palestinian students in Shu’afat camp, occupied Jerusalem.

Oct. 20, lsraeli occupation forces brutally assault and detain four Palestinian young men near Bab al-Zawiyah area, central Hebron.

Palestine Online, Oct 20, A video footage released by B’Tselem shows Israeli occupation forces attacking two young Palestinian men on 14 Sep. in Silwan town, occupied Jerusalem.

Israeli occupation forces brutally assaulted two young Palestinian men inside the court.

Haaretz, Oct 21, 2022   Security officials have noticed a worrying trend in recent weeks of violent acts committed by Israeli settlers across the West Bank, with over 100 Jewish nationalist crimes having been recorded in just the past 10 days alone. Security official says that contrary to claims, attackers aren’t ‘just a handful’ and include older adults, women and children.

WASHINGTON—The American Civil Liberties Union and the ACLU of Arkansas filed a petition with the U.S. Supreme Court on Thursday urging it to review whether an Arkansas law requiring state contractors to pledge not to boycott Israel is an unconstitutional violation of free speech. Petitioners argue that the law is an unconstitutional tax on free speech and infringes on the First Amendment right to boycott.

Several Jewish voters are impressed by United Arab List leader Mansour Abbas’ groundbreaking term in the outgoing government, and say he deserves their ballot. Prominent Israeli environmentalist Yosef Abramowitz has never publicly endorsed a political party or candidate before. This coming election, he’s making an exception.

Times of Gaza, October 21, 2022, “Please Salah wake up, please don’t go.” Mother of Salah Breaky bids final farewell to her son who was killed by the lsraeli occupation forces this dawn in

Jenin.

October 22, lsraeli occupation forces assault a Palestinian youth from Jenin after detaining him during a pre-dawn military raid today.

Palestine Online, October 22, 2022, Israeli occupation forces suppress Palestinians and foreign activists, preventing them from harvesting olives in #MasaferYatta, south of Hebron.

Haaretz, October 22, 2022, //Gideon Levy,  Police raided the East Jerusalem neighborhood of Beit Hanina to arrest Shadi Khoury. When the 16-year-old refused to disrobe in their presence, he was beaten in front of his parents, then taken away. No one told the parents – who both run local cultural institutions – why their son was arrested. Blotches of blood streak the spacious, elegant mansion. Wherever the police dragged their victim, he left behind a narrow trail of drops of blood, drop after drop, as though to mark the path of the arrest and the beatings. The boy screamed; the neighbors heard his shouts and were terrified.

Haaretz, Oct 23, 2022, Palestinian militant group ‘Lion’s Den’ blamed Israel for the death of one of its militants, identified as Tamer Al-Kilani, in an explosion in the West Bank city of Nablus early on Sunday, saying an explosive device was rigged to his motorcycle.

Times of Gaza, October 23, 2022 lsraeli occupation forces shoot then detain a 16-year-old Palestinian child under the pretext of an alleged attack. It’s worth mentioning that the shooting incident took place at a football field in occupied Jerusalem where other children were playing.

Palestine Online, US professor and Philosopher Dr. Cornel West: “I’m standing in deep solidarity with my precious Palestinian brothers and sisters for their dignity, for justice, and for their self-determination.”

Palestinian boxer Yazan Jaber, from occupied Jerusalem, ascends to podium of a world

championship, wearing the Palestinian flag. 

 Reported by Sabeel, Jerusalem, October 24, 2022,  Shadi Khoury, a 16-year-old pupil at the Quaker Friends’ School in Ramallah and grandson of Sabeel’s co-founder, Samia Khoury, was kidnapped in the early hours of Friday, the 18th of October, by Israeli occupation forces. He was beaten, blindfolded and dragged away from his home by twelve Israeli soldiers and security agents. He was taken for interrogation to the ‘Russian compound’.   Sabeel prays for an end to the injustices perpetrated daily on the Palestinian people and their children by the Israeli occupation forces.  

The Israeli Prison Service imposed a ban on family visits to Palestinian prisoners on Sunday, the 2nd of October. The Prisoners’ Affairs Commission have contacted the International Committee of the Red Cross to ask for their assistance in calling for a reinstatement of family visits for humanitarian reasons. According to Addameer there are currently 4,700 Palestinian political prisoners, including 400 children, and 800 Palestinians placed on administrative detention orders. 

Last week Father Albert Nolan died peacefully in his sleep at the age of 88 years. He was a Dominican priest and theologian and was fully engaged in the struggle against apartheid in South Africa. In 1973 he became the National Chaplain of the Catholic Federation of Students and gave guidance and support to young Catholics committed to opposing apartheid. He was working at the Institute for Contextual Theology in Johannesburg in 1985 when the Kairos document was published, which helped to unite many churches to take a stand against apartheid.

By Thursday, the 20th of October, the city of Nablus had been kept under siege conditions for ten consecutive days by the Israeli army after one of their soldiers was killed near an illegal settlement. The army set up checkpoints at every road leading into the city and closed the roads using iron gates and dirt mounds. There have been calls for Nablus residents to take part in peaceful marches to the Israeli checkpoints to call for the end of the siege.

Last week Israeli settlers attacked the volunteers helping Ibrahim Ibayyat, a Palestinian farmer as he was harvesting his olive crop in  the village of Kisan, east of Bethlehem.  The settlers attacked local and foreign volunteers, stabbing one of them in the back and breaking her leg. They uprooted more than three hundred olive saplings and sprayed  the mature trees with incendiary chemical pesticides.

Next week’s Kumi Now will focus on the topic of Islamophobia. Over recent times there has been a rise in hate crimes against Muslims,  as well as attempts in the Western media to link all Muslims with violent extremism. Not all Palestinians are Muslims and most Muslims never engage in any forms of violence and yet propaganda in the press is being used to present Palestinians as Muslim terrorists.

Week ending October 17, 2022

Haaretz, Oct 10, 2022, Opinion by Amira Hass, The website of the Home Front Command says that an earthquake or a missile attack can cause a panic attack, fainting or even a heart attack. That is, even without being injured physically, fear and terror can have clear physical manifestations.  Amira Hass goes on to explain that terror in an intentional weapon used against the Palestinians by the Israel Defence Force.

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Haaretz, Oct 11, 2022,  An Israeli soldier was shot dead in the northern West Bank on Tuesday in an attack claimed by a Nablus-based Palestinian militant group, according to the Israeli military spokesperson. Security forces are searching for several gunmen.  A manhunt is underway for several shooters who escaped the scene unharmed.  Nablus-based Lion’s Den militant group claims responsibility for the attack, calling for a ‘day of rage’ against Israeli forces. This marks the second soldier killed in the West Bank in four days.

Israeli occupation forces assault and arrest elderly Palestinian woman Nafisa Khweis in occupied Jerusalem. (Palestine Online)

Haaretz, October 12, 2022, The Israeli army closed all entrances to the West Bank city of Nablus on Wednesday, limiting entry and exit to only three locations and requiring a security check. The IDF estimates that most of those responsible for the shootings that occurred over the last week in the West Bank came from Nablus and fled to the city after carrying out the attacks; Palestinian shops and businesses in east Jerusalem shut down on Wednesday to protest Israeli police raids

Haaretz Analysis | Jewish setters’ marches needlessly toss a match into the West Bank powder keg. The defense establishment is concerned over the escalation in the West Bank, i.e., an Israeli soldier was killed while securing a settlers’ march north of Nablus. Despite this, the defense establishment is reluctant to confront settler leadership about halting the marches.

Palestine Online, October 12, Israeli occupation forces spray sewage water on Palestinian homes in Al-Isawiya town, occupied Jerusalem.

Times of Gaza, October 13, 2022, Attacked while performing his prayers, Palestinian young man sustains injuries to the head after being assaulted by the lsraeli occupation forces in occupied Jerusalem.

Palestine Online, October 13, 2022, Israeli occupation forces brutally arrest a Palestinian school student in the center of Hebron city.

Haaretz, October 13, 2022, Nablus’ ‘Lion’s Den’ has become a major headache for Israel and the Palestinian Authority. The ‘Lion’s Den’ is a secular and unorganized cell consisting primarily of young Palestinian men. Within weeks, it has become the main driver of the shooting incidents towards Israeli soldiers around Nablus.

Israel’s military operations in the West Bank are undermining the Palestinian Authority’s efforts to calm the territory, senior officers in the PA’s security services have told their Israeli counterparts.  Senior Palestinian Authority official says security knows who the armed men in the northern West Bank are and think they must be dealt with via dialogue, but says security services can’t do so ‘if a Palestinian is being killed in clashes with the army every day’.

Hundreds of Palestinians clashed with Israeli security forces across East Jerusalem on Wednesday, with residents in various neighborhoods burning tires and trashcans, hurling stones and firecrackers at security forces, according to Israel Police. Police have responded with tear gas and stun grenades.

Dozens of worshipers entered Joseph’s Tomb in Nablus late Wednesday night under the protection of Israeli forces – despite Israeli security officials’ warnings that it could only lead to further violent confrontations in the West Bank. Despite warnings of further clashes, the Israeli military accompanied worshipers heading to the holy site near Nablus, where the Palestinian militants vowed to disrupt the visit.

Life in Shoafat Refugee Camp stopped after Saturday’s shooting, and hasn’t resumed, though police have opened the two exits from the camp, due to the large number of security checks, the checkpoint is almost unusable; “For two days we were shup in our own homes, the soldiers fired rubber bullets and garbage wasn’t collected for three days’.  (Residents of Shoafat refugee camp near Jerusalem have been living in a pressure cooker for years.). Then reported by Haaretz on October 14, ‘Seige on Shoafat has united Jerusalem in protest’.  ‘The situation throughout Jerusalem is sitting on a ticking bomb because of the oppression we suffer every day,’ one resident warned.

Times of Gaza, October 13, 2022, lsraeli settlers set fire to a Palestinian-owned farm in Qusra, southeast of Nablus city, causing the loss of about 30,000 chickens.

October 14, lsraeli occupation forces shoot a Palestinian young man in Jenin camp and prevent Palestinian paramedics from attending to him.

Haaretz, October 14, 2022, .Two Palestinians were killed by Israeli military fire on Friday morning near Jenin refugee camp, the Palestinian Health Ministry said. One of the men killed was a 25 year-old Islamic Jihad operative. The other, a doctor and Fatah operative from Jenin, succumbed to his wounds a few hours after being hit by live fire near the hospital.

Rival Palestinian factions [Fatah and Hamas] signed an agreement in Algiers on Thursday aimed at resolving 15 years of discord by holding elections within a year after months of talks mediated by Algeria.

The Shin Bet security agency detained a teacher in front of his students and colleagues in a classroom in the city of Acre on Tuesday, and took him for interrogation.  The teacher, who serves as deputy principal as well as a clergyman, was taken from an elementary school in Acre and interrogated for 10 hours.

Archaeological survey finds not the odd isolated farm but intense agriculture in Israel’s Negev desert in the Byzantine period, between the 2nd and 6th centuries.

For decades, rumors and testimonies swirled about Jewish troops sent to poison wells in Arab villages. Now, researchers have located official documentation of the operation.

October 14, 2022, Defense of Children International Palestine. Israeli forces have escalated their violence toward Palestinians in the occupied West Bank in recent days: In the month of October alone, Israeli forces have killed six Palestinian boys with live ammunition. From Jerusalem to Hebron to Jenin, Israeli forces are targeting Palestinian children with excessive force and no one is being held accountable.  The boys—Fayez, Adel, Mahdi, Mahmoud, Osama, and Mahmoud—range in age from 12 to 17. The youngest, a seventh-grader named Mahmoud Samoudi, died on October 10 after Israeli forces shot him in the stomach with live ammunition in late September, tearing through his colon, kidneys, and bladder.

Times of Gaza, October 15, 2022, Shot in the head while on duty; Abdullah Abu al-Teen, a Palestinian doctor and father to three little kids, was killed by the lsraeli occupation forces as he was targeted by a snipper while attending to an injured man in front of Jenin Government Hospital.

Harretz, October 15, 2022, An Israeli soldier shot Adel Daoud in the head from an ambush as he sat with friends next to the separation barrier in Qalqilyah, killing him. The army says he threw Molotov cocktails at the troops; eyewitnesses and the city’s governor say the area was quiet and nothing justified such a lethal act.

Israeli forces arrested a second suspect on Saturday in Friday night’s shooting attack on the West Bank settlement of Beit El that wounded one Israeli, the military said.  Forces take into custody Muhammed Odeh, 19, and two accomplices after Friday night’s shooting, which wounded one Israeli man in the West Bank settlement of Beit El.

Women of the Sun is a grassroots Palestinian movement striving to improve women’s lives in the West Bank and Gaza, and has teamed up with a feminist Israeli group to try to breathe new life into the dormant peace process.

We tend to forget, certainly during times of tension in the West Bank, that the legal framework stipulated in the Oslo Accords (and in the Paris Protocol, the economic annex to the accords) remains in existence 29 years later. The Palestinian economy in the West Bank is still dependent largely on work in Israel and the settlements, whether with a permit or without. The Palestinian economy is still dependent on workers’ income earned in Israel, while Israeli banks can’t afford to cut ties with the West Bank. As for the Gaza Strip, the Israeli (and Egyptian) blockade dictates economic conditions under Hamas rule there.

Palestine Online, October 16, 2022, A colonial Israeli settler fires live bullets towards Palestinian homes in Hawara town, south of Nablus.

Week ending October 10, 2022

Times of Gaza, October 6, 2022, The lsraeli occupation forces intimidated a primary school in Hebron; dozens of Palestinian students were terrorized today as they were gassed and assaulted by the lsraeli occupation force during what was supposed to be a ‘normal’ school day.

Haaretz, October 6, 2022, The decapitated body of a gay Palestinian man who had been waiting in Israel for asylum for the past two years was discovered on Wednesday in Hebron.  The body of Ahmad Abu Marhia, 25, found in Hebron just two months before he was due to start a new life in Canada; images of body circulated on Palestinian social media.

B’Tselem Urges ICC to Prevent Expulsion of Palestinians in Masafer Yatta.

The group of Israeli Arabs that was attacked on the eve of Yom Kippur on Tuesday in Bat Yam were walking on the city’s promenade when they suddenly saw a crowd running towards them, according to one of them. Brother of one of the Israeli Arabs who was assaulted in Bat Yam on the eve of the Jewish holy day says group was attacked by 15-20 people.

On September 25, 1997, Mossad operatives from the special forces’ unit of Kidon (Hebrew for Bayonet) poisoned Khaled Meshal, the chairman of the political bureau of Hamas, in Amman, Jordan. One of the operatives held a small tube and sprayed Meshal’s ear with the material. New article by Benny Morris and Benjamin Kedar indicates that well before the botched assassination attempt 25 years ago, Israel attempted mass poisoning during the war in 1948

Times of Gaza, lsraeli settlers, backed by lsraeli occupation forces, steal olives from Palestinian-owned lands in occupied Jerusalem.

Defense for Children International Palestine, October 7, 2022, Israeli forces shot dead two Palestinian boys on Friday: 17-year-old Mahdi Mohammad Abulmuti Ladadwa and 14-year-old Adel Ibrahim Adel Daud. Israeli forces or settlers have shot and killed 25 Palestinian children in the occupied West Bank this year.

Times of Gaza, The lsraeli occupation forces have just killed a Palestinian youth in al-Mazra’a al-Gharbiyah, northwest of Ramallah city.

Haaretz, October 7, 2022, Religious Zionism lawmaker Simcha Rothman and his fellow Jewish Temple Mount activists could “lead us to another Guardian of the Walls”, Israel’s Police Commissioner Kobi Shabtai warned at a closed-door meeting on Thursday, police sources tell Haaretz. The commissioner’s harsh words yesterday follow the right-wing lawmakers multiple visits to the Muslim cemetery near Jerusalem’s Golden Gate (also known as the Gate of Mercy) to blow a ritual shofar on three separate occasions.

The Israeli government decided on Friday to close off the West Bank and Gaza Strip for the first and final days of Sukkot, but not the intermediate days of the weeklong holiday, as it does most years – despite rising West Bank tensions.

Haaretz, Oct 8, 2022, Two Palestinians aged 18 and 19 were killed and eleven others were wounded by Israeli military gunfire as forces entered Jenin refugee camp on Saturday, the Palestinian Health Ministry says.

As fears of election fraud in Israel’s Arab community mount among the political right, Kahanist lawmaker Itamar Ben-Gvir’s Otzma Yehudit party has decided to observe several dozen polling places in major Arab cities and towns. Claiming potential Arab voter fraud, Otzma Yehudit establishes an initiative to make right-wing activists and hilltop youth official election observers, giving them unfettered access to polling sites.

Muhammad Awad, a 36-year-old social worker and father of three, was on his way to buy items for his new cell-phone store, when his car collided with a parked police vehicle. Soldiers immediately shot and killed him; they say it was a ‘ramming attack.’ In his village, they’re convinced it was an accident. (Gideon Levy)

East Jerusalem’s Shoafat refugee camp is swarming with Israeli soldiers, where a manhunt is underway for the suspect behind a drive-by shooting that left an Israeli solder dead and several others wounded on Saturday evening. The army identified the soldier on Sunday as 18-year-old Sgt. Noa Lazar, who was posthumously promoted to the rank of sergeant. The gunman, who is still at large, has been identified as 22-year-old Palestinian Udi Tamimi from Shoafat in East Jerusalem.

Israeli police arrested six Palestinians on Saturday suspected of attacking officers during a religious Muslim procession in East Jerusalem. During the march commemorating the birth of the Prophet Mohammed, Israeli police says that protesters taunted them and threw rocks and bottles at them.

Israel will pay half a million shekels to the family of an 80-year-old Palestinian who died of a heart attack while detained by Israeli soldiers. In exchange, the family will withdraw the lawsuit they filed against the state, the Defense Ministry said on Friday.

Reported by the Palestinian Prisoner Solidarity Network, October 9, 2022, On Sunday, 9 October, 2022, 20 additional Palestinian prisoners joined the mass hunger strike launched by 30 administrative detainees demanding an end to detention without charge or trial. The Palestinian Prisoners’ Society announced that the 20 prisoners include Palestinians jailed arbitrarily under administrative detention as well as people serving sentences imposed by Israeli occupation military courts and people awaiting trial. Samidoun Palestinian Prisoner Solidarity Network urges people around the world to take action and mobilize to support the 50 hunger strikers.

Defense of Children International Palestine, October 9,  Israeli forces shot and killed 17-year-old Mahmoud in the northern occupied West Bank on Saturday. 43 Palestinian children have been killed in 2022. Canada must stop contributing to this violence by suspending military trade with Israel.

Sabeel, Jerusalem, October 10, 2022, Kumi Now on Tuesday, 11th October focusses on mental health.

Week ending October 3, 2022

Reported by Haaretz, September 26, 2022, A Palestinian teenager was shot dead on Thursday by Israeli military forces in the West Bank after a suspected car-ramming attack that injured an Israeli soldier.

Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas addressed the UN General Assembly on Friday, saying that the possibility of reaching a just solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict is regressing due to Israel’s actions. He requested that the international community hold Israel accountable for its actions.  Acknowledging Lapid’s UN speech on Thursday, Abbas says Israel should return to negotiations with Palestinians to show its commitment to a two-state solution.

Moussa Sarsour, who beat 84-year-old Shlomit Ovadia to death before committing suicide earlier this week, was found to be mentally unstable by Palestinian medical professionals, but had received an Israeli work permit regardless. The Palestinian man who beat an elderly Israeli woman to death before hanging himself earlier this week had been diagnosed with schizophrenia at a Palestinian hospital, documents revealed to Haaretz show.

Reported byTimes of Gaza , September27, 2022 The Israeli occupation forces assaulted a Palestinian elderly man so aggressively that he fell unconscious at one of the gates of Al-Aqsa mosque.

Reportrd by 7amleh, Sept.27, Last week, the Business for Social Responsibility (BSR) network released its Human Rights Due Diligence report regarding Arabic and Hebrew content on Meta’s platform during May 2021. The report clarified META’s over-enforcement of their content moderation policies when dealing with Arabic language content, as compared to a pattern of under-enforcement of these same policies when working with Hebrew language content. These clear differences in the moderation of content based on language confirmed the company’s bias against Palestinians created content.

Reported by AMP: Last week, the Business for Social Responsibility (BSR) network released its Human Rights Due Diligence report regarding Arabic and Hebrew content on Meta’s (Facebook and Instagram’s parent company) platform during May 2021.  American Muslims for Palestine (AMP), along with 71 local, regional, and international partners issued a joint statement in response to this report. Human rights organizations and civil society have been calling for an independent review of Meta’s content moderation policies as they pertain to Palestine for years, so we commend the publication of this report.

Haaretz, Sept. 22, When the photography collector Bouky Boaz, who turned 60 this year, first came across the works of Karimeh Abbud, his heart skipped a beat. “It moved me. I realized there was something extraordinary there,” he says.  In the early 20th century, Karimeh Abbud photographed the landscapes and people of her homeland. A new exhibition provides an opportunity to learn about her importance in documenting Palestinian lives.

September 28, Israeli forces surrounded the former home of Raad Hazem, a Palestinian terrorist who killed three people in April, and killed his brother and three additional wanted men on Wednesday in the Jenin refugee camp, according to Israeli officials. Palestinians say that 44 people were wounded  and four killed during the exchange of gunfire.

Israeli raids on militant strongholds, especially in the Jenin area of the West Bank, have become a near-daily occurrence, especially since the Palestinian Authority’s security apparatus has all but given up on trying to maintain a semblance of order in the town. But the raid on Wednesday morning, which was aimed at arresting or killing two men who were allegedly involved in a number of shooting attacks, looks like an escalation. Unusually, Israeli forces entered Jenin in full daylight, and the scale of the operation and firepower used were irregular as well. Abed Fathi Hazem (whose brother murdered three Israelis in Tel Aviv five months ago) and Ahmed Nazmi Alawneh were both killed, and according to Palestinian sources, Israeli forces killed two more and wounded another 44. Furthermore, at least one of those killed is a member of Palestinian security forces. Fatah, the movement which dominates the Palestinian Authority has called for a “Day of Rage,” and marches on Israeli checkpoints.

Haaretz Opinion, Oh, the hysteria that gripped the proud Jewish nation. Prime Minister Yair Lapid dared say the forbidden words “two states for two peoples.” It was as though he spoke the explicit name of God aloud. Drums rolled. After all, the detractors said, it’s technically impossible. We’d have to evict at least 150,000, maybe 200,000 settlers. A guaranteed civil war. A rift not seen since the biblical kingdom was sundered into Israel and Judah.

Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas’ speech at the United Nations General Assembly last week was very emotive. The Palestinian leader, who was there at every major crossroad of Palestinian history – from the Nakba in 1948, through the defeat of 1967, to the Oslo Accords in 1993 – took to the podium at the general assembly and called upon the world again and again: end the occupation.

Haaretz, September 29, 2022, Israel’s refusal to release the body of a slain Palestinian attacker from East Jerusalem, coupled with a recent increase in the number of Jews visiting the Temple Mount, have sparked nightly clashes between Palestinians and police in the capital since last Thursday.

A 7-year-old Palestinian boy died on Thursday after falling to his death whilst being chased by the Israeli army in a Palestinian town in the West Bank, the Palestinian Health Ministry said.  The boy, Rian Suleiman, fell from a significant height whilst being pursued by Israeli soldiers in the Palestinian town of Teqoa, near Bethlehem, and was taken to hospital in a critical condition. He was pronounced dead soon after.

Israel’s Interior Minister Ayelet Shaked informed seven relatives of Fadi al-Qanbar—who killed four soldiers in 2017—that they must leave the country within the coming week after the government revoked the residency status of 17 family members.

WASHINGTON – Israel will open the Allenby Bridge border crossing between the West Bank and Jordan to allow around-the-clock access for a pilot period beginning October 24, nearly one month after the target date announced by U.S. President Joe Biden during his July visit to Israel.

Times of Gaza, The lsrasli occupation forces invaded Al-Hajiriya school in southern Hebron, assauledt the teachers and detained two Palestinian students after breaking into their classrooms.

Haaretz, Sep 29, 2022, The Israeli army will provide unauthorized West Bank settlement outposts with observation and warning systems, lighting, public address systems and firefighting equipment, the military announced on Thursday.  While West Bank outposts are illegal according to Israeli law, the military said the Justice Ministry approved the move.

Senior Palestinian Authority official Hussein al-Sheikh is set to travel to the U.S. on Saturday to meet with Biden administration officials amid Israel’s recent escalation in the West Bank. Hussein al-Sheikh, a potential successor to Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, is expected to meet Secretary of State Antony Blinken and Biden administration officials over the weekend.

Haaretz editorial, Sep. 30, The violent clash between soldiers and armed Palestinians in the Jenin refugee camp on Wednesday, in which four Palestinians, including two wanted men, were killed, may be the most serious incident that occurred recently, but it shouldn’t be seen as an unusual one. Over the last year, a difficult military situation has developed in the West Bank; dozens of Palestinians have been killed, hundreds have been arrested and the number of warnings of planned terror attacks

  Israel is holding nearly 800 Palestinians without trial or charge, the highest number since 2008, an Israeli rights group said Sunday. The group, HaMoked, which regularly gathers figures from Israeli prison authorities, said that 798 Palestinians are currently being held in so-called administrative detention, a practice where the prisoners can be held for months, do not know the charges against them and are not granted access to the evidence against them.  The group said the number of those held in administrative detention has risen steadily this year, as Israel conducts nightly arrest raids in the occupied West Bank in response to a spate of attacks against Israelis earlier this year.

Oct 3, 2022 Amira Hass  Through its conduct since Oslo, Israel has proven what the Palestinians have claimed for more than 100 years – that the goal of Zionism is to dispossess and expel them from their homeland.  Frenetic elections that take place with Italian frequency stands in contrast to the stability of Israeli policy in the West Bank (including East Jerusalem). By that, I mean the policy that, ever since the occupation began in 1967, has been breaking up Palestinian territory into as many small enclaves as possible, each surrounded and disconnected from each other by as many Jewish-only settlement blocs as possible. These blocs are expanding and are increasingly being connected to Israel by a network of roads that is upgraded frequently.

Haaretz, October 1, 2022, by Gideon Levy,  Settlers go on a rampage in a Palestinian town, throwing stones, smashing windows. Israeli police and soldiers watch from the side, but do nothing to restrain the settlers. Palestinians who try to defend themselves are beaten and arrested. Such is the story of Ahmad Shaaweet.

Sep 30, 2022  Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas offered harsh words to the Israeli military in a phone call with the father of Riad Suleiman, the 7-year-old Palestinian boy who died during an IDF raid of the village Teqoa in the West Bank, and promised to punish those responsible. During the call, the Palestinian President vowed to punish those responsible for the death of Riad Suleiman, a 7-year-old boy killed during an Israeli raid in the West Bank. The U.S. has called for an ‘immediate and thorough probe’

Israeli forces killed two Palestinians who tried to run over soldiers operating in the Jalazone refugee camp on Monday, the army spokesperson said.   The slain Palestinians were identified as Basel Basbous and Khalid Anbar. A third man, Salamah Ra’fat, was wounded, Palestinian media says.  Overnight, Israeli troops arrested sixteen suspects in the West Bank. Palestinians deny the claim that Basel Basbous and Khalid Anbar tried to harm the Israeli forces ■ Fatah announces a day of mourning for those killed.

Sabeel, Jerusalem, reported on October 3, 2022, The travel website, Booking.com, has labelled all accommodation in the West Bank as being in a ‘conflict affected area’. Reports state that the company had originally intended to call the area occupied but had been dissuaded by Israeli government officials. Sabeel calls upon Booking.com to return to their earlier wording of the West Bank as occupied territory. We pray that they will work to support Palestinian hotels and other accommodation rather than making moves which may serve to put tourists and pilgrims off travelling.

Palestinian prisoner Khalil Awawdeh, who ended a 172-day hunger strike in August following a decision to release him on 2nd October has had his release postponed by at least a week. Khali Khalil is being held on administrative detention, without charge or trial.

Kumi Now, on Tuesday, 4th October focuses on the topic of nonviolence in Palestine.  Sabeel  gives thanks for the resilience and steadfastness of our Palestinian people. We pray that the people Palestine continue to prove that justice is mightier than the sword and renew their commitment to nonviolence.

Week of September 26, 2022

Haaretz, Sep. 19, 2022, The parents of 70,000 East Jerusalem students did not allow their children to attend school Monday, protesting the city’s plan to remove textbook material the Education Ministry defined as “incitement.”

Sep 20, 2022,  One man was killed and seven wounded when clashes erupted in the early hours of Tuesday between armed men and the Palestinian Authority’s security forces in the West Bank city of Nablus. The clashes took place overnight between armed men and the Palestinian Authority who had entered Nablus to arrest Hamas operatives at Israel’s request.

Sep 21, 2022,  Jack Khoury

Representatives of the Palestinian faction of Nablus reached an agreement with the Palestinian Authority’s security forces on Wednesday, aiming to restore calm to the West Bank city that saw clashes erupt following arrests of Hamas operatives.  Arrests will only be made if suspects break Palestinian law, agreements states, ending violence that had followed the arrests of two Hamas men wanted by Israel.

Sep 21, 2022, Fewer than six months after a court order expelling the inhabitants of Masafer Yatta from their homes, life in the area has changed beyond recognition. Day-to-day existence had always been difficult in the eight small villages scattered through the area in the absence of basic facilities, even before Israel declared the area a military firing zone, but in recent months it has grown even worse amid the constant presence of the Israeli army and live-fire training. Roadblocks between the villages make it harder for the inhabitants to get in and out, and roads are closed to non-residents. As a result, many villagers have stopped using their cars. As in the old days, they ride donkeys or they walk. Six months after an Israeli court ruled that the residents of Masafer Yatta can be evicted, they describe what’s it like walking hours to the doctor, having little access to education and waking up to the sounds of explosions.

Sep 21, 2022, Thousands of West Bank Palestinians enter Israel illegally every day through breaks in the security fence, the commander of the Israel Police Central District said Wednesday. The Police Central District commander says that since the number of troops deployed along the separation barrier has been reduced, there has been a significant rise in property crime in Israel.

Amira Hass, Some 20 to 30 engineering corps soldiers, accompanied by a Border Police force, entered the village of al-Tuwani in the South Hebron Hills in the dead of night, visiting an archaeological dig within a residential neighborhood as part of a “selichot tour.” The soldiers heard a lecture from a civilian at an archeological site at a-Tuwani, where settlers claim a synagogue once stood. The IDF has raided the village often in recent nights, so many residents were awake when the soldiers arrived

Haaretz, September 22, The relatives of 43 Mexican students who were abducted and killed in 2014 protested on Wednesday outside of Israel’s embassy in Mexico, calling for the extradition of a former investigator, Tomas Zerón, wanted in connection with the case. During the protest, dozens of masked protestors vandalized the Israeli embassy with graffitied slogans, including “death to Israel.”Gideon Levy

Sep 22, 2022, Israel wants another intifada, there’s no question about it. There’s no other explanation for the unbridled behavior of the past few months, even if it’s not clear what possible benefit could come from additional pointless bloodshed. Pointless, but Israel wants it: What it’s been doing in the occupied territories lately will inevitably lead to another intifada. Israel knows this well. Thus, one has to conclude that this is what it wants.

In a video published Wednesday on Palestinian networks, the two policemen are seen standing in a square in the West Bank town, without any clear threat nearby, not in the road nor beyond the separation fence.  Two Border Police officers were recorded firing gas grenades at the Palestinian town of al-Ram, just outside of Jerusalem and beyond the separation barrier, for no clear reason.

Bulldozers destroyed the protest tents that demonstrators had built in Rahat, to protest against the sale of lots for housing for residents of the nearby unauthorized Bedouin village of Al-Zarnug, saying they should be given priority for the lots in light of the housing shortage in Rahat.  Police denied having approved the protest tents, erected in opposition to the plan to relocate hundreds of Bedouins from nearby unrecognized village to the city of Rahat. But documents signed by officials from the Rahat police station show that the protest was in fact approved.

The Defense Ministry will be expanding the number of permits it issues to Gazans allowing them to work in Israel, the Coordinator of Government Activities in the Territories announced on Thursday.  Defense Ministry decides to allow 17,000 Gazans to work in Israel in order to maintain stability in the region, in continuation of a policy that will see the number increase to 20,000.

September 23,In a West Bank ‘terrorist village,’ the family of Uday Salah is in mourning. The teen was shot to death by an Israeli sniper during a nighttime army raid, after the killing of an IDF officer. A family member says. “You accuse us of being terrorists. What do you expect of us when you come to the village to kill?” (Gideon Levy and Alex Levac)

Haaretz, September 25, A Palestinian organization calling itself the Lion’s Den has reported that one of its members has been killed during clashes with Israeli forces early Sunday morning in Nablus.

Times of Gaza, September 26, 2022, Sa’ed Al-Kuni, a Palestinian young man, was killed by the lsraeli occupation forces this dawn in Nablus city while riding his motorbike. 

 Reported by Sabeel, Jerusalem, September 26, 2022,  On Friday, 23rd September, Sabeel and the local churches held a special event.  Christians came together in the Old City of Jerusalem to highlight the existence of local Christians and to celebrate together the feast of the Raising of the Cross, after celebrations were limited by the Israeli occupation forces during Easter.

September 26th and 27th mark Rosh Hashanah, the Jewish New Year. During this time, Jews celebrate with prayer and sweets to bring in a new year full of sweetness and good fortune. At this time of year, the Israeli authorities also restrict further the movement of Palestinians by closing the checkpoints from the West Bank and Gaza over the days of the holidays and limit Muslim access to al-Aqsa Mosque to allow Jewish settlers to pray in the area. 

On Sunday, 25th September, Israeli settlers destroyed water pipes in the village of as-Sawiya to the south of the West Bank city of Nablus. They also plugged a spring which supplied the village. Control of water is just one of the multitude of ways in which settlers try to control the land in the West Bank, closing off springs and re-directing water courses to serve settlements or outposts rather than the Palestinian villages.

 On Thursday, 22nd September, new UK Prime Minister, Liz Truss, told Israeli PM Yair Lapid that she would “review” moving the British Embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem. Palestine’s Ambassador to the UK, Husam Zumlot remarked that “Any embassy move would be a blatant violation of international law and the UK’s historic responsibilities. It undermines the two-state solution and enflames an already volatile situation in Jerusalem, the rest of the occupied territories and among communities in the UK and worldwide.”

This week’s Kumi Now focusses on Bedouin Rights. On Tuesday, 27th September we will be joined by www.sidreh.org who will speak about the topic and highlight the plight of the Bedouin.  These communities work hard to protect their way of life, care for the land around them, and maintain their traditions in the face of imminent expulsion from their land.

Week of September 19, 2022

Haaretz, Sep 13, 2022 An Israeli settler sustained serious head injuries on Monday evening in a scuffle which broke out between settlers from the farm outpost and Palestinians in the South Hebron Hills.

In the fall of 1987, U.S. Secretary of State George P. Shultz urged then-President Ronald Reagan to bypass Israeli PM Yitzhak Shamir and go with a Shimon Peres-King Hussein peace initiative. ‘Can’t,’ Reagan replied.  This thwarted peace plan let to the first intifada.

Sep 14, 2022, As of Monday, 81 Palestinians have been killed  by Israeli civilians or as a result of the army’s increasing arrest operations in the West Bank in 2022, making it the deadliest in seven years.

An Israeli army officer was shot and killed on Wednesday morning during an exchange of gunfire with Palestinian militants, according to the military. The two militants, one of which worked in the Palestinian security services, were also killed. The al-Aqsa Martyrs’ Brigades has taken responsibility for the shooting.

Sep 15, 2022, A video that captured a violent brawl between Palestinians and Israelis in the West Bank earlier this week shows that the settlers arrived at Palestinians property armed with bats and firearms, seemingly corroborating the Palestinian account of events, flying in the face of original claims by an Israeli security official.

Palestinian children miss school for the past two days.  Since 2004, the children of Tuba have been escorted to and from school by Israeli soldiers to guard against settler violence, but for the past two days, the army has refused — and residents believe it is punishment for hurting a settler.

