This week has seen a continuous attack on Palestinian youth, several of them have been killed. As well arrests continued and 12 year old Dima al Wawi became the youngest female Palestinian prisoner in Israeli jails. Israel has continued to destroy schools and to attck Palestinian education while journalist Muhammad al Qiq resists in ongoing hunger strike.
Palestinian Youth under attack
The violence particularly affected the young people. Several palestinians minors died this week, all due to confrontations with the occupation forces.
The Israeli military shot and killed Qussai Thiab Abu ar-Rob, 17, near the Beita village junction, on Monday 21. Qussai, from Qabatia town, south of Jenin, is the cousin of Ahmad Awad Abu ar-Rob, 16, who on November 2, 2015, was shot dead by the soldiers, near the al-Jalama military roadblock, northeast of Jenin, allegedly after attempting to stab a soldier.
Israeli soldiers killed, on Friday 19, a young Palestinian man, in Beit Fajjar town, in the West Bank district of Bethlehem, after several Israeli military vehicles invaded it. The army the same day killed a young man in Silwad town, east of Ramallah.
The al Jazeera crew that witnessed the third killing on Friday, close to Damascus Gate in the Old City in Jerusalem, recount a scene of Israeli border police shooting some 50 live rounds at Mohammad Abu Khalaf, 20 years of age, who was already injured lying on the floor. “What happened was the execution of the young man,” al Jazeera anchor Elias Karram stated, “The border police officers lined-up and opened fire although they could have easily arrested the man, especially since he was already injured.”
A Palestinian girl became the youngest imprisoned female in the history of the conflict. Indeed, Dima al-Wawi, 12 years, was arrested by the Israeli authorities because she was suspected to have a knife in her school bag while she was walking towards her school, near Beit Ummar, north of Hebron. The judgment, which was pronounced on February 18th, 2016, has sent her for four and a half months to the prison of Ofer.
Mohammed Al-Qiq
Demonstrations of support and protest has took place in several cities this week, some of them during the day others as nighttime vigils. On Sunday 21, a protest organized by the political parties paralyzed the commercial sector of Al-Khalil ( Hebron). The health of the journalist, who is reaching his third month of hunger strike, is critical. Journalists’ unions in France, Greece, Turkey, Ireland and the United Kingdom sent a letters to the Israeli prime minister denouncing the treatment of Al-Qiq and the use of the administrative detention. They protested attacks on al-Qiq, such as the incident when the fully armed Israeli special squad, including dogs, stormed the hospital where Al-Qiq is locked up. The reason of this intervention is still not clear, but the soldiers knew very well the fragility of the journalist when they attacked him.
Resistance in Bilin: 11 years and supporters from around the world
The first of the demonstrations in Bil’in took place in 2005, when the Israeli authorities began building the apartheid Wall to annex the land on which the settlement is built and the surrounding areas. The path of the Wall cuts off 195 hectares of farmland, the main source of income of the people of Bil’in.
The army used of heavy loads of gas against the protestors, but no arrest and no wounded person.
Denying education
The Israeli armed forces demolished a school in the hamlet of Abu Nawar, east of Occupied Jerusalem. The aim of the demolition is to increase the pressure on the inhabitants to leave the area, because Israel plans to start the construction of new colonies in the area. The school is the only one in the areas and has been built by France, to allow the children of Bedouins communities to be able to frequent school.
At the same time, the Israeli Minister Naftali Bennett, declared a reform in the curriculum of Israeli schools. The new curriculum will have to put the emphase on the importance of an undivided Jerusalem and its heritage 50 years after the city's reunification. The program is to launch officially on the next Jerusalem Day.