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This week in Palestine: a service of the International Middle East Media Center imemc.org, for the week of December 10 - 17, 2004
On Sunday December, 12, 2004, an Israeli sniper in Khan Younis refugee camp killed Rana Syiam, 7 years old, while she was sitting at home, eating supper with her family. The Israeli army gave no explanation for the attack.
Rana is just one of 231 Palestinians, mostly children and women, killed in the Khan Younis refugee camp over the four years of the current intifada. Khan Younis camp, one of the most crowded places on earth, shares a border with the illegal Israeli settlement of Gush Katif -- the largest Israeli settlement in the Gaza Strip. Population density in Gaza averages 65,800 persons per square mile, compared with 1,700 people per square mile in the illegal Israeli settlements that now control over 20% of Gaza.
According to the Palestinian Red Crescent Society, 3,478 Palestinians have been killed since September 2000, and 28,248 have been injured.
(During the same time period, 694 Israeli civilians have been killed)
The Health and Development Information Policy Center (HDIP) reports that 82% of the Palestinians killed by the army were civilians, 18.5% of them under the age of 18.
84% (699) of the Palestinians killed were shot in the head and neck, like Rana.
Rana Syiam was one of six Palestinians killed this past week. Twenty four Palestinians were wounded, including a three year old child in Rafah. 64 palestinians were arrested this week, 26 homes were demolished, major checkpoints were closed at least six times, and Palestinian towns and villages were invaded at least 38 times by the Israeli military.
Some examples of this week's violence:
Nine Palestinian schoolchildren aged 8-12 were wounded as an army tank shell landed close to their classroom at Tareq Ben Ziad School in Khan Yunis on Sunday morning.
In Nablus on Sunday, armed settlers barred residents from picking their olives, hurled stones at the residents and their cars, and forced them out of their fields. The Israeli army did not intervene in the settler's unprovoked attacks on the Palestinian farmers.
Ateyya Mustafa Yassin, 15, was hospitalized Wednesday after being severely beaten by Israeli soldiers in Nablus. Soldiers claim that Yassin was among a group of youth who were throwing stones at armored military vehicles.
In the West Bank town of Jayyous, 117 olive trees were uprooted on Saturday December 11. Residents of the town managed to obtain, with the help of their lawyer, a plan by Israeli contractors to build a new Israeli settlement on their land -- in violation of the "road map to peace", in which Israel pledged 'disengagement' from the Palestinian territories. All Israeli settlements on occupied Palestinian land are against the Geneva Convention, which Israel agreed to in 1951.
Sharif Omar of Jayyous village is one of those whose homes are scheduled to be demolished and land confiscated for the building of this new settlement:
If the wall is completed as planned by Israel, Palestinians will be left with ten percent of their original land, divided into a number of isolated islands with complete Israeli control of entrance and exit. This week the Wall's construction continued throughout the West Bank. On Tuesday a non-violent protest against the Wall in Bil'in, northwest of Jerusalem met with a violent military reaction. Four people were wounded, and Seven peace activists were arrested, including 4 Israelis, when they tried to intervene in the beating of a child by Israeli soldiers.
in southern gaza on sunday, 4 israeli soldiers and 2 palestinian resistance fighters were killed in an attack on an israeli army base.
Hamas and a group known as the Fatah Hawks claimed responsibility for Sunday's attack. The Fatah group said it was avenging the "assassination" of Yasir Arafat, referring to rumours widespread among Palestinians that their veteran leader was poisoned.
Fuad Kokali, a local secretary general of the fatah party, comments on the attack:
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The Israeli army responded to Sunday's bombing by firing six missiles into various populated areas in Gaza and conducting daily incursions throughout the week with Apache helicopters, tanks and armored vehicles, killing at least four people.
The attack came just two days after the Israeli army attempted to assassinate a Palestinian resistance leader by shooting a missile at his car.
Abu Samhadana, who survived the attack, stated that,
"Assassination attempts, even if they succeed, won't weaken the resistance, but will only strengthen it. We will continue fighting until we liberate all Palestinian land,".
Meanwhile, on the Palestinian presidential campaign, jailed Fatah leader Marwan Barghouti, the leading candidate, has dropped out of the race.
Five candidates for the municipal elections, scheduled for December 23, have been arrested by Israeli forces and remain in jail. Palestinian Local governing minister Jamal Shubaki this week urged the international community to immediately intervene to end Israeli actions that hinder the ability of Palestinians to run free and democratic elections, including the release of these five candidates.
And palestinian administrative detainees reported that they will boycott Israeli courts starting from December 19, until the Israeli authorities releases all detainees whose detention period has ended. Palestinians are routinely held without charges in administrative detention -- the boycotting prisoners demand that they either be charged, or released. At least 760 palestinians are currently held in administrative detention, according to the israeli organization b'tselem. they are among the over 5000 palestinians currently imprisoned in Israel.
And finally, 24-year-old peace activist Brian Avery from Albuquerque, New Mexico, petitioned the Israeli High Court of Justice for a police investigation of his shooting. Avery was shot in the face last year by a tank mounted machine gun in Jenin while volunteering with the International Solidarity Movement. The petition challenges the Israeli army's account of events, which contradict the accounts of numerous eyewitnesses, and states "the duty to investigate is part of the rule of law."
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