West Bank Dispatch: A time without symbols

Key Developments (May 4 – May 8)

• Israeli forces shot and killed two Palestinians in Tulkarem on Saturday, May 6. The Ministry of Health identified the youth as Samer Salah Al-Shafi’i and Jamil Kharyoush, both 22 years old. Al-Shafi’i was shot with bullets to the neck, chest, and abdomen while Kharyoush was killed with bullets to the chest, stomach, and left leg. Footage released by residents show Israeli forces abusing the bodies of the 22-year-olds after they were killed. Another Palestinian was injured during the Israeli invasion on the Ein Shams refugee camp in Tulkarem city, but is in stable condition. Before withdrawing, Israeli forces arrested one Palestinian, Ibrahim Shalash from the camp. On Sunday, May 7, Israeli forces also arrested a 14-year-old, Ahmad Abu Jamous, from Jericho.  
• The Palestinian occupied city of Jericho has entered its seventeenth day of a military-imposed siege. Since April 22, movement into and outside the city has been obstructed, while tourism and the city’s economy has been devastated. Nine Palestinians have been killed in Jericho this year, all of them refugees, including one 17-year-old. Although Israeli forces claim to be defending national security, the siege impacts nearly 55,200 Palestinians and the thousands of Palestinians (and internationals) who must pass through Jericho for travel towards Jordan and the outside world. Jericho is also an agricultural city, with 34% of its economy made up of the agricultural sector alone.
• The Palestinian writer, novelist, and political detainee Walid Daqqa, 61, continues to suffer from health complications which endanger his life. Calls for his release continue to demand that the Israeli Prison Services and military courts be held accountable for the continued obstruction of the necessary care Daqqa requires. 
• Last week, Palestinian hunger striker and political icon Khader Adnan, 44, died inside the Israeli Prison clinic of Ramleh. Adnan’s death was wilful and deliberate according to documentation and information gathered by Mondoweiss. Almost a week later, Adnan’s body remains withheld from his family, including his wife Randa Moussa and his nine children. With Adnan, the number of Palestinian bodies which remain illegally held captive by Israeli authorities since 2015 is 134, 13 of whom were political detainees who died in Israeli custody. According to the Palestinian human rights group, Al-Haq, Israeli authorities have also historically set “inconsiderate, restrictive, and degrading conditions on their families to receive their bodies, including by paying deposits, restricting the number of participants in the funeral, and requirements for the immediate burial of bodies following their release.” On May 6, Israeli authorities released three Palestinian bodies to their families for burial after 55 days of withholding them.
• Palestinian political detainees report preparation for a mass hunger strike in protest of Khader Adnan’s death and in light of administrative detention, the practice of imprisoning Palestinians without charge or trial, and during which Palestinians are often put in interrogation cells, where they are subjected to what has been documented as torture.
• In an escalation of settler violence against Palestinians, an Israeli has shot and killed a Palestinian with Israeli citizenship, 19-year-old Diar Omari. Omari was shot near Sandala just outside his car on Sunday, May 7. The Jewish-Israeli shooter claimed that he killed Omari in“self-defense,” but video footage of the shooting shows him actively getting out of his car, charging towards the 19-year-old, and shooting him. Since 2021, Israeli violence against Palestinians, whether against Palestinians in Gaza and the West Bank, or against Palestinians with Israeli citizenship, has reached a record high. Omari was buried on Sunday afternoon in his village of Marj Ibn Amer. Omari’s father accused the Israeli state of encouraging guns and spreading more hatred against Palestinians.
• Israeli authorities prepare for 1,248 new settlement units in the West Bank, despite agreements made in February and March of this year under the provision of Egypt, Jordan, and the USA in which Israel is supposed to cease settlements for at least 3-6 months. 

In-depth

Khader Adnan wouldn’t have been considered a particularly remarkable figure in Palestinian political life twenty or thirty years ago. He was not part of any armed group and did not occupy central positions of power within any particular political structure. A graduate of Birzeit University with a BA in economics, he became a spokesperson for the Palestinian Islamic Jihad (PIJ) in 1996 while still a student. He played a role in student activism and was arrested by the Palestinian Authority (PA) for organizing a protest against the visit of French President Lionel Jospin to BZU’s campus — but aside from that, most of his exploits were confined to being a spokesperson for the PIJ. He was also a baker, and ran a bakery in Qabatya in between periods of imprisonment in Israeli jails. In the age of Palestinian armed struggle and anti-colonial guerilla warfare throughout the Second Intifada, his was not a storied political life by comparison.

Yet as the Second Intifada died down after 2005, most Palestinians who resisted or even called for resistance were either imprisoned, killed, or given into defeat, accepting the idea that armed resistance would only bring about destruction for Palestinians in light of the military might Israel unleashed during its campaign of destruction against Palestinian towns and cities. With the advent of the so-called neoliberal order, Salam Fayyad and Netanyahu’s regime of “economic peace” after 2009, and PA-Israel security coordination, Palestinian capitulation to Israeli colonial interests became the new status quo. It was a time of defeat. Hardly anyone could be found saying “no,” let alone challenging colonial authority.

Then came 2011, and in the wake of the Arab uprisings, Khader Adnan launched his first long-term hunger strike protesting his administrative detention by Israel. A few months later, in 2012, he won his freedom and, with it, the respect and iconic status that he would continue to enjoy and renew until his death a decade later. When he was not in prison leading one hunger strike after the other, which progressively ate away at his health, he was always to be found out on the streets. He galvanized the Palestinian prisoners’ movement and continued to champion their cause. He visited martyrs’ funerals, agitated against security coordination and PA repression, attended every rally, and was beaten and dragged in the streets by PA security forces, yet he was not part of any resistance cell and did not engage in any armed activities. What he did do was model an example of tenacity and persistence in confronting the enemy. He provided victory in an era of defeat.

At a time when the Palestinian resistance began to reemerge in fits and starts throughout the past seven years, starting with the 2015 “Knife Intifada” and continuing into the subsequent uprisings and popular upheavals, Adnan remained one of the few voices that unambiguously supported the emergent moment of resistance without hesitation or qualification. When some were content to register the tragedy of Palestinian youth “throwing their lives away” or noting the “understandable but misguided” anger that drove them to attack a soldier or settler, Adnan was to be found at their funerals honoring their sacrifice. He hailed them as martyrs, reminding the public that, far from being the object of pathos, they should be the guiding compass of Palestinian political sensibility. 

In short, he was a symbol in a time without symbols, and his influence was clearly felt among the younger generation of Palestinians who would go on to join the resurgent armed resistance in 2022. It was evidenced in the fleeting embrace between Adnan and Ibrahim al-Nabulsi following a failed assassination attempt on Adnan in Nablus, and it was evident in his eulogization by armed groups like the Lions’ Den and the Jenin Brigade.

With his death, Israel sought to erase one of the last free Palestinian symbols. Israel knew Adnan’s efficacy and reach, and that is why Israel continued to imprison him in a vicious cycle of administrative detention without charge or trial.

It’s because Israel understood the power of symbols.

Mondoweiss highlights

Khader Adnan’s martyrdom, by Mariam Barghouti

Khader Adnan is free, by Mariam Barghouti

Khader Adnan’s death was “willful” and deliberate, by Yumna Patel and Mariam Barghouti

Important figures

• 111 Palestinians have been killed in the West Bank since the start of the year, 20 of whom were children, and 2 were women.
• More than 655 Palestinians were killed since the Unity Uprising in 2021. 
• There are currently 151 Palestinian children and minors being held in Israeli military prisons, ten of whom are held in administrative detention.