Israel’s ambassador to Chile publicly touted the signing of a new agricultural agreement between Santiago and Ramallah, tweeting a screenshot of a technical cooperation agreement acknowledging the Palestinian Authority as the “State of Palestine.” Israel’s ambassador to Chile tweeted his approval of a new agricultural agreement between Santiago and Ramallah from an official account, but the Foreign Ministry responds: ‘There is absolutely no endorsement of the state of Palestine or anything of the kind’

Haaretz, September 16, 2022, Gideon Levy and Alex Levac,  Two Palestinian boys, aged 11 and 15, each lost an eye after being shot by Israeli soldiers. The younger one has been denied entry into Israel to receive medical care because he is a ‘security risk.’ The older boy traveled to Jordan to try to save his eye.  They live a kilometer apart, have never met and probably never will. One is from a family of refugees and he lives in one of the grimmest, poorest and most crowded camps in the West Bank. The other, a few years older, lives with his mother and siblings in a relatively spacious home in an adjacent town. The father of the former is the camp imam. The father of the older boy has been living in Houston, Texas, for the past four and a half years, in the hopes of improving his life and obtaining U.S. citizenship for himself and his family, and securing a future for his children. For the boy from the refugee camp, however, there is neither a present nor a future.

Chile’s ambassador to Israel was reprimanded by the Foreign Ministry on Friday after Chile’s new left-wing president, a vocal critic of Israel, refused to accept the credentials of new Israeli Ambassador Gil Artzyeli on Wednesday, reportedly due to Israel’s escalation of military activities in the West Bank.

The Ministry of Tourism and Antiquities in the Gaza Strip announced on Friday “a major archeological finding”—the discovery of a stunning Byzantine mosaic. Hamas says it will issue an official statement providing additional details in the next few days. The mosaic floor, dating from between the 5th-7th centuries, was discovered a few months ago inside the Bureij refugee camp in central Gaza, approximately 1km from the Israeli border.   Earlier today, the Associated Press shared photos of the site and reported that a local farmer uncovered the mosaic whilst planting an olive tree, when his spade hit a hard surface. The farmer and his son started digging. Three months later, they uncovered the mosaic.

Around two months ago, the director of the Palestinian Authority’s Central Bureau of Statistics issued an unusual statement, one that in more normal times would have resonated on both sides of the Green Line. Dr. Ula Awad announced that for the first time, according to the bureau’s findings, parity exists in terms of the number of Jews and Arabs living between the Mediterranean Sea and the Jordan River. Each group numbers approximately 7 million people, she maintains. Among the Palestinians, some 3.2 million live in the West Bank and East Jerusalem, 2.1 million in the Gaza Strip, and within Israel there are 1.7 million Arab citizens.

Haaretz, September 19, 2022, The online travel reservation service Booking.com is planning on adding a warning to all properties in the West Bank owned by Israelis within a few days, stating that “visiting the area may be accompanied by an increased risk to safety and human rights, or other risks to the local community and visitors.”

Times of Gaza, lsraeli occupation forces detain a number of Palestinians in several predawn raids targeting different places in the West Bank.   

Reported by Sabeel, Jerusalem, September 19, 2022, Anglican priest and songwriter, Garth Hewitt, has released two new songs ‘Cry for Hope’ (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ogwDr-orP5k) and ‘Standing Against Apartheid’ (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nfmm7u2Arg0).

 On Saturday, 1st October 2022, Friends of Sabeel North America (FOSNA) will hold an online conference entitled “Christian Support for the State of Israel: Is it Biblical?” The conference will “hear from clergy in Bethlehem about the impact of this theology on the ground in the Holy Land and particularly how it affects the lives of the Christian community in Israel and Palestine.”

On September 23rd, Sabeel, with a coalition of Christian organizations and activists, will hold a one-day trip to the Old City of Jerusalem, the emphasis of the visit will be the Church of the Resurrection (Holy Sepulcher), a holy place for Christians. People will come from different cities and villages from the Holy Land. A time of fellowship will be held in the Armenian Quarter of the Old City.

 The Catholic Youth in Palestine held their annual conference in Nativity Square, Bethlehem from 16th – 19th September 2022. The well-attended and enjoyable festival was centered around the Bible and the prophets in the homeland of Jesus.   

Calls are growing for Israel to immediately release a Palestinian prisoner suffering from cancer who is in a critical condition and believed to be facing death. Nasser abu Hmaid who has been in prison since 2002 was transferred to Assaf Harofeh hospital near Tel Aviv where it is reported that he is near death.

 Israeli occupation authorities have so far issued more than 9500 administrative detention orders since 2015 until now, according to the Palestinian Prisoner’s Society (PPS). Administrative detention, the process of holding people in prison with no charge and no trial, is illegal under international law.

This week’s Kumi Now initiative focuses on the bloackade of Gaza.  On Tuesday, 20th September, we will hear from George Antone from Caritas in Gaza who works to respond to the healthcare crisis in the blockaded area.

Week of September 12, 2022

 September 6, 2022,

Haaretz, The U.S. Embassy in Israel has been asked to prepare an internal report on the Israeli army’s ultra-Orthodox Netzah Yehuda battalion, which has been mired in controversies relating to the abuse of Palestinians in the West Bank.  At the State Department’s request, staff at the American embassy in Israel have been conducting interviews with Israelis and Palestinians on the battalion’s conduct in the West Bank following reports of abuse of Palestinians.

The Jerusalem municipal planning and building committee has approved the construction of the Givat HaShaked neighborhood, which lies over the Green Line. The neighborhood, which is intended for the Jewish public, will be built next to the Palestinian quarter of Beit Safafa. The new Jewish neighborhood of Givat HaShaked will encroach on the Palestinian neighborhood of Beit Safafa

A 29-year-old Palestinian was shot dead in the West Bank city of Jenin on Tuesday during a live TikTok video he was filming of clashes between Israeli forces and Palestinians. About 15,000 people had been watching Sabaaneh’s live video of the Israeli army’s demolition of the home of a terrorist who killed three people at a Tel Aviv bar.

“I’m aware of the growing crime in the Arab society, and how easy it is to pull the trigger,” independent Arab journalist Nidal Agbaria said in an interview with Haaretz a year ago. On Sunday, after a year of constant threats, Agbaria was shot and killed near his home in the northern Israeli-Arab city of Umm al-Fahm. Previously, some 30 bullets were fired at his house in one incident, and in another his brother’s home was shot at.  ‘No one is safe in the Arab community,’ said a relative of independent Arab-Israeli journalist Nidal Agbaria, who was shot to death in Umm al-Fahm on Sunday.

OnlinePalEng,  Breaking|| Israeli occupation shot directly and injured two Palestinian young men while riding their motorcycle during the ongoing isrseli military raid into Jenin.

Times of Gaza, lsraeli occupation forces targeted a Palestinian paramedic while attending to the injured in Jenin this dawn.

Adalah Justice Preject,  Just today Ben & Jerry’s independent board filed a second lawsuit against parent company Unilever. Unilever has been attempting to override Ben & Jerry’s decision to end sales of its ice cream in Israeli settlements, all of which are illegal and constitute a war crime under international law. Unilever has sold the Ben & Jerry’s license to an Israeli licensee who is determined to  sell ice cream in illegal settlements against the wishes of Ben & Jerry’s.

Reported by Stop the Wall Campaign, September 7,  Apartheid Israel continues to escalate its ethnic cleansing measures against Palestinians living in eight villages in Masafer Yatta. Students and teachers in Masafer Yatta are particularly threatened and are sounding the alarm. On August 18, as students prepared to return to class, the schools of Jinba and Al-Fakheet, two major schools in Masafer Yatta, received demolition orders from the Israeli occupation authorities. They have also prevented both students and teachers from reaching their schools. They’ve confiscated cars transporting teachers to school, violently intimidated students and teachers, and stopped classes for hours every day.

Haaretz, Sep 7, 2022   Israel loosened the restrictions on foreign entry to the West Bank following international criticism over its latest requirement that foreigners inform Israel if they have a romantic relation with someone in the Palestinian territories and other travel restrictions on foreign students. Foreign visitors to the West Bank will no longer have to declare their romantic relationships with Palestinians and the quota on entry of outstanding students and lecturers was lifted. The U.S. has held ‘quiet and consistent’ talks with Israel in recent months, a U.S. embassy official said.

Israel’s military chief Lt. Gen. Aviv Kochavi criticized Palestinian security forces on Monday, saying that the increase in the number of terrorist incidents in the West Bank is due to their lack of resources. Chief of Staff Aviv Kochavi says the Palestinian security forces’ lack of governance in parts of the West bank is fertile ground for terrorism, leading the IDF to step in. But some in the security establishment criticized the military’s recent operations

Times of Gaza,  Sept. 7, lsraeli occupation forces block the road between Bidu and Al Jib towns, northwest of occupied Jerusalem, preventing students from going back to their homes.

Sept 8, The West Bank has seen a tensed night as several places, including Qalandiya camp,  were invaded by the lsraeli occupation forces.

Haaretz, Sept. 8,  A Palestinian man was shot dead after assaulting an Israeli soldier with a hammer early Thursday morning. The soldier, who was taking part in operations in the village of Beitin, near Ramallah, was lightly wounded. The attack took place amongst a series of clashes between Israeli forces and Palestinians during raids to arrest suspects in this week’s attack against an Israeli bus.

Special police forces arrested a 19-year-old Palestinian in possession of an assault rifle and two magazines in Jaffa, who has subsequently confessed to plotting to carry out a terror attack, according to Tel Aviv police. The 19-year-old man from the West Bank city of Nablus, who did not have an entry permit to Israel, was detained near the Jaffa Clock Tower after he aroused the suspicions of special forces in the busy area, according to sources in the police. In the preliminary investigation, he said that he “wanted to kill as many people as possible,” motivated by the death of a relative killed by the Israeli forces, the sources added.  In May, he was sentenced to four months in prison after he was caught in possession of a knife and resisted arrest near the Temple Mount in the Old City.  He told the police during the interrogation that “my ambition is to be a martyr,” and that his desire to carry out an attack was “because I hate Jews.”

Israel and the Palestinians have “reached a dead end with regard to everything related to the two-state solution,” and the Jordanian government must adjust its approach from solely promoting a Palestinian state to advocating for Palestinian rights within a unified country, one of the architects of the Israeli-Jordanian peace deal declared this week.

Sep 9, 2022, Israel is focusing its efforts on calming the security situation in the northern West Bank by putting pressure on Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, a government official told Haaretz on Thursday. An Israeli man was lightly wounded in a shooting early Friday, while the Israeli army conducted several overnight raids in the West Bank.

Times of Gaza,  The Palestinian, Hamad Abu Jildeh,  succumbed to his wounds today.  He was  shot by the lsraeli occupation forces and left bleeding during a military raid in Jenin camp last Tuesday.

Haaretz, Sep 11, 2022,  A 22-year-old Arab-Israeli man was shot by the army on Friday near the separation barrier in the city of Baka al-Garbiyeh. The Israeli army suspects the man was attempting to smuggle Palestinian workers into Israel. The shooting occurred during an attempt to smuggle Palestinians into Israel, according to the army, yet the incident was not initially reported by the soldiers at the scene.

A Palestinian man who is seen in an amateur video lying face down, bloody and motionless, as an Israeli policeman kneels on his neck, said Sunday that Israeli forces beat and detained him without provocation as he headed to pray at Jerusalem’s chief Muslim shrine.  Yousef Adi, 36, said that he suffered a broken nose and required four stitches on his forehead after last Thursday’s beating nearby the Al-Aqsa Mosque. The incident is the latest in a series of violent acts by Israeli police against Palestinians. Israeli police said the video distorted the facts, and they had used “reasonable force.”  Adi, a West Bank resident who works as a technician at Palestine TV, said he had all the necessary Israeli permits to enter Jerusalem. Inside the Old City, he said officers arbitrarily detained him and dragged him against a wall and began to beat him.

Haaretz, Sep 12, 2022,  Israel is promoting a plan to double the size of Har Gilo, a settlement just south of Jerusalem. The new satellite neighborhood is not slated to connect to the current settlement, and opponents of the plan argue the new neighborhood is in fact an entirely new settlement.

The chairman of the board of the Freedom Theatre in Jenin, was arrested on Sunday by Israeli forces while crossing through a military checkpoint in the West Bank, the Palestinian Wafa news agency reported. The Israeli security establishment confirmed that Bilal al-Saadi was in fact arrested, “but we cannot elaborate on additional details at this time.”  According to a statement issued by the theater’s spokespeople, al-Saadi had driven through the Za’atara military checkpoint between Ramallah and Nablus along with the theater’s producer, Mustafa Sheta. “They were both returning from a meeting with the culture minister in Ramallah. The Freedom Theatre is in contact with human rights groups who have been alerted of the situation. We are seeking further information and advice and will then inform people how they can campaign for Bilal’s release.”

Reported by Sabeel, Jerusalem, September 12, 2022, A long-lost Banksy mural called ‘Slingshot Rat’ originally painted in protest at the nine-metre-high separation wall in Bethlehem, has turned up in an expensive Tel Aviv art gallery. The artwork had been spray-painted on a concrete block that was part of an abandoned Israeli army position. It was later defaced with acrylic paint and then secretly removed. Banksy has worked in the West Bank and Gaza since 2005 to draw attention to the sufferings of the Palestinians living under Israeli occupation.

Next week Kumi Now will commemorate the International Day of Peace on Wednesday, the 21st of September by focusing on the need for peace in Gaza. Israel implemented a blockade on Gaza to punish Hamas for the 2006 election victory. In reality it is the children and families in Gaza who have been punished, suffering from increasing levels of poverty and deprivation.

Week September 7, 2022

Haaretz, August 29, 2022,  A few days after the Israeli military forced their way into the West Bank offices of Al-Haq, several people worked to fix its doors. The human rights group was one of seven NGOs raided on August 18, more than six months after Israel declared them terrorist organizations. The forces confiscated documents, printers and scanners from some of the organizations, but this did not happen at Al-Haq, which was relatively fortunate in this respect. Since the raid, many people have come to Al-Haq’s Ramallah office to show solidarity: ‘We’re concerned, but we’re keeping on with our work,’ says director Shawan Jabarin. ‘They want to silence us and control us’

Aug 30, An Israeli court on Tuesday sentenced the Gaza director of a major international charity to 12 years in prison after he was found guilty of terrorism charges, despite independent investigations that found no proof of wrongdoing.  Mohammed el-Halabi, the Gaza director for the international Christian charity World Vision, was arrested in 2016 and accused of diverting tens of millions of dollars to the Islamic militant group Hamas that rules the territory. The trial and his prolonged detention have further strained relations between Israel and humanitarian organizations that provide aid to Palestinians. The sentence is likely to continue to affect those ties. The trial sheds light on the way Israel’s legal system handles sensitive security cases, with the defense team given only limited access to evidence, which was also not made public. Critics say the courts too often side with the evidence brought forward by Israel’s security establishment.

Gideon Levy says, “Either El Halabi is one of Israel’s greatest and most dangerous enemies ever, as the indictment against him indicates – or he’s the victim of a cynical, cruel propaganda system that is exploiting him to stop the influx of international humanitarian aid into the Gaza Strip.”

Some 84 percent of all crime victims in Israel are Arabs, but updates from prosecutors on the progress of criminal cases and the online forms to apply to get them are available only in Hebrew.

Haaretz Opinion, Tens of thousands of Bedouin citizens who are eligible voters are unable to exercise their democratic right because their polling station is simply too far away. The message Israel is sending the Bedouin is clear – as far as we’re concerned, don’t vote.

Haaretz, August 30,  Israel’s High Court rejected a petition demanding the release of Khalil Awawdeh on Tuesday, a Palestinian hunger striker protesting his administrative detention, which was frozen in light of his deteriorating condition but not ultimately cancelled.  Khalil Awawdeh’s lawyer warns that 171 days into his hunger strike, he could die at any moment.

The police prosecution intends to sign a plea deal with an Israeli man who assaulted left-wing activists near the settlement of Bat Ayin. Young people threw stones at activists assisting Palestinian olive harvesters, and two attacked them with clubs.

Tuesday’s incidents in the West Bank, which will apparently merit at best a fleeting mention in most morning papers, , offer a glimpse into an increasingly high-intensity campaign that’s almost hidden from the public’s eyes, since it receives only a limited amount of media attention.

Aug 31, 2022, The Palestinian Prisoners’ Club announced Wednesday that one thousand security prisoners will go on hunger strike on Thursday in protest of what they say are measures the Israel Prison Service is preparing to take against them.  The director of the Palestinian Prisoners’ Club said they believe Israel’s prison service is trying to suppress their political movement in an organized crackdown, following recommendations by the state probe into the Gilboa prison break.

Times of Gaza, For the second day in a row, lsraeli occupation forces prevent a group of Palestinian students and teachers from commuting to their school in Masafer Yatta, Hebron.

Yazan Afaneh was killed by the lsraeli occupation forces earlier today.

Haaretz, September 1, 2022, 

Two Palestinians were shot and killed early Thursday in separate incidents during clashes with the Israeli army in the West Bank, the Palestinian Health Ministry said.  The Palestinian Health Ministry reports one man killed near Ramallah, and another by Palestinian fire near Nablus, during confrontations with the Israeli army.

The Supreme Court rejected an appeal Thursday by an Israeli convicted in the 2015 firebombing attack that killed three members of a Palestinian family in the West Bank, including a baby.  The judges rejected Amiram Ben Uliel’s claim that he was interrogated under torture. The Israeli was convicted of firebombing the Dawabsheh family’s home in the West Bank in 2015, killing a baby and his parents and severely wounding a 4-year-old boy

A Jewish Google employee who helped lead internal opposition against the company’s ties with Israel has resigned due to what she described as “retaliation, a hostile environment, and illegal actions by the company.”  “I have consistently witnessed that instead of supporting diverse employees looking to make Google a more ethical company, Google systematically silences Palestinian, Jewish, Arab, and Muslim voices concerned about Google’s complicity in violations of Palestinian human rights – to the point of formally retaliating against workers and creating an environment of fear,” she alleged.

Khalil Awawdeh, whose images shocked the world amid his more than 170-day strike, has ended his strike after striking a deal to be released October 2.

A Palestinian human rights organization has blamed Israel for the death of a young Gazan boy, after he was blocked from leaving the Strip to access medical treatment in Jerusalem. Farouk Abu Naja, 6, died last week after being prevented from attending two medical appointments in Jerusalem. Al Mezan says he is the third Gazan child to die this year after being denied access to medical treatment in Israel.Gideon Levy, Alex Levac.   Haaretz, Sep 2, 2022 During a protest near Hebron, Israeli troops fired rubber-coated bullets and then live ammunition at Mustafa al-Hasis, 16. Wounded, he was left to lie on the road before being allowed to receive medical care. Not long afterward, Momen Jaber, 15, was killed in the same spot.  Mustafa was cuffed and detained by Israeli troops- then released.  Mustafa al-Hasis slowly enters the room. A youth of 16 and a half, with a walker. His family hurry to bring him cushions so he’ll be more comfortable on the sofa; others scurry to bring fans. Tall and pale – his scarred and stitched-up left leg full of screws and platinum implants – he lies down slowly. He’s been ordered to keep his weight off the foot for three months.  

Times of Gaza, September 3, lsraeli settlers, escorted by the lsraeli occupation forces, organise a provocative march and assault the Palestinian families of Nabi Samuel village, north of occupied Jerusalem.

Haaretz, Analysis, Sep 4, 2022,  The West Bank is about to erupt, and Israel is doing little to stop it.  Most of Israel’s frequent security briefings focus on the new nuclear deal between the world powers and Iran. The maritime border dispute between Israel and Lebanon is still raging, accompanied by fierce threats from Hezbollah. But in every conversation with defense officials in the past several weeks, it is the Palestinian arena that tops the list of potential areas of escalation, particularly the West Bank.

Haaretz, September 4, New regulations on the entry of foreigners into the West Bank are expected to take effect on Monday, including a requirement that foreigners inform Israel if they have a romantic relation with someone in the Palestinian territories, as well as limitations on spousal visits and the entry of foreign students and lecturers.

Two suspects were arrested after six Israeli soldiers and one other passenger aboard a bus were injured in a shooting attack in the northern reaches of the West Bank on Sunday, according to an Israeli military spokesperson. The shooting took place in the Jordan Valley, near the Israeli settlement of Hamra.   Israeli soldiers raided the Palestinian village of Khirbet ‘Atuf near the site of the attack in search of suspects soon after the attack, Palestinian eyewitnesses confirmed.

A Hamas spokesperson praised the shooting, describing it as a “natural response to the occupation’s crime and its continued attack on the al-Aqsa Mosque.”

Two Palestinians in the Gaza Strip accused of spying for Israel have been executed, the Palestinian Interior Ministry in the Gaza Strip announced on Sunday. The Gaza Strip’s Interior Ministry alleged that both men had been in contact with Israeli authorities for years, if not decades. According to local rights groups, at least 15 death sentences have already been issued this year.

Times of Gaza, September 4, 2022, A Palestinian child suffers a heatstroke as the lsraeli occupation forces detained a group of teachers and students in Masafer Yatta, south of Hebron.

Haaretz, September 5, 2022, The Israeli army admitted on Monday that it is “highly probable” Palestinian-American journalist Shireen Abu Akleh was killed by an Israeli soldier.  An Israeli soldier under fire likely erroneously targeted Palestinian American journalist Shireen Abu Akleh, misidentifying her as an armed militant, according to an army probe ■ The IDF said it would not open an investigation into any soldiers.  It took almost four months, but on Monday the Israel Defense Forces issued its conclusions about the killing of journalist Shireen Abu Akleh, which appear to be as reasonable as they would have been were they published the day after the tragedy.

Israeli authorities refrain from enforcing demolition orders issued against the farm outposts, which are extremely common across the West Bank and take over large swaths of land. Israel’s civil administration is pushing forward with a plan that would allow the legalization of dozens of “farm outposts” across the West Bank using a new regulation

Times of Gaza, Filled with grief, Palestinians in Qabatiya bid farewell to slain Taher Zakarneh who was killed by the lsraeli occupation forces this morning.

Reported by Sabeel, Jerusalem, September 5, 2022,   Palestinian prisoner, Khalil Awawdeh, has ended a hunger strike which lasted more than 170 days, after the Israeli authorities agreed to his release in October. He is weak and frail and will have to remain in hospital until he has recovered some strength. He began his hunger strike after his arrest in December 2021 in protest at being held in Israel without charge or trial, on ‘administrative detention’. On this charge prisoners can be arrested on ‘secret evidence’ and cannot defend themselves in court. They are often held for renewable six-month periods that can lead to years of detention.

Last week the Beersheba District Court ruled against the appeal for the early release of Ahmed Manasra on the grounds of his deteriorating mental health. He was arrested at the age of 13 years in horrifying circumstances, interrogated and sentenced to nine years in prison. Despite his diagnosis of schizophrenia he has recently been kept in solitary confinement for ten months.

 The UN Human Rights’ Commissioner, Michelle Bachelot has deplored Israel’s refusal over the past two years to grant visas for  international staff to return to the UN Human Rights’ Office. She reminded the Israeli authorities of their obligations as a UN Member State to process UN visa applications as speedily as possible. She stated, ‘Israel’s treatment of our staff is part of a wider and worrying trend to block human rights’ access to the occupied Palestinian territory. This raises the question of what exactly the Israeli authorities are trying to hide.’

 Sabeel, in partnership with Jussor from Nablus, are organising a special event on Friday, the 9th of September. The event will be an opportunity for the community of Nablus, including Samaritans, Muslims and Christians to come together to show their gratitude and respect for the devoted service of Father Ioustinos, who is recovering from a recent attack by Palestinian criminals who broke into the Greek Orthodox Jacob’s Well Church.

 More than 1.3 million Palestinian schoolchildren living in the occupied territories are at risk as they start back at school, according to the UN. Since the beginning of the year twenty children have been killed in the West Bank, while seventeen children died in Gaza during the Israeli offensive in July. Many schools are overcrowded and 6,400 children attend schools which have been targeted for demolition by the Israeli authorities.

Next week Kumi Now will focus on the West Bank city of Bethlehem and how the Israeli occupation has ravaged its economy. At the north end of Bethlehem lies Rachel’s Tomb, which is a site sacred to Christians, Muslims and Jews alike. However in 2002 Israel annexed the tomb, built high walls around it and prohibited Palestinians from visiting the site. Thriving Palestinian businesses in the area have now all closed down.

Week of August 29, 2022

Haaretz, August 22, 2022,  Following American pressure to ease Palestinian travel, Israel declared it would arrange special flights departing from the country’s south,  Ramon Airport, near the Red Sea resort city of Eilat.  This plan has been postponed without providing an adequate justification or timeline with no new date for its implementation given.

August 23, Young Gazans are being disconnected from the outside world. Two young women in Gaza describe what it’s like to live under a blockade that just entered its 15th year. ‘I would love to get out,’ says one, ‘but there’s no such thing for young people’ The latest round of fighting between Israel and Palestinian Islamic Jihad in the Gaza Strip came shortly after a grim milestone was marked in the coastal enclave: 15 years since the beginning of the blockade.

Haaretz, Opinion, August 24, 2022,  Israel is currently holding 723 detainees without trial. All of them are Arabs; 11 are Israeli citizens. This number, reported by Haaretz’s Hagar Shezaf on Monday, should shock every law-abiding citizen, judge and attorney – and anyone who still believes in human rights. The figure is only a partial one and reflects a picture that is true to one particular moment, one day, and does not include the dark history of the use of administrative detention against thousands of people throughout the years of the occupation.

 Haaretz, Aug 24, 2022,. The Central Elections Committee has rejected a demand to place polling stations on Election Day in Bedouin communities in southern Israel that are not recognized by the state. Ruling means some residents must travel up to 40 miles to reach their polling stations, driving down voting rates in these villages.

The Israeli Army suspended four soldiers on Wednesday who were recorded on video beating Palestinians near Ramallah.  An investigation of the incident found that the soldiers had ‘behaved violently and used unnecessary force’

At least three vehicles with punctured tires were found on Wednesday morning in the West Bank village of Marda, north of the Jewish settlement of Ariel.  Over the past year, Marda has become a frequent target of so-called “price tag attacks” – various acts of vandalism committed by Jewish settlers. In March, four cars were pelted with rocks, leading to the arrest of three Jewish suspects.  In addition to puncturing tires, the suspects sprayed anti-Arab sentiments and a Star of David on a wall in the West Bank village.

Times of Gaza, August 24, Palestinians in Nablus bid final farewell to Muhammad Araysheh who succumbed today to his wounds sustained two weeks ago in an lsraeli gunfire.

August 25, lsraeli occupation forces confiscate a Palestinian-owned vehicle during a military raid in Silwad, northeast of Ramallah city this morning.

New security camera records document how the lsraeli occupation forces kidnapped the body of the Palestinian Mohammad Shaham after murdering him about a week ago in his own house in Kafr Aqab, occupied Jerusalem.

Haaretz, Gideon Levy, Aug 26, 2022,  Salah Sawafta, 58, left the mosque and was walking home when a bullet to the head killed him. The shot was most likely fired by one of the IDF snipers on the fourth floor of an office building, who were spraying the street below with live ammunition. Now the army is trying to shirk responsibility.  The wedding of Sawafta’s daughter Dunya, 22, was set for today, Friday. Invitations had gone out to about 1,000 guests for the celebration at the Al-Kalah wedding hall in Nablus. His new suit was also ready. Last Friday, at the conclusion of morning prayers in the mosque in Tubas, he told his friends that he was hurrying home because he had to go to Nablus: There were still arrangements to make for the wedding.

Palestine Online, August 28, Palestinian children were stuck in traffic due to the Israeli military checkpoints and cried as the Israeli occupation forces were firing gas canisters at Palestinian cars for no reason.

Haaretz, August 28, 2022, A security guard at Israel Railways allegedly assaulted activists from an anti-occupation organization and prevented them from entering a train station in Tel Aviv on Thursday. The activists said the guard argued that the shirt one of them was wearing, bearing the name of the organization, Looking the Occupation in the Eye, was liable “to trigger a provocation.”

Three Palestinians, Islamic Jihad operatives according to Haaretz, were seriously injured during one of Israel’s nightly raids in Jenin in an exchange of fire with IDF soldiers.

Israel Police on Sunday played down reports by Jewish worshippers about their ascent to the Temple Mount under the supervision of an officer through a gate reserved for Muslims, in violation of the status quo at the disputed holy site. Hamas referred to the entrance of Jewish worshippers through the Gate of the Tribes, which is reserved for Muslim entrance only, a ‘serious escalation.’ While the incident does not signal a change in government policy, Jewish groups are taking the opportunity to call for additional Jewish entry.

This week, kids from all over Israel will start a new school year. They’ll be learning all the usual subjects: history, literature, math, English. But there’s one subject the Education Ministry insists will not be in this year’s curriculum: the truth. The truth about living in this country.  When Israel’s education ministry ordered the removal of maps showing the 1967 borders from classrooms, it was the just the most recent blatant, dangerous, absurd attempt to erase the occupation – and the Palestinians.

Aug 29, 2022

A new tourist attraction made its debut in Jerusalem this summer: Farm in the Valley. The pro-settler Elad Association, which operates the attraction, promises on its website to offer “a special agricultural experience, where you can feel with your hands the work of ancient farmers, in keeping with the season, just as in ancient times.” After striking down roots in the East Jerusalem neighborhood of Silwan, the right-wing association Elad has marked the Hinnom Valley for its next expansion project.

At least eight Palestinians were wounded on Monday, one of them seriously, during an exchange of fire with Israeli forces in the town of Kabatia near Jenin, Palestinian reports say.  All of the eight injured were transferred to nearby hospitals. Israel’s military spokesperson’s unit said in a statement that it had arrest nine Palestinians suspected of terror activity in the West Bank throughout the night.

Reported by Sabeel, Jerusalem, August 29, 2022,  Wadi Rabah is an area in the occupied West Bank which is extremely important for the conservation of wild animals and delicate biodiversity. It also needs protection as it forms a corridor for millions of migratory birds flying across the Jordan River to the Mediterranean. Experts and activists are concerned that plans to build the Nahal Rabah cemetery for settlers in this sensitive area have been passed without an environmental survey. 

Last week Father Ioustinos, the 81-year-old Archimandrite of the Greek Orthodox Church of Jacob’s Well was injured by some Palestinians who broke into the church. Father Ioustinos is much respected in his Nablus community and has worked for years to restore the church and monastery after they were damaged in the 1927 earthquake. This is one of many attacks he has had to endure and the Palestinian Authority have been criticised for not providing sufficient levels of security in this area which is under their supervision.

On Thursday, the 25th of August, hundreds of Palestinian detainees throughout the Israeli prison system began a sit-in protest in prison courtyards. They are protesting against the harsh measures taken by Israeli prison authorities to constantly transfer Palestinian prisoners with longer sentences and to keep them in solitary confinement.  

Last week Human Rights’ Watch wrote an open letter to the Biden Administration about the Israeli governments’ targeting of seven notable Palestinian Civil Societies. They have been designated as ‘terror’ organisations by the Israeli Defence Minister. The UN and nine European Foreign Ministries have stated that there is no substantial information to support this designation and that the organisations should continue to receive funding. However  the letter states that the Biden Administration has not voiced concern over the lack of evidence and is ‘effectively acquiescing’ to repressive attacks on Palestinian civil society.

It is the start of the new academic year in Palestine and Israel and students will be returning to classes which are funded quite differently. Next week Kumi Now will consider the unjust discrimination faced by Palestinian citizens of Israel when it comes to educational funding from the Israeli authorities.

Week of August 16, 2022

ON THE GREOUND IN PALESTINE

Haaretz, Aug 10, 2022. Archaeologists at Bar-Ilan University have been conducting an archeological excavation for the past few weeks in a location called Khirbet Tibnah, close to the West Bank village of Nabi Salih. Villagers claim that the excavation is happening on privately owned land, but the university says that they are digging on state lands in accordance with the Civil Administration in Judea and Samaria. Bassem Tamimi says he has Jordanian documents proving his ownership over the land.

A Palestinian boy from East Jerusalem was severely beaten by police officers during his arrest and while in custody, an Israeli judge has found.  After being held for three days, a medical exam following the boy’s release found clotted blood in his ear and a swollen upper lip. Police, however, insist his rights were protected throughout the process.

August 11, The Israel Prison Service’s director of medicine said that Awawdeh – one of the imprisoned Palestinians who Islamic Jihad claimed would be released as part of its cease-fire conditions – should be transferred to a public hospital immediately. Khalil Awawdeh, a Palestinian held by Israel who has been on a hunger strike for 147 days, is now at risk of permanent neurological damage, doctors said Thursday, warning that his health is rapidly deteriorating.

Aljazeera, August 11, 2022,  Almost 40 Palestinian children have been killed so far this year in the occupied territories and in many incidents, Israeli forces appear to use lethal force in a manner that violates international human rights law, UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Michelle Bachelet said.  The United Nations rights chief issued a statement on Thursday expressing “alarm” at the large numbers of Palestinians – particularly children – who have been killed and injured by Israeli forces in occupied Palestinian territory so far this year.

Haaretz, August 11,  A large army force raided the village of Palestinian human rights activist Nasser Nawajah. He was taken handcuffed and blindfolded into detention for 14 hours – all for a 15-minute talk with a Shin Bet agent who advised him to moderate his behavior.

August 12, Gaza’s death toll rises to 49 as 22-year-old Anas Khaled Anshasi, wounded in an Israeli air strike east of Khan Yunis in the southern Gaza strip, succumbs to his wounds.

Aug 12, 2022. According to unofficial estimates, more than a hundred houses were destroyed after Israel launched an operation against Islamic Jihad targets across Gaza.  Qatar has agreed to finance the restoration of the houses destroyed during the latest conflict in Gaza, the head of Hamas’ political wing Ismail Haniyeh said in a statement on Friday.

Reported by B’tselem. August 16,  Israel: sends soldiers to confiscate solar panels from Palestinians living in the heart of the desert. Yesterday in Khirbet Qawawis, 13 solar panels were confiscated from 6 families numbering 40 people. By B’tselem.

Haaretz, August 16, 2022,  Israeli defense officials have confirmed that Israel was responsible for the deaths of five minors killed on the last day of the recent hostilities with Islamic Jihad this month.  Immediately after their deaths on the final day of the recent Israel-Gaza flare-up, Israeli senior officers had said the five were likely killed by a misfired Islamic Jihad rocket, a day after what was initially seen as a similar incident.

Reported by Sabeel, Jerusalem, August 17, 2022,  The Israeli District Court in Jerusalem has just ordered the immediate demolition of a school for the village of Ein Samiya and neighbouring nomadic communities, near Ramallah. The school opened in January 2022, after being funded by countries from the European Union. The court order requires the petitioners to demolish the school themselves or else to pay for Israeli bulldozers to come and destroy it.

 An Israeli bus company, Tnufa has had to issue an apology after it was revealed that fifty Palestinian workers were forced to get off one of its buses. Last week three Jewish passengers had boarded the bus in a suburb of Tel Aviv and then complained that they would not travel with the Palestinians and that the driver must demand that they disembark. More than 100,000 Palestinians in the West Bank have permits to cross into Israel and West Bank settlements, where most of them are employed as construction workers and gardeners. 

Israeli forces entered the Silwan neighbourhood of East Jerusalem to demolish the home of Hazem Abu Sneineh on Wednesday, the 4th of August. Israeli police and a crew of municipal workers with a bulldozer came to flatten his home on the pretext that he had no building permit. While extensive programmes of settler homes are built in the occupied Palestinian territories, hardly any building permits are ever granted to Palestinians.

Shireen Abu Akleh’s memory has been honoured with a monument set up on the street in Ramallah which now bears her name. The Palestinian American journalist is depicted on the monument carrying out her work covering an Israeli military operation outside a refugee camp in Jenin. Despite the fact that she was wearing a vest clearly marked ‘Press’ and a helmet, she was shot and killed. Investigations carried out by the Palestinian Authority and the United Nations have established that the Al Jazeera journalist was shot by Israeli forces.

Next Tuesday Kumi Now will remember the Jerusalem Declaration on Christian Zionism which was made on the 22nd of August, 2006. Palestinian Christians wrote this declaration to address the threat of Christian Zionism. Palestinians are seen as alien residents in Israel and Arab Christians are dismissed by Christian Zionists, who believe in the sovereignty of the Jews over the whole land.

Week ending August 9, 2022

Haaretz, Jul 25, 2022, About a month ago, the technology giant Apple made a surprising announcement: not only does it currently employ about 60 engineers in the Palestinian city of   Rawabi in the West Bank, it also plans to further increase its workforce there. Although these numbers pale in comparison to Israel, where the number of Apple employees is estimated at 2,000 people, this is still encouraging news for the Palestinians, with the potential to become a pillar of the Palestinian economy.

Jul 26, 2022 The Israeli military on Tuesday demolished the homes of two Palestinians who were behind the shooting in the settlement of Ariel in back in April which left one Israeli dead.  The Israeli military claims that hundreds of Palestinians threw rocks, blazing tires, fireworks and explosives at the troops operating to destroy the attackers’ residence.

