In Palestine, as in the rest of the Arab world, many are turning to religion in response to the failure of the various liberation and nationalist or socialist projects. Some practice a religious-inspired political quietism or wait for an apocalyptic solution for the existing impasse.
Birzeit and San Francisco State University’s team up for 7th Annual Conference of “Struggles for Freedom” at the university in the West Bank
Twelve-year-old Ramzi Abu Ajamia has been in hiding for the past seven nights, the boy’s father, Nasir Abu Ajamia said from their family home in Bethlehem’s Dheisha refugee camp. The father fears for his son’s life.
Runners woke up at dawn on Friday in the southern occupied West Bank city of Bethlehem, ready to take on the Freedom of Movement Marathon in the city. The marathon stretches across the city, quite literally running through two refugee camps, and circles around twice. As locals will ready explain, there is not space for a 42 kilometer route through Bethlehem, so unlike most marathons, the track has to double over two 21 kilometer paths.
In a shocking move, Birthright Israel announced today, April 1, that the well known travel-program-cum-dating-service will no longer be offering trips to Israel for Jewish young people. In an exclusive interview with Mondoweiss Birthright CEO Gidi Mark explains, “We finally figured it out, the best way to build support for Israel is to have as little contact with Israel as possible.”
Samih al-Masri, a Palestinian resident of a refugee camp in the Gaza Strip, has become suddenly aware of the substandard conditions in which he lives after logging on to Facebook, just as Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has warned. Masri says, on account of the memes, he was reevaluating everything: “My family has loved Gaza ever since my my grandparents were driven here from Jaffa by Zionist forces in 1948. It’s the only home we know. But now that I realize not every place is enclosed by a fence, with only three highly restricted points of access, I’m pretty pissed off.”
Mahmoud Matter says that participating in demonstrations held by the workers’ syndicate in Gaza is his only hope to receive his wages. He has been employed by the Ministry of Health since 2010, but has not yet received a full wage. “I go early to my work every day, and do my best to efficiently do my duty and serve my people. But instead of being honored by receiving my salary, I am left to demonstrate and shout in order to get my right of a salary,” Matter said. “We are blackmailed in political splits, and left prone to extortion so that our leaders can achieve their narrow political interests,” he added.
Dan Cohen visits the site Abed al-Fattah Yusri al-Sharif was executed in Hebron and finds a representative from the IDF Spokesperson Unit stationed there to prevent journalists from speaking to combat soldiers. As locals tell Cohen what occurred during the killing a young Israeli settler tells a Palestinian showing Cohen the area, “My father will kill you.”
Four Palestinians arrested this week for Facebook posts have spoken of physical assault during their detention and interrogation, in the latest evidence to emerge of abuse that rights groups say is systemic in Israel’s prisons.
Palestinian citizens of Israel today marked “Land Day,” an annual commemoration of protests that began 40 years ago on March 30, 1976 when Israeli police killed six during a demonstration over land confiscations. As in years past, a general strike was announced for one day, and thousands protested in the north and the south of the country in opposition to a similar looming round of land expropriations.
Palestinians across the occupied West Bank on Wednesday gathered to commemorate the 40th anniversary of “Land Day.” The first Land Day, on March 30, 1976, saw thousands of Palestinians take to the streets in protest of the confiscation of thousands of acres of Palestinian land in the northern Galilee region of Israel. During the protest, six demonstrators were shot dead and over 100 were wounded. Forty years later, Palestinians are still taking to the streets in protest of massive Israeli land grabs.
Silvia Hassoun interviews Palestinian filmmaker Muayad Alayan about his first feature film Love, Theft and other Entanglements, which presents a fresh and innovative way to look at the reality of occupation in Palestine. Alayan says, “We wanted to create a story that is somehow unreal like a fairy tale. Not because the characters and their problems are not real, they are very real, but because we wanted to express a state of mind and a feeling that I myself go through everyday living under occupation. My generation, the post-Oslo generation, we are really exploring the dark comedy and sarcasm.”
One of Israel’s biggest newspapers, Yedioth Ahronoth, staged the country’s first national conference against the boycott, divestment and sanctions (BDS) movement in Jerusalem. Antony Loewenstien reports, “It was a surreal day, filled with determination to defeat BDS, but participants were seemingly incapable of truly understanding why the movement was surging globally. Fear, paranoia, anger and determination was ubiquitous amongst the panelists and audience. BDS could never have imagined a more high-profile advertisement for its agenda.”
