Demonstrations Continue in Budrus for Third Consecutive Day
Latest News, PENGON/Anti-Apartheid Wall Campaign, January 1st, 2004
 |
| Above: For the past 3 days, villagers in Budrus and surrounding communities have put up strong resistance to the Occupation Forces who have come to destroy their lands for construction of the Apartheid Wall. Photo courtesy of Al Jazeera.Net |
Today, for the third consecutive day, hundreds of Palestinians demonstrated in Budrus, west of Ramallah to resist the construction of the Apartheid Wall. The demonstration started at 10:30 a.m. when demonstrators from Budrus, as well as the nearby villages of Qibya, Ni’lin, and Midya, headed towards their lands where occupation bulldozers have already begun uprooting trees and clearing land to make way for the Wall. The protestors sat in the land until 11:00 a.m. when Occupation Forces arrived and started shooting tear gas at the demonstrators, who responded by throwing stones at the Occupation soldiers. The demonstrators then went back to the main street of the village, afraid that they would be surrounded by the Occupation Forces. However, the soldiers followed the people as they returned to the village and entered Budrus from the Qibya side, after the demonstrators blocked the other entrances to the village.
20 people were injured today by the Occupation soldiers when they shot the tear gas and rubber coated bullets at them. Mohammad Samih from Ni’lin was caught by three soldiers who started beating him and caused him many injuries in the head and elsewhere. Fortunately, he was able to escape.
 |
| Above: The Apartheid Wall, in red and in blue, will make life in the trapped communities near impossible. This is an excerpt from the Campaign's November 2003 poster map. See the complete map here. |
Following the demonstration, but before retreating to their military station near the lands they are destroying, Occupation soldiers entered one of the village’s houses and arrested three brothers who were in the house. The people in the village still have no information as to where the brothers were taken. Tonight, the village remains under curfew; however, the people are still willing to break it in order to reach their threatened land.
The people in the village are determined to return to the fields, to continue their resistance to the Wall that is destroying what is left of their lands and their livelihood.
 |
| Above: This powerful cartoon from artist Abu Arafeh depicts the resistance in Budrus. The Arabic text reads "Budrus". |
EXPLORE THE ISSUE
Search for more about Budrus on this site.
RECENT SITE ADDITIONS
Ni'lin: Israeli forces injure 8 protesters and arrest 17-year old boy (March 16th, 2010)
Stop the Wall releases two reports on Brazil's complicity with Israeli wars and occupation. (March 16th, 2010)
Alert: Israeli occupation forces arrest activist from al Ma’sara (March 15th, 2010)
BNC: A Vote for Israel’s Entry in the OECD is a Vote in Support of War Crimes (March 15th, 2010)
BDS workshop in Bil’in in occasion of Israeli Apartheid Week (March 15th, 2010)
Tree Planting in Bethlehem area: New confiscation orders discovered (March 15th, 2010)
Israeli forces test new weapons on the protestors in Nabi Saleh (March 13th, 2010)
|
 |
|