Jul 28, 2022 The American Israel Public Affairs Committee’s grand experiment venturing into the campaign space via a political action committee will face its biggest test next week, when Reps. Andy Levin and Haley Stevens will face off in the Democratic congressional primary for Michigan’s 11th district. The United Democracy Project has spent nearly millions to support Congresswoman Haley Stevens against Rep. Andy Levin ahead of next Tuesday’s Democratic primary. J Street, meanwhile, is backing the Jewish incumbent.

Ben-Gurion University of the Negev summoned Watan Madi, a student and left-wing activist affiliated with the Hadash party’s campus chapter, to disciplinary proceedings on Monday over a Mahmoud Darwish quote she read at a Nakba Day rally — the university claims that reading the call by the famed Palestinian poet to “not forget the martyrs” constitutes support for terrorism.

Israel’s Supreme Court ruled against the evacuation of settlers living in the Mitzpeh Kramim outpost near Ramallah on Wednesday, reversing a previous ruling that ordered their removal. Two years ago the court ruled that the Mitzpeh Kramim outpost could not be recognized because the sale of its lands to settlers was not made in ‘good faith,’ but an expanded panel now reversed that ruling.

After a wave of violence between Jews and Arabs across Israel last May, the government is paying millions of shekels in compensation to mixed Jewish-Arab cities for damage caused duri ng Operation Guardian of the Walls, but is not compensating Arab cities and local authorities that also suffered damage.

Jul 29, 2022,  Three Jewish men were charged Thursday with terrorism and related offenses for allegedly throwing Molotov cocktails at an Arab man. The three suspects went to a beach in northern Israel with the express purpose of attacking Arabs, the indictment claims.

Muatasem Abbasi and Khalaf Huwarin, two Palestinian construction workers, left home for work but never returned. Both of them were killed in horrific accidents – Abbasi was hit by a concrete container that detached from a crane, and Khalaf was crushed when a wall collapsed on him – leaving behind emotionally and financially devastated families. Those responsible got off lightly. 

The state has filed just 90 indictments in the 379 cases of work-related deaths in Israel in the last five years, with offenders often receiving mild punishments.

A mentally ill Palestinian is held in isolation in an Israeli prison, with no release in sight.  At the age of 13 he participated in a terrorist attack in which his cousin stabbed and seriously wounded two Israelis. He himself was sentenced to 9 and a half years in prison, but his mental situation deteriorated. The UN and hundreds of thousands of people around the world are calling for his release.

A group of Palestinians opened fire on an Israeli military outpost near Nablus on Thursday overnight, instigating a gun fight which left at least three Palestinians wounded.

Reported by Palestine Electronic Forces,  Israeli occupation forces opened fire on a car, wounding three Palestinians, near Hawara Checkpoint, south of Nablus. One of them was detained.

[My question: Is this the same incident?]

@Timesofgaza, July 39, 2022,

A Palestinian child Amjad Abu Alia was shot to death by the Israeli occupation forces in Al-Mughayyir village, northeast of Ramallah. 

Reported by DCIP, August 10, 2022, Israeli forces agreed to a ceasefire late Sunday night, after 16 Palestinian children in Gaza had been killed. Then, Israeli forces shot and killed two 16-year-old Palestinian boys in the occupied West Bank barely more than a day later.  Hussein Jamal Hussein Taha, 16, was shot and killed by Israeli forces while shopping for groceries with his father and younger brother in Nablus on Tuesday morning. A few hours later in Hebron, 16-year-old Momen Yasin Mohammad Joude Jaber was shot dead with a live round to the chest with by an Israeli soldier.

Times of Gaza, August 9, Israeli occupation forces raided Shu’afat camp in Jerusalem and demolish three Palestinian-owned houses.

Haaretz, Aug 9, 2022,  Three Jewish passengers who boarded a bus on its way to the West Bank forced the removal of dozens of Palestinians. The bus operator claims that one of the passengers pretended to be a Transportation Ministry official and threatened the driver.

A 17-year-old Palestinian was killed by Israeli fire in Hebron on Tuesday, the Palestinian Health Ministry said, as clashes erupt across the West Bank hours after a military raid in Nablus left at least three Palestinians dead, including a 16-year-old.

Israel’s Civil Administration in the West Bank demolished a Palestinian family’s home in the South Hebron Hills despite a court order barring it from being torn down.  Israel’s Civil Administration claims the property was mistaken for another. The owner of the house said inspectors ignored him when he said a court order barred the demolition.  He now lives in a tent with his children.

Reported by Sabeel, Jerusalem, August 11, 2022, Next week, on Friday the 19th of August, Kumi Now will mark World Humanitarian Day.

On this day we advocate for humanitarian aid workers and for all those affected by crises around the world. At the same time we call to mind the massive cuts in US humanitarian aid to Palestinians and for the suffering of refugees living in Gaza, Syria and the Lebanon now living in dire need.

 Palestinian students have succeeded well in their Tawjihi high school general certificate examinations this summer. More than 85,300 students took the exam in the West Bank, Jerusalem and Gaza and there was an overall pass rate of over 68 per cent.

After three days of fighting, Israel and Islamic Jihad have agreed to a ceasefire negotiated by Egypt. The death toll in Gaza reached 44, including 15 children, and 360 injured due to Israeli airstrikes.

Nineteen families have left the herding community of Ras a Tin in Area C in the West Bank, with many of them relocating to Area B. The community was formerly made up of 35 households, comprising 250 people. It has been subjected to continual harassment from Israeli forces with frequent damage to their homes and livestock structures, as well as violent assaults from settlers, including a recent arson attack.

Nuzhah ‘Afanah, a young Palestinian woman with a Palestinian Authority identity card was arrested on Wednesday, the 29th of June, when her husband was driving her and their two baby daughters in East Jerusalem. Under the Citizenship and Entry into Israel Law, (2003) Nuzhah is required to have a temporary permit to allow her to enter East Jerusalem, but these permits are rarely, if ever, granted. She was taken to the police station to be interrogated and then driven to Checkpoint 300 in southern Jerusalem and left there alone in the middle of the night. Relatives had to go and collect the young children and later go and rescue her.

 Nabil Ghanum,(53), lived in Sara, a village near Nablus. On Sunday, the 19th of June, Nabil tried to cross through one of the gaps in the separation barrier near Qalqiliyah Checkpoint to enter Israel to work. As soon as he crossed the fence with some other Palestinian workers, Israeli soldiers fired at them. Nabil was shot and injured and later died of his wounds in an Israeli hospital. The B’Tselem report of this incident states that, ‘the opening of live fire against Palestinians seeking to work in Israel is unlawful and cannot be justified’.

Musicians Michele Cantoni and his wife Mathilde decided to move to Palestine and have dedicated their lives to supporting young Palestinians. They set up the Amwaj Choir in 2015, an Arabic name meaning waves. There are sixty choir members between the ages of 7-21 years. They come from cities, refugee camps and rural areas in the Bethlehem and Hebron area. Standards are high and the choir members are expected to rehearse for 6-8 hours each week.

 The Ramallah-based Lawyers for Justice group have reported that 94 activists have been arrested by the Palestinian Authority over the past two months. This is one of the widest political arrest campaigns in years. Students and journalists have been among those arrested, but none have been charged with offences. Many were released after ten days in prison, but twenty remain in detention.

Week Ending July 25, 2022

Palestine Electronic Forces, July 19, 2022,

For the 204th time in a row, Israeli occupation authorities have demolished Al-Araqib village in the Al-Naqab desert, leaving its residents homeless, today morning.

Reported by DCIP, July 19, In October last year, the Israeli government effectively outlawed our work documenting human rights violations against Palestinian children by designating Defense for Children International – Palestine (DCIP) and five other Palestinian civil society organizations as “terrorist organizations.” Last week, nine EU countries—Belgium, Denmark, France, Germany, Ireland, Italy, the Netherlands, Spain and Sweden—rejected that designation. And yesterday, 22 members of the U.S. Congress, led by Rep. Ayanna Pressley, rejected the designation and sent a letter demanding the Biden   administration do the same.

Haaretz, July 19,  The Nachala settlement movement is planning to erect three unauthorized outposts throughout the West Bank on Wednesday, despite Defense Minister Benny Gantz’s warning that security forces have been instructed to prevent their establishment.

Israeli military aircraft attacked the Gaza Strip on Tuesday in retaliation for gunfire from the strip that hit an industrial building in an Israeli town near the border earlier in the day, Palestinian media reported.

Jul 20, 2022,  WASHINGTON – State Prosecutor Glenn Ivey is projected to defeat former Rep. Donna Edwards in a Maryland Democratic primary for the House of Representatives, undoubtedly buoyed to victory by AIPAC’s $6 million investment in the race, more than AIPAC  has spent in any race to date.

Jul 22, 2022  Israel’s High Court of Justice partially granted a petition by a Palestinian family in the East Jerusalem neighborhood of Silwan on Thursday to postpone their eviction until a further hearing.  The verdict, along with a similar one on Sheikh Jarrah, complicates settler groups’ strategy of getting Palestinian families in East Jerusalem evicted.

Jul 21,  NEW YORK – Although there are plenty of Middle Eastern eateries in New York City, it’s stil rare to find ones that are branded as Palestinian. As you enter the Ayat Palestinian bistro in Brooklyn, it’s hard to miss the political context that accompanies your meal. The walls are covered with paintings of olive branch-bearing doves and writings calling to end the occupation and live in peace. A large mural shows a Palestinian woman crying while looking at an Israeli soldier aiming his gun at an imprisoned Palestinian underneath Jerusalem’s Dome of the Rock. The message is very clear at this restaurant that promises “honest, authentic Palestinian food made with love.”

TIMES OF GAZA Under the protection of occupation forces, Israeli settlers break into Tell es-Sultan area in Jericho for the second day in a row.

July 22,  Israel is to build a new wall along the borderlines of Hebron to restrict Palestinians.

 

Israeli settlers cut down dozens of olive trees in Palestinian lands in the village of Turmus Ayya, east of Ramallah.

Haaretz, Jul 22, 2022,   Gideon Levy,  Seventeen families, 120 souls, in search of a home. This week they were joined by other families, and the number of homeless among them will rise to 140. Their children’s school, which they built with much toil, is now shuttered and unlikely to reopen. Their 3,000 sheep also remained behind – there is no place to move them to from their present pastures. Their owners may thus have no choice but to sell them and thereby eliminate their one source of income, which is also their way of life. On six occasions Israel has expelled the Ka’abneh tribe from the lands it has lived on since it was first expelled in 1948. Last week, it was forced to uproot again, this time after being terrorized by settlers. Shepherd families without homes, without flocks.

Jul 23, 2022, Israeli researchers put American cops through an intensive course of respectful communication, then examined the effects in the field. Not only did the number of arrests plummet – so did crime.  Researchers, led by Prof. David Weisburd, a Hebrew University of Jerusalem criminologist, conducted an intensive course for police officers in three cities in the United States (Houston, Tucson, and Cambridge, Massachusetts) based on a model known as “procedural justice.” Addressing the encounter between police and the citizenry, this concept focuses on making the interaction between them fair and dignified: Has the citizen been given the opportunity to voice his or her side, do the police show respect and project neutrality?

A Palestinian infant got suffocated last night due to tear gas inhalation following an Israeli raid in Silwan during which a considerable number of Palestinians sustained injuries, including children.

@Timesofgaza

Haaretz, July 24, 2022 . Two Palestinians were killed early Sunday morning in an exchange of fire with Israeli forces in Nablus, Israeli and Palestinians officials said.  The two killed were members of Al-Aqsa Martyrs’ Brigades, according to the group, and police say they shot at members of an elite anti-terrorism force as part of a larger firefight.  (A wanted militant showed  up at the funeral.)

Israel’s navy destroyed a Palestinian boat overnight into Sunday off the coast of the southern Gaza Strip, in what Israel described as a thwarted weapons smuggling attempt, and what Palestinians dubbed harassment of local fishermen.

 Reported by Sabeel, Jerusalem, July 25, 2022, Churches for Middle East Peace, a coalition of thirty US churches, released a statement on Tuesday, the 19th of July, expressing disappointment with President Biden’s visit to Israel and Palestine. It stated, ‘while affirming the US/Israel relationship and the billions of dollars of US assistance that go with it, the President said almost nothing about the abuses committed by Israel with that assistance against Palestinians’. 

The US Presbyterian Church has declared that Israel’s treatment of the Palestinian people constitutes apartheid. The General Assembly voted decisively for the resolution on Friday, the 8th of July.

The Palestinian composer, Ahmed Abu Abed won first place at the USA Music Composition International Competition in June 2022. Abu Abed is a music teacher at the Modern American School in Amman, Jordan. He will travel to New York in early 2023 to perform his prize-winning piece before a live audience. 

Young Palestinian musicians were invited to perform concerts in Ankara and Istanbul this July. Palestinians from the diaspora joined together with musicians from the Edward Said National Conservatory of Music in Ramallah to perform with Turkish musicians from the Presidential Symphony Orchestra. The young musicians wanted to send a message of peace through their concert performances.

On Tuesday the 2nd of August the Kumi Now community looks at the Geneva Convention, adopted in 1949. Article 33 of the fourth Geneva Convention outlaws the use of collective punishment. And yet, Israel has used collective punishment as one of the key components in its policies towards Palestine, apparently without drawing down international condemnation.

Week ending July 17, 2022

Haaretz, Jul 12, 2022,  Amira Hass

At 7:30 PM, the assailants arrived at the tent where Hajar and Mustafa Ka’abneh live in the family encampment at Ras al-Tin, northeast of Ramallah. “We were sitting in the tent, and suddenly, four civilian cars and a military one showed up,” Ka’abneh said. “Around 15 Settlers got out of them and another four or five soldiers. I stood at the entrance to the tent. More than one settler attacked me. One of them beat me with a club and someone sprayed pepper spray into my eyes. My wife came out, and one of them attacked her with a club. Not one strike. Five. She passed out.” With clubs and threats, residents of 10 Israeli shepherd outposts north of Ramallah are chasing Palestinians off their land. The pattern repeats itself: attacking Palestinians and then claiming they were attacked first.

Jul 12, 2022, Defense Minister Benny Gantz approved Tuesday several confidence-building measures for Palestinians in the West Bank, a day before U.S. President Joe Biden’s arrival in Israel, including West Bank construction for Palestinians.  Defense Minister Gantz also approves registering 5,500 Palestinians with no legal status, as well as raising the number of Gazans allowed to cross into Israel.

Jul 13, Palestinians from the West Bank village of Masafer Yatta have asked High Court of Justice to issue an interim injunction barring the Israeli military from continuing the training exercises that have been underway the past three weeks after a village home was struck by a bullet last Wednesday.

Nine European countries issued a joint statement on Tuesday saying they will continue working with six Palestinian organizations that Israel outlawed last year because Israel had failed to prove its claim that they should be considered terrorist organizations.

Reported by OFIP (Ottawa Forum Israel Palestine), A recent report by the Norwegian Refugee Council calculates that Israel has displaced a total of 1,657 people as a result of the demolishing of 1,269 structures in the occupied West Bank, including East Jerusalem, since Joe Biden was elected in November 2020. That is an average of 3 people per day.  Since the Canadian federal election on 21 September 2021, 628 structures have been demolished and 735 Palestinians in the West Bank including East Jerusalem.
This works out to an average of 2.5 Palestinians displaced per day (18 per week) since Trudeau took office. So far, neither Trudeau nor the Foreign Minister Mme Joly have made any public comment about the actions of Israel which Canada describes as a “friend and ally”.

Haaretz,  July 13, Hours before President Joe Biden landed in Israel on Wednesday, the Israeli human rights group B’Tselem has erected billboards in the West Bank addressing the U.S. president in English and accusing Israel of running an apartheid regime.

Sixty Palestinians were killed in incidents involving the Israeli security forces in the West Bank over the first six months of 2022, compared to 70 such deaths in the whole of 2021. So far, Israeli Military Police investigators have opened investigations into just over a quarter of the incidents. The number of deadly incidents was significantly lower in previous years: 19 in 2020 and 20 in 2019.

Jul 14, 2022. U.S. President Joe Biden and Prime Minister Yair Lapid on Thursday will sign a landmark strategic declaration on the U.S.-Israel alliance, detailing America’s commitment to Israel’s security, regional integration and combatting antisemitism. It also makes a cursory reference to a two-state solution, fails to mention Russia in the context of Ukraine and firmly rejects the BDS movement.

OFIP, July 15,  A Canadian first: University of Waterloo launches a “Foundation for Palestinian Studies”, initiated with start-up funding by Shawky Falel, a Palestinian Canadian business man, who is an impressive and enthusiastic spokesperson for Palestine.

Palestine, Online, An announcement of US$100M for the East Jerusalem Lutheran hospital network provides a much-needed injection of support to Palestinian health care

Aljazeera, July 16, Palestinian universities are under attack once again.  Later this month, the Israeli authorities are expected to put into effect a 97-page ordinance, called Procedure for Entry and Residence for Foreigners in Judea and Samaria Area (PDF), which would grant the Israeli Ministry of Defence and thus, the military, absolute power to determine how many and which foreign academics and students can visit, study or work at all 15 Palestinian universities and colleges in the West Bank.  The “procedure” limits the number of staff allowed to work for any of these 15 universities and colleges to no more than 100 “distinguished lecturers and researchers,” noting that “applications for a permit under this section will be approved if it is demonstrated, to the satisfaction of the authorised [military] official, that the lecturer contributes significantly to academic learning, to the area’s economy, or to advancing regional cooperation and peace”.  Moreover, under the new ordinance, the Israeli authorities will not only determine who can or cannot teach in Palestinian universities but will also restrict the time foreign academics can reside in the West Bank to one semester, which ensures that foreign professors will no longer be able to become permanent members of the academic staff at any of West Bank’s institutions of higher education.  Finally, the procedure will only allow up to 150 foreign students to study in the West Bank at any given moment, while restricting their stay to one semester as well.

Haaretz,  Jul 15, 2022,  JEDDAH – U.S. President Joe Biden on Friday publicly committed to a two-state solution based on 1967 borders with mutually agreed land swaps — a return to the Obama administration’s positions after Donald Trump all but abandoned these principles.

TIMES OF GAZA, July 16,

Israeli warplanes target a site in central Gaza this morning.

July 17, Israeli warplanes target several sites in Gaza Strip at dawn.

Haaretz, July 17  Analysis, Rockets fired from Gaza mere hours after Biden left for Saudi Arabia show that the Gaza factions know that the current government – just like the ones before it – seeks to avoid a military confrontation

Haaretz, July 16,  Saudi Arabia will not fully normalize ties with Israel until a two-state solution with the Palestinians is reached, Saudi Foreign Minister Adel al-Jubeir said Friday. Palestinian state with East Jerusalem as the capital is Saudi Arabia’s requirement for peace with Israel, Saudi Foreign Minister tells CNN.Gideon Levy

Jul 16, 2022,  At Augusta Victoria Hospital in East Jerusalem, of all places, U.S. President Joe Biden signed a death certificate. The two-state solution died a long time ago, and now so has the Palestinians’ strategic choice of relying on the West in their struggle for their national rights.

Jul 17, 2022   The northern Israel city of Afula is set to ban driving lessons on Shabbat, in what appears to be a bid to deter Arabs from the neighboring communities from entering the city.  ‘Whoever enters this city needs to understand that this is a Jewish city,’ Afula council member argues. 

July 18, Israel’s Defense Ministry ordered representatives of three of the six organizations designated as terror groups to obtain a special permit to represent them or face a penalty of seven years in prison. One attorney says this is an unprecedented ‘government threat’

Reported by Sabeel, Jerusalem, July 18, 2022,  At the same time as President Biden arrived in Israel on Wednesday, the 13th of July, the Israeli military seized a large area of Palestinian land  between Ramallah and Nablus. The land was owned by Palestinian farmers who cultivated olive and almond trees there and are residents of four neighbouring villages. Their appeals for the land went unheeded by the authorities and the land has been declared a security zone set up to protect nearby Israeli settlements and outposts.

Four out of five children living in Gaza suffer from depression, sadness and fear caused by fifteen years of the Israeli blockade, according to the latest report, entitled ‘Trapped’, by the Save the Children Fund. More than 800,000 children in Gaza have only known life under the blockade and have lived through five escalations of violence and a pandemic. These experiences have left many suffering from anxiety, leading to nightmares and bedwetting and many experience difficulties in concentrating and communicating.

Kumi Now will consider the topic of Family Unification on Tuesday, the 26^th of July. Under international law most countries permit the immigration of a citizen’s close relatives and offer them legal status within the state. Israel does not recognise the right of Palestinians to family unification. The Nationality and Entry into Israel Law, (31.7.2003), has left thousands of Palestinians from the occupied Palestinian territories who are married to Israeli citizens without residency status and living under constant threat of expulsion.

Nora Arsenian-Carmi was invited to speak on the July webinar for Friends of Sabeel Australia on Saturday, the 16th of July. Nora was born in Jerusalem, Palestine, a few months before the establishment of Israel in 1948. Since 1967, she has been a permanent resident of East Jerusalem. Conflict is something she is familiar with considering her Armenian heritage. Her family survived the genocide of 1915. Nora has served as a community builder in various religious and civil society circles. She has worked with the YWCA, Sabeel Liberation Theology Center and Kairos Palestine for more than 37 years. She remains closely connected with the World Council of Churches assemblies and events and participates in several global church involvements.

A recording of the session can be found on the following link: https://youtu.be/5WqNBVWsKCY

Week of July 11, 2022

Reported by Haaretz, July 5, 2022, The announcement by the U.S. State Department that it’s impossible to conclusively determine which gun fired the bullet that killed Palestinian journalist Shireen Abu Akleh made clear something that Palestinians have always known: Whenever the United States has to decide between an Israeli position and a Palestinian one, Israel always enjoys a clear advantage. July 6, WASHINGTON – Ben & Jerry’s sued its parent company, Unilever, on Tuesday to block the sale of the ice cream maker’s business interests in Israel to an Israeli company. A 20-year-old man was killed on Wednesday during an Israeli military raid in his West Bank village of Jaba, the Palestinian Health Ministry reported.  Rafiq Ghannam was killed as Israel’s military conducts near-daily raids focusing largely on Jenin and nearby villages.  His was the second death in that same town within just a few days. Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas met on Tuesday with the head of Hamas’ political bureau, Ismail Haniyeh, in Algeria, the first such meeting between the two in 15 years. After years of unofficial segregation, Tel Aviv University is offering prospective dorm students the opportunity to sign up for a pilot program in which Jews and Arabs are placed together in on-campus housing. The pilot program was developed ‘out of a sense that it’s what the students want,’ the university’s commissioner of equality and diversity explained. Haaretz opinion: Biden is making a big mistake with the Abraham Accords. The Abraham Accords of 2020, normalizing relations between Israel and four Arab countries, was a triumph for Israel but represented bitter lemons for Palestinians. The deals ripped up any residual solidarity that Arab nations once sought to convey for the plight of Palestinians. Any incentives for Israel’s leadership to advance a future peace, or even slow its expanding control over Palestinians, appeared to vanish. Reported by DCIP (Defense of Children International Palestine), July 7, 11-year-old Safi Ahmad Mohammad Jawabra was walking home to Al-Arroub refugee camp near Hebron from school after his math final exam when Israeli forces shot him in the head with a rubber-coated metal bullet unexpectedly and without warning. Now, his left eye only has 10% of its original function.  Haaretz, July 7, Supreme Court Justice Khaled Kabub has come out in opposition of Israel’s policy of demolishing the homes of Palestinians accused of terrorism, arguing that it goes against the country’s values. Khaled Kabub, Israel’s first Muslim justice, argued in a dissenting opinion that the state shouldn’t punish the family of a Palestinian man who killed three people in a May attack. But the majority justices upheld the demolition. Haaretz Opinion, While the overturning of Roe v. Wade made waves, two no less monumental cases decided in the past few weeks mark an unprecedented reversal in the Supreme Court’s stance on separation of church and state. Marching hand-in-hand with right-wing lobbyists, state legislators and media figures, the US highest court is now not dispensing justice but leading a crusade for Christian supremacy in America. From abortion to school prayer, the ‘religious freedom’ touted by Supreme Court judges backed by Evangelical Christian and their Catholic allies will never be accessible to American Jews and Muslims. Haaretz, July 8,  Two pages of issue No. 60 of the Kibbutz Nahshon bulletin, distributed to members at the end of the 1967 Six-Day War, were glued together. After the bulletins had been mimeographed, an unknown person decided to silence the reservations members had in connection with the lands of neighboring Palestinian villages whose inhabitants had recently fled or been expelled, and whose houses had been razed to the ground. “It was decided,” says a note attached to a surviving, uncensored copy of the bulletin, “not to make our deliberations public.” During the 1967 war, an elite Egyptian army unit sustained heavy losses west of Jerusalem. The bodies were interred in a mass grave, in fields tended but not owned by Kibbutz Nahshon. The story was hushed up and the fields became part of the Mini Israel park. One of the people involved in burying some of the bodies wonders why no one has asked him about it until now.   July 9, Sa’dieh Matar, a Palestinian woman with eight children and 28 grandchildren, was arrested in December for allegedly trying to stab a settler and had been jailed ever since, in deteriorating health. She died in prison, and no one know why.· Jun 26, Times of Gaza Israeli settlers aggressively assault the Jerusalemite Arafat Saleem At-Tahan and torch his car near Ramallah.   July 6, The Palestine Chronicle, Palestinian attorneys Thursday foiled an attempt by Israeli settlers to “evict” Palestinian families from their houses in the East Jerusalem neighborhood of Sheikh Jarrah, the official Palestinian news agency WAFA reported.   Reported by Sabeel, Jerusalem, July 11,  Israel’s Supreme Court gave its ruling on the case of the Israeli military shooting and serious injury of 15-year-old Palestinian Attiya Nabaheen in November 2014. Attiya was shot on his family’s property near Al Bureij, 500 metres from the fence between Israel and Gaza. He has been left with quadriplegia and will be confined to a wheelchair for the rest of his life. The court ruled that the Israeli government is not liable to compensate Attiya for the Israeli military’s unlawful assault because he is a resident of Gaza, which is deemed ‘enemy territory’.   During the month of July there will be a whole series of events at the Saot Festival which will be hosted by Palestinian filmmakers, artists, chefs and activists to celebrate Palestinian culture in the Neuhoelln neighbourhood of Berlin. It is estimated that there are over 25,000 people of Palestinian descent living in Berlin.   On Wednesday, the 6th of July Israeli military forces destroyed water pipelines in the village of Duma, south of Nablus in the occupied West Bank. Israeli soldiers escorted a bulldozer to the local spring and demolished the main water supply used by local Palestinians for their cattle.  The family of Ahmad Harb Ayyad from the Zaitoun neighbourhood of Gaza City have accused Israeli soldiers of beating their son to death. The Israeli military captured the 32-year-old man as he tried to cross the separation barrier in the northern West Bank city of Tulkarm to reach his work in Israel. Next Tuesday Kumi Now will remember the 20th of July, 2004 as the day when the International Court of Justice gave its advisory opinion that the Israeli Apartheid Wall violates international law. It stated that the wall has led to the destruction and confiscation of Palestinian lands and property and has imposed unlawful restrictions on the movement of Palestinians.   On Wednesday, the 13th of July, the Friends of Sabeel North America, (FOSNA), will hold a webinar conversation on liberation theology in the context of Palestine/Israel. This event was held in honor of the memory of Rosemary Radford Ruetter, a pioneering theologian, who died on the 21st of May 2022 after suffering a long illness. To register please click on this link.

Week of July 4, 2022

Reported by The Palestine Chronicle, June 28, 2022, The Grand Mufti of Jerusalem and the Palestinian territories, Mohammad Hussein, warned on Monday that the ongoing excavations carried out by the 28, 2022, Israeli Antiquities Authority (IAA) and Elad settlement group near and under the foundations of Al-Aqsa Mosque could lead to its collapse, the official Palestinian news agency WAFA reported.

Haaretz, June 28, Three relatives of the Palestinian man allegedly stabbed to death by an Israeli in the West Bank say that they were arrested and interrogated by the Shin Bet security service over their claims that the Israeli police and military were present at the scene of the attack.

Reported by OFIP (Ottawa Forum Israel Palestine), June 29, A recent report by Save The Children has found that “four out of five children in the Gaza Strip suffer from depression, sadness and fear“ as a result of the 15-year blockade imposed by Israel. “The report, entitled ‘Trapped’, interviewed 488 children and 168 parents and caregivers in the Gaza Strip, following up on similar research that was conducted by the organisation in 2018.” Haaretz, June 29, The Palestinian teenager, who crossed into Israel seeking work, was detained for illegal entry after he reported that his employer tried to rape him.  The suspect was let off. Jun 30, Mohammed ‘Moha’ Alshawamreh grew up in a small village south of Hebron, without regular supply of electricity, has three degrees from three different countries. He’s happy at his IT job in Tel Aviv, even though it’s about a four-hour trip each way.  He is from a small village in the West Bank, one of three at his school who went to college. July 1, 2022,  After freezing funding for rights group Al-Haq last year following allegations made by Israel, the European Commission is set to reinstate it after finding no suspicions of fraud or misconduct, and no reason for an investigation. July 2, Nabil Ghanem, a Palestinian laborer, worked in renovations in Israel for 35 years without a permit. He would sleep in fields and return home after a week or two. Last week a soldier shot him dead as he tried to cross the barrier into Israel, where he is declared a ‘terrorist’. A Palestinian security detainee died Saturday in a northern Israel prison. According to Israel’s Prison Service’s spokesperson, 68 – year – old Sa’dieh Matar suffered from a chronic illness and was hospitalized earlier in the week before returning to the prison.  The woman has been incarcerated since December 2021 for an attempted stabbing.  Fatah calls for an international investigation. July 3, Kamel Abdullah Alawneh, a 17-year-old Palestinian died on Sunday, the Palestinian Health Ministry said, a day after he was shot in the stomach and arm by Israeli forces during clashes in in the village of Jaba, in the Nablus area. Reported by Sabeel, Jerusalem, July 4, 2022,  The members of Kairos Palestine and Global Kairos for Justice, have produced a theological study here for Christians and civil society organizations to explain what the Israeli crimes of apartheid are. It explains why Palestinians and a growing number of churches and human rights organizations use this word to describe the oppression of the Palestinian people by the state of Israel, a biblical-theological reflection describing the sin of apartheid; with an urgent call to the global church to hear the pleas of Palestinian Christians as well as a list of recommended actions.  Friends of Sabeel France met to consider the work of the French Development Agency,(AFD), on Sunday, the 26th of June. Thirty members heard how the agency is focused on helping to fund sustainable development and water and sanitation projects in the occupied Palestinian territories. A Palestinian teenager was arrested by Israeli police after he had reported to them that he had just managed to flee from a violent sexual assault from a Palestinian employer. He was arrested for illegally entering Israel, but was not admitted to a trauma room to receive medical and psychological attention. His assailant was fined and served a short prison sentence for entering Israel illegally, but he was not charged with sexual assault . The Israeli police representative could not offer any explanation in court for the mishandling of this case and the teenager was released.  On Thursday, the 24th of June, a demonstration was held in Ramallah in memory of Nizar Banat, the Palestinian activist who was arrested and beaten to death by Palestinian security officers. Although fourteen officers were arrested for his death in custody, critics say that justice under the Palestinian Authority is moving too slowly. Recent reports from the United Nations Committee Against Torture and from Human Rights Watch state that both the Palestinian Authority in the West Bank and Hamas in Gaza are systematically mistreating and torturing Palestinians in detention.  On Friday, the 24th of June, staff members of the Society of Saint Yves Catholic Centre for Human Rights and their accompanying film crew were detained by Israeli soldiers as they tried to carry out work supporting families living in Masafer Yatta who have been  threatened with demolition orders. The soldiers claimed they did not have the proper permits to enter ‘Firing Zone 918’. They were transported to Beersheba in a military vehicle and left without any means of transport back to Jerusalem.  On Saturday, the 9th of July, Muslims in Palestine and in other countries will be gathering in mosques to celebrate Eid al-Adha. Afterwards many will meet up with family and friends to celebrate by eating traditional foods and to share their feasts with less fortunate families. Next week Kumi Now will mark the 9th of July, 2005 as the date of the launch of the Palestinian Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions Movement, BDS seeks to influence faith communities and other organizations and businesses to consider whether their investments in Israel are helping to support the occupation.

Week of June 27, 2022

Reported by Haaretz, Jun. 20, 2022,  Three weeks ago, Riyad Sumrin and his son Laith were driving on a dirt road that leads to their home in the Silwan neighborhood of East Jerusalem when they encountered a gathering of about 20 Jews, some of them armed. He “got a rock in the face”. No arrests were made after this and a series of attacks on Palestinians in Jerusalem.  Joint List lawmaker Ahmed Tibi says the immunity is creating a ‘police-approved jungle’ of violence in Jerusalem.

The Israel Police on Monday indicted a settler who hurled stones at left-wing protesters in the West Bank.. The attack, which injured two, came after a second settler blocked the activists’ car with his own vehicle.

The government said on Sunday that Israel will grant work permits to Palestinians granted asylum in Israel who are LGBT.  The policy will also apply to Palestinians fleeing domestic violence, although only 66 people are covered under the new rules as of January.

Jun. 21, During the filming of ‘Jerusalem District’ a weapon was planted in the home of a Palestinian family. The company, Koda Communications .was forced to pay damages to Palestinians for planting weapons in their home while filming the documentary series.  The production company is suing its insurance companies to cover the damages and subsequent lost revenue.

Ali Hassan Harb, 27, was stabbed to death near the settlement of Ariel while trying to clear out settlers who were trying to erect an outpost on his family’s land in the West Bank.  The Israel Police arrested a Jewish man on Wednesday in connection to the stabbing death of the Palestinian the previous day.

Jun 23, 2022,  For a generation of Gazans, the siege is the only reality they know.  “I’ve never left Gaza, and I don’t even have a passport. I’m part of a generation that doesn’t know a reality other than that of a closed Gaza. I grew up on reports of opening and closing the checkpoint and on stories of patients who were unable to leave for medical care. I grew up in the shadow of life in a prison, my father and other people from his generation told me how they used to go out to eat and of the sunset in Jaffa.

Jun. 26, The Shin Bet arrested on Sunday three family members of the Palestinian who was stabbed to death by a Jewish Israeli man in the West Bank last week, Israel’s defense establishment confirmed, but refused to say if the three are considered suspects.

The Israel Defense Forces blocked the main entrance to the West Bank village of Aaboud, northwest of Ramallah, for two weeks. The entrance to the village of Aaboud was blocked without any notice, forcing residents and emergency vehicles to take long detours.  Despite testimony and a probe by Haaretz, the army spokesperson denies the entrance was blocked for so long. On Wednesday night, about eight hours after a Haaretz submitted a query on the matter, soldiers unlocked the iron gate to the village.

Jun. 27,  Israeli forces arrested 17 “wanted” Palestinians across several locations in the West Bank overnight on Sunday, according to the Israeli army spokesperson. Israel’s military has conducted nearly nightly West Bank operations since a ‘wave of terror’ attacks began a few months ago.

Israel moves to register lands near Al-Aqsa using funds earmarked for Palestinians.  The registration process – carried out using funds earmarked for narrowing economic disparities and improving the quality of life of Palestinian residents of Jerusalem – could spark protests from the Muslim religious trust that administers the Al-Aqsa mosque compound.

In recent years, we have been witness to the blossoming of a grandiose project – the domestication of the Arab citizens of Israel – to get them to toe the line of establishment policy in several fields. Arab citizens interfered with the project of redeeming the land from their own hands and from the hands of their brethren in the occupied territories, and not only because of their national identity but also because the cry they raised was heard around the world, grating on the ears of racists. The goal of the project was to create the kind of Arab who would express gratitude for being allowed to remain in the land of the forefathers – of the Jews of course – at all.

Israel is refusing to pay the city of Umm al-Fahm for damage caused during last May’s riots, arguing that the damage was not incurred within the context of Jewish-Arab conflict, and that the damage was caused by the city’s own residents.  Israel is also refusing to reveal which local authorities did receive such remuneration after last year’s clashes in mixed cities during fighting with Hamas.

 Reported by Sabeel, Jerusalem, June 27, Hundreds of Palestinians took part in the funeral of Ali Hasan Harb in the West Bank village of Iskaka, near Salfit on Wednesday, the 22nd of June, after he had been stabbed and killed by a settler the day before. Eye witnesses report that Harb was stabbed in his heart by a settler who was part of a group attempting to erect a tent on his family’s land. The stabbing took place while security guards from the nearby Ariel settlement, Israeli police and soldiers looked on and did nothing to prevent the attack.