Last year Brazil refused to accept Israel’s bid for settler leader Dani Dayan to become the country’s next Israeli ambassador. According to a statement from Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s office today, Dayan will now take a post in U.S. as the newest Consul General in New York instead.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu defended the Israeli army Sunday as controversy gripped the country over a soldier caught on video shooting a Palestinian in the head as he lay on the ground: “Any challenge to the morality of the IDF is outrageous and unacceptable. The soldiers of the IDF, our children, maintain high ethical values while courageously fighting against bloodthirsty murderers under difficult operational conditions.”
Itamar Ben-Gvir and Bentzi Gopstein, far-right settlers and followers of the late Rabbi Meir Kahane, have filed a complaint with Israeli police against Emad Abu Shamsiya, the Palestinian videographer who captured the execution of an incapacitated Palestinian suspect in Hebron. In their letter to the police, they claim that Abu Shamsiya’s presence during the killing is no coincidence, but was coordinated with the alleged attack in order to capture damning video.
As a video recording of an Israeli soldier killing a wounded Palestinian in Hebron on Thursday emerged hours after the shooting Israeli government officials and civil society representatives were split in their responses. Some quickly moved to condemn the shooting, while an outspoken group of Israeli leaders applauded the soldier and circulated a counter-theory of self-defense and heroism.
Nickolay Mladenov, who reports to the UN security council on the peace process, said: “I strongly condemn yesterday’s apparent extrajudicial execution of a Palestinian assailant in Hebron in the occupied West Bank. This was a gruesome, immoral and unjust act that can only fuel more violence and escalate an already volatile situation.”
Palestinian man who shot video of Israeli soldier executing an incapacitated suspect in the street in Hebron Thursday receives death threats from Jewish settlers. Imad Abu Shamsiya shot the video for Human Rights Defenders group.
Elor Azraya, the soldier who summarily executed Abed al-Fattah Yusri al-Sharif as he lay immobile and unarmed on the street in Hebron yesterday is suspected of murder.
In his defense, his lawyer Eyal Beserglick said Azraya “acted in accordance with the rules of engagement as suggested by his superiors.”
He’s right.
The United Nations Human Rights Council will “produce a database of all business enterprises” operating in Israel’s settlements in territory occupied in 1967. The company blacklist was approved as part of a series of five resolutions passed by the Geneva-based group, condemning Israel’s control over Palestinian lands and re-affirming European guidelines to label Israeli products originating in the settlements.
Ha’aretz diplomatic correspondent and gourmand, Barak Ravid, recently tweeted a picture of “a likeable wine from the Livni vineyard in Kiryat Arba.” “Surprisingly good,” he concludes. The reason that the quality of the wine, produced in the darkest heart of the Israeli-occupied territory, is surprising, I would guess, is that Ravid believes that an admitted, convicted and unrepentant terrorist is unlikely to also become a successful vintner. But in Israel all is possible, at least for Jews.
Hundreds of Israelis converged on religious sites across the occupied West Bank on Wednesday morning ahead of the Jewish holiday of Purim, in visits Palestinians condemned as “provocative.” In Hebron, Israeli settlers as well as other right-wing Israelis held celebrations in the Old City’s Ibrahimi Mosque. Locals told Ma‘an News that during the celebrations, which began late Tuesday, the settlers “provocatively” used the mosque’s loudspeakers “to sing racist songs that call for the expulsion of ‘Arabs’ from Hebron.”
Today an Israeli soldier executed a wounded Palestinian man on the ground in the Tel Rumeida area of Hebron’s old city in the occupied West Bank. In a graphic B’Tselem video capturing the killing, the man can be seen semi-conscious on the ground, when a soldier cocks his rifle and fires, killing him on the spot. The Israeli military spokesperson said the filmed execution “contradicts the IDF’s ethical code and what is expected from the IDF’s soldiers and commanders” and that the soldier has been suspended while the military conducts a probe, but in fact the policy of summary executions has been ordered as a directive from top political and military officials.
Last December, an Israeli medic announced on his Twitter account that he would not treat injured Palestinians he deemed “terrorists.” This is not an aberration, rather, it is an instance of increasing turmoil in the Israeli medical community over the concept of triage, the internationally recognized protocol for medical treatment based on severity and likely benefit from immediate treatment. Politicians, religious leaders and doctors are all calling for Israeli Jews to be prioritized when it comes to emergency medical treatment. Deputy Minister of the Interior Yaron Mazuz told Israeli news, “The first priority should be give in to the residents of Israel, mostly to those who were injured from the attacks. Is it unacceptable that we would treat terrorists before residents of the state.”