After violence took hold of Jerusalem at the beginning of October, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu charged the fault fell on Palestinian Authority, Hamas and the Islamic movement of northern Israel for inciting attacks against Israelis, and spurring demonstrations across the West Bank, Jerusalem and Gaza that have led to the killings of Palestinian protesters. Yet the 20-percent Arab-Palestinian minority in Israel believe that it is the Israeli government, and not the Palestinian leadership that is responsible for the outbreak of hostilities, according to a survey published by the Haifa-based think tank Mada al-Carmel.
Amid weeks of violence in Jerusalem, Israeli police and special forces raided an East Jerusalem hospital for a third day in a row on Thursday and fired tear gas, sound grenades and rubber bullets into the medical compound, injuring three patients with rubber bullets.
For the 30,000 Palestinian residents of Jabel Mukaber the checkpoints—and a new wall that is being constructed in the center of town, cement roadblocks suspending vehicle traffic and a border police force deployed throughout the neighborhood—have made the quiet hilltop town with a view from Tel Aviv to Jordan, a militarized enclave.
A masked Israeli settler attacked an Israeli-American rabbi and co-founder of the group Rabbis for Human Rights, taking knife to the religious leader and peace activist’s neck, this afternoon following an annual olive harvest in the West Bank village of Awarta outside of Nablus.
Israeli police and barking dogs woke Abdallah and Fatima Abu Nab from inside of the couple’s bedroom shortly after daybreak Monday morning, and told them to immediately and permanently leave their house in the East Jerusalem neighborhood of Silwan, bringing an end to an seven-year legal battle with Israeli settlers. This latest Israeli provocation took place in the heart of East Jerusalem where more than 40 Palestinians, and eight Israelis have been killed in shootings and attacks since the start of October.
France will present a Security Council resolution this week on behalf of the Palestinian leadership calling for international observers deployed in Jerusalem, according to senior Palestinian official and member of the PLO executive committee Hanan Ashrawi.
An Eritrean national shot by an Israeli security guard after he was surrounded by a frenzied mob of Israelis in a Beersheva bus station in southern Israel Sunday night, died today of wounds sustained during the assault. A video circulated on social media shows the man, Haftom Zarhum, 29, laying on the floor in a pool of blood, as security officials attempt to stave off the crowd. One Israeli threw a bench at him.
Israeli police shut hundreds of Palestinian businesses in the Muslim quarters of Jerusalem’s Old City Tuesday night, hours before a general order from Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu for “a closure on, or to surround, centers of friction and incitement” went into effect.
Amid clashes and killings that have blazed into a second week Israel’s cabinet unanimously approved mandatory minimum sentences for Jerusalemites and Israeli citizens who throw stones or launch heftier projectiles such as firebombs and fireworks.
Fadi Aloon, 19, had his back to police and was walking away from them when he was gunned down with several shots to his torso, a new video published today by Local Call (+972 Magazine’s Hebrew sister-news blog) revealed. The footage, a third recording of the killing posted online, shows Aloon, and East Jerusalem resident from the Shuafat neighborhood, tracing the track’s of Jerusalem’s light rail line in the eastern part of the city moments after he allegedly stabbed 15-year old Israeli Moshe Malka.