Two weeks ago a right-wing Israeli group called Ad Kan released an undercover video that claimed leftist Israeli activists were a driving force behind Palestinian violence. After the footage was aired on a major local news station three people were arrested on charges of conspiracy—one Palestinian and two Israelis. Now Ad Kan has released a second video, this time targeting the organization Anarchists Against the Wall as so-called “extremist Israeli activists” who “have a clear goal: to injure and kill IDF soldiers and police officers.”
Green metal panels shutter recently out of business storefronts along al-Wad Street, a narrow stone road inside of Jerusalem’s Old City walls that links Damascus Gate to the holy sites of the Western Wall and the al-Aqsa mosque. During the summer foot traffic was heavy on this Muslim quarter walkway lined with souvenir mongers and restaurants. Yet six stores on al-Wad street alone have closed since October when violence erupted across Israel and the West Bank in what many Palestinians are calling the start of an uprising.
For the second time in a year, Israeli vandals targeted a Christian church in Jerusalem Sunday with extremist anti-Christian graffiti. Assailants tagged the religious site with messages in Hebrew: “Death to the heathen Christians, “the enemies of Israel”, “Let his [Jesus’] name and memory be obliterated” and “Christians to Hell.”
Israel charged two suspects this morning in district court for an arson attack on the West Bank village of Duma where Jewish extremists killed three Palestinians five months ago in most high-profile case of settler violence. The lead suspect is Amiram Ben-Uliel, 21, who is said to have confessed to the firebombing. His alleged accomplice, 17, is unnamed.
Supermodel Gigi Hadid made international headlines last week when she posted to Instagram a note about her Palestinian heritage —“check out the last name. Hadid. Half Palestinian & proud of it.” But the model is not the only “proud Palestinian” from the Hadid family on social media. Her father Mohamed Hadid posted a series of images of the past few weeks of his Nazareth-born family as refugees in Syria following the 1948 war.
A group of red beret Palestinian police scuffled with Israeli soldiers near Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas’ residence last week ordering the military to leave the area of the West Bank under Palestinian security control. A recording of the December 21, 2015 incident was published by local media, showing Palestinian presidential guards threatening Israeli forces.
Israeli police have opened an investigation into a group of extremist Israelis who recorded themselves rejoicing over the killing of a Palestinian baby by stabbing a photograph of the toddler who was burned alive earlier this year. Footage of the incident aired on Israeli news stations last night, depicting a wedding party in a West Bank settlement waving knives and guns in the air while singing “we will take revenge on the Palestinians.”
Early Tuesday morning suspected Jewish nationalists launched two tear gas canisters scribbled with the word “revenge” into a Palestinian home in Beitillu outside of Ramallah, said Israeli police. At the time a Palestinian family was sleeping inside of the house, including an nine-month old baby.
For the first time since the weeks leading up to the second Intifada, or the 2000-2005 uprising, a majority of Palestinians believe current intensified violence will build into a full scale Intifada with greater potential to achieve their goals than peace talks with Israel, said a report published on Monday by the Palestinian Center for Policy and Survey (PCPS), the West Bank’s leading independent pollster.
Last night, Israeli soldiers entered the West Bank city of Ramallah and raided a municipal library as nearly 100 Palestinian youth clashed with soldiers setting on fire tires and trash cans. Palestinians view Israeli army activities inside of the de facto capital as an escalation to an already tense few months.