 Communities in Masafer Yatta in the South Hebron Hills are facing increased pressure since the Israeli High Court of Justice rejected their appeals against their eviction orders in May. Dozens of people in Khirbet al Fakhiet and Mirkez have had their homes demolished, in some cases for the third time in less than a year. The area is now designated as a closed military training site, ‘Firing Zone 918’, and military exercises have recently been launched close to residential areas.

 Palestinian students are taking their ‘tawjihi’, or matriculation examinations, at this time in the academic year. One student, Ahmed al Naasan, was prevented from sitting this important examination when the Israeli military arrested him in a dawn raid on the village of Al-Mughayer in Ramallah. He was detained on Monday, the 20th of June, with ten other Palestinians in different areas.

On Wednesday, the 22nd of June, the Israeli Parole Committee designated the case of Ahmed Manasra as a case of ‘terrorism’. Ahmed was imprisoned at the age of thirteen and he has developed a serious mental health condition since his arrest as a child, seven years ago. Amnesty International has called for his release stating, ‘he endured ill-treatment during interrogations which were conducted without his parents or lawyers’ presence and was denied the right to a fair trial.’

Week of June 20, 20222

Haaretz, Jun. 16, 2022   The IDF is slated to conduct a live fire military exercise in the rural South Hebron Hills area of the West Bank next week, the first such exercise in over a year on the heels of a High Court of Justice decision that rejected Palestinian residents’ claims to the land in favor of the military’s declaration of the region as a closed military training area.  The drills, which have seen tanks roll through and damage several rural villages in the past, have been described by local residents as a scare tactic meant to push them off their land.

Jun. 17, Three Palestinians were killed and eight more wounded by the IDF on Friday during a raid in the eastern neighborhood of the Jenin refugee camp, the Palestinian Health Ministry reported.  According to witness testimony, the three men – Laith Abu Srur, Baraa Lahlouh and Yousef Salah – were shot while sitting in a car. Following the incident, hundreds gathered outside the Jenin hospital to which the three were taken.

A play based on testimonies by female Israeli soldiers serving in the West Bank was cancelled on Thursday, after a right-wing group protested to the mayor of the southern Israel city of Be’er Sheva. The cancellation came after a right-wing group complained to the southern Israel city’s mayor that the show is linked to a prominent anti-occupation group which ‘slanders and attacks IDF soldiers’.

A week after his wedding, Jewish settlers attacked his home, in the Old City of Hebron, with stones. When he tried to stop the assault, soldiers arrested him. Thus began 72 nightmarish hours, during which the groom, Maher Abu Haya, was aimlessly shunted about before being released unconditionally.

Jun. 18,  The Israeli military attacked the Gaza Strip on Saturday morning in response to rocket fire from the coastal enclave, a military spokesperson said, shattering a two-month lull that prevailed along the Gaza-Israel fence in contrast to soaring tensions in the West Bank. Overnight, a Gaza rocket fired into southern Israel was intercepted by aerial defense systems breaking a 2-month lull along the Israel-Gaza border.

Jun. 19,  A 53-year-old Palestinian man was shot dead by Israeli forces at the West Bank separation barrier Sunday, the Palestinian Health Ministry said. According to the military, the man was trying to damage the separation barrier; witnesses say he may have been trying to enter Israel to find work.

Two women at a rally marking the 55th anniversary of the occupation were struck and lightly injured by a man riding an electric scooter on Saturday night in Tel Aviv. Rose Assadi says she was posing for a picture with a Palestinian flag when a man screamed ‘death to Arabs’ and ran into her sibling and her with an electric scooter, eyewitnesses say.

The Israel Land Authority’s exclusion of the Bedouin community from a critical solar energy project might keep it out of the industry for years, government and industry sources told Haaretz.  The country’s pilot project will serve as a model for Israel’s future solar energy efforts, so the exclusion of the Bedouin now is critical. Participation by Bedouin villages in the southern Negev region has been approved by the energy and agriculture ministries, but not by the land authority.  “The discriminatory criterion in the voltaic energy project is a climatic injustice,” said Joseph Abramovich, a solar energy pioneer in Israel and Africa and a promoter of Project Wadi Attir, a Bedouin solar energy initiative just south of the West Bank in the Negev.

Palestine Electronic Forces

Palestinian Sarah Al-Sakka is the first female surgeon to obtain a Palestinian board certificate in general surgery, and to be a surgeon in the Gaza Strip, after 12 years of efforts.

 Reported by Sabeel, Jerusalem, June 20, 2022,  On Wednesday, the 15th of June, the global Christian charity, World Vision, expressed its disappointment over the decision of the Israeli District Court to convict Mohammed El Halabi .The court stated that El Halabi was guilty of diverting huge sums of charitable funds to armed groups in Gaza. World Vision stated that ‘there have been irregularities in the trial process and a lack of substantive publicly available evidence’.

 An Israeli police investigation into officers’ attacks on the mourners at Shireen Abu Aqleh’s funeral concluded that it was a case of police misconduct. However, before the investigation started, it had been agreed that none of the officers involved in the incident would face any disciplinary action.

 Matan Kahana, a senior member of Israel’s coalition, caused anger on Tuesday when a recording of a remark he made at a boys school in Efrat on the previous day was broadcast. He said, ‘If there was a button I could press that would take all the Arabs and put them on a train to Switzerland, I would.’ He is the Deputy Religious Affairs Minister in Naftali Bennett’s right-wing Yamina Party.

 On Tuesday, the 14th of June, security guards employed by the Palestinian Authority violently dispersed a student rally at An Najah University, Nablus. The students had been protesting over the university administration’s decision to expel ten students. Five members of the Islamic bloc and five members of its rival Shabiba group were expelled after getting involved in a brawl the previous week.

 The Palestinian Prisoner Society stated on Wednesday, the 15th of June, that there are now six Palestinians in Israeli prisons who have gone on hunger strike in protest at their conditions of imprisonment. Among the prisoners are Khalil Awawdeh from Dora town in the south of the West Bank, who has been on hunger strike for 105 days and Raed Rayyan from Beit Duqqo near Jerusalem, who has been on hunger strike for 70 days.

Kumi Now focused on the plight of the Palestinian refugees this week. Next Tuesday, Kumi Now will mark the anniversary of the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons, (NPT),on the 1st of July, by considering Israel’s position on nuclear weapons. Israel built the Shimon Peres Negev Nuclear Research Centre near Dimona in the 1950’s, but has not yet openly admitted to owning nuclear weapons and is one of only five other countries in the world which is not party to the NPT treaty.

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Week of June 13, 2022

Reported by Haaretz, Jun. 7, 2022   Investigators commissioned by the UN’s top human rights body say tensions between Palestinians and Israelis are underpinned by Israel’s “perpetual occupation” of Palestinian areas with no apparent intention of ending it. Expert panel set up after last year’s Gaza war submits its first report to the UN’s top human rights body, in a move Israel rejected as ‘part and parcel of the witch hunt carried out by the Human Rights Council’ against it.

Canada Talks Israel Palestine, of Ottawa, reported, A pamphlet was used to warn Ontario voters about the rising danger of anti-Semitism in Ontario. Along with the text there is a photo showing angry demonstrators holding a sign saying “Holocaust = Great lie”. But the photo is of a demonstration that took place in Iran… 16 years ago. The Centre for Israel and Jewish Affairs (CIJA) is using the scare of a rebirth of anti-Semitism in Canada for another reason, to dampen the rising criticism of Israel.

OFIP (Ottawa Forum on Israel Palestine) reported, “What is happening in Masafer Yatta is not only the largest ethnic cleansing scheme to be carried out by Israel since 1967, but the move should be considered a first step in a much larger scheme of illegal land appropriation, ethnic cleansing and official mass annexation.” (Ramzy Baroud in “Israel’s New Annexation Strategy in Palestine” on June 3) Haaretz, Jun. 8, 2022, The University of Haifa, which has a large Arab student body (41%), awards a scholarship to students who have passed their matriculation exam in subjects related to Judaism – which are mandatory in Jewish schools – effectively excluding Arab students who are not tested in these subjects.  The scholarship is in the amount of $2,000 a year.

Haaretz Editorial  The attempt to blame Arab lawmaker for the current political crisis must be utterly rejected. One would need quite a bit of gall to expect that the Arabs of all people would support laws that ensure apartheid in the West Bank, that perpetuates the inferior status of their Palestinian brethren in the Israeli military dictatorship and “regularizes” the privileges of the occupied civilians.

The European Commission’s Anti-Fraud Office is not expected to open a probe into the Palestinian groups Israel declared as terrorist orgs, sources say.  Israel has not provided European countries with sufficient evidence about the six civil society organizations in the West Bank it accused of funding and acting on behalf of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine, European diplomats told Haaretz.

An anti-theft effort is seen as the possible start of a de facto annexation of the West Bank in the realm of antiquities. Anti-theft inspectors from the Israel Antiquities Authority will begin operating in the West Bank, a move pushed by right-wing groups seeking to weaken or even do away with Israel’s main representative in the territory, the Defense Ministry’s Civil Administration.

June 9,  The Greek Foreign Ministry called on Israel to take “appropriate action” after a group of’ approximately fifty Israelis allegedly broke into a property belonging to the Greek Orthodox Patriarchate of Jerusalem on Mount Zion, threatening to kill a guard at the site.

Most of Gaza’s beaches are finally safe after years of pollution, thanks to internationally-funded sewage treatment facilities.

A 27-year-old Palestinian was shot and killed Thursday by Israeli fire after clashes broke out near the West Bank city of Hebron, the Palestinian Health Ministry announced.  The Palestinian Health Ministry identified the man as Mahmoud Fayez Abu Ayhour, who was critically wounded by live fire to his upper body

The latest buzz in East Jerusalem is sticky and sweet. Thanks to a community program that teaches beekeeping and honey-harvesting, local Palestinian women are bringing joy to the neighborhood’s rooftops.  The art of beekeeping is a course offered by the Sinsila Center, located on the rooftop terraces of East Jerusalem‘s Central Library. The center is a project of the Muslala NGO, which initiates a host of social and artistic projects in Jerusalem. The beating heart and founder of the Sinsila Center, a few minutes’ walk from Jerusalem’s Old City, is Tareq Nassar, 38, an architect and urban planner who grew up in the Old City and the nearby East Jerusalem quarter of Ras al-Amud. When he returned from Europe after completing his studies about six years ago, he began to apply what he had learned to his childhood surroundings.

Times of Gaza, June 10, Yesterday in Nabi Saleh village, two Palestinian brothers were shot by the Israeli occupation forces. It turned out today that they are the Tamimi brothers, one of whom was severely injured in 2018 after being shot at close range by Israeli soldiers.

Israeli forces re-arrested ex-prisoner Mohammad Ferawi after raiding his home in the old city of Jerusalem. Ferawi was released 2 days ago from Israeli prisons after serving a sentence of 8 years.

Reported by the Palestine Chronicle ,  June 12,  A group of Jewish settlers tried to kidnap a Palestinian child on Thursday in the town of Yatta, near Hebron (Al-Khalil), in the occupied West Bank, the official Palestinian news agency WAFA reported.  Ratib al-Jabour, the coordinator of the National Committee for the Resistance of the Apartheid Wall and Settlements in the area, told WAFA that a large group of Jewish settlers gathered near the town, attacked Palestinian citizens and tried to kidnap a child, but were fiercely confronted and thwarted by residents.

Meanwhile, another group of settlers attacked the memorial of martyr Sheikh Suleiman Al-Hathlin, east of the town, according to eyewitnesses. Al-Hathalin died on January 17 from a serious wound he sustained at the entrance to the village of Umm al-Khair in the Masafer Yatta area, after being run over by an Israeli police vehicle on January 5. 

Reported by Sabeel, Jerusalem, June, 13, 2022,  B’tselem has just released its report on the uprooting of olive saplings on Saturday, the 14th of May, in Turmusaya, a Palestinian village in the district of Ramallah. The report reveals that three masked settlers uprooted 190 saplings under the protection of an Israeli military patrol. This is the second crop of olive trees that have been destroyed in these fields by settlers this year, bringing ruinous cost and anguish to the Palestinian farmers. 

The United Nations Office for the Co-ordination of Humanitarian Affairs reported on Sunday, the 5th of June, that a building of twelve housing units is under imminent threat of demolition in the Wadi Qaddum area of the neighbourhood of Silwan in East Jerusalem.  If the demolition goes ahead 32 adults and 42 children will be forcibly evicted. The Israeli authorities wish to have the site left as a public garden.

On Wednesday, the 8th of June, the Greek Foreign Ministry expressed deep concern over the desecration of the holy site belonging to the Greek Orthodox Church. carried out by members of a Jewish seminary on the Greek Garden on Mount Zion in Jerusalem.

The Israeli Supreme Court ruled on Wednesday, the 8th of June, that the settler group, Ateret Cohanim, purchased property legally from the Greek Orthodox Church. The settler group bought three buildings in East Jerusalem from the church in a controversial secret deal in 2004. This recent court decision means that a proposed takeover by settlers of the Imperial Hotel, run by Palestinian Christians, at Jaffa Gate in the Christian Quarter is looking more likely.

 An independent commission of inquiry, set up by the UN Human Rights Council after the 2021 Israeli assault on Gaza, has concluded that Israel must end its occupation. The report was released on Tuesday, the 7th of June. It states that Israel is pursuing “complete control” over the occupied Palestinian Territory, including East Jerusalem. It gives evidence to show that Israel has been ‘acting to alter the demography through the maintenance of a repressive environment for Palestinians and a favourable environment for Israeli settlers.’

This week Kumi Now considers ethical tourism and pilgrimage to the Holy Land.  Next week, Kumi Now will consider the plight of Palestinian refugees as we mark World Refugee Day on Monday, the 20th of June. More than 5.6 million Palestinian refugees were registered with the UN in 2019 and more than 1.5 million of these refugees live in camps run by UNRWA.

Week of June 6, 2022

Palestine On-line, May 31, Israeli occupation forces arrested a Palestinian youth, Abd Samrin, from the Wadi al-Rababa neighborhood in Silwan while colonial settlers settlers attacked his parents and brother.

Haaretz, June 1, 2022, Less than a week has passed since a 14-year-old boy was shot and killed in confrontations between Palestinians and IDF soldiers in the town of al-Khader near Bethlehem. Eyewitnesses said Zaid Abu Mohammed Ghanim was not involved in the riots at all. Relatives said he was on his way to his grandmother’s house when he was shot in the back by soldiers, at a distance of about 150 meters from his house, where his mother and sister waited for him.

The Arab Israeli experience: constant vigilance against prejudice. Facing rude stares on the train, showing your ID everywhere and staying indoors during times of violence. Arab Israelis tell Haaretz about how they cope with the country’s worsening intercommunal relations.

A revolution in Arabic studies is shaking up Israeli universities. From the Negev to the north, universities are changing how Arabic is being taught, challenging both Jewish and Arab students. Could new trends in academia transform Jewish-Arab relations across the country?

June 2,  Assaults, vandalism, racist chants, pepper spray and rock-throwing were documented on Jerusalem Day, in some cases in front of the police.  Numerous videos and photographs taken on Sunday in Jerusalem appear to show offenses committed by Flag March participants against Palestinians along the route of the march and in areas adjacent to the Old City. The police say more than 60 people were arrested and detained in the city that day, the large majority of them Palestinian. Only two of the people arrested were Jews.

The Israeli government plans to raze Ras Jrabah in order to expand the city of Dimona; the Bedouin villagers fight the resettlement plan, saying “We will die here.” They argue that they should simply be integrated into the city. For decades, the villagers have had close ties to their neighbors from the city across the way. Many of them work in Dimona and the village gets its water, mail and health care services from the city.

June 3, Israeli soldiers shot Harun Abu Aram point-blank when he tried to prevent them from confiscating a generator. The army claims the soldiers’ lives were in danger, and no one was punished. Now Harun languishes on the floor of his family’s cave, paralyzed from the head down, a year and a half later. Reported by Gideon Levy and Alex Levac.

A new documentary, ‘Children of Peace,’ explores Neve Shalom (Wahat-as-Salam), a unique Israeli social experiment that for the past 50-plus years has seen Jews and Arabs coexisting in one village.  Established in 1970, Neve Shalom is home to about 70 families – equally divided between Arabs and Jews, as a matter of principle – who are dedicated to promoting peace and equality. Children in the village study together in a mixed elementary school, the first of its kind in Israel, where they take classes in both Hebrew and Arabic and have both Jewish and Arab teachers.   Ultimately, has this social experiment been a success or a failure? If the benchmark for success is whether it has fulfilled its mission of bringing peace and equality to Jews and Arabs living in Israeli, then clearly it has failed dismally.   But if the benchmark is whether those who grew up in this village still want to live there and raise their own children there – and thereby signal their continued identification with what it represents – then the experiment may have succeeded.

Reported by DCIP (Defence of Children International Palestine), Yesterday, Israeli forces shot dead 16-year-old Odeh Mohammad Odeh Sadaqa in the back with live ammunition. The bullet pierced his heart and exited through his chest. Odeh was walking near his home with two of his friends. Odeh is the sixth Palestinian child killed in the last month, and the 14th this year so far. Israeli forces are repeatedly using live ammunition to shoot-to-kill Palestinian children who do not show a direct threat to life or serious injury—a violation of international law. 

Haaretz, An Israeli army officer handcuffed two Palestinian children together in a playground in Hebron on Wednesday, after he suspected that one of them might be wielding a knife.

Whenever another story appears about a crime the Israel Defense Forces has committed in the territories – yesterday it was Hagar Shezaf’s story on the boy who was shot in the back in Al-Khader; tomorrow it will be a story about the shooting of a youth in Al-Rakiz – we are always immediately reassured: It’s not the soldiers. They are not to blame. You can’t fault them. It’s the situation. Gideon Levy

Jun. 4, 2022. Security guards knelt on the neck of a Bedouin bus driver in southern Israel on Thursday. The guards pinned him to the ground for at least half an hour, choking him, before arresting him on suspicion of attempting to steal a gun from one of the guards.  ‘It immediately brought to my mind the case of George Floyd, who was choked to death…it could have happened,’ said Ali Suad.

June 6, Some 60 percent of Israeli Jews believe it is best for Jews and Arabs to live apart, according to a survey conducted by the Israeli Democracy Institute in March of this year. This is a significant rise compared with the rate that agreed with the same statement in April 2021, which then stood at 45 percent.  Among Arab respondents there was almost no change in the rate of support for living apart, which has stood at 20 percent for several years. In other words, most Jews now support segregation, compared with a constant minority among Arabs.

Reported by Sabeel, Jerusalem, June 6, 2022,   More than one hundred organisations and individuals have endorsed a letter from Friends of Sabeel in North America, (FOSNA), calling on President Biden to help protect and defend the Palestinian Christian presence in Jerusalem and to meet with Christian leaders. It also calls for an investigation into the killing of Palestinian American journalist Shireen Abu Aqleh and that all Status Quo agreements over Jerusalem should be observed. 

Three sisters from Deir al-Balah, in the central Gaza Strip, have been diagnosed with conditions that cause irreversible kidney damage. Suzan,(21) Saja,(15) and Sama Khatab(!0) all need to travel to hospitals in the West Bank for specialist treatment.The Israeli authorities are refusing to allow their mother to escort them, even though their serious condition means they cannot travel alone. 

The ‘Masahatuna’ or “Our Spaces’ app has been developed by a local computer engineer, Alaa  Huthut, to enable women in Gaza to report any domestic abuse they are suffering. The app allows them to register for help and advice from care centres without them having to leave their names or leaving any trace of contact on their phones.  

Levels of violence perpetrated by Israeli forces against Palestinians continue to rise. In the course of two days last week four Palestinians were shot in unrelated incidents. A 17-year -old boy, Odeh Mohammed Odeh, was shot in the chest and killed by Israeli forces in al-Midya, a village west of Ramallah. A female Palestinian journalist, Ghufran Warasneh was shot and killed at the entrance to the Arroub refugee camp, north of Hebron, on her third day of a new job at a radio station.

This week Kumi Now looked at the environmental damage being inflicted on the land of Palestine by the Israeli occupation.  Next week, on Tuesday, the 7th of June, Kumi Now will look towards the summer season as Palestinian schools and colleges begin their vacation period. Tourists and pilgrims are beginning to return to the Holy Land after the pandemic lockdown. They can make ethical decisions in the  travel companies they choose to support by enquiring whether those companies are profiting illegal Israeli settlements.

Week of May 28, 2022

May 25, 2022

New evidence suggests Shireen Abu Akleh was killed in targeted attack by Israeli forces – CNN

Palestinian young man gets shot by Israeli occupation forces in Hebron. Tines of Gaza

Israeli occupation forces assault an American YouTuber for documenting Israeli violations in Hebron.

16-year-old Palestinian teen Ghaith Yamin was shot dead in the head by Israeli occupation forces in Joseph’s Tomb area in Nablus. Palestine Electronic Forces

Hours before his death, 16-year-old Ghaith Yamin expressed to a friend his intention to become a martyr in clashes with IDF and even posted his will on Instagram. These pre-planned clashes near Joseph’s Tomb were meant to deter Jews from praying there (as per the Oslo Accords)

Reported by OFIP (Ottawa Forum on Israel Palestine), In what appears to be an Ottawa first, over 200 Palestinian Canadian students in several Ottawa high schools walked off class publicly demanding that the school boards live up to their claimed values of equality and non-discrimination. The date was chosen to commemorate the Palestinian Nakba (Nakba Day was on the following Sunday) but the lively demonstration reflected some deeper issues with the the school board. The protest was organized by the Palestinian Youth Movement of Ottawa (PYM) but included many non-Palestinians as well.

Haaretz, May 26, The Yamam counterterrorism police that raided the Al-Hadaf neighborhood in Jenin on May 13 fired an anti-tank missile at a building in which 19 people, including 11 minors ranging in age from one to 16, were sleeping. A father and daughter say they were also held by the troops for several hours as human shields during the raid and gun battle with armed Palestinians.. The house in question belongs to the Al-Dabai family. Mahmoud al-Dabai, 19, a member of the military arm of Islamic Jihad (Saraya Al-Quds), was arrested after a five-hour siege.

WASHINGTON – Rep. Henry Cuellar declared victory against progressive Jessica Cisneros in the Democratic Texas primary runoff, in a potentially major victory for the American Israel Public Affairs Committee in the war between the pro-Israel establishment and critics of U.S. policy toward Israel and the Palestinians.  AIPAC invested $1.8 million on behalf of Rep. Henry Cuellar’s campaign,

Haaretz, May 27,  WASHINGTON – Eighty-three Democrats from the House and the Senate on Thursday urged U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken to actively prevent Israel from evicting more than 1,000 Palestinians from the Masafer Yatta villages in the West Bank, saying it violates international law, and might ‘spark violence’ and ‘further undermine efforts to reach a two-state solution’

May 28, Two 20-year-old students were walking along a West Bank road the day after the terrorist attack in Tel Aviv, when they came under heavy fire from Israeli soldiers lurking in ambush. One is now in a wheelchair; the other lost a leg.

Reported by Canada Talks Israel Palestine, May 29,  After a half decade long legal battle, David Kattenburg has won his case that wines produced by Israeli settlers in the occupied Palestinian Territory cannot be labelled as “product of Israel”. While the amount of wine at stake was rather small, he faced huge opposition from the Israeli government, the Israel lobby in Canada and the Canadian government itself.

Haaretz, May 29,  Tens of thousands of right-wing Israelis took place in the controversial Jerusalem Day Flag March in the Old City on Sunday.. Palestinian journalists were blocked from entering Al-Aqsa compound, 21 people detained for ‘rioting’. Israel beefed up security presence, primed Iron Dome.  About 45 were arrested, chiefly Palestinians, on Sunday in Jerusalem as the right-wing Flag March ended.

The Israeli army in the attack on Gaza hit a warehouse containing many tons of pesticides and other chemicals even though no fighting was going on nearby, the group Al-Haq says. The army wouldn’t say whether the site was considered a target or environmental damage was taken into account.  A study shows that hazardous substances were released into the air.

Israel told the High Court of Justice on Sunday that the illegal outpost of Homesh must be evacuated, responding to a petition filed by Palestinian landowners demanding to clear out the former West Bank settlement. The state, however, did not specify when the former settlement would be evacuated.

May 30,  Police arrests two Jewish suspects for assaulting a prominent Arabic-language journalist who had arrived in the East Jerusalem neighborhood after covering Jerusalem Day events.

Reported by Sabeel, Jerusalem. May 30. 2022, The Global Day of Parents will be observed by the UN on Wednesday, the 1st of June. On this day many Palestinian parents will be thinking of their children caught up in the Israeli military court system or grieving for those shot and killed by Israeli soldiers. Sabeel will be hosting the Parents’ Circle, an organization which draws together Palestinian and Israeli bereaved families and which recently addressed the UN Security Council, (26.5.22)

Next week Kumi Now will be focusing on the devastation wreaked on Palestinian land by the Israeli occupation, as we mark ‘World Environment Day’ on Sunday, the 5th of June.

 The death of Rosemary Radford Ruether  was announced on the 21st of May. She was an outspoken theologian whose writings focused on feminist theology, as well as liberation theology, particularly in Latin America and Palestine.

Global Kairos for Asia Pacific Palestinian Solidarity has just published its closing statement summarizing contributions from their recent four day conference, (April 27-30th), based in Taiwan. The group has supporters in more than 21 countries in the Asia/Pacific area and they came together to consider the struggles of different groups of marginalized people and how they could be inspired by the non-violent resistance of the Palestinians living under occupation. 

The US State Department has just removed the ultra-nationalist Israeli group known as ‘Kahane Chai’ or ‘Kach’ from its list of foreign terrorist organizations. The founder of the group, Meir Kahane used to advocate openly for Palestinians to be expelled from their homeland. His followers continue to carry out violent attacks. 

A CNN investigation published on Tuesday, the 24th of May, suggested that Palestinian American journalist Shereen Abu Aqleh was killed by targeted Israeli fire. The investigation was based on eleven videos of the incident and eight eye-witness testimonies. The witnesses have discounted the Israeli military claim that there was ‘widespread and uncontrolled gunfire‘ in the area at the time the reporter was shot. 

The Israeli Committee Against Home Demolitions, (ICHAD), continues to monitor and record the number of Palestinian homes, as well as essential structures needed for maintaining livelihood such as barns, cisterns, fencing, which are demolished by the Israeli authorities. There has been an increase in the number of demolitions carried out recently in urban areas, such as in East Jerusalem  as well as in more rural areas such as the Jordan Valley and in the Salfit area in Palestine.

Week of May 23, 2022

Reported by Haaretz, May17, 2022,   Jerusalem’s call for Arabic-speaking students to apply for a job at the municipality bars about 90 percent of prospective applicants from applying because it requires Israeli citizenship.  Only an estimated 20,000 of 360,000 Palestinians living in East Jerusalem, which was annexed by Israel after the 1967 Six-Day War, have Israeli citizenship.

Reported by DCIP (Defence of Children International Palestine): Last week an Israeli soldier shot 16-year-old Thaer Khalil Mohammad Maslat with live ammunition in the chest in the occupied West Bank city of Al-Bireh. Thaer was watching confrontations between Israeli forces and Palestinian youth.  Thaer arrived and stood next to a building watching the confrontations when an Israeli soldier shot him in the chest with live ammunition. Thaer did not pose any threat to Israeli forces when he was shot, according to information collected by DCIP.  A second Palestinian child was killed last week—Motasem Mohammad Taleb Attallah, 17. Motasem was shot and killed inside the Jewish-only Tekoa settlement located near Bethlehem. Motsasem left home in the evening after an argument with his parents, and an hour later his family was informed that he was shot and killed after entering the settlement with a knife. DCIP has been unable to confirm the specific circumstances of Motasem’s killing, including whether he was shot by an Israeli soldier, private security contractor, or an Israeli settler.

Palestine Online: Israeli occupation extended the detention of Palestinian youth Omar Abu Khdair, who prevented the coffin of #ShireenAbuAkleh from falling as the funeral was attacked by Israeli forces, until Sunday. He was arrested from his home at dawn today.

Haaretz, May 18, Israeli police assaulted the family of a Palestinian man at Sha’are Tzedek Hospital in Jerusalem on Tuesday, after arriving to arrest the man, who is hospitalized in serious condition.  One of the family members needed medical treatment for injuries sustained during the confrontation with the police. The Palestinian man whom the police attempted to arrest is sedated and intubated after being hit in the head by a sponge-tipped bullet. He sustained the injury during the funeral of another Palestinian man who was wounded in clashes with Israeli police at the Temple Mount and later died of his wounds.

Israel carried out eight times as many demolition orders in the West Bank against new structures built by Palestinians compared to settlers between May 2019 and the end of 2021. The demolitions are carried out in accordance with a draconian order that requires residents to present a building permit within 96 hours, and cannot be appealed

WASHINGTON – Progressive Democrat Summer Lee on Tuesday declared victory in her primary race in Pennsylvania’s 12th Congressional District, despite extraordinary opposition from the American Israel Public Affairs Committee and its backed candidate Steve Irwin, who has yet to concede.

Israel will allow the right-wing Flag March to pass through the Muslim Quarter on Jerusalem Day.  Last year’s flag march, despite a last-minute change to the contentious route to avoid the Muslim Quarter, devolved into violence. Last year, a barrage of rockets were fired by Hamas at the city during the march, prompting Israel’s Operation Guardian of the Walls in the Gaza Strip which coincided with interethnic riots throughout Israel.

Over 600 people have been indicted for offenses allegedly committed during the May 2021 riots in Israel, and nearly 90 percent of those indicted are Arab, statistics from the State Prosecutor’s Office published on Tuesday showed.  In May 2021, a nationwide wave of violence occurred in Israel, particularly in mixed Jewish-Arab cities, throughout the fighting between Israel and Gaza.

Reported by DCIP, May 19,  Israeli soldiers forced 16-year-old Ahed Mohammad Rida Mereb, 16, to stand in front of an Israeli military vehicle on last week in the Al Hadaf neighborhood of Jenin as Palestinian gunmen shot heavily toward the Israeli forces’ position. Israeli forces ordered Ahed to stand outside the military vehicle for around two hours while they sat inside.  Ahed endured so much stress that she was hospitalized later that day for intense mental stress and a severe lack of oxygen. Using children as human shields is explicitly and absolutely prohibited by international law. Israeli forces later evacuated Ahed’s two-story house then fired rocket-propelled grenades and live ammunition at the house, causing it to catch on fire.

Haaretz, May 20, A few days after the High Court of Justice green-lighted the expulsion of residents of eight villages in the South Hebron Hills, Israeli forces started to demolish their homes: They razed 20 dwellings in three villages, leaving families homeless.

Israeli troops shot and killed a 17-year-old Palestinian as clashes erupted when they entered a volatile town in the West Bank overnight into Saturday.  The Palestinian Health Ministry identifies the dead as Amjad al-Fayyed and says another 18-year-old Palestinian is in critical condition after being wounded by Israeli fire.

Meretz lawmaker Ghaida Rinaewei Zoabi will return to Israel’s coalition, just three days after her resignation threatened to send the country into its fifth election in four years. Zoabi said that she was put under massive pressure from local Arab government heads, who approached her and assured her that they “understood the reasons” behind her resignation from the coalition, after which she agreed to meet with Foreign Minister Yair Lapid.                                                         

Reported by Sabeel, Jerusalem, May 23, 2022, In the first week of May the Israeli Supreme Court ruled that the Israeli authorities can destroy eight villages in the Masafer Yatta area of the South Hebron Hills and expel more than 1,200 Palestinian inhabitants permanently. The area is designated a firing zone, but illegal outposts which have been set up by Israeli settlers in the area will not be destroyed.  Sabeel calls on the international community to hold the Israeli government and its judicial system to account for the way it is dismissing international  humanitarian law. We pray that pressure from governments around the world will stop the forcible transfer of Palestinians living in the Masafer Yatta area.

 The Israeli government and police have agreed to allow the Jerusalem Day march to go ahead on Sunday, the 29th of May. The route will take Israelis through the Muslim Quarter and they will enter the Old City through the Damascus Gate as they proceed to the Western Wall. The day is a celebration of the Israeli conquest of the Old City and East Jerusalem in the 1967 War and it has become a way for nationalists to assert Israeli sovereignty throughout the city.  Sabeel prays that this provocative march be cancelled altogether and that International Law be respected in occupied East Jerusalem.

 On Sunday, the 16th of May, the Israeli Supreme Court rejected several petitions against a controversial cable car project. Israeli supporters of the project want to connect the western and eastern sides of the city. The cable car is set to pass over the Jewish Karaite cemetery and will reach the City of David park in Silwan, a Palestinian neighbourhood, whose residents have long faced eviction. The historical skyline of the Old City in occupied East Jerusalem will be dominated by the cable car construction.  This project threatens to further diminish the Palestinian presence and to assert Jewish sovereignty in the city of Jerusalem.

Thousands of people gathered in the US city of Paterson, New Jersey to celebrate the renaming of part of the Main Street, as ‘Palestine Way’. Paterson City Council renamed  the street in honour of the contribution its Palestinian community has made to civic life. Alaa Abdelaziz, the city’s first Palestinian-American councillor commented, ‘It’s a celebration, but it’s also showing that Palestinians are human. We are Americans and we will never forget where we come from.’  Sabeel prays the Palestinians living abroad will continue to support and advocate fortheir families still living under the grip of the Israeli occupation.

Aida Abu Farha, from the town of al-Jalama, near Jenin in the occupied West Bank, has now received widespread recognition for her mastery of the Palestinian art of ‘zajal’, a traditional form of oral poetry. This ancient form of artistic expression used to be the sole preserve of men, but Aida has persevered and studied to improve her skills at composing ‘zajal’. She is now invited to perform at many different cultural occasions.

 The six Palestinian NGO’s designated by Israel as ‘terror organisations’ have called on the international community to take action against Israel’s unfounded harassment of them. Israel claims it has ‘secret evidence’ which condemns them, but has failed to provide any concrete evidence. Last week the Carter Center confirmed it would continue to support the organisations and denounced Israel’s move as a way to ‘silence voices calling for accountability for the Israeli occupation authorities.’

 At a news conference at St Joseph’s Hospital in East Jerusalem on Monday, the 16th of May, Christian leaders of 15 denominations condemned the violent intrusion of Israeli police at Shereen Abu Aqleh’s funeral procession. Monsignor Tomasz Grysa, the Vatican’s representative in Jerusalem, accused Israel of brutally violating an agreement to uphold religious freedom. Patriarch Pizzaballa described the disproportionate use of force by the Israeli police as, ‘a severe violation of the international norms and regulations, including the fundamental human right of freedom of religion.’

This week’s Kumi Now online gathering focuses on how Palestinians are working to preserve their culture and history.  Next week, on Tuesday, the 31st of May, the topic will be the high number of child fatalities in Palestine. Defence for Children International Palestine monitors these fatalities and records widespread Israeli military violations against Palestinian children living under occupation.

Week of May 16, 2022

Haaretz, May 12, Thousands gathered Thursday to mourn Al Jazeera journalist Shireen Abu Akleh, who was killed during an Israeli military raid in the Jenin refugee camp on Wednesday. 

Diaspora Minister and former Israeli military spokesperson Nachman Shai said on Thursday morning in a radio interview regarding the killing of Palestinian journalist Shireen Abu Akleh that, “With all due respect to us, let’s say that Israel’s credibility is not very high in such events.”  “We know this,” Shai added, “It is based on the past.”

Haaretz opinion: We know in advance what the results of any investigation will be: No one can be held responsible because there isn’t sufficient evidence or because the army acted according to the rules, and actually, it’s the Palestinians’ fault.

Gideon Levy: The relative horror expressed over the killing of Shireen Abu Akleh is justified and necessary. It is also belated and self-righteous. Now you’re appalled? The blood of a famous journalist, no matter how brave and experienced she was – and she was – is no redder than the blood of an anonymous high school student who was traveling home in a taxi full of women in this same Jenin a month ago when she was killed by gunfire from Israeli soldiers.

The Israeli panel that authorizes West Bank settlement construction approved nearly 4,500 new housing units for Jews in the area on Thursday.

Reported by DCIP (Defence of Children International Palestine),  A few hours ago, Israeli settlers accompanied by Israeli forces attacked DCIP field researcher Hani Nassar, near the evacuated Israeli settlement Homesh south of Jenin in the northern occupied West Bank.  Hani’s work is critical to DCIP’s efforts protecting and defending Palestinian human rights. Please keep him in your thoughts for a swift recovery from this violent attack.

