On Monday, September 19, security forces belonging to the Palestinian Authority (PA) raided the city of Nablus, 80 km northeast of Ramallah, in order to arrest two Palestinian resistance fighters wanted by Israel, Musaab Shtayyeh, 30, and Ameed Tbeileh, 21.
One Palestinian, 55-year-old Firas Yaish, was killed, while several others were injured, including Abed El Fattah who was hit with three bullets and was left in critical condition at the Arab Specialized Hospital.
Musaab Shtayyeh is on hunger strike according to his father, Akef Shtayyeh, 60. “His health is deteriorating, according to his lawyer,” Akef told Mondoweiss. “Musaab already has thyroid problems and health issues, and his hunger strike will also add to that.”
While the PA’s arrest of resistance fighters amid a large-scale assassination campaign against them may have been a shock to some Palestinians, there was a vastly different atmosphere engulfing Nablus, specifically in the Old City.
Mondoweiss was on the ground in the Old City and met with some of the resistance fighters stationed there. Shtayyeh, who was arrested by the PA in Jericho, was also a close comrade of the slain fighter Ibrahim al-Nabulsi, the “Lion of Nablus,” assassinated by the Israeli regime on August 9 this year.
The PA serves as Israel’s proxy army
Ever since Monday evening, when PA forces kidnapped Musaab Shtayyeh and Ameed Tbeileh, the city of Nablus and its neighboring towns have been aflame. The streets are full of burning tires and a layer of stones marked the battle that took place a short while before.
The factions of armed resistance fighters had released a statement earlier on Tuesday, September 20, calling on Palestinains to revolt against the detainment of the young resistance fighters.
“We inform that until now we have been silent and no subversive actions have been taken yet in response to this arrest, despite our capacity to do so,” the statement said.
A few hours later, a call to action was disseminated amongst Palestinian social media and media reports.
“To all our people in our valiant city, the city of martyrs and resistance, we salute you in defiance and steadfastness,” it said, followed by a call to close all city roads at 3:00 p.m. on Tuesday in protest against the attack on resistance fighters. This attack has come amidst a brutal Israeli military crackdown dubbed “Operation Break the Wave,” in which the PA is now an informal participant.
Palestinian youth in neighboring towns and villages, especially refugee camps, responded to the call. The roads to Nablus were blocked with trash cans and burning tires, but the familiar orange flames that stretched several kilometers around the city, usually signaling a confrontation with the Israeli army, now marked a different warzone with the armed Palestinian security forces.
The absence of Israeli soldiers, who were usually stationed at the different entrances to Nablus, was almost eerie. The road to Nablus near Balata refugee camp was closed off, and the sound of teargas, stun grenades, and live ammunition echoed from Martyr’s Square, a few kilometers away.
The young men and boys roaming the streets were visibly exhausted. Drivers who seemed foreign to the towns and city were encouraged to turn around. Yet for those that managed to enter Martyr’s Square, the sight was at once heart-breaking and anti-climactic — almost performative, but no less threatening and volatile.
“What a disgusting situation,” a man in his 40s says, as he watches Palestinian security forces fire teargas amid the sound of live ammunition ringing in the near distance.
Dozens of Palestinian families were treated for teargas inhalation, while tens were injured by PA fire. At least five youth were reported to have been hit with PA forces’ live ammunition by 10 p.m. on Tuesday, medics on the ground told Mondoweiss at the time.
The bullets of resistance fighters were this time guided by the demand to have their comrades released from the custody of the Palestinian Preventative Security, headed by Ziad Hab El-Reeh, who has been the Minister of Interior since January of this year.
The sounds of live ammunition persisted until past midnight. The official number of injuries in the ranks of the PA forces documented by the Red Crescent, reportedly from the live ammunition of the resistance fighters, was comically low — only 25 injuries announced, due to restrictions on reporting by the PA.
The battleground was almost identical to what the city had grown used to during Israeli army raids. Most striking of all was the sight of the PA’s armored vehicles, resembling those of the Israeli army, while their tactics in quelling the protests seemed to be lifted from the Israeli playbook. Truly, it was as though Israel were delegating its task of colonial domination to its PA proxies.
“This is such an ugly sight,” some of the men observing on Martyr’s Square would say repeatedly. Shaking their heads, almost in disappointment, they kept watching on in passivity as the only officially armed force in the West Bank continued its crackdown.
