Ni’lin town is a village located in the Occupied West Bank to the west of Ramallah city.In 1967, a large part of Ni’lin was annexed as a result of the newly created Israeli state. Throughout 1967 and later on, half of our land has been taken from us and colonized by Israel with illegal settlements.

Since Israel continuously violates human rights and International laws with its illegal occupation, our daily struggles and painful experiences that shape the Palestinian life under the Israeli military occupation regime are unlimited.
These violations include theft of land, building illegal settlements, land confiscation, home demolition, daily abuses and harassment.
While people were peacefully protesting and struggling for the honor and survival of their country, their land, and its sovereignty, dozens of people were killed, hundreds were injured and arrested.

In 1967, Israel’s theft of land and ethnic cleansing continued throughout the building of illegal settlements in the Southern part of Ni’lin town. Nilin ‘s people defended their land and resisted the ethnic cleansing within a peaceful opposition and strategy.
Even though Israel’s global apparatus is extremely influential on the international scale through an omnipresent and well-funded propaganda and lobbying warfare, it couldn’t manipulate the international public anymore.
Palestinians are currently carrying on a diplomatic struggle in the international institutions to stop the regular ethnic cleansing and theft of land with the illegal annexations and settlements.

Ni’lin town took part in the First Intifada in 1980 and consequently lost a number of its freedom veterans and activists, many were detained after long chasing and had a jubilant reception after their release.
Throughout 1990, Ni’lin Town kept on organizing and protesting against the illegal settlements and against the 446 street which divided the town into two separated parts. Our people paid with their lives while opposing Israel’s threats to our survival.
In 2004, Israel disclosed its intention to build the apartheid-wall on our land for security reasons as they claim. In fact, the apartheid wall is meant to steal more from our land, to suffocate our life and to finally force people to transfer.

The Apartheid Wall is built deep into Palestinian territory and miles away from the armistice line of 1967, which cause more land theft. The apartheid wall was implemented to complement the various Israeli policies and practices that control Palestinian’s access to the world outside their towns and villages.

The system of checkpoints and the Jewish-only bypass roads are part of the various aspects of the Israeli military occupation regime imposed on Palestinians.

Check points, where Palestinians are searched, questioned, hassled, detained for hours or simply turned back, renders the ability to reach school, agricultural land, work, medical and healthcare facilities rather inconceivable.

Jewish bypass roads are built to connect illegal settlements across the Occupied West Bank and from which Palestinians are barred. Every activity that is intrinsic for survival, such as work, education, healthcare is subject to arbitrary restriction and delay by the Israeli military occupation.

As a result, each town is being isolated from neighboring ones. Therefore freedom of mobility is completely denied to all Palestinians. The consequences brought by the Apartheid Wall are devastating for Palestinian farmers and agricultural workers who are denied their utmost right to cultivate their land.

Because their freedom of mobility is denied, Palestinian are unable to reach their own agricultural land, sometimes for many long months, which result in having their own agricultural land (their own means of survival) confiscated because of the macabre Israeli policies that are implemented to enforce more land theft and ethnic cleansing.

The consequences are brutal for Palestinian children attending schools, and for Palestinian patients seeking medical care in hospitals and clinics in neighboring cities, bringing more humiliation, suffering and ghastly consequences.

Freedom of mobility is essential to survival. Freedom of mobility is crucial to connect and create a civil society and to resist the occupation.

The news of Israel’s disclosure of their plan to build the Apartheid Wall was met with absolute rejection. People organized peaceful protests regularly. The Israeli army cracked down on these protests through a massive and regular assault consisting of tear gas, rubber-coated steel bullets and live ammunition. Their project was enforced despite the Palestinian and the international community’s outcry.

In 2008, the Israeli Supreme Court granted the Israeli army the authorization to build the wall and suppress any disapproval or protest. Ni’lin town immediately re-formed a larger committee that opposed the Wall through legal procedures as well as organized and lead non –violent demonstrations on the ground. They again felt that their existence was at stake and they resisted with their faith, will and determination. The Israeli Occupation Army disrupted Ni’lin’s non-violent protests using aggressive, brutal and barbaric methods.
For example, in one year and two months, the Israeli Occupation Army killed five of our dear and close ones : Ahmed Moussa 9 years old, Youssef Amireh 17 years old, Arafat Khawaja 23 years old, Muhammed Khawaja 18 years old and Aqil Srour 36 years old. They also denied their fathers and other relatives from work permits.
A curfew was imposed on the town for three days. Vandalism and sadism was deliberately inflicted on the people but their faith remained unshaken.
Moreover, the Israeli Occupation Forces used to climb on the top roofs and shoot tear gas canisters in random motion that caused fire in several houses. Many people suffocated from gas inhalation.
The Israeli Occupation army also terrorized and humiliated the families during the mid-night invasions aimed at arresting the activists and sentencing them to long detention and making them pay exorbitant bailout.
They detained the committee members and charged them with incitement. Hundreds of people got injured, some were left handicapped and paralyzed but they never lost faith.

All these inhuman methods failed to suppress our just resistance. Ni’lin town became more powerful, more united and more determined to fight for their right for a peaceful existence with dignity and freedom.
We would like to express our deep sense of gratitude to the Israeli peace activists and the international solidarity movement’s members whose role was cogent in fostering and supporting our eagerness for self-determination and justice.
They joined our protests and witnessed our painful and deteriorating living conditions. They conveyed our message that calls for an effective and immediate support from the free world.
We have a joint-target, which is to end the ages of occupation and tyranny and to achieve an everlasting peace by virtue of freedom, justice and equality.