Haaretz, May 13, Two Palestinian militants turned themselves in to Israeli forces on Friday, ending an hours-long standoff at the Jenin refugee camp, two days after a Palestinian-American journalist was killed there.  The fighting left an Israeli officer seriously wounded and two Palestinian militants in critical condition.

Tareq Abu Hamad is the first Jerusalem Palestinian to reach a senior position in an Israeli government ministry. Now, as director of the Arava Institute for Environmental Studies, he describes the difficulties to function as a Palestinian within the Israeli system, and to promote renewable energy infrastructures in Gaza.

Five left-wing activists are reported wounded in settler attacks as some 200 march to Masafer Yatta, a week after Israel’s top court greenlights eviction.  The Israeli military issued an order on Friday preventing buses from going into the West Bank through a crossing that leads to the Palestinian hamlets of Masafer Yatta, blocking Israeli activists from joining a demonstration against their eviction.

Reported by the ITUC (International Trade Union Confederation), The ITUC has condemned the killing of Palestinian journalist Shireen Abu Akleh and the wounding of producer Ali al-Samudi in Jenin, occupied Palestine, on 11 May.   

Since the beginning of this year 2,140 Palestinians, mainly from occupied Jerusalem and Jenin, have been detained by Israeli security forces, including 815 Palestinian workers of which 91 are accused of employing and transporting workers without special permits.

This week, 27 year-old Palestinian worker Mahmoud Sami Khalil Aram was killed as he passed through an opening in the wall erected by Israel. Like many Palestinians, he had tried to enter Israel without a permit to seek work as an undocumented worker.

The ITUC’s Palestine affiliate, the PGFTU, has highlighted the plight of many Palestinians who have to work in Israel due to high unemployment in Gaza and the West Bank. Low wages and poor working conditions are common and the PGFTU states that 67 Palestinian workers in Israel have died due to poor occupational health and safety in the past year.

May 14, Palestine Online, Israeli occupation authorities forced Palestinian father Faraj Dabish to self-demolish his own house, his only shelter with a wife and 3 children, in Sur Baher neighborhood in occupied Jerusalem under the pretense of building without a permit.

Haaretz, May 14,  The Biden administration issued on Friday perhaps its harshest public rebuke of Israel to date over scenes of Israeli police violence at the funeral of Palestinian-American journalist Shireen Abu Akleh, who was killed earlier in the week while covering an Israeli military raid in the West Bank city of Jenin.

Israel used to be beautiful,  Then came Zionism. If the world’s flora and fauna will need millions of years to rebound from the damage humanity has wrought on the planet, recovering from the ecological and aesthetic ravages of Zionism will take twice as long.

Arrested for the first time at age 14, Yahya Adwan spent the rest of his short life in jail for throwing Molotov cocktails and stones at Israeli troops. Last week a soldier shot and killed the 27-year-old Palestinian.

May 15,  A Palestinian militant, brother of a prominent Fatah military leader, died on Sunday in an Israeli hospital, two days after being wounded in a shootout with Israeli forces in Jenin.

Daoud Zubeidi was hit in the stomach during an hours-long standoff at the Jenin refugee camp, when Israeli forces surrounded the house of an Islamic Jihad militant, who eventually turned himself in.

At a conference in the West Bank, the Nachala settler movement, which is behind contested illegal West Bank outposts, presents its vision: To establish 10 new illegal outposts at once on July 20.

Jewish Settlers Take Over Hebron Building, Ignoring Palestinian’s Ownership Claim.  Settler group says they purchased the building, but have no documented ownership of it. Israeli soldiers are guarding the location anyway.

Israel will reopen its border with the Gaza Strip on Sunday and allow the entry of workers and all Palestinians who hold entry permits, the Israeli army said Saturday.  The Erez crossing, which closed since May 3, as well as all border crossing into the West Bank were shut ahead of Israel’s memorial day and Independence Day celebrations.

The decisions of Israeli police at events like journalist Shireen Abu Akleh’s funeral display their inability to see the humanity and pain of the Palestinian people.  Police, dressed in black, wearing helmets and protective gear, using their batons to assault people carrying a coffin at a funeral procession. They strike their legs until the coffin slips, almost hitting the ground. This is what most of the world saw – and this is what most of the world will remember from the funeral of Al Jazeera journalist Shireen Abu Akleh, which took place in Jerusalem on Friday.

May 16, A Palestinian man carrying an ax and a suicide note was arrested in the West Bank Sunday night, police said.  The 22-year-old suspect, from the West Bank city of Al-Bireh, was searching for victims for about an hour prior to his arrest, scouring for Israelis who were standing alone, an initial police investigation shows.

Declassification of the name and photo of a Druze commander who fell during a covert mission in the Gaza Strip in 2018 sparked calls among Israeli lawmakers to amend the controversial nation-state law that defines the country as the nation state of the Jewish people. 

Jerusalem’s police chief gave the order to officers to prevent the waving of Palestinian flags and to confiscate any Palestinian flags they saw during the funeral of journalist Shireen Abu Akleh last Friday, police sources told Haaretz. At the time, the district police commander was not present in the Old City, but taking part in a police delegation to Germany.

 Reported by Sabeel, Jerusalem, May 16, 2922, On Wednesday, the 11th of May, Palestinian residents of Jabal al Tawil, near the city of Al-Bireh were protesting at a nearby illegal settlement, when Israeli soldiers opened fire on them. Thayer Yazouri, 18, was shot directly in the heart and was killed, while another Palestinian teenager was injured in his leg.

The Israeli government is set to put forward plans for 4,000 illegal settler homes to be built in the occupied West Bank. If the plans are approved, this move will mark the largest advancement of illegal settlements since President Biden’s administration took office.

  In Gaza Tuesday, the 10th of May marked a grim anniversary of the outbreak of hostilities inflicted on them last year by the Israeli military. According to the records of the United Nations, 260 Palestinians were killed during the Israeli attacks, including 66 children. In Israel 12 civilians were killed as a result of indiscriminate rocket attacks from Gaza.  Israeli restrictions on the movement of people and goods across the borders of the enclave remain in place and are leading to further impoverishment.

Week of May 9, 2022

Reported by Haaretz, May 5, 2022, The High Court of Justice approved Wednesday the eviction of some 1,000 Palestinians from eight villages in the southern West Bank, after a two-decade legal dispute over land that has been repurposed by the Israeli army as a firing zone, and where Palestinians have lived for generations.    Starting this morning, at any given moment, the Civil Administration, the Israel Defense Forces, the Border Police and the regular police are allowed to send dozens – and if they need to, even more – of soldiers and police officers into eight villages in Masafer Yatta and with their guns trained on them, put on trucks and buses hundreds of their residents – the elderly, the young, women and infants. And this will be done with a seal of approval from Israel’s High Court of Justice.

A director of a Palestinian NGO that Israel declared a terror organization last year was barred from boarding a flight to the United States.  Sahar Francis, the director of Addameer – director of Addameer Prisoner Support and Human Rights Organization – sought to travel on Saturday to a conference of civil society groups in Mexico, but was informed she was not allowed to board her flight upon her arrival at Ben-Gurion International Airport.

May 6, Thousands marched Thursday to mark the Palestinian Nakba in the Lower Galilee in northern Israel, the area where the village of Miar, depopulated in 1948, once stood.  Participants carried Palestinian flags and signs with the names of Arab villages uprooted in Israel’s War of Independence, which Palestinians refer to as the ‘catastrophe.’ Organizers from the Association for the Defense of the Rights for the Internally Displaced Persons in Israel said that the marchers were strict about not carrying the flags of political parties or movements or calling out political slogans.

Three people were murdered and four wounded in a terror attack in the ultra-Orthodox city of Elad in central Israel on Thursday, police said.  Manhunt is underway.  Security official says attackers influenced by Hamas’ Yahya Sinwar. PM Bennett vows assailants ‘will pay the price’

Reported by Palestine Electronic Media, May 7, Palestinian shepherd Omar al-Hathaleen yesterday got injured after being brutally assaulted and beaten by colonial Israeli settlers near the village of Umm El-Khair in Massafer Yatta, south of Al-Khalil.

Times of Gaza,  A funeral of the freed prisoner Yahia Adwan was held after he was cold-bloodily murdered last night by the Israeli occupation forces in Azzun village, Qalqilya.

Haaretz, May 7, Israeli forces demolished on Saturday the home of the one of the Palestinian gunmen who killed an Israeli near the evacuated West Bank outpost of Homesh in December.

Dozens of settlers swooped down on a Palestinian family tending its olive grove, throwing stones and beating them. Three Palestinians were wounded; the eldest remains hospitalized. When the family filed a complaint, they were interrogated for allegedly throwing rocks.

Israel’s Civil Administration will advance nearly 4,000 housing units in Jewish settlements in the West Bank next week, the Israeli governing body that operates in the West Bank said in a statement on Friday. Biden administration: ‘We strongly oppose the expansion of settlements’

May 8, The High Court of Justice has again proved that it is unmatched as a rubber stamp and whitewasher of the injustices of the occupation. In a ruling issued in the dead of night – ironically, between Memorial Day and Independence Day – the court permitted the expulsion from their homes of about 1,000 Palestinian residents of Masafer Yatta, in the southeast West Bank, for the benefit of Israel Defense Forces training. As a result, eight Palestinian villages whose residents have lived in them for generations will be destroyed.

Israeli forces captured the two Palestinians who murdered three Israelis last week after a three-day manhunt.  The two were found in a forest in central Israel, close to the ultra-Orthodox city of Elad where the attack took place.  The two are identified as As’ad al-Rifa’i, 19, and Subhi Abu Shakir, 20, from the village of Rummaneh, near Jenin.  The Defense Ministry said Saturday that following a security assessment, the ongoing closure of the West Bank and crossings at the Gaza border will be extended through Monday, with only approved cases being allowed to pass into or through Israel. Another assessment will be made Sunday, the ministry said. The attack in Elad is the latest in a string of Palestinian terror attacks in Israel and the West Bank have left 19 dead. Meanwhile, at least 27 Palestinians have been killed by Israeli forces, some related to operations to locate suspects in the attacks. 

Palestine Electronic Media,  After being brutally assaulted and beaten by colonial settlers,  a Palestinian taxi driver at the village of Sinjil, north of Ramallah, was detained by Israeli occupation forces.

 Reported by Sabeel, Jerusalem, May 9, On Thursday, the 5th of May, more than six hundred Israeli settlers resumed their incursions, under police protection, into the Al Aqsa compound, after the ten day pause for the end of Ramadan. Israeli police arrested fifty Palestinians, including elderly men and young boys, and injured sixteen others during clashes at the compound. Tensions have heightened following a series of attacks inside Israel and police raids in occupied East Jerusalem and the West Bank.

B’Tselem, the Israel Information Center for Human Rights in the Occupied Territories, has looked into the circumstances under which the Israeli border police shot and killed Nader Rayan in Nablus on the 15th of March this year. Their investigation showed that Nader and his friend were on their scooter behind the police vehicles. When the scooter broke down, they ran down a side alley. As they run, the police shot Nader in the back. Then the police left their vehicles, tracked down the injured Nader, shot him repeatedly and killed him. 

Eight Republican and Democrat Congressmen sent a joint letter to the US Secretary of State, Anthony Blinken, at the end of April. They wished to express their deep concern over the disturbing rise in recent Israeli extremist attacks against Jerusalem’s Christian community. The lawmakers stressed that the protection of religious freedom abroad must be a critical element of US foreign policy.

For Palestinians, Sunday, the 15th of May will be the time they commemorate the Nakba, when thousands of Palestinians were forced to flee their homes in 1948.

Palestinian Electronic Media, May 9, Israeli occupation forces attacked and wounded Palestinian journalist Basil al-Adraa in his home village of A-Tuwani in Masafer Yatta in the occupied West Bank this afternoon.

Week of May 2, 2022

Reported by Haaretz, April 25, 2022, The Shin Bet security service announced Monday the arrest of seven West Bank Islamic Jihad operatives suspected of planning to carry out terror attacks against Israelis.  According to the Shin Bet, they were recruited and instructed by Jihadists from the Gaza Strip.  Among the detainees is a mother of four from the village of Jalamah near Jenin. She was identified as Yasmin Shaaban, an operative in the organization who previously served a prison sentence for being involved in the planning of a suicide attack.

April 26, Israeli police only allowed Muslim worshippers to enter the Al-Aqsa Mosque last week if they agreed to hand over their ID cards to police – in violation of the law and the right to freedom of worship.   The incident took place hours after the end of clashes between police and Palestinians at the mosque last Thursday. A group of young men, some from East Jerusalem and others from Arab towns in Israel, stood in line to deposit their ID cards with the police as a condition for entering the mosque to pray.

Apr. 26, The number of Palestinians in administrative detention – detention without trial – in Israel reached a five-and-a-half year high over the weekend.  According to data supplied by the Israel Prison Service to Haaretz, there are currently 579 Palestinians in administrative detention.

 B’Tselem, speaking of administrative detention in its monthly report on April 26, says:  Detainees suffer not only incarceration in rough conditions, cut off from their family, friends and daily life, but also unbearable uncertainty regarding why they are there and for how long. Yet Israel uses this measure extensively against Palestinians, with the ongoing approval of legal advisors, military judges, and the Supreme Court.
 All these seals of approval do not render Israel’s use of administrative detention lawful or just . As is the case in a myriad of issues concerning Israel’s regime of Jewish supremacy over Palestinians, here too, the Israeli legal system does not serve justice nor seeks to do so. It seeks only to represent the interests of the apartheid regime and to perpetuate it in the entire area between the Jordan River and the Mediterranean Sea.

Haaretz, The Jerusalem Magistrate’s Court has ordered that the case of a Palestinian family facing immediate eviction in the East Jerusalem Sheikh Jarrah neighborhood be reheard, a process that will delay any possible eviction by at least two months.  Police have feared that the eviction of the Salem family from their East Jerusalem home, which has been at the center of tensions in recent months, could reignite the neighborhood along with the rest of the city.

Palestinian Electronic Media, April 27, Four Palestinians were shot and injured, including one in a serious condition after being shot in his head, by Israeli occupation forces during the storming of Jenin camp, this morning.

IMEU  Palestinian children played music in solidarity with Athal Al-Azza, a child who is being imprisoned by Israel. Athal was on his way to his grandmother’s house when Israeli soldiers beat him on the side of the road before bringing him to an Israeli prison where he was tortured.

Haaretz, April 27, Three Palestinians were attacked near the West Bank village of Kisan on Tuesday, with one of them, a 62-year-old hospitalized with an injury to his head.  According to the victims, they were attacked by dozens of masked Israelis from the nearby settlement of Ma’ale Amos with stones, clubs and pepper spray.  Police said they were investigating the case following a complaint filed by the victims. No suspects have been arrested.

Seven Israeli men who participated in the so-called 2015 “wedding of hate,” during which pictures of the murdered Palestinian toddler Ali Dawabshe were waved around and stabbed, were convicted of incitement to violence and terror by the Jerusalem District Court on Wednesday. One of the seven, Daniel Zvi Moshe, was also convicted of incitement to racism, of supporting a terrorist organization and of possession of a weapon.

April 28, Around 200,000 Muslims prayed overnight into Thursday at the Al-Aqsa Mosque on the Islam’s holy night of Laylat al-Qadr. Despite recent tensions in Jerusalem, the prayer – the biggest religious event in the city – passed in relative quiet.  On Wednesday evening, worshipers flocked into the mosque from the West Bank and Israel after the military permitted the entry of Palestinians from the West Bank who were over 40 years old.

April 29, Violent clashes broke out Friday between Palestinians and Israeli police at Al-Aqsa Mosque, in what has become a weekly occurrence ahead of midday prayers for the entire month of Ramadan.  Hundreds of young Palestinians fired fireworks and threw rocks within the compound, with some also hurling rocks   towards the Western Wall and Mughrabi Bridge. One fell in the Western Wall plaza, though no one was reported injured.  In response, police entered the Temple Mount compound for the first time in a week and used riot control methods, which Palestinians said included tear gas and foam-tipped bullets. According to the Red Crescent, 42 people were wounded and transported to the hospital. After the clashes, 160,000 worshippers attended Friday’s prayers, the highest number of attendees since the beginning of Ramadan, according to The Waqf. 

Reported by DCIP,  The United Nations Working Group on Arbitrary Detention adopted an opinion this month finding that Israeli authorities’ imprisonment of Palestinian teen, Mohammad Mansour, 18, amounts to an arbitrary detention and called for Mansour’s immediate release. More than a year ago, Israeli authorities detained Palestinian teen Mohammad Mansour, then 17 years old, without charge. To this day, he is still sitting in administrative detention.

Reported by Palestine Electronic Media, April 30, 27-year-old freed Palestinian prisoner, Yahya Ali Adwan, was shot dead by Israeli gunfire in the town of Azzun, east of Qalqilya.

Haaretz, Apr. 30,  A 23-year-old security guard was killed by gunfire on Friday outside the Israeli settlement of Ariel in the West Bank. The military said that two assailants driving a car with an Israeli license plate arrived at Ariel and opened fire at the security guards posted at the settlement’s entrance.  The shooters fled the scene after the attack, the military said, as forces were searching for the attackers in the northern West Bank.

When Hanan Khadour was born, Jenin was under Israeli army lockdown due to Operation Defensive Shield, and her father had to carry her to the hospital in his arms. Three weeks ago she boarded a shared taxi in the same city, which was teeming with Israeli soldiers and snipers. A single bullet pierced her body.  She has died, aged 19.

IMEU, May1, Sahar Francis, the longtime director of Addameer, human rights defender & lawyer, was just banned from boarding a plane to the US (from the airport in Tel Aviv) while headed to the World Social Forum in Mexico.

Haaretz, May 1,  Sheikh Yusuf Albaz, the imam of the Great Mosque of the central Israeli city of Lod, was detained on Saturday morning on suspicion of incitement over his stance on the recent uptick in violence at Al-Aqsa Mosque.

Israeli forces raided overnight into Sunday the West Bank village where the two suspects accused of attacking security guards outside the settlement of Ariel live, the military said, arresting 12 suspects. The army “mapped” the homes of the two suspects believed to be responsible for the Friday evening attack, which left one 23-year-old dead. The mapping is likely to precede demolitions.

Israel will shut all its border crossings with the West Bank and the Gaza Strip from Tuesday until Friday, while the country marks its memorial and independence days, the army announced.

Reported by Sabeel, Jerusalem, May 2, This year the Eid al-Fitr holiday will be celebrated by Muslims in Palestine and Israel on Monday the 2nd of May. The three-day feast marks the end of 30 days of fasting from dawn to dusk during the Muslim holy month of Ramadan. Many Palestinians will try to cross the Israeli military checkpoints to visit the Al Aqsa Mosque in occupied East Jerusalem to worship during this special time. However, the Israeli authorities have imposed a military closure on the Westbank and the Gaza Strip because of the Israeli National holidays. 

 A new Israeli government policy is set to come into force on Sunday, the 22nd of May which will further restrict the entry and residence of foreigners in the occupied West Bank.  Palestinians who hold foreign passports will now be required to provide information to the Israeli authorities about relatives or friends they intend to visit and whether they own property or expect to inherit any property. Travellers wishing to visit Israeli settlers in the occupied Territories do not have to supply any information to the Israeli authorities.

The holiday on Sunday, the 1st of May, which is known as Labour Day, is marked with a public holiday in Palestine/Israel and in more than eighty other countries. Many Palestinians are herded like cattle through checkpoints to reach their place of work and from day to day they do not know what time they will reach their jobs. Many are forced to queue for hours in cramped and crowded conditions. Sabeel prays for an end to the occupation and for the inhumane constraints forced on Palestinian workers as they try to earn their livelihood and support their families.

 Khalil Awawdeh was rushed by the Israeli Prison Service from Ramleh Prison to an Israeli hospital when his medical condition suddenly became critical. Khalil is forty years old and comes from Idhna, near Hebron. He has been on a hunger strike for 57 days in protest at his administrative detention order. 

On Thursday, the 28th of April, a coalition of 46 UK based organizations urged the UK government to halt legislation which would target boycott, divestment and sanctions, (BDS) efforts. The proposed law, due to be announced at the Queen’s Speech on Tuesday, the 10th of May, would prohibit public bodies from calling for BDS campaigns against foreign countries, including Israel.

 A petition brought by four human rights organizations on behalf of two families in Gaza was rejected by the Israeli Supreme Court on Sunday, the 24th of April. On the 16th of July 2014, during Israel’s attack on Gaza, seven children, brothers and cousins, were playing football on the beach when an Israeli drone fired and killed four of the children and injured the other three. The petitioners claim that the Israeli air force intentionally opened fire on the children, without identification, and that this is a serious violation of the laws of warfare and criminal law. They will now take the case to the International Criminal Court for consideration there.

Week of April 25, 2022

Reported by Haaretz, April 18, 2022, Jordan’s Foreign Ministry has summoned Israel’s envoy to receive a letter from the government demanding an “immediate stop to violations” on the Al-Aqsa Mosque compound, after clashes in Jerusalem’s Old City, coinciding with Ramadan and Passover, left both Palestinians and Israelis wounded.

Reported by ‘Canada talks Israel/Palestine’, on April 18,

The National Council of Canadian Muslims has called on the Canadian government to condemn the recent attacks by Israeli police on Palestinian Muslim worshippers at the Al Aqsa mosque in Jerusalem. So far the Canadian government has been platitudinous, only calling for “de-escalation”.

Haaretz, April 18,

Police use of clubs has been on the rise after the force’s commander relaxed rules governing it.  Several cases were documented during clashes between Israeli forces and Palestinians in the Jerusalem holy site.  Footage from Friday shows a police officer beating journalist Alaa Sous with a club. She was left with a broken arm.

Two Palestinians were severely wounded by Israeli live fire in the northern West Bank, the Palestinian Health Ministry said on Monday.  Israeli military forces raided the town and arrested people, witnesses in al-Yamun, west of Jenin, said. During the military operation, Israeli soldiers and armed locals fired at each other, residents reported.

Israeli settlers are preventing the opening of a West Bank road that has been closed to Palestinians for 20 years, connecting the Palestinian town of Azzariyeh with the main road to Bethlehem.  Last week, work began to remove the roadblock, but settlers successfully prevented it from continuing, so the road remains closed. Azzariyeh residents said they were told it would open soon.

April 19,  The Israeli air force attacked southern Gaza Monday in response to a rocket launched from the Strip earlier in the day, according to the military spokesperson.  The Israeli army said that air force fighter jets destroyed a weapons manufacturing workshop belonging to Hamas. Hamas said that militants responded with anti-aircraft weapons, but failed to hit the Israeli jets. No injuries were reported.  Meanwhile, Israeli forces and armed Palestinians clashed and exchanged fire in West Bank city of Jenin, according to Palestinian reports.

Palestinians and Israeli forces clash as thousands march to an evacuated West Bank outpost.  Far-right lawmakers accompanied the protesters to the evacuated outpost of Homesh, after Defense Minister Gantz countered earlier military warnings against the march by announcing Israeli forces would secure it.

An 18-year-old Palestinian high school student succumbed to her wounds nearly two weeks after being caught in a crossfire during an Israeli military raid in Jenin, the Palestinian Health Ministry said on Tuesday.

April 20, 2022. A war over the Temple Mount is just a matter of time.  The messiahs of the right are correct when they attempt time after time to burst into Haram al-Sharif/Temple Mount to establish Israeli sovereignty there. In their eyes, the main thing is not prayers but sovereignty. Control, ownership, authority.  They’re right when they claim that Israel does not rule the holy compound, since as long as Jews cannot pray there as they wish, the Temple Mount is not in the hands of the state. Because what is the point of defining the state as Jewish if it has agreed to share the place most sacred to its believers with the Muslims.

Leaders of militant groups in the Gaza Strip discussed on Wednesday tensions with Israel in a meeting convened at the office of Yahya Sinwar, the local leader of Hamas, which rules the enclave. According to Hamas sources, Sinwar stressed that “independent” initiatives, such as the rocket fired at Israel on Monday, must be prevented and that any action must be coordinated by all the factions and Gaza’s political leadership.

Israel police blocked the route to Jerusalem’s Damascus Gate on Wednesday as hundreds of right-wing activists defied police orders and began marching toward the Old City’s Muslim Quarter. Far-right lawmaker Ben-Gvir joined marchers.  As tensions mounted, some 20 people managed to breach police barriers and reach the gate, but were turned back by officers. 

Apr. 21, Dozens of Palestinians clashed with police forces at Jerusalem’s Temple Mount on Thursday morning after hundreds of Jews attempted to reach the site with police protection.    Palestinians shot fireworks and threw stones at the police, barricading themselves inside the Al-Aqsa Mosque in the ensuing clashes. The police responded by firing sponge-tipped bullets and tear gas at the Palestinian, injuring at least one, according to Palestinian reports. Gideon Levy  All of us, every single Israeli, marched to Homesh the other day. All of us, every single Israeli, marched in the flag parade in Jerusalem on Wednesday. All of us, every single Israeli, are settlers. There is no other way to describe the reality. Anyone who thinks that it is only a small and violent settler minority to which most people have no connection, anyone who thinks that this is about some remote part of the land, some dark backyard that has no connection to the display window, is completely lying to himself.  

Israeli jets struck the Gaza Strip early Thursday morning in what the IDF deemed “the most significant” attack on the enclave since the last major confrontation in May, after a day in which militants fired a rocket at an Israeli border city and Jerusalem stood on edge over a far-right march.

Apr. 22,  At least 31 Palestinians were wounded Friday morning in a five-hour clash with Israeli police at Al-Aqsa Mosque compound, according to the Palestinian Red Crescent, as violence spikes at the Jerusalem site sacred to both Muslims and Jews.  The violent skirmishes at the Al-Aqsa Mosque compound, revered in Judaism as the Temple Mount and by Muslims as the Noble Sanctuary, have surged over the past week, raising concerns about a slide back into wider Israeli-Palestinian conflict.  Fourteen Palestinians were taken to the hospital, with two in serious condition, the Red Crescent said. An Israeli police officer was hit in the face by a rock and required medical attention.

Attorney Mohammed Assaf would take his son and two nephews to school in Nablus every morning. Last week they encountered clashes by Joseph’s Tomb. When Assaf left his car; a soldier in a speeding jeep opened the door and shot him.

April 23,  Israel Police used a drone to fire tear gas grenades at the Temple Mount on Friday to quell rioting following afternoon prayers which were attended by thousands of Palestinian worshipers.  According to the Palestinian Red Crescent, 57 Palestinians were wounded and treated at the scene, 26 of which were suffering from gas inhalation. Fourteen Palestinians were evacuated to hospitals — 12 in moderate condition and two in serious condition.

Reported by IMEU,  As Christians gather to celebrate Holy Saturday at the Church of the Holy Sepulcher in Jerusalem, Israeli soldiers are separating Palestinian and Arab Christians from foreign Christians, denying them entry on the basis that they speak Arabic.

April 24,  An Israeli settler wounded three Palestinians in a shooting attack near the West Bank town of Surif on Saturday, local Palestinian residents reported. A group of settlers was throwing stones at Palestinians near the Bat Ayin settlement before one settler started firing shots.

Reported by Sabeel, Jerusalem, April 23,  Last weekend the Holy Saturday Service was celebrated across the Holy Land. Thousands of Palestinian Christians and pilgrims celebrated the Holy Fire ceremony at the Church of the Resurrection – Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem, even though the Israeli authorities had imposed new restrictions on attendance. The authorities sought to limit participation to 1,000 worshippers, over a 90% decrease from previous years. Palestinian Christians and Church leaders criticized this move as an infringement of the right to freedom of worship. The local community tried to fight their way across the barriers yet they were stopped by the Israeli forces.   

In the past week more than two hundred people, mostly Palestinians, have been hurt in clashes in and around the Al-Aqsa compound. Many Palestinians have been outraged by the massive Israeli police deployment at the compound. They are also angered by the repeated visits to the site by Jewish worshippers, who are permitted to enter but may not pray there.

 On Saturday, the 23rd of April the Israeli authorities announced the closure of the Erez Crossing, after rockets were fired by a splinter group from Gaza into Israel. The closure comes just before the holiday marking the end of Ramadan, which will make it even harder for families in the enclave to survive. Israel carried out air raids in different areas of Gaza twice last week, in response to rocket attacks from Gaza. 

Thousands of Israeli settlers marched to the evacuated settlement outpost of Homesh, near Nablus on Tuesday, the 19th of April. They passed through several Palestinian villages before marching from a location near Homesh, which was built on land belonging to the Palestinian village of Burqa. Forty Palestinian protestors from Burqa were injured in clashes with Israeli forces sent to protect the settlers. The march took place despite the Israeli Supreme Court ruling stating that the settlement of Homesh is illegal, as the land belongs to private owners from Burqa.

Week of April 18, 2022

Reported by Defence of Children International Palestine (DCIP) on April 11, 2022.         Last night, Israeli forces shot 16-year-old Mohammad Hussein Mohammad Qassim in the abdomen with live ammunition in the northern occupied West Bank city of Jenin. Mohammad succumbed to his wounds this morning.  An Israeli military vehicle entered Jenin around 5 p.m. on Sunday and pursued a civilian car, according to information collected by DCIP. Mohammad began running behind the Israeli military vehicle and appeared to be looking on the ground for stones to throw at it, an eyewitness told DCIP. Suddenly, without any prior warning, an Israeli soldier fired three bullets from the military vehicle’s rear window, striking Mohammad from a distance of about four meters (13 feet) in the abdomen, according to the eyewitness.  Mohammad is the sixth Palestinian child killed by Israeli forces so far this year, and the third killed in or near the city of Jenin.Apr. 11, 2022 6:10 PM

Haaretz, April 11,    Fourteen Palestinians suspected of terrorist activity in the West Bank were arrested on Monday, the Israeli army said in a statement. Palestinian Prime Minister Mohammad Shtayyeh  says Israel is ‘increasing its aggression’ and urges the world ‘to stop Israeli escalation’.

April 12,  Gaza may respond with rocket fire over Israeli crackdown on West Bank.  Israeli defense officials don’t rule out an extensive operation in the Jenin area, which they would prefer take place after Ramadan ends at the turn of the month.

The Israeli army detained 20 Palestinian suspected of terrorist activities in an overnight operation in the West Bank, the army spokesperson unit said Tuesday.  The Israeli army has also operated in Jenin for the third consecutive day since the attack in Tel Aviv which claimed the lives of three Israelis.

A Palestinian man was shot and killed after stabbing an Israeli officer Tuesday morning in the southern city of Ashkelon, police said. The officer was lightly wounded.  Police said the 40-year-old Palestinian from the West Bank was in Israel without a permit, while his relatives rejected the claim that he stabbed the officer, adding that he’d worked in such construction sites for years.

Israel’s Attorney General’s Office has approved connecting illegal West Bank Jewish outposts that were built without Israeli government approval to the electricity grid.  The plan, which would also hook up Palestinian communities to power and carve a path to legalization for both illegal Jewish outposts and Palestinian villages, ignited uproar among right-wing Israeli lawmakers.

Apr. 13,   A 34-year-old Palestinian activist was killed on Wednesday in clashes with Israeli forces in Nablus, the Palestinian Health Ministry said, and at least 16 others were wounded, amid a spike in tensions in the West Bank in the aftermath of a string of deadly attacks in Israel.  Mohammed Assaf was hit by live fire in the chest, the Health Ministry said. Assaf was a lawyer and acted against the separation barrier and the settlements. A source said that Assaf, a resident of Kafr Laqif and a father of two, was escorting his cousin to school in the vicinity of Joshep’s Tomb and was not involved in the clashes. 

Reported by Palestine Online, May 13,  Israeli special forces shoot, injure and arrest a Palestinian youth outside Kadoorie University in the occupied West Bank city of Tulkarm.

Harretz, April 14,  Two Palestinians were killed by live ammunition on Thursday during clashes with Israeli soldiers near the city of Jenin in the West Bank, the Palestinian Health Ministry said.  The two were killed during a raid in Kafr Dan, according to the Palestinian Health Ministry. The Israeli army said they were carrying out an arrest operation throughout the West Bank.  Later Thursday, a Palestinian resident of Beita succumbed to his wounds after being hit by Israeli fire during clashes Wednesday morning in his home village, the Palestinian Health Ministry said. His death marks the sixth Palestinian killed by Israeli fire in the last 24 hour

A 14-year-old Palestinian was shot and killed Wednesday by Israeli security forces near the West Bank town of Husan just south of Bethlehem, with the Israeli military saying he was shot after hurling a Molotov cocktail at troops at an army position in the center of town.  The Palestinian was identified as Qusai Fuad Hamamra, a resident of Husan. Hundreds of Palestinians protested in the town and threw stones at army vehicles on Wednesday evening.  Meanwhile, the Palestinian Health Ministry in Ramallah reported that 20-year-old Omar Muhammad Aliyan had been killed by a shot in the chest fired by security forces during clashes in the town of Silwan.  Earlier on Wednesday, security forces arrested four Palestinians north of Ramallah suspected of planning to carry out an attack in Israel on Passover, which starts this week. 

Haaretz’ Analysis | Extremists’ call for Passover sacrifice on Temple Mount (Islam’s holy site) is a provacative ploy.  An ad promising payment to Jews who get arrested trying to offer a sacrifice at the holy site is causing an uproar among Palestinians this year.

April 14, In a plan to try to stop the wave of resignations from the force and boost morale, Police officers suspected of using excessive force against civilians while carrying out their duties, now will not be suspended and can be promoted in rank even before a decision is made in their case, Israel Police Commissioner Kobi Shabtai said on Tuesday.

Haaretz editorial: An evil wind is blowing in the Israel Defense Forces. The messianic speech given by Samaria Brigade Commander Col. Roi Zweig, in a briefing to troops before they entered Joseph’s Tomb in Nablus to provide security while repair work was being done, should be keeping IDF Chief of Staff Aviv Kochavi, Defense Minister Benny Gantz, Prime Minister Naftali Bennett and all Israelis up at night.

Reported by American Muslims for Palestine, April 14, Since the beginning of the Muslim holy month of Ramadan (April 1st, 2022), more than 17 Palestinians have been brutally murdered, dozens injured, and over 200 have been arrested. In the last 24 hours alone, Israel continued its 5-day raid across the West Bank, murdering 6Palestinians and wounding 18 others.

Reported by DCIP, April 14,  Israeli forces shot and killed another Palestinian child last night—16-year-old Qusai Fuad Mohammad Hamamra, the second Palestinian child killed by Israeli forces this week and the seventh this year.  In Husan, a village near Bethlehem, Israeli forces shot Qusai multiple times with live ammunition and prevented Palestinian paramedics from poviding aid.

April 15, (DCIP) 17-year-old Shawkat Kamal Shawkat Abed succumbed to his wounds early this morning after being shot by Israeli forces yesterday in Kafr Dan, a village northwest of Jenin in the northern occupied West Bank.   Injuries suggest that Shawkat was struck with an exploding bullet that ruptured his blood vessels and veins. The use of expanding and exploding bullets is a violation of international humanitarian law and amounts to a war crime under the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court. 

Haaretz, April 15,  A six-hour clash broke out Friday in the Al-Aqsa compound between Palestinian worshipers and Israeli police forces, leaving at least 152 Palestinians and three Israeli police officers injured in the biggest escalation in Jerusalem since the holy month of Ramadan began. 

The same event as reported by the National Council of Canadian Muslims.” Earlier this morning, as hundreds were completing their prayers at Al Aqsa Mosque, Israeli soldiers attacked with rubber bullets, stun grenades and beatings with police batons. 150 worshippers were injured. “

Haaretz, April 16, Police arrested 400 people inside the Al-Aqsa Mosque after hours of skirmishes and managed to restore calm. But images of cops detaining worshipers might trigger the next terror attack.  The intense clashes Friday morning on Jerusalem’s Temple Mount were almost inevitable. The rumors on social media – and the media’s noise surrounding it – that Jews were planning to come to the site and offer a Passover sacrifice spread like wildfire.

April 16, Soldiers arrested Shams a-Dim Aazem, 17, on suspicion of throwing stones. But between his cancer and his disability, the boy can barely move around. That didn’t save him from being handcuffed and spending five hours in detention.  There is no mistaking Shams a-Din Aazem’s disability. His torso is deformed and rigid and inclines to one side. His arms are as skinny as matches. His face is ashen. Though his intellect is unimpaired, his manner of speech is quiet and strained. His face is anguished. He sits down with difficulty, stands up with  difficulty and moves about with difficulty because of his physical adversities and his thin build 

.Reported by Sabeel, Jerusalem, April 18, 2022,  On Thursday, the 14th of April, a Palestinian human rights lawyer and a teenager were shot and killed on the fifth day of Israeli military raids in the West Bank. Muhammad Assaf, a 34-year-old father was dropping his children at school when he was shot in the chest by Israeli soldiers in Nablus. In the evening soldiers shot and killed a 16-year-old, Qusai Hamamrah, who was caught up in riots in Husan, near Bethlehem.