The youth were not to be dissuaded, while resistance brigades in both Nablus and Jenin continued to escalate retaliatory measures, in a bid to leverage for the release of their comrades.
With confrontation and unwavering demands for the release of the resistance fighters, meetings were held between various representatives extending from late Tuesday evening to the early hours of Wednesday morning.
At approximately 2:00 a.m., Wednesday morning, final briefings of the meetings reported that the PA will pursue an investigation into the killing of Yaish. Shortly after, photos of PA officials cleaning the streets of Nablus were disseminated to journalists and the media — almost gleefully demonstrating that the PA had successfully calmed the state of uproar in the Old City and its surroundings.
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Israeli Forces Deliberately Killed Shireen Abu Akleh (theintercept.com)
The Intercept:
ISRAELI FORCES DELIBERATELY KILLED PALESTINIAN AMERICAN JOURNALIST, REPORT SHOWS. A new forensic analysis proves that an Israeli sniper could see that Shireen Abu Akleh was a journalist before firing the bullet that killed her. By Alice Speri, Sept. 2022.“PALESTINIAN AMERICAN JOURNALIST Shireen Abu Akleh, who was killed by Israeli forces in May while reporting from the occupied West Bank city of Jenin, was deliberately & repeatedly targeted, along with her colleagues, despite being clearly identified as a member of the press, a new report released Tuesday concludes.
“The report, a collaboration between Palestinian human rights group Al-Haq & the U.K.-based research agency Forensic Architecture, confirms the findings of half a dozen earlier independent reviews of the incident, including by the United Nations, which have found that Israeli forces were responsible for Abu Akleh’s killing, with the U.N. noting that the bullet that killed her was ‘well aimed.’ But the new report, which includes a detailed digital reconstruction of the incident based on previously unseen footage recorded by Al Jazeera staff at the scene, in addition to witness testimony, open-source video, & a drone survey of the area, offers the most conclusive account yet of what transpired that day.
“The report directly contradicts the final conclusions of a review by Israeli authorities issued earlier this month, in which officials conceded there was a ‘high possibility’ that Abu Akleh was ‘accidentally hit by [Israel Defense Forces] gunfire.’ In that report, Israeli officials claimed that the IDF soldiers were firing toward ‘suspects identified as armed Palestinian gunmen, during an exchange of fire in which life-risking, widespread & indiscriminate shots were fired toward IDF soldiers.’ (cont’d)
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“But the new reconstruction clearly shows that there were neither armed gunmen nor shots fired in the minutes leading up to Abu Akleh’s killing. Instead, the reconstruction shows that Abu Akleh’s & her colleagues’ ‘PRESS’ insignia was clearly visible from the position of the IDF shooter; that the shooter had a ‘clear line of fire,’ indicating ‘precise aim’; & that the firing continued as the journalists’ sought shelter. After Abu Akleh was hit, a civilian attempting to provide aid to her was fired upon each time he tried to approach her.
“’This is literally the last nail in the coffin of what the army is arguing,’ the Forensic Architecture researcher in charge of the investigation, who asked not to be named because of fear for their safety when working in the region, told The Intercept.
““’We can prove conclusively that there was no one — zero persons — in between the occupation forces & Shireen,’ they added. ‘There were no bullets, in sound or visually, so it’s not that the army was responding to anything. We can also show using visibility analysis that we’ve done in our model, that the shooting only happened when they were within the visible range of the army, which means that it was fully intentional.’
“The IDF did not immediately respond to questions about how the new evidence contradicts its claims. Al Jazeera did not respond to a request for comment, including questions about the footage it had not previously made public, which shows the last moment in which Abu Akleh was alive. The network is considering legal action in the case.
“The new report was presented at a press conference in The Hague, the seat of the International Criminal Court. On Tuesday, the International Federation of Journalists, the Palestinian Journalists Syndicate, & International Center of Justice for Palestinians filed a complaint with the court on behalf of Abu Akleh’s family & journalist Ali Al Samoudi, who was also shot during the same incident. In April, the groups had submitted another request for the court to launch an investigation into the systematic targeting, maiming, & killing of journalists in Palestine. Abu Akleh’s killing came just days after the ICC acknowledged receipt of that complaint.” “Israel’s failure to carry out an effective investigation into the killing of Shireen amounts to a shielding of perpetrators…”
Without a “one gun” policy, Palestinians will be undermined and their cause will continue to suffer. I have yet to hear a case for bullets or lone wolf attacks. Condoning them is self-defeating. There are only creative political solutions.