“Despite killings, arrests and repression, we will continue”
In the series of repression practiced by the occupation forces on the popular weekly demonstrations against the apartheid wall and settlements, occupation forces arrested and wounded dozens during the weekly demonstrations in the West Bank.
In Bilin, the occupation forces faced the protesters with sound and tear gas bombs and shot metal bullets covered with rubber, which caused dozens of suffocation cases and injured 20-year-old photojournalist Iyas Abo Rahme.
In Kufur Qaddom village, the occupation forces arrested two youths, 23-year-old Amer Muhammad Rushdi and 13-year-old Qasim Amer during the weekly protest. After the clashes took place between the protesters and the occupation forces on the closed main street of the village, they also raided the village from all sides and fired dozens of tear gas bombs into homes which wounded some villagers including the elderly.
In al-Masara village, the weekly march also was suppressed by the occupation forces. The protest was against the assassination of Mustafa Tamimi, the expansion of Efrat settlement south of Bethlehem, and in condemnation of extending the detention of Hasan Brejieh, who was detained during the weekly march last week. The spoke man of the popular committee said, “the popular resistance will continue till achieve our legitimate demands.“
Twelve people were arrested in Nabi Saleh during the weekly march and dozens suffocated due to tear gas. Mustafa Tamimi’s mother participated in the weekly protest condemning the expansion of settlements into their village.
The weekly protest against the apartheid wall and settlements came under the slogan “We are all Mustafa Tamimi.” Mustafa Tamimi was assassinated last week by the occupation soldiers, an event which coincided with the international community’s celebration of the world day for human rights, a day which the isreali occupation celebrated by killing a human right’s defender in cold blood.
The protesters assured that the killing, arrests, and repressive practices against the popular resistance will not discourage them from continuing their popular resistance until the removal of settlements, demolition of the wall, and establishment of an independent Palestinian state and Jerusalem as a capital.
Also emphasized was that the struggle of the Palestinian people with the Israeli occupation is a struggle for land civilization, history, and heritage and not, as the occupation claims, that the conflict is a religious war.