  Oded Goldreich, Professor of Computer Science at the Weizmann Institute of Science, has declared his intention to donate the Israel Prize money he won, to five organizations dedicated to working for social justice and the end of the Israeli occupation. He nominated the groups as B’Tselem, Breaking the Silence, Adalah, Kav LaOved and Standing Together.

 On Wednesday, the 13th of April, European diplomats visited the Old City of Jerusalem. They were briefed about the Israeli settler organizations which threaten to evict Christians from their properties at Jaffa Gate. They also discovered that the Israeli authorities planned to restrict numbers taking part in processions on Holy Fire Saturday, as well as limiting the number of worshippers allowed into the Church of the Holy Sepulcher.

 Shops and businesses were closed on Thursday, the 14th of April, as Palestinians in Ramallah and Bethlehem called for a general strike in protest against the recent deadly Israeli military operations. Earlier in the week a Palestinian gunman from Jenin had opened fire in Tel Aviv, killing three people and wounding ten others. In response to this incident the Israeli army launched violent collective raids throughout the West Bank, with six Palestinians shot and killed in just one 24-hour-period and many others arrested and detained.

 Canadians for Justice and Peace in the Middle East, (CJPME), have just published a report called ‘Arming Apartheid’, which analyses Canada’s arms exports to Israel. The report finds that military exports have accelerated in recent years and reached a 30-year high in 2020. Michael Bueckert, Vice President of CJPME, stated, ’the potential risk to human rights is far too high to justify the transfer of any military goods into the context of occupation and apartheid.’

April 11, 2022

Haaretz, Mar 27

Following an 18-year legal battle, members of a settler organization have moved into the Petra Hotel in Jerusalem’s Old City.

Currently, Ateret Cohanim occupies only part of the Petra Hotel, but Christians in Jerusalem consider the hotel a strategic building that could affect the character of the Old City’s entire Christian Quarter.

Sabeel. April 4 (see the above news from Haaretz)

The World Council of Churches expressed solidarity with the heads of the churches in Jerusalem as Israeli settlers broke into a hotel belonging to the Greek Orthodox Patriarchate. On Sunday, the 27th of March, members of  the Ateret Cohanim settler group, accompanied by local Israeli police, broke into the Little Petra Hotel near Jaffa Gate in the Christian Quarter of Jerusalem and evicted the family who managed the hotel.

Haaretz Apr. 4,

Israel has witnessed a wave of terrorist attacks over the last few weeks. In two of the attacks, the assailants were Arab citizens of Israel. As soon as the perpetrators’ identities were known, a familiar, grisly ritual began: Arab leaders denounce the attacks, and Israeli right-wingers accuse all Arabs in Israel of collective responsibility for the deaths, inciting racism and calling for revenge.Ninety-six percent of prisoners and detainees in Israel who are brought to hospitals for treatment are restrained during the procedure or hospitalization, usually cuffed to the bed, the Israel Medical Association says in a new study.  The study finds that even a prisoner missing a limb has been restrained, something that not only violates the person’s dignity but can impede the treatment itself.

April 5An Arab motorist accused undercover Israeli police of detaining him Sunday in the central town of Kalansua after suspecting him of supporting the Islamic State – after which they beat him and left him in a forest upon discovering that they had mistaken him for someone else.Abed Mansour, 38, said that he was blindfolded and taken to a forest near Kochav Ya’ir, south of Kalansua, where he was beaten after police refused to believe that his Israeli identity card was genuine. Mansour claims that when the police realized they had the wrong person, they freed him and commanded him to walk away and not look back.

April 6,The Judaization of East Jerusalem gathers steam.  New neighborhoods will be built on both sides of crowded Beit Safafa, but mainly for Israelis ■ Sheikh Jarrah faces possible evictions ■ Houses in Silwan are being demolished – and that’s just a partial list.
April 7A gunman opened fire in central Tel Aviv on Thursday, police said, in what appears to be the latest in a string of terror attacks across Israel.Ambulance service Magen David Adom reported six casualties that were taken to the hospital, two in critical condition and one in serious condition. The shooting took place along several different spots along Dizengoff Street, one of Tel Aviv’s busiest streets.
April 9A Palestinian militant has been killed and at least a dozen others were wounded in a fire exchange with Israeli military forces in the West Bank on Saturday, according to Israeli and Palestinian accounts.Israeli military forces surrounded a compound in Jenin belonging to the family of Raad Hazem, who carried out a deadly attack in central Te Aviv on Thursday. During the raids, the army said soldiers came under fire. Troops fired back, killing one militant.

Israeli military officials recommended increasing the numbers of work permits for Palestinians from the West Bank on Friday in order to reduce illegal entry and monitor those who enter the country.During security talks held following the wave of terror attacks that has seen 14 Israelis murdered, IDF representatives suggested giving work permits to many of the tens of thousands of Palestinians who are in Israel illegally, most of whom come in order to work. This proposal is not universally agreed upon within the defense establishment.

Abd al-Rahman al-Qassem lay wounded at the bottom of the steps next to the Cotton Merchants’ Gate, one of the entrances to the Temple Mount in the Old City of Jerusalem. A few seconds earlier he had stabbed two police officers with a modest-looking knife. One officer was lightly wounded, the other’s injuries were more serious. The assailant knifed the two in a fit of rage as he descended the steps next to the gate. Shot immediately and incapacitated by the police officers, he lay on the ground, not moving when one officer shot him at close range.pril 10
April 10Israeli forces and Palestinians exchanged fire on Sunday during a raid in the town of Yabad, near Jenin, in the second consecutive day that troops have entered a gun battle with militants in the area.The Red Crescent reported six people were wounded and treated in Yabad, one of whom sustained a gunshot wound to the back and was evacuated to a hospital in Jenin. There were no reports of injuries on the Israeli side.

Israeli soldiers shot dead a Palestinian woman in her forties after she approached them in a “suspicious manner” in the West Bank town of Husan, near Bethlehem, on Sunday.Ghada Ibrahim Ali Al-Aridi from Bethlehem, a widowed mother of six, was shot in the lower body after she did not heed to calls to stay back or warning shots fired into the air, according to the IDF.No weapon was found on her person and the IDF is investigating the incident.

Palestinians set ablaze Joseph’s tomb, a holy site for Jews, late on Saturday night, as friction continues to grow between a spate of recent terror attacks and IDF raids in the West Bank.Military spokesman Brig. Gen. Ran Kochav told Israeli Army Radio that some 100 Palestinians marched toward the site, rioted and then torched the tomb before they were dispersed by Palestinian security forces. Images on social media showed parts of the tomb inside the shrine smashed and charred.

A Palestinian woman was shot dead on Sunday by Israeli forces in Hebron, after stabbing a Border Police officer, according to Israeli authorities.A preliminary investigation found that the officer shot the woman after she stabbed him with a kitchen knife.The Israeli officer was lightly wounded in the suspected attack near the Tomb of the Patriarchs in the West Bank city.

Reported by Sabeel, Jerusalem, April 11 Rev. Canon Naim Ateek and women from the Sabeel movement will lead us in worship and reflection this coming Holy Saturday, on the 16th of April, for the Sabeel Easter Service in Jerusalem. The Latin Patriarchate of Jerusalem has appointed two new bishops. The Rev. Jamal Khader Daibes is Palestinian and has been appointed as the Patriarchal Bishop of Jordan. The new Patriarchal Vicar of Israel is the Rev. Rafic Nahra. He was born in Egypt to Lebanese parents. Sabeel gives thanks for these two newly appointed bishops. Both men were born and raised in the Middle East and have a deep love and understanding for the people there.

April 4, 2022

The U.S. secretary of state urged Israel to de-escalate tensions before Ramadan, as he visits the region for historic ‘Negev Summit’ with Arab allies.

Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas asked the Biden administration to press Israeli on freezing West Bank settlement expansion and curbing settler aggression, in a meeting Sunday with U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken in Ramallah.

According to Abbas, the international political action following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine exposed a double standard when compared with the issue of Israeli occupation, which has not received the same attention or demands of accountability.

Following an 18-year legal battle, members of a settler organization have moved into the Petra Hotel in Jerusalem’s Old City.

Currently, Ateret Cohanim occupies only part of the Petra Hotel, but Christians in Jerusalem consider the hotel a strategic building that could affect the character of the Old City’s entire Christian Quarter.

Mar. 28,

Prime Minister Naftali Bennett said Monday that he had ordered a bolstering of Israel’s security forces until Independence Day on May 5, with an emphasis on volatile regions at risk of violence following a terror attack that left two Israelis dead and put Israel’s security echelon on high alert.

Bennett’s announcement is based on a security assessment following the attack in Hadera that left two Border Police officers, in addition to the two assailants from the nearby town of Umm al-Fahm, dead on Sunday evening. This was the second deadly attack  carried out by Islamic State supporters in less than a week.

The images from the north-central city of Hadera on Sunday sent many Israelis back in time to the dark days of the second intifada: two terrorists, armed with multiple weapons, standing in the middle of a busy street and opening fire.

The fact that the perpetrators turned out to be Arab citizens of Israel who had pledged allegiance to ISIS, and that an attack by another Arab-Israeli ISIS supporter took place just days earlier in the south of the country, made the situation even more shocking.

Roughly 400 security personnel, including police, soldiers and officials from Israel’s Civil Administration in the West Bank, took part in demolishing buildings in two settlement outposts last week. Altogether, 20 buildings were razed, after roughly two years in which the outposts had been left alone. One can only imagine how much money this operation cost, given the large number of people involved and the heavy machinery mobilized for the task.

Five cars were set on fire and vandalism was reported in suspected hate crimes against West Bank Palestinians on Sunday night, according to police.

A group of about 15 people came into Jalud, a village south of Nablus, and set fire to the vehicles, according to area activist Bashar Karyoti. The attackers also began throwing stones at a home in the village before the family living there repelled them, he said.

Mar. 29, 2022

Five people were killed in a shooting attack on Tuesday in a suburb of Tel Aviv, in the third such attack in Israel within days, prompting police to go on the highest level of alert since the fighting with Gaza last year.

Police said that the assailant was shot at the scene by a police officer. The shooter was named as Diaa Hamarsheha, a 26-year-old Palestinian from Ya’bad, near Jenin, in the West Bank. He had apparently been in Israel illegally. The assailant had been arrested by Israel in 2013 for security offenses and served a six-month sentence.

Police are still searching for other suspects. Ramat Gan Mayor Carmel Shama-Hacohen had called on the city’s residents not to leave their homes if not absolutely necessary. 

Mar. 30, 2022

Israeli forces arrested on Wednesday four family members of the Palestinian gunman who killed five people in a shooting attack in Bnei Brak the night before.

Military forces were operating the assailant’s hometown of Ya’bad, near Jenin in the northern West Bank, as the probe into the deadly attack continues and as investigators work to determine whether 26-year-old Diaa Hamarsheh had any accomplices. 

Mar. 30, 2022

Arab leaders in Israel have decided to carry on with their plans for the 46th annual Land Day on Wednesday, amid concerns by both Palestinian and Israeli officials that events may exacerbate tensions at a volatile time, after three deadly attacks against Israelis in a week.

Palestinians worldwide have commemorated Land Day since 1976, when Israeli forces shot dead six Israeli Arabs who were protesting the expropriation of Arab-owned land in northern Israel to build Jewish communities. About 100 others were wounded and hundreds were arrested during the protest on March 30 of that year.

Police officers, who are studying at the Hebrew University as part of a program through the force, detained and questioned two East Jerusalem residents who were singing a Palestinian folk song.  After being questioned on suspicion of conduct that could disturb the peace, the students were released from detention about six hours later, and suspended from the university for six days.

A day after a terror attack that left five Israelis dead, Palestinian laborers in central Israel tell of cancelled work, racism and hostility from local residents.

Reported by B’TSelem on March 31, 2022.  Since December 2021, B’Tselem has documented growing pressure by the Israeli military on Palestinian communities in the northern Jordan Valley. Dozens of armed soldiers roam among the families’ paltry tents and dwellings, trampling their fields with tanks and shooting live fire. In one of these communities, Khirbet Ibziq, residents were required to vacate their homes overnight several times, sometimes up to 17 hours at a time. The military calls this “training troops.”

In just three months, between December 2021 and February 2022, the Israeli military conducted continual “military exercises” in the northern Jordan Valley. In no less than 27 days, the “exercises” were held right on the residents’ land and among their homes. The six families living in Khirbet Ibziq, numbering 35 people in total, including 17 minors, were forced to vacate their homes several times during this period, which accumulated to nine days.  When the military delivers the families orders to vacate – under the guise of concern for their safety – that means massive gunfire can be expected. The residents have to gather their bare essentials, leave their livestock behind and go stay with relatives or friends. Often, they have to walk up to seven kilometers to get there. Women and children march in procession, accompanied by military jeeps.

The nightmare of Khirbet Ibziq residents does not end when they return home. Then, they have to start warning their children not to curiously touch ammunition duds left behind. The soldiers do not always bother to comb the area before they leave, often leaving ammunition behind as if no-one lives there. In 2017, ‘Udai Nawaj’ah, a 16-year-old community resident, was killed by one such dud while grazing his flock.

The decision to “train troops,” as Israel calls it, among the fields and homes of some of the most underprivileged communities in the West Bank is no accident. In addition to this “training,” from early 2021 until date, we have documented the demolition or confiscation of 76 residential structures that housed 146 people, including 81 minors, 142 non-residential structures and one road in the northern Jordan Valley. These are all manifestations of the Israeli apartheid regime’s policy, designed to create impossible living conditions for these residents so they will give up and leave their land – ostensibly of their own free willHaaretz, April 1

Settlers with firebombs descended on a Palestinian village at night, torching cars. Following the terror attack in Hadera, Mohammed Abad, a resident of the West Bank village of Jalud, refused to go to sleep, fearing settlers’ revenge. He went up to his roof when he heard noises, to find his yard in flames.  “We pray five times a day, but I pray a million times a day only for the settlers not to come,” says Mohammed Abad.

Reported by Gideon Levy and Alex Levac

A smell of fire and smoke still hung in the air when we arrived on Monday this week at the residential compound of the Abad family in the West Bank village of Jalud. During the night, their parking area had become a graveyard for skeletons of cars. On the hill opposite, around 300 meters away, two hydraulic excavators were at work in the settler outpost of Ahiya, thrusting their shovels repeatedly into the earth, as part of the effort to expand the outpost. The panorama here is stunning.

April 2

Three Palestinians were killed by Israeli forces on Saturday near Jenin in the West Bank, in what Israel’s security service said was a counterterrorism operation. Four members of the Police Special Anti-Terror Unit were injured during the clash, with one in a serious but stable condition.

The Shin Bet said that the Palestinians opened fire at the forces who were coming to arrest them, and were killed during the exchange. Weapons and grenades were later found in their vehicle. According to Palestinian reports the men were identified as Saib Abahra, 30, a father of five from Jenin, Halil Toalba, 24, and Seif Abu Labda, 25.

Amira Hass

Apr. 2,

The three acts of murder-suicide perpetrated by four Palestinians — from both sides of the Green Line — in less than two weeks only highlight the absence of a leading political Palestinian body, employing a single, clear and unifying strategy. For West Bank Palestinians, these attacks are an exception, not a ‘terror wave’.  As for condemnation by Israelis: Let them first condemn the violence they exercise against Palestinians.  The attacks reflect internal divisions and the painful awareness of Palestinian weakness and inability to act in the face of Israel’s might. On the other hand, the fact that so few choose this route, despite its availability, indicates a broader political understanding that such attacks do not further the Palestinian cause.

March 28, 2022

Reported by Haaretz, Mar. 21, 2022

WASHINGTON – Fifty House Democrats urged U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken to prevent Israel from moving forward with the planned displacement of Palestinian families and the demolition of their homes in the West Bank village of Walaja.

“The destruction and displacement of this community would run counter to the values shared by the U.S. and Israel, while further undermining long-term Israeli security, Palestinian dignity, and prospects for peace,” the lawmakers — led by Reps. Jan Schakowsky, David Price, Jamie Raskin, John Yarmuth and Mark Pocan — wrote concerning the pending eviction of 38 Palestinian families, totaling approximately 300 people.

Mar. 22

An Israeli orchestra plays Arabic music from memory, under a Haredi conductor. The mixed Arab-Jewish orchestra Firqat Alnoor and its conductor Ariel Cohen are fighting stereotypes — around the music they play and around Israeli Haredim and Arabic culture. And they do it all without sheet music.

Haaretz Editorial

Mar. 23,

The growing settlement enterprise requires a constantly growing circle of partners in crime. Even the Authority for National-Civic Service, known in Hebrew as Sherut Leumi, contributes its bit to this criminal operation. Last week we discovered that the state allows national service volunteers to do their service in illegal West Bank settlement outposts. It is time to put an end to nationalist service volunteers at illegal West Bank outposts.

Mar. 23,

An Israeli court issued an order Wednesday reducing by two weeks the detention without trial of a Jewish man who was arrested last month on suspicion of attacking left-wing Israeli activists and who had previously violated numerous restraining orders.

The 20-year-old man, whose name is under gag order, is the resident of a West Bank settlement who is suspected of assaulting the activists near the West Bank village of Burin in January. He is the only Jewish administrative detainee in the country at this time; there are 490 Palestinians being held without trial by Israel.

WASHINGTON – The Middle East Studies Association on Wednesday officially passed a resolution endorsing the boycott, divestment and sanctions movement as a means of effectively holding Israel accountable for alleged human rights violations, in what can be described as a watershed moment for the BDS movement.

Mar. 23,

A Bedouin Israeli in the south who complained to the police that he was attacked by four Jews simply because he was an Arab was arrested on suspicion that he assaulted the four men.  A judge says Sabah Abu Zaid was definitely attacked first, but the complainant’s lawyer says his testimony is being treated as false while the people he complained about went home after being questioned

According to a district court judge, there is no disputing that the man, Sabah Abu Zaid, was attacked first and believed that his life was in danger.

A Palestinian man arrested for an alleged stabbing attack Saturday is being held in a Jerusalem hospital with restraints on his hands and feet, despite the objections of his doctors, while sedated and intubated.

The head of the Shaare Zedek Medical Center’s trauma center, Dr. Alon Schwartz, has asked the police to remove the restraints from Murad Barkat, 28, warning that it could endanger his recovery. The police have not yet agreed to the request.

Mar. 24

WASHINGTON – United Nations Special Rapporteur Michael Lynk accused Israel of apartheid in a report submitted Tuesday to the UN Human Rights Council, the latest example of such accusations emerging in the international arena.

Soldiers posted in the West Bank have recently received instructions from their commanders that in any shift at a checkpoint or guard post they must enter the details and photos of at least 50 Palestinians to the IDF’s “Blue Wolf” tracking system. A soldier who doesn’t make the quota, they were told at the briefing, will not be relieved from duty at the end of their shift and will be forced to remain on duty until they make quota. The Blue Wolf system is used by the IDF to tag and monitor the entire Palestinian population, even those about whom there is no intelligence. 

Mar. 24, 2022 11:34 PM

Israeli soldiers operating in the South Hebron Hills region of the West Bank have been collecting personal information about human rights activists from Europe, according to footage obtained by anti-occupation group Breaking the Silence. 

Videos depict Israeli soldiers photographing activists in the South Hebron Hills, ‘so they don’t let them into the airport the next time,’ according to a settlement security guard.

Mar. 25

Two Palestinian teens were riding a motorbike in Nablus when a convoy of Border Police passed by. The officers first claimed the two shot at them, then said that they just pointed a gun, which was never found. It doesn’t change the outcome: The officers shot one of the teens as he fled, riddling his body with bullets

Horrorific images, utterly appalling, showing the corpse of a 16-year-old boy riddled with bullet holes. The entire body of Nader Rayan, son to a refugee family from the Balata refugee camp abutting Nablus, is strewn with deep, bleeding bullet wounds, his flesh is bare, his brain is spilling out, his head and face are perforated. Border Police troops shot him with pathological madness, in a rage, savagely, without restraint.

Mar. 27

The Israeli cabinet on Sunday approved the establishment of five new communities in the Arad area of Israel’s Negev desert.  Four of the five communities in Israel’s southern desert are slated for Jews, with admission committees vetting the prospective residents.

Reported by Sabeel, Jerusalem, March, 28, 2022,

While Christians continue to observe Lent, Muslims will begin fasting for Ramadan next week. Local residents and visitors will be taking part in religious ceremonies in the sacred city of Jerusalem during the coming month, with Easter celebrations for Christians, Ramadan for Muslims and Passover for Jews.  Sabeel prays that Jerusalem will remain a city of peace through this significant time. We pray that worshippers will be granted access to their places of worship without fear of unprovoked attacks.

In a number of larger Palestinian cities voting for municipal elections took place on Saturday, the 26th of March. While the level of participation in voting for mayoral candidates is often high in Arab localities in Israel, levels are much lower in the West Bank.

Sabeel prays for young and dynamic leaders to emerge from the Palestinian community with a passion to defend human rights and to support democratic values.

Sabeel has again invited people to join their healthcare initiative. They open for enrolment every three months. Sabeel has brought together churches, non-profit organizations, lay people and businesses to develop a Health Insurance Plan which is available to the whole community and is meant to give support to those in greatest need in their communities.

A new non-fiction book for young adults has recently been published which aims to tell the story of young Palestinians living in Silwan, near the Old City of Jerusalem, through their own voices. ‘Determined to Stay: Palestinian Youth Fight for Their Village’ by Jody Sokolower tackles the issues faced by Palestinians living under Israeli occupation in bite sized chapters relating to life for youngsters in Silwan.

Four people were killed on Tuesday, the 22nd of March, in a stabbing and car ramming attack in Beersheba in southern Israel. The assailant, Mohammed Abu Qian, a Palestinian citizen of Israel from the town of Hura, was shot by a bus driver at the scene. Sabeel prays

  that tensions in al Naqab region may ease and that the Bedouin will not be forced from their land by the Israeli authorities.

Haaretz, referring to this same incident, on Mar. 24, (speaking of the assailant as a ‘terrorist’)

Hura residents condemn neighbor’s terror killings in Be’er Sheva and fear retaliation.

The morning after Tuesday’s attack in Be’er Sheva, the streets in the town of Hura, where the terrorist Muhammad Abu al-Kiyan lived, were almost empty. The few walking around al-Salam Street, where Abu al-Kiyan lived, looked suspiciously at any unfamiliar person passing by. ‘We live here together with our Jewish neighbors, work with them, they buy from us, and we have good relations. We won’t let anything destroy that,’ says a resident of Hura where the terrorist Muhammad Abu al-Kiyan was from.

Many of them declined to speak to me for fear of being questioned by security personnel, after police and Shin Bet forces had raided the neighborhood, and were seen walking around al-Kiyan’s family home minutes after the attack. “There’s tension here, and everyone is afraid,” said resident Nafed Abu al-Kiyan.

March 21. 2022

Reported by Haaretz, Mar. 14

The High Court of Justice will hold another hearing on Tuesday for the two petitions against the permanent eviction of the residents of Masafer Yatta from their homes, part of a bid by the state to declare part of the southeastern West Bank a “firing zone” for regular Israeli military exercises.

After putting off a decision on the petitions for two decades, the High Court is expected to hand down its final ruling soon. Following through with the state’s demands for a total evacuation would spell the end for eight Palestinian villages in Masafer Yatta – also known as the South Hebron Hills – and the erasure of their distinct way of life, developed over many generations.

Mar. 13, 2022

Palestinian lawyer Salah Hamouri was detained without trial by Israeli authorities on Thursday, who alleged he belongs to the outlawed Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine and poses a threat to national security.

Mar. 15

A 16-year-old Palestinian was killed by Israeli fire on Tuesday during a raid in a West Bank refugee camp, the Palestinian Health Ministry said, and another Palestinian was killed in a separate incident in the Jerusalem area.

Apart from the teen, at least three other Palestinians were wounded in clashes that followed the early morning raid in Balata, a sprawling refugee camp in the northern West Bank city of Nablus. One of them, according to medical officials, is in serious condition, and another suffered facial burns from a stun grenade.

Israeli undercover officers shot dead on Tuesday a suspect who opened fire on them in the southern Israeli city of Rahat, police said.

He was identified as 27-year-old Salem al-Harbad.

The incident occurred during a Shin Bet arrest of two suspects. According to the security service, one of them was wanted for staying in Israel without permits and the other for security-related offenses.

Mar. 16,

Israeli settlers established a new outpost on a UNESCO World Heritage Site last week, near the Palestinian village of Battir.

The Palestinian owners of the land near the outpost said they have been barred from accessing their land since the outpost appeared. They said they have asked Israel’s Civil Administration to remove it, and have also contacted UNESCO over the matter.

An Israeli officer and soldier filed a complaint with the police on Tuesday after settlers reportedly attacked them near the West Bank outpost of Homesh. 

The IDF released details of the incident, which occurred on Monday evening, and told that an Israeli vehicle breached the checkpoint near Homesh, hitting the legs of the two soldiers. They did not require medical treatment.  This follows another incident of violence near Homesh on Saturday night, in which Israelis near the outpost pelted Palestinian vehicles with stones, the IDF Spokesman reported. The troops at the scene tried to stop the incident but ended up being attacked as well, the army said. 

Mar. 19

On his way home from the gym, Israe troops fired 31 bullets at him. Soldiers pump Sudki Adwani’s car with bullets, seriously wounding the innocent driver. They leave him wounded and half-naked in the rain, only later calling for a Palestinian ambulance. The final blow: the revocation of his father’s Israeli work permit.

Mar. 21

A controversial new film called ‘Huda’s Salon’ reveals the Palestinian narrative from a unique perspective: the double occupation of women.

Had anyone told me the day would come when a male Palestinian director would look at the Israeli occupation through female eyes and without self-pity, I would not have believed it. But director-screenwriter Hany Abu-Assad has outdone himself in “Huda’s Salon,” in which he paints the occupation in colors we’ve never seen before in Palestinian cinema.

Reported by Sabeel, Jerusalem, Mar 21, 2022

Last week Israeli crop duster planes flew for four consecutive days near the eastern Gazan Strip, spraying chemicals, believed to be herbicides, close to agricultural land owned by Palestinians. The spraying only starts when the wind is blowing in a westerly direction, in the direction of Palestinian land. The herbicides destroy the crops and ruin the arable land. The Israeli army claims it is clearing vegetation on the buffer zone.

On Friday, the 18th of March, the Eighth International Palestine Marathon took place in Bethlehem, after it had to be cancelled for the past two years due to the pandemic. Over ten thousand Palestinians and international runners took part in the event. Full marathon runners had to run the 11km course four times over, to avoid passing through Israeli checkpoints.

The Palestinian prisoners’ movement has announced that prisoners in Israeli jails will begin an open-ended hunger strike from Friday, the 25th of March. The hunger strike will be in protest at the worsening conditions being imposed upon them by the Israeli prison authorities.

The World Council of Churches’ Easter Initiative 2022(EAPPI) gives us a glimpse of the lives of Palestinians living in and around Jerusalem. While our hearts cry out for those suffering from warfare in Ukraine, let us also remember those who live under constant threat of eviction from their homes and communities in Palestinian neighbourhoods around this sacred city. One Palestinian interviewed in Silwan spoke about how the news of the Russian invasion of Ukraine makes him feel ‘more persecuted than ever’. He lamented, ’I see the whole world and the UN standing resolutely on the side of the Ukrainians- as they should. But I see a double standard and I see the world giving Israel a free hand to do whatever it wants to persecute us.’

March 14, 2022

Reported by DCIP (Defence of Children International Palestine), Mar. 7,

Last night, Israeli forces killed another Palestinian child—the third in less than a month. Yamen Nafez Mahmoud Khanafseh was 15 years old. Israeli forces shot and killed him in Abu Dis, east of Jerusalem in the occupied West Bank.

Israeli forces prevented Palestinian paramedics from treating Yamen, firing tear gas canisters at the ambulance as it approached the scene, according to information gathered by DCIP. Israeli forces confiscated Yamen’s body, and it has not yet been returned to his family.

While it is unclear if Israeli authorities will continue to withhold Yamen’s body, Israeli authorities continue to implement a policy of confiscating and withholding Palestinian bodies in violation of international humanitarian law and international human rights law. For grieving families, the Israeli policy of confiscating and withholding Palestinian bodies amounts to collective punishment.

Israel is the only country in the world with such a policy of confiscating human remains.

Reported by Haaretz, Mar. 7, 2022

A Palestinian man was killed on Monday after stabbing two Israeli police officers in Jerusalem’s Old City, police said, in the second such incident in the city in as many days.  Footage from the scene shows a police officer firing at the assailant while he was on the ground. The two officers were taken to hospital in moderate condition.

Israel will permit Palestinian institutions of higher education to employ lecturers from overseas only if they teach in fields that have been designated as essential by Israel, and only if the lecturers and researchers are accomplished and possess at least a doctorate, according to a new set of procedures by the Defense Ministry.

Haaretz Editorial

Mar. 10, 2022 

Resist Israel’s Academic occupation of the Palestinians.  An officer in the Defense Ministry’s Coordinator of Government Activities in the Territories will soon rule that a certain college instructor, a U.S. citizen, cannot enter the West Bank to teach at a university in Jenin because her area of expertise is not an “essential field” for Palestinians. The field will be determined in accordance with a COGAT ruling. A French student’s application to Bethlehem University will be refused because the Defense Ministry has decided that the department is closed to foreign students.

Mar. 9, 2022

Israel will halt demolitions of structures built without permits in the Arab community during Ramadan next month, in order to prevent an escalation of the security situation. The police chief’s decision comes amid heightened tensions in East Jerusalem.  Police Commissioner Kobi Shabtai instructed the police to refrain from carrying out evictions as well as freezing home demolition orders in East Jerusalem and the Negev.

‘Extremely arbitrary’ travel bans stop thousands of Palestinians from going abroad.  More than 10,000 Palestinians were issued travel bans by Israel in 2021, and many of them only find out at the border

Israel prohibited 10,594 West Bank Palestinians from traveling abroad last year but granted nearly half of the appeals against the travel bans that were filed.

A 23-year-old Palestinian shot by the Israeli army during a protest march in the West Bank last week succumbed to his wounds, Palestinian media reported on Wednesday.

Ahmad Hikmat Seif was evacuated to hospital on Tuesday last week after he was wounded by gunshots in the stomach and back during a demonstration in support of Palestinian prisoners in the village of Burqa, local sources said.

Burqa and nearby villages in the northern West Bank have become flash points for violence in the last few months, amid renewed attempts by Israelis to reestablish the West Bank settlement of Homesh.

Anti-Arab graffiti was spray-painted on a car and the tires of 30 other vehicles were slashed on Wednesday in the central town of Jaljulya.

The graffiti reads “Arabs beware,” warning Arab men to stay away from “my sister,” referring to Jewish women.

While hate crimes targeting Palestinians are relatively common in the West Bank, this is a rare case within Israel’s borders.

Mar. 10, 2022 2:59 PM

Israel’s coalition passed a law effectively barring Palestinians from the West Bank or Gaza who are married to Israeli citizens from gaining citizenship or residency on Thursday, in a fraught final session before the Knesset breaks for recess.

The bill passed with 45 votes in favor and 15 against, with both the United Arab List and Meretz of the coalition opposing the law.

Reported Sabeel, Jerusalem, Mar. 14,

On Thursday, the 10th of March, the Knesset passed the new Citizenship Law. It replaces a temporary order introduced in 2003, which was renewed annually. The law discriminates against  those Palestinians who are Palestinian by heritage and Israeli by citizenship. It prevents them from extending citizenship and permanent residency to their Palestinian spouses, if they come from the occupied Palestinian territories or Gaza. It will force thousands of Palestinian families to emigrate or to live separately.

There has been another attack on the Orthodox Monastery in Nablus, at the site of Jacob’s Well. The monastery and the Superior, Archimandrite Justinus, suffered a previous attack on the 24th of January. He has survived no fewer than thirty-two life threatening attacks.

March 7, 2022

Reported by Haaretz, Feb. 28

The Palestinian Red Crescent said 14 were wounded in confrontations near Jerusalem’s Damascus Gate, signalling mounting tensions ahead of Ramadan.

Israeli forces detained at least 20 Palestinians in clashes in Jerusalem’s Old City, and 14 were wounded, according to the Palestinian Red Crescent, four of whom were rushed to hospital.

An 11-year-old child was wounded in the leg by a stun grenade, the Red Crescent said. She was taken to hospital, but her condition remains unclear.

Mar. 1,

Two Palestinians were killed during an overnight raid by Israeli forces at the Jenin refugee camp.

Israeli forces entered the Jenin refugee camp to arrest a suspect – who turned himself in – but two others were killed in firefight

One of them, according to witnesses, was an unarmed 18-year-old, and the other a member of Palestinian militant group Islamic Jihad.

Reported by B’Tselem, March 1

Last May, Israel established the settlement outpost of Evyatar on top of Jabal Sabih – a hill near Nablus in the northern West Bank. The outpost was built on land that belongs to the towns of Beita and Qabalan and to the village of Yatma. Since then, the residents of these communities have not had a single day’s peace. Nine months without respite; nine months of fear and loss, and of people killed, wounded and detained.

Since the outpost was established, Israeli forces have killed nine Palestinians from these communities. Eight were shot to death during or near the demonstrations against the land grab; the ninth, a plumber from Beita, was shot and killed near the town’s water mains.

This week, we are publishing a report about the lethal open-fire policy the military is employing against residents of Beita who protest the establishment of the outpost. According to UN figures, in addition to the people killed in the demonstrations, more than 5,300 have been injured: about 180 by live fire, about 1,000 by rubber-coated metal bullets or sponge rounds, and the rest by tear gas inhalation. More than 100 residents of Beita have been arrested, and Israel has revoked the work permits of dozens.

 Meanwhile, in Beita, Yatma and Qabalan, everyone is asking, “How many more dead, how many more wounded and arrested? How much destruction and suffering will it take to return to the hill?”

Haaretz, Mar. 1,

A 19-year-old Palestinian student was killed by Israeli army gunfire near a West Bank town just south of Bethlehem, the Palestinian Health Ministry said on Tuesday.

According to an Israeli security official, Amar Shafiq Abu Afifa, a resident of the al-Aroub refugee camp, and another Palestinian were near a viewpoint, between Beit Fajjar and the Migdal Oz settlement, where several Israelis were sitting.

Palestinian families slated for eviction from their Sheikh Jarrah homes can stay there until a final decision on property rights in the contested East Jerusalem neighborhood has been reached, Israel’s top court ruled on Tuesday.

The Supreme Court partially accepted the Palestinian residents’ appeal, letting them keep their homes for now for a reduced rent, paid to the settler group that claims ownership of the houses.

Mar. 2, 2022

Jerusalem police officers have used excessive force against Palestinians this week, police sources say, warning that tensions in the city and elsewhere could seriously escalate if the Jerusalem District, under the command of Maj. Gen. Doron Turgeman, doesn’t change its policy.

Eight Israeli settlers were arrested Wednesday over an attack on soldiers and Palestinians last month in the northern West Bank.

The police suspect that they arrived at the Shavei Shomron checkpoint in an attempt to enter the nearby illegal outpost of Homesh. After soldiers refused to let them pass, the eight allegedly started shoving and attacking soldiers and Palestinians in the checkpoint’s vicinity. A video footage of the incident shows settlers throwing stones at a Palestinian taxi.

Jack Khoury

Mar. 4, 2022

Sanctions on Russia: What about sanctions helping Palestinians?

The Palestinian leaders are following developments in Ukraine and biting their lips. “This is a time for remaining silent,” a senior Palestinian official told me. “Any statement or taking of a position will cost us dearly. Why annoy the United States and the West? We desperately need their help. And why open a front against the Russians and Putin?”

Mar. 4,

A Palestinian man who was shot and killed by Israeli soldiers near Bethlehem on Tuesday had been strolling with a friend in a forest near his home when he was killed, the friend told B’Tselem’s investigator on Thursday.

Amar Shafiq Abu Afifa was a ‘peaceful’ person on a hike ■ ‘If he had wanted to clash with the army, he had plenty of opportunities in the refugee camp’Amar Shafiq Abu Afifa, a 19-year-old college student, was shot in the leg and then died from another shot to the head, the preliminary investigation into his death shows.

Mar. 5,

This is what Israeli evil looks like: Even after a deathly ill Hisham Abu Hawash ended his hunger strike, which had gone on for 141 days in protest of his administrative detention, Israel insisted on returning him to his cell until the termination of the period of his arrest without trial. Last weekend, he was finally released.  He survived a 141 day hunger strike in Israel custody and vows to do it again if arrested.  But despite the happiness at home, he is still far from the person he once was. His physicians in Shamir Medical Center, near Rishon Letzion, where he spent the final days of his hunger strike, told him that it would take a year and a half for his body to recover. For now, his speech is faint, his walk hesitant and the food he eats is measured.

Mar. 6,

Karim El Kusami, a 19-year-old Palestinian from East Jerusalem stabbed police in the Old City early Sunday morning and was subsequently shot dead by officers, according to Israeli police. Two officers were lightly injured during the attack and received treatment.

El Kusami’s brother, Muhammad, was arrested by police forces at the end of a house search conducted by Israeli officers according to an eyewitness.

Mar, 7

Bethlehem factories now face harsher security regulations from Israel. Even after installing cameras in factories, equipping trucks with GPS devices and conducting security checks on workers, factory owners say they have to travel to far-away checkpoints to transfer goods to Israel.

A 16-year-old Palestinian was shot and killed by Israeli military fire near Jerusalem, the Palestinian Health Ministry and Israel Defense Forces said on Sunday.

According to the IDF, Israeli soldiers operating in the village of Abu Dis identified two suspects throwing firebombs at one of the army positions in the area. Yamin Jaffal was wounded by Israeli fire and later succumbed to his wounds. The second suspect fled the scene.

 Reported by Sabeel, Jerusalem, Mar 7, 2022,

On Tuesday, the 1st of March, entry requirements for travelers to Israel were relaxed. The rule change means that more pilgrims and tourists can return to visit Palestine and Israel after thirty months of absence and uncertainty, due to the pandemic.

A project called ‘Afaq’,(meaning, horizons) is being sponsored by the Latin Patriarchate of Jerusalem and Bethlehem University. It aims to help Palestinian women and young people start their own businesses. So far it has reached one hundred Palestinians across thirteen parishes.

Ra’ef Salaymeh was forced to start demolishing his own home in the occupied Jerusalem neighborhood of Beit Hanina on Friday, the 4th of March. The Israeli municipality accused him of building his home without a permit. The municipality rarely grants permits to Palestinians. He would incur a fine of $35,000 in demolition costs if he had not started to demolish his own house.

The funeral of Ammar Abu Afifeh  took place at his home in the Arroub refugee camp, north of Hebron on Wednesday, the 2nd of March. Ammar had been shot and killed by Israeli soldiers at the village of Beit Fajjar, north of Hebron on the previous day, but the army had refused to release his body to his family for twenty four hours. Hundreds of Palestinians attended his funeral  to protest his killing. Mourners at the funeral were fired on by Israeli soldiers using rubber coated bullets and many also suffered suffocation from tear gas canisters fired at the crowd by the soldiers.

On Wednesday, the 2nd of March, Israeli settlers chased Palestinians who were foraging for gundelia,(or akkoub) in the Khallet Makhoul area, in the northern Jordan Valley. Israeli soldiers provided protection for the settlers and detained some of the foragers. Gundelia is a thistle-like plant which grows for a brief season in the springtime and has been used in traditional Palestinian dishes for generations. Israeli authorities claim the plant is now an endangered species. Palestinians maintain that environmental degradation and any threat to plant species is caused by rapidly expanding Israeli settlements and the proliferation of closed military zones in the occupied Palestinian territories.

February 28, 2022 Summary

Reported by Haaretz, Feb. 21, 2022

Representatives of the three largest churches in Jerusalem warn against attempts of ‘various entities’ who ‘are seeking to minimize, not to say eliminate, any non-Jewish characteristics of the Holy City’.  The heads of the largest churches in Jerusalem have urged Israel’s environmental protection minister to halt a plan to expand the Jerusalem Walls National Park surrounding the Old City.  The plan calls for expanding the national park on the slopes of the Mount of Olives to property owned by several different churches. The heads of the major denominations believe the scheme will infringe on their rights at the sites and on the status quo there.

Israel’s Nature and Parks Authority said on Monday that it was backing down from an expansion plan to encompass Christian holy sites on Jerusalem’s Mount of Olives in a national park, following outcry from major churches.

The Justice Ministry has decided to close an investigation into police officers suspected of killing an uninvolved Israeli Arab during a shootout with criminals a year ago.

The Justice Ministry says it’s ‘more likely’ that Ahmad Hijazi was shot by one of the suspects and not one of the officers.  The Family plans to appeal the decision.

The police arrested 13 Palestinians, including three minors, during a nighttime police raid of their homes in the East Jerusalem neighborhood of Isawiya.

The Palestinians are suspected of hurling firebombs, stones and fireworks at security forces over the past few months. According to police, the suspects committed the acts between September and November of last year.

Feb. 22, 

A Jerusalem court suspended on Tuesday the evacuation of a Palestinian family from their home in the East Jerusalem neighborhood of Sheikh Jarrah, which had been slated for March, in favor of a Jewish settler group.  The court feared that the evacuation could have reignited violence in Jerusalem, particularly due to its timing, just before Ramadan.

A 14-year-old Palestinian was shot dead on Tuesday by Israeli forces near Bethlehem, the Palestinian Health Ministry said.

The Israeli military said in a statement that the teen, Mohammed Shehadeh, was throwing a Molotov cocktail before being shot by soldiers in the West Bank town of al-Khader.

Reported by DCIP, Feb. 24,

Yesterday evening, an Israeli soldier shot and killed 13-year-old Mohammad Rezq Shehadeh Salah with live ammunition. The shooting occurred close to the Israeli separation barrier in Al-Khader, southwest of Bethlehem in the occupied West Bank.

After Mohammad was injured and lying on the ground, Israeli soldiers approached him and removed his clothes, according to video footage taken after the shooting. Israeli forces prevented a Palestinian ambulance from reaching Mohammad, and he remained lying on the ground for around 30 minutes after being shot.

Haaretz, Feb. 23,

The Israeli army is refusing to process humanitarian requests from Palestinians and Israeli Arabs seeking to leave or enter the Gaza Strip if the necessary documents that they submit are labeled with a “State of Palestine” header.

Numerous Palestinian applicants were denied permits to attend family funerals, weddings or visit a sick family member over the new practice

In most cases, the heading appears on medical records or death certificates issued by Palestinian hospitals in the Gaza Strip. In many cases, documents have been rejected even though there were no factual disputes regarding the basis for the request.

The Israeli government has issued a demolition order of the home of a 95-year-old physically disabled woman in an unrecognized Bedouin village in the Negev.

The order was issued even though the woman’s shack is built on the ruins of the old house where she had lived for the last 15 years in order to make it wheel-chair accessible.

Feb. 25,

Israeli soldiers shot on Friday a Palestinian man who the military says threw an explosive device from his car at a West Bank checkpoint, seriously wounding the man, according to the Palestinian Health Ministry.  He was taken to hospital in Jenin.

There were no other casualties in the incident near the Jalameh checkpoint, in the northern West Bank.

Reported by Sabeel, Jerusalem, Feb. 28, 2022

Video footage of Israeli police manhandling Muhammad al-Ajlouni, a young Palestinian man with Downs’ syndrome, has caused outrage. On Monday, the 21st of February, Muhammad started to join in with the protesters he came across at Sheikh Jarrah. When soldiers attempted to restrain him, he was terrified. An Israeli police officer came to apologise to his family for the rough treatment on the following day and stated that the police had, ‘a duty to take care of people with special needs’.

On Thursday, the 24th of February, B’Tselem published the full witness statements of those Palestinians who had been affected by settler attacks while driving in the Nablus and Ramallah areas over a period of four days, from the 21st to the 24th of November, 2021. The settlers had damaged Palestinian vehicles by driving by and throwing large stones at their windscreens, injuring three Palestinians and inflicting life-changing injuries on one driver.

B’Tselem has also highlighted the disruption caused by the 50-day closure of the village of Deir Nizam in the Ramallah District by the Israeli military during this past December and January. On the premise of looking for Palestinian children who may have thrown stones at Israeli settler cars, the army set up a checkpoint to control movement in and out of the village, patrolled the village and detained residents as a form of collective punishment.

February 21, 2022 Summary

Reported by Haaretz, Feb 14, 2022,

Large numbers of police were deployed in East Jerusalem’s Sheikh Jarrah neighborhood on Monday, using stun grenades to disperse young Palestinians who had gathered in the neighborhood.

Supporters of the Likud party rallied nearby with Israeli flags, as far-right lawmaker Itamar Ben-Gvir returned to a makeshift office he set up in the flash point neighborhood.

Reported by Defence of Children international, Palestine, Feb. 14,

Late last night, Israeli forces entered the village of Silat Al-Harithiya in the northern occupied West Bank to demolish the home of a Palestinian prisoner—a policy that amounts to collective punishment. As villagers gathered near the soldiers, an Israeli sniper shot 16-year-old Mohammad Akram Ali Taher Abu Salah in the eye with live ammunition. 

Bystanders transported Mohammad to a hospital in Jenin, where he was pronounced dead a few hours later.

Haaretz, Feb. 15,

A 26-year-old Palestinian was killed Tuesday in the West Bank by Israeli army fire near Ramallah, the Palestinian Health Ministry said. Israeli defense officials have confirmed the fatality and said the circumstances of the incident are being investigated. 

Nihad Amin al-Barghouti was shot in the village of Nabi Saleh, according to a local activist, after an Israeli force entered the village northwest of Ramallah.

Feb. 16,

Elad, a right-wing Zionist organization, has been holding educational activities on private Palestinian farmland in East Jerusalem under the auspices of the Jerusalem Municipality.

The activity is defined as a joint project between Elad and the Israel Nature and Parks Authority and was made possible after Jerusalem Mayor Moshe Leon signed a landscaping order to develop the area of the Hinnom Valley where the farmland is located.

Police arrested on Wednesday 17 people suspected of assaulting Palestinians and causing damage to property in the West Bank village of Hawara last month. 

Three Palestinians were injured in the incident, after a convoy of cars passed through the West Bank village of Hawara and some passengers hurled stones at vehicles and shopsThe suspects, some of whom are from the north, settlements in the West Bank and Jerusalem, are being questioned by the police on suspicion of assault, taking part in illegal gathering and causing damage to property out of racist motives. Their detention may be extended later on Wednesday.

Reported by Defence of Children International Palestine, Feb 17,

Israeli authorities renewed the administrative detention of Palestinian teen Mohammad Mansour for an additional four-month period, adding to more than 300 days of imprisonment without charge or trial.  Israeli forces detained Mohammad, then 17, during a night raid on his home in Jenin in the northern occupied West Bank on April 9, 2021. He’s been imprisoned without charge ever since.

Haaretz, Feb. 18,

The Shin Bet’s former No. 3 thinks it’s time for Israel to rethink its modus operandi. ‘We arrested countless Palestinians for no reason”, says ex-0top Shin Bey officer.

The events of the past two weeks – tensions in Sheikh Jarrah and the increase in the number of Palestinians killed in clashes with the army – have strengthened assessments inside the Israel Defense Forces that a major escalation could break out in the territories around April, between the start of Ramadan and Passover.

Dozens of settlers, the ‘Klan on Mt.Qantub’, swooped down, armed with axes and clubs, on a pastoral shepherding community on the dark edge of the Judean Desert and attacked a 73-year-old Palestinian, Mohammed Shalaida this week.

He is now sitting on an old bed in a shabby room in Sa’ir, a town near Hebron. His head and hand are bandaged: Shalalda is recovering from a pogrom. He was hospitalized for five days in Hebron and is now recuperating at the home of one of his sons. When he is well again, he’ll return to his tent-home in his family’s small pastoral enclave, which lies a few kilometers to the east, on Mount Qanub. Shalalda, who has 10 children, was born on that mountain and will probably die there, too.

Reported by Sabeel, Jerusalem, Feb. 21, 2022,

On Friday, the 18th of February, representatives from the Humanitarian Country Team in Palestine met with the Salem family in the neighbourhood of Sheikh Jarrah in occupied East Jerusalem. The family of twelve, including six children, face forcible eviction from their home in March. The team, comprised of members of UN agencies and international and Palestinian NGOs has called on the Israeli authorities to halt all further evictions from the Sheikh Jarrah and Silwan neighbourhoods of East Jerusalem. 218 Palestinian families are living with this imminent threat.

Footage of Israeli soldiers arresting a 19-year-old Palestinian at his workplace at night in al-Bireh, near Ramallah was released on Wednesday, the 16th of February. Malik Maala was working as a guard at an industrial facility to raise money for his university tuition fees when soldiers arrived to arrest him. The film shows that when the soldiers came to detain him, he raised his hands behind his head, expecting to be handcuffed. At this point an Israeli soldier released a military dog which pounced on him and attacked him. Some moments later the dog was recovered by a soldier and Malik was detained and taken to an undisclosed location.

Acute water scarcity has forced the villagers of Furush Beit Dajan, near Nablus, to abandon their once famous lemon trees and to grow tomatoes in greenhouses instead. There are plenty of wells under their land for crops but their water has been diverted. The Israeli army  has  constructed artisian aquifers and supplies unlimited quantities of water to the nearby Israeli settlements of Hamra and Mekhora.

On Friday, the 25th of February Sabeel Jerusalem will host an event with Rev. Mitri Raheb. He will be discussing a document he helped to write which is entitled, ‘We choose abundant life’. It is the work of a group of theologians and specialists in human and geopolitical sciences, both women and men, from different church traditions, who have come together to lay out a new vision for the people of the Middle East.

Last week Palestinian Christians gathered in Beit Sahour to pay tribute to Archbishop Desmond Tutu, who died in December 2021. The prayer service was held at Our Lady of Fatima Catholic Church, where Tutu prayed when he visited in 1989. Tutu came to Beit Sahour during the first Palestinian Intifada. He spoke at Shepherd’s Field, where he was welcomed by thousands of Palestinians, both Christian and Muslim. Tutu identified the situation in Palestine/Israel as apartheid three decades before the recent reports of B’Tselem, Human Rights Watch and Amnesty International.

Samir Mansour once again opened his bookstore/library  in Gaza to customers on Thursday, the 17th of February. His shop had been completely destroyed by Israeli bombing in May 2021. Last year Human Rights lawyers Mahvish Rukhsana and Clive Stafford Smith led a fundraising operation called 3DC to help raise donations from all around the world to help him rebuild and restock his shop.

February 14, 2022 Summary

Reported by Haaretz, Feb. 9, 2022

Two vehicles owned by a Palestinian man were vandalized Tuesday night in the West Bank by a group of Hebrew-speaking attackers, hours after the nearby illegal outpost of Ma’ale Ahuvia was evacuated.  

The group smashed the windows and punctured the tires of the car and tractor owned by a resident of the Palestinian village Deir Jarir.

The Netzah Yehuda Battalion, the West Bank militia formed inside the Israeli army, has a long history of bad behavior, driven by a far-right ideology imbibed from the settler movement.

Haaretz, Feb 13,

A 17-year-old Palestinian was killed by live Israeli fire in clashes in the Jenin area that erupted after the military demolished the home of one of the Palestinian attackers convicted of a deadly shooting attack last year. 

According to the Palestinian Health Ministry, Muhammad Akram Ali Tahr was killed by a gunshot wound to the head fired by Israeli forces. The ministry reported 11 more Palestinians were wounded. The Red Crescent said two of them were in serious condition.

Far-right MK Ben-Gvir came to Sheikh Jarrah to reopen an office and pour some more fuel on the flames which threaten to reignite simmering Arab-Jewish tensions in the neighborhood.

If the next round of violence pitting Israel against Hamas and the Palestinian residents of Jerusalem begins soon, it will begin in the ugliest corner of the city, in the small plot of land between the homes of the Yushvaevs and the Salems in the neighborhood of Sheikh Jarrah. The area is covered with garbage and construction debris, with a large muddy puddle in the center, and next to it a burned-out vehicle and a trampled fence. This plot has been the center of the confrontation between the neighborhood settlers and Palestinians in recent weeks.

Reported by Sabeel, Jerusalem, Feb 14, 2022,

On Saturday, the !2th of February, the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs in the occupied Palestinian territory reported that the Israeli authorities had demolished, confiscated or forced owners to demolish 53 Palestinian-owned homes in Area C of the occupied West Bank and East Jerusalem. The authorities cite the reason for the demolitions is the lack of Israeli building permits,(which Palestinians find almost impossible to obtain). The demolitions affected the livelihoods of 400 Palestinians and displaced 26 people, including 13 children. Some of the structures that were torn down were temporary shelters, which had been provided as humanitarian assistance to families whose homes had already been demolished.

‘Coalition-stop settlements’is a broad alliance of NGOs, grassroots movements, trades unions and politicians who have come together to halt the annexation of the occupied Palestinian territory. On Sunday, the 20th of February, they are launching the European Citizen’s Initiative. They are aiming to get one million signatures to support their petition. They are appealing to the European Commission to start respecting international law by stopping all trade with illegal settlements.

During the first month of 2022 the Israeli authorities have arrested 502 Palestinians, according to prisoner advocacy groups. Among the detainees were 6 women and 54 children, one of whom was younger than twelve-years-old. There are now 4,500 Palestinian detainees in Israeli military prisons, 500 of whom are held on administrative detention. Many prisoners are suffering from Covid, with 500 cases reported in Ofer Prison alone.

Stanford University in the US has announced that the scientist Bassam Dally is now ranked in the top two per cent of scientists across the world. Bassam is a Palestinian- Australian academic and his family originated from Kafr Yassif, near Galilee. His research currently focuses on the use of renewable energy sources to decarbonise pollution from heavy industries. Alongside his academic work he has continued to support Palestine.

This year Kumi Now is taking a fresh look at the different challenges faced by Palestinians and finding out from them about the innovative ways they have come up with to overcome them. On Tuesday, the 15th of February, Vera Baboun, who served as the first female mayor of Bethlehem, is featured in the new Palestinian Innovator Series.

February 9, 2022 Summary

Reported by Haaretz, Feb. 7, 2022,

Israel’s public security minister has called for an investigation into the Israel Police’s use of hard sponge-tipped bullets against Bedouin, five of whom suffered head injuries, during protests last month over the planting of JNF trees. 

Public Security Minister Omer Bar-Lev asked the Justice Ministry’s police misconduct unit to investigate the cases after learning about them from a report published by the Hebrew edition of Haaretz on Sunday.

16-year-old Abdullah Tarabin lost an eye ■ Bassem has three fractures in his jaw ■ Taleb’s skull was smashed ■ Obeideh and Uday were injured in their faces ■ Israeli police loosened restrictions on the use of the hard sponge-tipped bullets. These are the stories of those paying the high price for it.

It’s been two weeks since his eldest son, Abdullah, lost his left eye to a hard sponge-tipped police bullet, but Mohammed Tarabin, a soft-spoken 38-year-old man, still finds it difficult to work up the courage to tell his family.

“I’ve lied to everyone,” he told Haaretz, explaining that he hasn’t been able to share the news that the 16-year-old has permanently lost his sight in the eye.

Feb. 8,

Israel said its forces killed three Palestinian gunmen on Tuesday in Nablus, accusing them of several shooting attacks targeting military forces and Israeli civilians in the West Bank over the past weeks.

The Palestinian Health Ministry confirmed the three deaths, calling the Israeli operation “an assassination.” The Foreign Ministry described it as a “field execution.”

Reported by Sabeel, Jerusalem, Feb. 8, 2022,

Amnesty International launched its most recent report, entitled ‘Israel’s apartheid against Palestine’ on Tuesday, the 1st of February in occupied East Jerusalem. The report concludes that the Israeli occupation state has imposed a ‘cruel system of domination and has committed crimes against humanity’. Fourteen Israeli NGOs and human rights’ groups have signed a statement in support of the Amnesty International report and expressed their concern over an attack against the report by the Israeli government which accuses it of being antisemitic.

The Rawajba family have spent the last fourteen months trying to establish what has happened to their son. They do not know if he is alive or dead and they are worn down with suffering. Their son, Bilal was wounded by the Israeli army when he drove by Huwara, an army checkpoint near Nablus. He was reported to have been injured and airlifted to an unnamed hospital in Tel Aviv. At one point the family were contacted to let them know he had died, but they were later told he was still receiving treatment.

The scenes of Syrian refugees struggling to survive in wintry conditions moved Ibraheem Khalil and his friend Jabr Hijaz to launch an online campaign to raise funds for the work of relief organisations building houses for them in Syria, Jordan and Turkey. They have raised more than 10 million shekels in relief funds from Palestinians living in Arab cities in Israel.

On Saturday, the 29th of January, Episcopalians from the Washington D.C. area adopted resolutions, (3 to 1), to oppose the Israeli apartheid, to confront Christian Zionism and to defend the right to boycott as a legitimate form of protest.

This week five Palestinian NGOs, supported by Israeli human rights’ NGOs, made a formal request that the IDF Legal Advisor from the West Bank reverse his declaration, made in October 2021, that they were ‘unlawful associations’. A sixth group is not part of the latest legal challenge. The Palestinian NGOs have long established records of working to support the human rights of Palestinians living under Israeli occupation, and have worked in partnership with the UN and the global human rights’ community. The IDF has stated that it will not produce evidence against the groups as it is based on classified intelligence.

The Citizenship and Entry into Israel Law, first passed in 2003, makes inhabitants of the West Bank and Gaza ineligible for the granting of Israeli citizenship and residency permits that are usually available through marriage to other Israeli citizens. Palestinians living in East Jerusalem pay a particularly heavy price for this law, often denied unification rights with members of their family. Some Palestinian families have recently been granted residency permits, but many thousands are still denied the right to live with their own family members.

A US District Court judge has blocked the State of Texas from enforcing its Anti-Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions Law against a Palestinian-American contractor who refused to sign a pledge not to boycott Israel. The judge stated that this law infringed Rasmy Hassounas’ First Amendment rights. A number of US states have recently introduced legislation to prevent citizens from participating in any economic boycott of Israel and from any expression of support for Palestinians on the grounds of antisemitism.

Haaretz, Feb. 9,

Thousands take to the streets in the west Bank over the colt of living. The price of fruits and vegetables has skyrocketed, and gasoline, electricity and dairy products have also gone up substantially, but the Palestinian Authority has had a hard time providing solutions.

Feb. 9, 2022

Police cleared out some 20 right-wing activists who set up several mobile structures in a largely Bedouin area in southern Israel early Wednesday morning.  At least 15 were briefly detained after refusing to leave ‘Ma’aleh Paula,’ which was set up as a new ‘settlement’ by activists looking to pressure authorities on Bedouin construction in the Negev

February 7, 2022

Reported by Palestinian Centre for Human Rights’ (PCHR) on Jan 31, 2022,

On Saturday, 29 January 2022, the Palestinian Ministry of Health in Gaza announced that the Israeli authorities have banned the import of new medical radiology devices for the Gaza Strip hospitals for several months, including stationary and mobile x-ray machines.  According to the Palestinian Centre for Human Rights’ (PCHR) follow-up, it was confirmed that the Israeli occupation authorities have banned the import of new medical devices necessary for radiology services in the Gaza Strip hospitals for 10 months.  The Israeli authorities also banned the import of spare parts necessary for the maintenance of many broken and out-of-service medical devices despite their importance in diagnosing diseases and treating patients.

Reported by Haaretz, Jan. 31, 2022,

New research has uncovered an Israeli military operation commanded by Moshe Dayan, whose goal was to forcibly remove Bedouin citizens from their lands. ‘Transferring the Bedouin to new territories would annul their rights as landowners and make them tenants on government lands,’ wrote Dayan in 1951.

WASHINGTON – Several of the most significant U.S.-Jewish establishment organizations issued a rare joint statement Sunday, vehemently condemning Amnesty International UK’s upcoming report accusing Israel of being guilty of “the crime against humanity of apartheid.” 

The report, slated to be released Tuesday, marks the first time the group is officially using the term “apartheid” to describe the state of affairs in Israel, going further than last year’s Human Rights Watch report that limited its description of apartheid to Palestinian areas under Israeli occupation. Various human rights organizations within Israel proper, including B’Tselem and Yesh Din, have also begun using the term in recent years.

The years-long weakening of the Palestinian Authority, widely unpopular among the Palestinian public, has served to strengthen Hamas and threaten Israel’s security, Defense Minister Benny Gantz said Monday.

While Gantz maintained that the Israeli government refuses to negotiate with the Palestinian leadership, he stressed that maintaining a “diplomatic horizon,” is within Israeli interests.

Reported by Al Jazeera, Feb. 1,

Israel forced two Palestinian families in occupied Jerusalem to self-demolish their own homes this morning. Thirteen Shqeirat family members, incl. 5 children, were forcibly displaced.

Haaretz, Feb. 3,

Non-profit groups and aid organizations from Israel’s Arab community have raised more than 20 million shekels ($6.3 million) for residents of refugee camps in northern Syria, as the region suffers from freezing temperatures.

Officials from the aid organizations said they were surprised by the outpouring of donations they received from the community, many of whose members are of low socio-economic standing and are facing their own economic hardships.

Haareetz, Feb. 4,

Palestinians in Gaza and West Bank confront winter Covid , fueled by Omicron.  70,000 active cases in the West Bank, east Jerusalem and the Gaza Strip on Thursday, Palestinian Authority’s Health Ministry reports, as West Bank hospitals reach 85% capacity.

Analysis: Settlers score decisive win against israeli government. 

One of Avichai Mendelblit’s last decisions before his term as attorney general ended this week was also one of the most shameful. He legalized the illegal West Bank settlement of Evyatar. In his legal opinion, he wrote that the preparations for founding the settlement can begin now, and when they have been completed the government can authorize the construction of a new settlement on the site.

A mentally ill Palestinian, 30, was arrested on suspicion of running over a soldier. Now for weeks, despite three court orders, Israel has failed to provide a psychiatric opinion saying that he is mentally fit for detention or to stand trial.

The Israeli government said Thursday that no date has been set for the evacuation of the illegal outpost of Homesh, and that the decision to remove the last remaining structure in the northern West Bank site rests only with Defense Minister Benny Gantz.

In response to a petition filed at the Supreme Court by the Palestinians who own the land, the government also said that it will continue to allow Israelis who study at the outpost yeshiva to come there, despite this violating a law that bars the presence of Israeli civilians from areas which Israel withdrew in 2005.

Female Palestinian journalist Raja Jaber was shot and injured by Israeli regime forces while she was doing her job in covering the weekly anti-settlement protest in Beita town, in the occupied West Bank.

Reported by the Palestine Information Centre, Feb. 5,

The Israeli occupation police on Friday summoned Jerusalemite researcher and activist Nasser al-Hadmi and notified him of their decision to impose renewed restrictions on his movement and contacts in the holy city.
According to the police decision which was issued at the behest of the Shin Bet intelligence service, Hadmi will be banished from east Jerusalem and banned from contacting certain Jerusalemite figures for six months.
The Israeli intelligence apparatus claims that Hadmi, who works as head of the Jerusalem Committee Against Judaization, is a Hamas activist and participates in events that pose a security threat to Israel.
Similar restrictions had been imposed on Hadmi during the past six months, but they expired on Thursday, February 3, 2022.
Hadmi described the renewed measure against him as “a violation of his rights to freedoms of movement, worship and work,” adding that this would prevent him from working, visiting his doctor and the bank, shopping for his family and taking his children to schools and other places.

Haaretz, Feb. 6, 2022

The decision by outgoing Attorney General Avichai Mendelblit to establish a settlement on the location of the outpost Evyatar did nothing to cool the ardor of the residents of Beita, the Palestinian village whose lands the outpost occupies. On the contrary. “It only strengthens our will to resist and fight,” a 17-year-old, attending the demonstration against the outpost, the largest weekly protest in the West Bank, told Haaretz. The Palestinians of Beita have demonstrated every week since the establishment of Evyatar last year, losing eight people. With Mendelblit’s final action in office, he has given the protests a new lease of life.

Amira Hass

Feb. 6, 2022,  Ibrahim Abu Yaqoub was killed by Israeli soldiers when he was out for a walk. A soldier’s testimony exposes the contrast between how the army treated his death and how it reacted to the death of a Palestinian-American.

As a number of writers have asserted, with varying levels of cynicism, the Israel Defense Forces treated the death of 78-year-old Omar As’ad seriously because he was an American citizen. A look back at the killing of another Palestinian, Ibrahim Abu Yaqoub, 34, shows how extraordinary the steps are that the military has taken against those involved in As’ad’s death.

Feb. 7, 2022 6:05 AM

The Israel Defense Forces and police continue to pass the buck to one another in the face of increasing numbers of politically motivated anti-Arab crimes committed by Jews in the West Bank. 

‘It’s very difficult to instill an understanding in the commanders and soldiers that their job is to protect the safety of both sides,’ a senior security source said, ‘Eventually, this violence will blow up in our faces’

January 31, 2022

Reported by Haaretzm Jan. 23, 2022 (Opinion )
This weekend’s attack on Israeli peace activists by violent West Bank settlers should put to rest any attempts to doubt or dismiss the severity of what is a grotesque and accelerating campaign of terror.  But perhaps even more alarming than the attempts to turn a blind eye to settler violence is the misunderstanding or misrepresentation of the settlers’ goals. Most violent attacks by West Bank settlers are not random acts of hooliganism. They are harnessed to a strategy, a political objective wholehearted endorsed by sections of the current Israeli government.
Jan. 25,

WASHINGTON – Seven prominent American-Jewish organizations urged Israeli officials Tuesday to condemn “the ongoing terrorism and political violence committed by Jewish Israeli extremists in the West Bank against Palestinians, Israeli civilians and IDF soldiers.”
Jan. 24, 2022

Raz Sagi, a city council member from the Jewish Tel Aviv suburb of Rosh Ha’ayin, and Musa Abu Zaid, of the neighboring Arab town of Kafr Qasem, sit together in a small protest tent. The smell of coffee prepared on a camping stove wafts through the tent in the middle of an open field near Kafr Qasem. They have been sitting there for the past month as part of a joint effort to stop the construction of the Kesem power plant, which is slated to be built between their two communities.Jan. 24, 2022

Three Palestinians were reportedly wounded on Monday as settlers hurled stones at businesses and cars in the town of Hawara south of Nablus in the West Bank.

According to Palestinian reports, three Palestinians were lightly injured and the windows of some 20 cars and two stores were shattered in the attack.  In a video of the incident, soldiers are seen standing at the side of the road and a military jeep is seen driving behind the settlers’ vehicles.

January 27, 2022

During a two-hour visit to the Eyal Checkpoint near Tul Karm on a particularly cold January afternoon, hundreds of Palestinians, perhaps thousands, were on their way home. Aside from the few women, most of whom work in agriculture, they were men in clean clothes and tall, dirty boots, hinting that they work in construction. They had set out for Israel 14 hours earlier. Now, they will travel in a Palestinian taxi to their homes near Nablus, Jenin or Tul Karm, only to get up before dawn the next morning and start the exhausting trip all over again.

A great exploitation: under the current system, tens of thousands of Palestinian workers are each forced to pay 2,500 shekels ($780) a month for a work permit in Israel.

Reported by Sabeel, Jerusalem, Jan 31, 2022,

On Saturday, 29^th December, Sabeel international held a service of thanks for the like of Archbishop Desmond Tutu. The service, on Zoom, was very well attended and Sabeel are thankful to all those who attended to celebrate the life of Archbishop Tutu, a former patron of Sabeel.

On Friday, 29^th December, Daoud and Daher Nassar from the Tent of Nations were attacked by a group of 15 men carrying clubs and other weapons. Daoud and Daher were both hospitalised with head injuries following the assault. Sabeel asks for prayers for the Nassar family, and especially for Daoud and Daher, as they recover from this attack, and asks for blessings for the Tent of Nations as they strive to live on their farm and seek the way of peace as they ‘refuse to be enemies’.

13-year-old Lujain Alqattawi is a finalist in the Time Magazine Kid of the Year competition. Lujain, an American Palestinian, began to teach Palestinian refugee girls in her community to speak English and has created a programme with the aim of healing Palestinian refugee girls to achieve their dreams.

On Saturday, the 23rd of January a group of lawless Palestinians attacked   Archimandrite Ioustinos, the caretaker of the Church on the site of Jacob’s Well in the city of Nablus.  He suffered medium physical injuries. This attack is not the first one, as it happened several times in the past. The Palestinian Authority promised to bring the persons who did it to justice but until now no one was arrested.

 Kumi Now online sessions restart on Tuesday 1^st February with the first in our new ‘Palestinian Innovators’ series. These sessions, which take place on the first Tuesday of each month, will hear from upcoming and influential Palestinians.  On the third Thursday of each month we will hear about possible solutions to the situation in Palestine.

January 24, 2022

Reported by Haaretz, Jan. 17, 2022

A Palestinian man was shot after attempting to stab an Israeli soldier at the Gush Etzion Junction in the West Bank, the military’s Spokesperson’s Unit said Monday.

The Palestinian exited his vehicle, armed with a knife, and attempted to stab the soldier. The soldier then shot his attacker, according to the military. There were no casualties among the Israeli soldiers, the army says, as Palestinian media says the assailant, Falah Jaradat, was killed Jan. 17,

Israeli military restricts Palestinians, but allows settler event at evicted oupost.

Some 1,200 people participated in a Tu B’Shvat seder on Sunday at the evacuated settlement of Homesh in the West Bank, although the site is a closed military zone and the event was held without IDF permission or coordination. Other events there since the killing of local yeshiva student Yehuda Dimentman were coordinated with the army.Jan. 17, 

The eviction of a family from their home in the flashpoint East Jerusalem neighborhood of Sheikh Jarrah was delayed after police clashed with locals and failed to complete it on Monday.

The attempted eviction saw Mohammed Salahiya, a Palestinian, barricading himself on the roof with his children and threatening to blow up a gas tank.

Then on Jan. 19, The pre-dawn demolition marked the end of a struggle over a family home in East Jerusalem’s Sheikh Jarrah on land that has been expropriated by the Jerusalem Municipality to build a school

Israeli police carried out a demolition order and arrested over a dozen people in the flashpoint East Jerusalem neighborhood of Sheikh Jarrah early Wednesday morning, heading off a two-day struggle between a local family and the Jerusalem Municipality.

The European Union condemned Thursday the “worrying trend of increasing numbers of demolitions and evictions in the West Bank, including in East Jerusalem,” one day after the after police razed a Palestinian home in the flashpoint neighborhood of Sheikh Jarrah.

The statement issued by EU spokesperson Peter Stano highlighted the decision by the Jerusalem municipality to “advance a plan for the construction of more than 1,450 settlement-housing units” in East Jerusalem, warning that the plan “undermines the possibility of Jerusalem serving as the future capital of both States.”

Jan 19, 2022

Where the streets have no Arabic name, a group of women remind us of Palestinian history.  Behind the project Shawari’a Yafa (‘Streets of Jaffa’), is a mix of Arab and Jewish residents, who seek to commemorate Arab street names that were Hebraized by putting up additional street signs. An enterprise of the utmost importanceJan. 21, 2022 12:56 PM

Four human rights activists were injured following a settler attack on Friday near the Palestinian village of Burin in the West Bank.  Footage from the scene depicts a group of masked people attacking activists with clubs, hurling stones at them and setting one of their cars on fire. The injured activists were evacuated to Beilinson Hospital in Petah Tikva.

Then on Jan. 22, Israeli public security minister called the masked setters who attacked human rights activists on Friday a ‘terror organization’, but stated that it is ‘very difficult’ for police to arrest the perpetrators.

Jan. 21, 2022

There’s a mass Palestinian grave at a popular Israeli beach, veterans confess. The Israeli veterans of the 1948 battle at Tantura village finally come clean about the mass killing of Arabs that took place after the village’s surrender.

Reported by Sabeel, Jerusalem on January 24,

On Wednesday 19^th January, Israeli occupation forces evicted the Salhiye family from their home and plant nursery business in the East Jerusalem area of Sheikh Jarrah. In previous days attempts to force the family out had failed due to the peaceful resistance of the family and others, however, the forces arrived in the very early hours of Wednesday morning, evicted the family and demolished their house and several surrounding structures.

After 13 days in a coma, South Hebron Hills community leader Suleiman al-Hathalin (Haj Suleiman) passed away in hospital. 75-year-old Suleiman had been run over by a tow truck operating for the Israeli occupation forces and had suffered head injuries and broken bones.

Rasmia Barbur, 28, from the northern city of Nof Hagalil became the 6^th victim of violence in the Israeli-Palestinian community this year after being killed by her husband. Violence in the Arab community in northern Israel has been on the rise in recent years with 126 Israeli-Palestinian citizens killed in 2021. Police investigation of these killings is not always completed with only 23 percent solved compared to 71 percent in the Jewish community.

Jewish settler extremists from the illegal outpost of Givat Ronen attacked Palestinians and left-wing Israeli activists, including some from Rabbis for Human Rights, as they planted olive trees in the area of Burin, near Nablus in the West Bank. In an unusual move, the Yesha Council which represents much of the settler leadership, condemned the attacks as ‘aberrant’ and said that ‘such grave conduct is against the values of the people of Israel…It is not our path. We call for authorities to investigate the incident and bring the perpetrators to justice.”

UN agencies, including UNICEF, UNWRA, and OHCHR, have called upon Israeli occupation authorities to immediately release Palestinian teenager Amal Nakhleh. Amal, who suffers from a severe autoimmune disease requiring continuous medical treatment and monitoring, has been held in an Israeli military prison on administrative detention without charge or trial for over a year.

January 17, 2022

Reported by Haaretz, Jan. 10,

Hundreds of police officers were deployed to guard Jewish National Fund workers preparing land for forestation near the Bedouin town of Hura in the Negev on Monday – land used by locals for agriculture.

Several people were detained after residents gathered to protest the work, including Nas Radio journalist Yasser Okbi. He was detained on suspicion of interfering with police, despite the fact that he had presented his press card. One person was reported to be injured.

Jan. 12,

The Israeli government said on Wednesday that future work by the Jewish National Fund in the Negev will be negotiated by coalition partners, in a bid to ease tensions after days of violent clashes over forestation work on the land used for agriculture by local Bedouin.

The JNF’s tree-planting, which began on Monday, ended on Wednesday as planned.Jan. 13,Police disperse hundreds of protesters with stun grenades and tear gas, as Israel’s Negev erupts in protest over Jewish National Fund’s tree-planting on land used for agriculture by local Bedouin.

Thirteen protesters were arrested Thursday after clashes in southern Israel resumed for the fourth day in a row, with hundreds of protesters demonstrating against the Jewish National Fund’s tree-planting in Bedouin communities in the Negev.
Jan. 11,

The Gaza Health Ministry says: “We don’t have the ability to deal with the Omicron wave”, and urges the international community to press Israel to let more medical equipment into Gaza.
Jan. 11,

The High Court of Justice has for the first time refrained from issuing a freeze order for the demolition of a terrorist’s house to avoid harming the victim’s grieving family with procedural misunderstandings.

Judge Barak-Erez criticized the state for, among other things, not informing the family of Eliyahu Kay in advance that an order might be issued to freeze the demolition of the terrorist’s house, which would then lead to a hearing.Jan. 10

Fifteen sewage treatment plants were torched in recent years, menacing water facilities of mainly Palestinians in Northern Israel.  Haarerz is asking: “Where are the police?” The police tell corporations to hire security guards.

The burnt smell surrounding the water pumping facility in the village of Zarzir is particularly strong against the backdrop of the pastoral landscape of the green valley spreading beneath the village homes.

Almost a year has passed since the previous arson attack against the facility, which was preceded by another six instances of destruction, break-ins or arson. The local water company has already stopped counting the number of times when fuel was stolen from the site.Jan. 11, 2022 12:55 PM

The shooting of a Palestinian in the West Bank settlement of Anatot raised questions on the ‘problematic’ scope of armed security coordinators’ work, as one defense official put it. ‘This system is often exploited for ideological interests,’ attorney says.

They walk around armed. They’re trained by the army. They’re allowed to detain Palestinians, and they have the authority to send out emergency response teams. In some sense, they’re the local sheriffs, the highest security authority in and around the settlements. But who has authority over the people responsible for day-to-day security in the West Bank? Not only by Palestinians or leftist activists who find fault in their mode of operation wonder about this question, but also the security coordinators themselves.

Jack Khoury
Jan. 12, 2022 3:58 PM
An 80-year-old Palestinian man died of a heart attack on Wednesday after being detained overnight by Israeli forces in the Ramallah area, the Palestinian Health Ministry said.  According to the ministry’s statement, Omar Abdalmajeed, As’ad was “assaulted” and beaten by Israeli soldiers, who stopped him on his way home, in the village of Jiljilya, and handcuffed him.

Jiljilya village council head Fouad Qattoum said As’ad was returning home after visiting relatives when Israeli soldiers stopped his car, bound him, blindfolded him and led him away to a building still under construction. Another villager said he saw Israeli soldiers walking As’ad away around 3 A.M.

As’ad’s body was found more than an hour later, according to vegetable seller Mamdouh Elaboud, who said he was himself detained for 20 minutes, then released.As’ad’s family said he was taken to a hospital in Ramallah, where he was pronounced dead. His brother said that As’ad was “an elderly man who suffered from respiration and heart problems.”

“I don’t understand how a man that age can be considered a danger,” the brother added. “They handcuffed him and shoved him. That’s abuse… I have no doubt what he went through caused his death.”

Jan. 13,

Proof of vaccination or recovery from COVID is necessary to gain admission to a range of public places, but Palestinians with legal residency in Israel cite several obstacles in receiving the so-called Green PassPalestinians who are married to Israeli citizens and are legal residents of Israel are unable to download the Health Ministry’s Green Pass, which certifies that they are vaccinated against the coronavirus or recovered from the virus.  Many Palestinians reported difficulties in acquiring the Green Pass, even if they were vaccinated in Israel. The Health Ministry said in response that the matter is being dealt with, but affected Palestinians say the issue is persisting.

One of the affected Palestinians is Rim Shibat, who is a legal resident of Israel and is married to an Israeli. She has been living in the southern Israeli Bedouin town of Rahat for several years and has national medical coverage provided through a special plan.  She has received three doses of the coronavirus vaccine but has been unable to obtain a COVID certificate on the Health Ministry website. When she enters her personal details, she receives a message saying that it does not match system records.  “We feel humiliated and discriminated against after so many months of trying to issue a Green Pass so we can live like normal people in Israel,” Rim Shibat’s husband, Adam Ziadna, said.  They are being brushed off and told to contact the Palestinian Authority, “where my wife hasn’t lived since 2004,” he added. “The Health Ministry is washing its hands of us.”Jan. 11, 2022

The Police Internal Investigations Department pressed charges Tuesday against a female Border Police officer for attacking a Palestinian youth in Jerusalem’s Old City.

The indictment, which was filed to the Jerusalem Magisters Court, charges Orian Ben Califa with assault and obstruction of justice. “The suspect grabbed the complainant and ripped her hijab off her head and then pulled her hair.” states the indictment against an officer who allegedly assaulted a Palestinian in Jerusalem.

Jan. 17,

A Palestinian man is threatening to blow up a gas tank while barricaded on the roof of his home as a large police force attempts to evict his family from their home in the flashpoint East Jerusalem neighborhood of Sheikh Jarrah.

The Jerusalem Municipality expropriated the land on which the family home is built in order to build a school.

Reported by Sabeel, Jerusalem, January 17, 2022,

An 82-year-old Jewish woman, who is being investigated by Labour for alleged antisemitism for the third time in less than three years, is threatening legal action against the party, claiming it has unlawfully discriminated against her based on her belief in anti-Zionism.

 Film stars including Mark Ruffalo, Susan Sarandon, Gael García Bernal, and Viggo Mortensen, have backed Harry Potter actress Emma Watson, after her social media post about Palestinian solidarity drew ire from Israeli officials. “We join Emma Watson in support of the simple statement that ‘solidarity is a verb’, including meaningful solidarity with Palestinians struggling for their human rights under international law,” said a statement signed by more than 40 film industry notables.

Israeli settlers attacked the Palestine TV crew this morning while they were returning from a filming assignment in the Jordan Valley. The crew, composed of three members, were stopped and forced out of their vehicle near the village of Bittin, east of Ramallah. The settlers proceeded to harass and attack the Palestine TV members until they were bruised. They, the settlers, were protected by Israeli occupation officers nearby, who did nothing to stop the brutality.

Dozens of Palestinian Bedouins have been wounded in a crackdown by Israeli forces on a protest against continuing Israeli forestation work on land residents say they privately own near the southern city of Beer al-Sabe (Beer Sheva). The Jewish National Fund (KKL-JNF) use tree planting as a method of preventing Palestinians from accessing their land and to obliterate Palestinian villages.
An 80-year-old Palestinian was found dead in a village in the West Bank early Wednesday, his body still handcuffed after an Israeli arrest raid. Omar Abdulmajeed Asad and other family members were returning from visiting relatives when they were stopped by the soldiers. After the troops withdrew, villagers found Asad’s body in a building under construction.

January 10, 2022

Reported by Haaretz, Jan. 6, 2022,

A Palestinian was killed overnight Wednesday in an exchange of gunfire with Israeli troops at the entrance to the Balata refugee camp, adjacent to the West Bank city of Nablus.

The man was identified as Bakir Mohammed Hashash, and according to his brother, he has been wanted by Israeli security forces for some time.

Yehuda Dimentman’s murder last month has intensified setters’ revival efforts around the illegal Homesh outpost, and has led to a number of attacks against the local Palestinians and punishment of the Palestinians by the military.

For three weeks, all traffic from Nablus to Jenin has been funneled to a small, narrow, broken road. The reason for this is an IDF checkpoint erected near the settlement of Shavei Shomron on Route 60, the main road connecting the two districts, and is manned by soldiers 24 hours a day since the killing of Yehuda Dimentman near the settlement of Homesh last month.

A masked right-wing protester attacked a Palestinian press photographer on Wednesday, during a demonstration against the release of Palestinian detainee Hisham Abu Hawash in front of the central Israeli hospital he is kept in after ending a 141-day hunger strike.

The Israeli protester struck Faiz Abu Rmeleh, a photographer for Turkish news agency Anadolu, with two fists, knocked him to the ground, and fled the scene. The police canvassed the scene, but has yet to locate the suspect.

 ‘We were playing. A white car passed by and two people got out of it and started firing. We all ran, but Ammar was on the swing and couldn’t run fast,’ says 7-year-old witness

A 4-year-old (sic.),was killed in northern Israel on Thursday, with sources saying the toddler was struck in the neck by a bullet.

The boy, Ammar Hujayrat, was found unconscious in a playground in the Bedouin town of Bir al-Maksur near Nazareth. The police are checking whether Hujayrat had been hit by a stray bullet and said it was fired from a construction site some 300 meters (nearly 1,000 feet) away from the playground.

Reported on Jan 9,’The guns have started to threaten all of us, even in our own homes,’ says the mayor of the Bedouin village in northern Israel, where 3-year-old Ammar Hujayrat was killed by a stray bullet,

Deputy Economy Minister Yair Golan of the Meretz party came under widespread criticism after he dubbed settlers at the West Bank Homesh outpost “subhuman” on Thursday, in response to the vandalism of gravestones by Jewish settlers in a nearby Palestinian village.

In response, Haaretz reported, on Jan. 9, Gideon Levy’s words: “They’re the scum of the earth. Any one who snatches a Palestinian teen, abuses him for hours, beats him and kicks him, ties him up under the car’s hood and then finally hangs him from a tree and burns the soles of his feet with a lighter is subhuman. How is it possible to say otherwise?

Anyone who expels the legal owners of the land he stole by threatening to shoot them, destroys their gravestones, tramples their harvests into the dust, vandalizes their cars and torches their fields is subhuman. What else?”
Jan. 6.

‘I need a place to play, Dad,’ my seven-year-old daughter, Daliah, tells me. When my kids see the playgrounds built for the settlers’ kids, they have a hundred questions. They ask why I can’t build them the same kind of playground,” Nasser Nawaja, a resident of Susya and a field researcher for the Israeli human rights group B’Tselem in the South Hebron Hills, tells me. “Targeting our kid’s play space is so disturbing: so crude, intrusive, almost obscene.  It makes me afraid for the future of my children”. When violent settlers pick on Palestinian kids in Susya, backed by the army, it is part of a larger strategy.

Eight Palestinian teens were killed on Thursday when the van they were in collided head-on with a truck in the Jordan Valley.

Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas declared a day of national mourning following the fatal incident.

The victims, all 14-17 years old, are from Aqraba, a village in the Nablus area, according to a Palestinian labor union. They were driving back from work.

Jan 8,

The army continues to expel residents of this Jordan Valley village when it trains on their land. It bulldozes Palestinian wheat fields to make way for tanks.Amira HassJan. 9, 2022 6:02 AM

Israel is holding up the entry of hundreds of vital replacement parts for the proper functioning of Gaza’s water and sewage systems. As a result, partially treated wastewater is being released into the sea, water leakage from pipes is even worse than usual, rainwater runoff is causing a danger of flooding. The quality and quantity of drinking water, purified in special facilities, is also being affected, and the same problems keep happening because repairs are being made with makeshift materials.

The Greek Orthodox Patriarch of Jerusalem has accused radical Israeli groups of threatening the presence of Christians in the holy city, in remarks that Israeli officials rejected as baseless.In a column in the Times of London on Saturday, His Beatitude, Theophilos III, said he believed the aim was to drive the Christian community from Jerusalem’s Old City, which has sites sacred to Judaism, Christianity and Islam.

“Our churches are threatened by Israeli radical fringe groups. At the hands of these Zionist extremists the Christian community in Jerusalem is suffering greatly, he said.

“Our brothers and sisters are the victims of hate crimes. Our churches are regularly desecrated and vandalized. Our clergy are subject to frequent intimidation.”

Reported by Sabeel, Jerusalem, January 10, 2022,

Suleiman al Hathaleen (Hajj Suleiman), a 75-year-old activist and community leader from the South Hebron Hills was hit by an Israeli police tow-truck as he protested against the removal of vehicles from the community of Umm al-Khair. Suleiman was left without help in a coma with head injuries along with spine, rib, and hip fractures. Sabeel prays for the swift and full recovery of Suleiman. We are thankful for the skills and knowledge of those responsible for his treatment. Grant strength to the communities of the South Hebron Hills as they struggle daily with threats from settler communities and oppression by Israeli authorities.

As Palestinian farmers looked on, more than 500 dunams (125 acres) of cultivated land were destroyed by Israeli occupation forces in the Jordan valley on Monday 3^rd January. The land, used to grow wheat, was used by the Israeli tanks as part of a training exercise for the Armored Engineering Corps. Sabeel fervently prays that these farmers will have the strength and opportunity to re-sow their crop and that crop be allowed to grow to harvest.

On Tuesday 18^th January, Bethlehem will see its third and final round of Christmas celebrations. The Armenian community will celebrate the birth of Jesus on this date based on the Gregorian calendar.

At the 16th session of the Intergovernmental Committee for the Safeguarding of the Intangible Cultural Heritage of UNESCO, held mid-December, Palestinian embroidery (tatreez) was added to the UNESCO cultural heritage list. While the practice originated in rural areas, the culture of stitching and wearing embroidered items is now common across cities and villages, with different patterns representing the various regions in historic Palestine and can act as an indicator for the economic and marital status of the woman wearing it.

 Kumi Now has started for 2022, with information being sent out on a weekly basis regarding the topics for that week. We will be starting exciting new webinars from 1^st February, starting with webinars with influential and innovative Palestinians followed by a webinar panel discussion on February 15^th. These webinars will continue on the 1^st and 3^rd Tuesdays of each month at 6pm. Watch out for more information in coming weeks.

January 3, 2022

Reported by Haaretz, Dec. 31, 2021.

A Palestinian was shot dead after attempting to carry out a stabbing attack at a junction near the West Bank settlement of Ariel on Friday, according to the IDF. The man reportedly got out of a car and charged a bus stop where civilians and soldiers were present, the army is searching for the vehicle which fled the scene.  The assailant, identified as 36-year-old Amir Ataf Reyan, as evacuated to Beilinson Hospital in Petach Tikva in a serious condition, and later succumbed to his wounds.

However, a friend of the assailant disputed the account, stating Reyan had worked in Israel for a long time to support his family, including his wife, who is seven-months pregnant, and their four other young children. The Palestinian Foreign Ministry condemned the killing as “an execution.”

Dec. 30, 2021

Opinion: Bar-Lev is right: Jewish terror exists.
Omer Bar-Lev, a courageous warrior who once commanded Sayeret Matkal, the general staff’s elite special-operations force, has insisted that Jewish terror exists, and thus has been transformed by social media into a “traitor,” a “murderer” and a “terrorist.”

January 1, 2022

The Israel Defense Forces acting as a subcontractor for the Shin Bet security service. That’s the situation when a Shin Bet agent wants to meet with a young Palestinian man: A force of 20 soldiers is sent to his home after midnight, they wake up the whole family, throw 15 people into a small room, where they are left for several hours, pummel a few of them with rifles and fists, and kick them when they collapse. The wanted young man is taken to meet the Shin Bet agent for an incredibly brief interrogation – for reasons never explained – and is then sent home. In the meantime, four family members need to be taken to the hospital in ambulances, after their beatings by the soldiers, and one is taken into custody until the conclusion of the proceedings against him – he has been accused of assaulting a soldier. All this to arrange a short meeting with a Shin Bet man.

Jan. 2, 2022
Pressure on the Palestinian Authority to intervene on behalf of Hisham Abu Hawash from Israeli custody is intensifying, as his condition rapidly deteriorates on the 139th day of a hunger strike to protest his detention without trial.

Abu Hawash’s family members have urged the PA leadership to intervene with Israel to save his life, while protests have taken place across the West Bank over the weekend, including in Al-Manara Square in Ramallah.

Israel attacked targets in Gaza early on Sunday, hours after two rockets were fired from the Hamas-controlled enclave at Israel but fell into the Mediterranean Sea, according to the Israeli army.

Amira Hass

Jan. 3, 2022

In the northern Jordan Valley, on Saturday a week ago, settlers attacked a Palestinian shepherd and his family who came to his assistance. The settlers, a few of them armed, used batons and fists. The Israel Defense Forces and police arrested those attacked: Eight Palestinians. They were transferred to a nearby army base, and soldiers called for the settlers to conduct a lineup for identification of “their attackers.” The settlers beat the detainees on the base too. Four of the eight Palestinians were released the same day. The others were held in detention for four more days, and at a hearing on extending their detention they were released without posting any bail and without an indictment.

Palestinian witnesses who spoke with Haaretz bolster police investigators’ suspicions that a car accident in which a Nablus resident was badly injured was caused by stones thrown by settlers.

Reported by Sabeel, Jerusalem, Jan 3, 2022

A new book on the Tent of Nations has been published. “The Stories I Never Knew” – Acts of Loving Kindness in the Struggle for Human Rights and Dignity in the Occupied Palestinian Territories and Israel was written by William Plitt and tells the story of the Nassar family and their belief in refusing to be enemie

An Israeli court has ordered the owners of a printing house in Umm al-Fahm, north of Jenin, to pay a fine of 3,500 Israeli Shekels to an activist from the right-wing Return to the Mountain movement. The printing house had refused to print flyers for right-wing activist Yair Kehati. The community of Umm al-Fahm came together to raise the fine and it will be paid in thousands of agora coins (the smallest legal currency in Israel).

Israeli occupation forces continue to disrupt education in the West Bank. On Wednesday 29^th December, Israeli forces attacked staff and students at a high school in Tuqu’ town, east of Bethlehem. The Ministry of Education said that a number of Israeli soldiers attempted to break into the campus of Tuqu‘ Secondary Boys School, when they were stopped by the school staff. Following a scuffle with the staff preventing them from breaking into the school campus, the soldiers beat the teachers with rifle butts and fired tear gas into the school.

On the 20^th of December, Israeli forces demolished the Bedouin village of Al-Araqib for the 14^th time in 2020. The village has been the source of constant demolitions and the latest marks the demolition of the village, or structures in the village 196 times since the year 2010.

As the new year begins, Kumi Now is taking a break whilst we consider the best way forward. We would like to thank all of those who were involved in producing the Kumi Now sessions, from those behind the scenes, to the speakers, and our MC’s drawn from friends of Sabeel. We would also like to thank everyone who attended a session, took part in action, or helped to spread the word. 

December 28, 2021

Reported by Haaretz, Dec 20,

This Christmas, Bethlehem is preparing for a very ‘Silent Night’.  Before omicron fears prompted Israel’s latest tourist ban, residents of the biblical town of Bethlehem were preparing for a sea of pilgrims this Christmas season. Now the magnificent church, the hotels and the shops stand empty, and locals are wondering how they will recover the losses.

Jack Khoury Dec. 21, 2021 12:35 PM

Representatives of Palestinian prisoners in administrative detention announced on Monday that they had decided to boycott the Israeli legal system, and their lawyers will no longer appear in sessions on their matters in military courts and the Supreme Court.

Representatives of the detainees explained that the decision was made in protest of the broad use of administrative detention by the defense establishment in Israel. According to the representatives’ statement, if Israel continues to use this tool, which they say violates international law, the administrative detainees could very well declare a general hunger strike next week.Nir HassonDec. 21, 2021 5:46 PM

The heads of Christian denominations in Jerusalem have launched a campaign protesting violence by radical groups and attempts by Israeli settler organizations to acquire properties in the Old City, decrying a “systematic attempt to drive the Christian community out of Jerusalem and other parts of the Holy Land.”Amira HassDec. 22, 2021 Israel’s 1,000 front war in Palestinians:

Under orders from Minister of Public Security Omer Bar-Lev, police on Sunday banned a meeting of Palestinian business people at the Ambassador Hotel in Jerusalem. The minister claimed the meeting was initiated, sponsored and financed by the Palestinian Authority. The business folks had been invited to a meeting and dinner by Al-Quds Bank.

Israeli miliary let settlers come to an outpost despite warnings of violence. A month before a deadly shooting, officers warned that growing tensions in the immediate area could undermine security throughout the West Bank.Staff at Israel’s defense bodies have been warning the army, police and Shin Bet for months that the yeshiva operating at the Homesh outpost in the West Bank was becoming a focal point for violence that could end up endangering the settlers living there illegally.

Despite the warnings and a series of violent incidents occurring in the Homesh area recently, the army has not acted to block settlers from coming to the yeshiva.

December 23,

A Palestinian man was shot dead late Wednesday by Israeli forces in the West Bank after he has opened fire at Israeli troops, according to the military.

The Palestinian Health Ministry reported that Muhammad Issa Abbas, 26, was shot in the back near the al-Amari refugee camp in Ramallah.

A military force entered the West Bank city of al-Bireh after it has identified suspects on their way to the settlement of Psagot, the army said. According to a military statement, shots were fired at the troop from a passing-by vehicle. Soldiers then opened fire at the car and hit the shooter.

Haaretz editorial, Dec 24.

Thousands of settlers, under the army’s protection, went Thursday, once again, to the “evacuated” West Bank settlement of Homesh, after the one-week mourning period for Yehuda Dimentman, a student at the Homesh yeshiva who was murdered nearby.

Instead of this provocative demonstration, the state should have allowed the owners of the land on which Homesh stood, Palestinian farmers from the village of Burka, to finally return to this land, which has been their private property for generations. As long as this doesn’t happen, and as long as the settlers, with backing from the government and the army, continue making mischief – whether by maintaining a yeshiva at Homesh or anything else – Homesh will continue to be a place of injustice and bloodshed.

A court halted the evacuation of a Palestinian family from their home in the East Jerusalem neighborhood of Sheikh Jarrah on Thursday, after police asked the court registrar to postpone the eviction, citing a security risk.

Earlier this week, the head of the European Union’s mission to the West Bank and Gaza Strip, Sven Kuhn von Burgsdorff, visited the Salem family, who have been living in their home in Sheikh Jarrah for the past 70 years. He blasted the eviction, calling it “inhuman and unfair.

Gideon Levy Dec, 25,
Jamil protested against the takeover of his family’s land, and was shot dead by the Israeli Defence Force.  He was the eighth casualty in recent months from the village of Beita, whose residents are outraged at the settler outpost Evyatar on their land, signalled by on outsize Hanukkah menorah planted by the encroaching settlers. along with the row o trailer hoes and watchtowers.

Dec. 25, 2021

A Palestinian man was seriously wounded by Israeli army fire in the West Bank village of Burqa, as protests continue against settlement activity in the nearby Homesh outpost, more than a week after the death of a young settler in a shooting attack reignited tensions in the area.

Nine other Palestinian protesters were also wounded by live fine, the Palestinian Health Ministry said, and 48 others lightly wounded by rubber-tipped bullets fired by Israeli forces.

Dec. 27, 2021

A 16-year-old stripped and beaten in a public washroom, a 60-year-old woman handcuffed and dragged across the floor, a female journalist subjected to sexist comments during an interrogation, a youth attacked in a city center, and another one dragged out of bed in the middle of the night, falsely identified as someone else, his family members beaten. All of this can be found in six complaints filed in recent months at the unit for investigating police misconduct at the Justice Ministry, copies of which have reached Haaretz. Following several complaints of serious violent behavior towards Palestinians, only one indictment was filed against a policeman. The Jerusalem police response: “This is a distorted and one-sided picture which does not reflect the truth.”

Joshua Angrist, one of the recipients of this year’s Nobel Prize in economics, , who once taught at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, noticed a paradox in the Palestinian labor market: A plasterer working in Israel makes more than someone with a graduate degree in chemistry, in the territories. The result is a negative return on higher education. In other words, it simply doesn’t pay for Palestinians to invest in getting an education, since it only harms them.

Reported by Sabeel, Jerusalem, December 28,

Archbishop Emeritus of South Africa, Desmond Tutu, passed away on Sunday 26^th December. Archbishop Tutu was an outspoken activist against apartheid in South Africa and, in his later years, turned his attention to the Holy Land and the similarities he saw between Israel’s treatment of the Palestinians and the treatment of black South Africans under apartheid.

Hisham Abu Hawash, a Palestinian prisoner in an Israeli military prison, has been on hunger strike for over 4 months. In the past days, Abu Hawash’s health condition has deteriorated significantly. Abu Hawash, 40 and the father of five children (Hadi, Mohammed, Izz al-Din, Waqas and Saba), has spent 8 years in total in Israeli occupation prisons. Of that time, 52 months — over half of his time behind bars — has been spent jailed without charge or trial under administrative detention orders.

The Palestinian town of Burqa, near Nablus, has been under constant attack by Israeli settlers and Israeli occupation forces. The town is almost completely blocked from the rest of the area by mounds of earth which block the roads to allow settler-only access to the illegal Israeli settlements and outposts which surround the area. Burqa has been under increasing attacks since around 15,000 Israelis gathered at the settlement of Homesh to commemorate the life of Yehuda Dimentman, who was reportedly killed by Palestinian gunmen.

Kumi Now on Thursday 28^th December, heard from Bishop Emeritus Munib Younan. Bishop Younan spoke on the topic of Christians in the Holy Land. This is the last week of the Kumi Now year and we will now take a break to assess the future of Kumi Now.

DECEMBER 20, 2021

Reported by Haaretz, Dec. 14, 2021

The Israeli military and Shin Bet security service arrested early Tuesday morning 11 students who are allegedly part of a Hamas cell, after raiding two Palestinian universities in the West Bank, a statement by the Israeli army said. 

Those arrested, all students at An-Najah University in Nablus, were accused of funneling money, organizing rallies in support of Hamas as well as incitement, according to the statement.

Dec.18

A Palestinian woman stabbed a 38-year-old Israeli Saturday morning near the Tomb of the Patriarchs in Hebron, in the West Bank.

The Israeli, a resident of the Kiryat Arba settlement, suffered minor injuries and the Palestinian woman was arrested on the spot.

According to the Israeli Border Police, after the stabbing, the Israeli man fought with the woman, who is 65-years-old and a resident of Idna village in the West Bank.
Dec. 17, 2021

A Palestinian couple was attacked in their West Bank home in the early morning on Friday by a group of settlers they said claimed to be Israeli soldiers in order to get into the house.

The attack – which left 55-year-old Wail Mohammed Makbal with fractured ribs, and his 46-year-old wife, Samiha, requiring medical attention after inhaling pepper spray – occurred hours after the death of a 25-year-old Jewish settler in a shooting attack in the same area of the West Bank.

Dec. 16, (Gideon Levy),

Israeli troops and settlers zero in on a new target for attacks: Palestinian schools.  Israeli soldiers forcibly prevent these Palestinian kids from reaching school, and fire tear-gas grenades into classrooms. Settlers curse and beat them, and humiliate their teachers. Imagine what sort of sentiments are brewing here.

No one is getting better lessons in the doctrines of occupation and apartheid than the children of Lubban al-Sharqiyah, a village of 4,000 people located 15 kilometers south of Nablus. It’s not hard to guess what sort of sentiments are developing there and what future generations will spring from its two elementary schools, one for boys and o bne for girls, from Lubban and two other villages. The buildings are both located near Highway 60, the West Bank’s busiest roadway, used by both settlers and Palestinians, and where there have been many incidents of stone throwing by Palestinian kids.

Reported by Sabeel, Jerusalem, Dec. 20, 2021,

Palestinian political prisoners are continuing to hunger strike. The hunger strikes are against torture, ill treatment, and medical neglect of Palestinian political prisoners at the hands of the Israeli authorities, as well as Israel’s widespread use of administrative detention, which is only permitted under international law in extremely limited circumstances.

This Christmas we turn our eyes to Bethlehem, the birthplace of Jesus, and we see a suffering town. The pandemic has hit the economy of the town hard with many people relying on international tourism which has now been largely absent for two years. Some families are having to continue to withdraw their children from schools, forced to make hard choices between education, food, or medicine. Others can no longer afford to pay rent and are having to move back in with their parents and grandparents.

 The Kumi Now initiative focuses this week on the Syrian Golan. Syrians still living in the Golan live under the threat of Israeli military activity as well as the promotion of tourism from illegal settlements in the area. Next Tuesday, Kumi Now will focus its attention on Christians in the Holy Land.

DECEMBER 13, 2021

Reported by Haaretz, Dec. 6, 2021,
The PA’s 140,000 employees in the West Bank and Gaza would see their November salaries cut by 25 percent, treasury says, amid prisoner, taz dispute with Israel.

The Palestinian Authority said on Monday it would cut wages paid to its employees in response to a cash crunch exacerbated by a renewed dispute with Israel over payments it makes to Palestinians held in Israeli jails.

Israel and the United States say the PA stipends, dispersed monthly to prisoners, their relatives and the families of Palestinians killed for allegedly carrying out attacks, encourage further violence. The Palestinians consider them a form of welfare for inmates they regard as national heroes.

Dec. 7,

Israeli demolition orders for Palestinians in West Bank Area C hit a five-year record.  797 demolition orders were issued by Israel last year, the Civil Administration said, while less than 1 percent of Palestinian requests for construction permits in Area C were granted between 2016 and 2020.
Dec. 8, 2021
In Israel, a detainee is allowed to die in jail – if he is a Palestinian.

In a locked room in an Israel Prisons Service clinic, lies a man who has refused to put food into his mouth for 114 days. Besides his extreme weight loss, he has difficulty speaking and communicating, even drinking water and whenever he moves, he has palpitations. He is brought to meetings with his lawyer groggy and in a wheelchair. This is Hisham Abu Hawash, 40, who is on a hunger strike to protest his administrative detention.

An Israrli woman was stabbed in East Jerusalem; a Palestinian minor was arrested.  The Palestinian assailant’s family is among those in Jerusalem’s Sheikh Jarrah neighborhood who have immediate eviction orders pending against themAn Israeli woman was lightly wounded Wednesday in a stabbing attack in the East Jerusalem neighborhood of Sheikh Jarrah.Police apprehended a 14-year-old Palestinian girl, Nofoud Jad Araf Hamad, from the neighborhood. She is suspected of stabbing the 26-year-old Israeli woman with a knife while she was crossing the street with her daughter. Hamad fled the scene after the attack and was found about an hour later at the nearby al-Ruda girls’ school. The stabbing victim was taken to Hadassah University Hospital at Mount Scopus in Jerusalem.

Hamad’s family is among those in Sheikh Jarrah who have immediate eviction orders pending against them; her grandfather is a prominent activist against the evictions. Before the teenager was apprehended, a large number of police officers, aided by a police helicopter, searched the area for the suspect. 

Also taken into custody were the school’s principal, another staff member and another student who is related to Hamad. Police raided Hamad’s home and arrested her mother as well.

Testimonies continue to pile up, documents are revealed, and gradually a broader picture emerges of the acts of murder committed by Israeli troops during the War of Independence. Minutes recorded during cabinet meetings in 1948 leave no room for doubt: Israel’s leaders knew in real time about the blood-drenched events that accompanied the conquest of the Arab villages

Dec. 9, 2021.A Palestinian medic rushed toward a hurt protester. An Israeli cop shop him at close range.

Palestinian paramedics are often attacked by Israeli soldiers, who prevent them from fulfilling their duty during clashes. Mohammed Omar was beaten and arrested in 2018 – a year when three of his colleagues were shot to death in Gaza protests. Recently he too was hit by live fire. Every few nights he gets an alert from the social networks or rescue services about an IDF incursion in his city of El Bireh or a nearby village.

Mohammed Omar is a friendly 29-year-old who managed to extricate himself from life in the Amari refugee camp near Ramallah, where he grew up, and move to the adjacent city of El Bireh. He has only a primary-school education, makes a living selling coffee at a kiosk that he owns, and is currently engaged to be married. For the past eight years he has volunteered several times a week as a paramedic with local firefighters. Having no prospect of entering university, he has taken courses in first aid and firefighting, so that he can contribute his share to the community and be a better citizen. “There are those who donate money – I volunteer,” he says.
Dec. 11, 2021 11:12 AM

Palestinians held municipal elections in the occupied West Bank on Saturday in a rare democratic exercise and amid rising anger with President Mahmoud Abbas after he canceled planned legislative and presidential votes earlier this year.

More than 400,000 Palestinians were eligible to cast ballots for representatives in 154 village councils in the West Bank, where Abbas’ Palestinian Authority has limited self-rule. Municipal votes are typically held every four or five years.

60 Palestinians live there, but Jerusalem city hall insists on demolishing the building.  The municipality doesn’t do construction planning for Palestinians and hasn’t approved their self-financed plan
Dec. 13, 2021,

The Custodian General’s Unit in the Justice Ministry is promoting widespread plans for building Jewish neighborhoods and housing complexes in East Jerusalem – a move that would entail the eviction of Palestinian residents.

The Custodian General’s Unit in the Justice Ministry is promoting widespread plans for building Jewish neighborhoods and housing complexes in East Jerusalem – a move that would entail the eviction of Palestinian residents.

The proposal includes a new neighborhood in Sheikh Jarrah, one near Damascus Gate, two near Beit Safafa, and one each in Sur Baher and Beit Hanina, documents obtained by Haaretz show. The Justice Ministry, for its part, says that except for examining a construction project in Sheikh Jarrah, no other plans are being advanced.Dec. 13, 2021 11:08 AMAmira Hass

Mining gold from East Jerusalem’s streets: Israel profits twice from Palestinians living in the capital: once from the fines they pay for the city’s own crimes, and again when the community is forced into a life of low-paying jobs and abject povertyMoney, and lots of it, is behind the ongoing Israeli refusal to develop and build for Palestinian residents of East Jerusalem. Money – and not just the clear intention to restrict the number of Palestinians in the city.

Mayors, heads of planning and construction departments, municipal officials and successive interior ministers in the Jewish democratic state have conspired together to create a sophisticated system that sucks the very marrow from the bones of local Palestinians. The talent and the enthusiasm for squeezing money out of the Palestinians were created and heightened by the very nature of their key functions in a country whose essence is occupation and the expulsion of another people from its land.Reported by Sabeel, Jerusalem, December 13, 2021,

On Saturday, 11th December, Sabeel, in coordination with the Pontifical Mission and the Jerusalem Center for Palestine Studies, held a conference in Ramallah,  on the Christian History of Palestine.

Sabeel will hold a Zoom session to present the Christmas story from the perspective of Palestinian liberation theology. www.bilda.nu/Christmas-Theological-Uprising

During this time of Advent and Christmas, we turn our thoughts towards those for whom this time of year is difficult. Especially this year for those who rely on tourism which has been decimated once again by Covid-19 travel restrictions with no end in sight.

The plan to build a new settlement on the site of Qalandia Airport (Atarot) in East Jerusalem has been delayed by the Jerusalem district planning and building committee citing the need for an environment study for their delay. At the same time, the US envoy to the UN, Linda Thomas-Greenfield said that settlement building had “reached a critical juncture”.

Kumi Now on Tuesday concentrated on the issue of the right of return for Palestinians forcibly evicted from their homes in 1948. On Tuesday, 21^st December, we will hear about the Syrian Golan.