Mounting Israeli Occupation violence – one of the deadliest years for Palestinians

On 28 October this year, Tor Wennesland, Special Co-ordinator for the Middle East Peace Process, told a United Nations Security Council quarterly meeting that 2022 is on course to be the deadliest year for Palestinians in the West Bank since the systematic tracking of Palestinian fatalities began in 2005. Increasing illegal settler violence and sabotage, noted during the reporting period, 17 June to 20 September 2022, is reinforcing Israeli military aggression and population-control. For Palestinians, the deaths, injuries and dispossession are creating mounting hopelessness, anger and appeals for justice.

During the period, a total of 32 Palestinians, including six children, were killed by Israeli security forces during protests, home invasions and searches, while 311 of them, including one woman and eight children, were injured. Israeli settlers and their supporters perpetrated 106 attacks against Palestinians, resulting in 63 injuries and damage to Palestinian property.

Since the beginning of October until 6 November, Israel carried out 22 Gaza ceasefire violations, targeting fishing boats, agriculture and communities. On 26 October, Israeli gunboats opened fire on, and pursued, Palestinian fishing boats off al-Sudaniya, hijacking one vessel and taking prisoner five crew members. On 31 October, the Israeli Navy opened fire on Palestinian fishing vessels off Gaza City, and hijacked two of them as well as taking four people prisoner. Occasional Resistance to the Israeli blockade is only to be expected and, on the evening of 4 November three missiles were fired in two failed Palestinian attacks. All three missiles fell inside the Gaza Strip. Nevertheless, by 3:30am, five Israeli air raids had launched a total of 12 missiles into the al-Maghazi UN refugee camp in Central Gaza.

The UN Representative for France noted that Israel’s land-grabbing settlement policy manifested contempt for international law and human rights. Alien settlement evicts Palestinians from their homes, even forcing them to demolish their own houses. Settlers have complete freedom of movement, while Palestinians are subjected to severe restrictions of movement. Norway’s UN delegate drew particular attention to the increasing number of Palestinian children abducted by Israeli forces and subjected to physical violence as well as incarceration.

There were reminders at the UN Security Council meeting over the need to support the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees (UNRWA) as well as, in line with Security Council Resolution 1860, the total lifting of Israel’s Gaza blockade. Great Power world leaders and the mainstream news media continue to remain silent concerning Israel‘s brazen violations of all United Nations and Security Council resolutions regarding abuses of Palestinian human rights. Noting the sharp increase in settler violence with Israeli Army complicity, especially now against olive harvesters, Caít Moran (Ireland) reminded the Conference that Palestinians, living and farming in the Occupied West Bank, have the right to go about their daily lives without fear of violence or intimidation.

The Daily Toll

For around 20 years now, subscribers have been receiving my news reports based upon daily sitreps produced by the Palestine Liberation Organisation (PLO). While the sitreps can never be up-to-date and are often released by the PLO in groups, rather than singly, they do provide a daily record of the relentless persecution suffered by Palestinians under Zionist Occupation and blockade. This year, producing the daily newsletters has become even more time-consuming because of the growing frequency of Israel’s injustices and atrocities. For example, at the beginning of the last quarter of 2022, the headlines on the first day of October were:

Israeli Army attack: 1 youngster killed – another wounded

Israeli troops severely beat up ambulance driver

Israeli Navy opens fire on Palestinian fishing boats

Israeli Army positions open fire on Gaza farmland

Israeli Army position opens fire on Gaza community

2 Israeli Army acts of armed robbery

Israeli settlers severely beat up farmer

Night peace disruption and/or home invasions

in 7 towns and villages

10 attacks – 5 Israeli Gaza ceasefire violations

27 raids, including home invasions

2 beaten – 1 wounded – 2 injured – 6 taken prisoner

6 acts of agricultural/economic sabotage

Some report details:

Israeli Army attack – 1 killed: Jerusalem – 16:00, Israeli Occupation forces shot and killed a motorcyclist travelling behind a military vehicle in al-Eizariya.

Israeli Army attack – 1 youngster killed – another wounded: Jerusalem – 18:30, Israeli forces, firing live ammunition, rubber-coated bullets, stun grenades and tear gas canisters, raided and patrolled al-Eizariya, killing 18-year-old Mohammed Khaled Damdoum, as well as wounding a 17-year-old youth: Abdul Aziz Mohammed Erekat.

Israeli Army attack: Ramallah – 06:35, the Israeli Army opened fire on a motor vehicle, near the Rantis checkpoint.

Israeli Army assault on ambulance driver: Ramallah – 22:15, Israeli checkpoint troops severely beat up an ambulance driver, Firas Ayoub Samara, at the entrance to Beit Ur al-Tahta.

Israeli Army armed robbery: Tulkarem – 13:10, the Israeli Army seized a bulldozer, being used for work in Quffin.

Israeli Army armed robbery and assault with stun grenades and tear gas canisters: Nablus – 15:30, Israeli soldiers, firing stun grenades and tear gas canisters at the Masoudia checkpoint, near Burqa village, robbed a National Security Force Officer, Iyad Salah, of his uniform.

Occupation settler agricultural sabotage: Nablus – 23:15, Israelis, from the Yitzhar Occupation settlement, laid waste to crops on Burin village land.

Occupation settler beating and agricultural sabotage: Salfit – 13:20, a gang of Israeli settlers severely beat up a 62-year-old farmer, Rabah Ayoub Ali Ahmed, while he was working on his land near Kafr al-Dik.

Silence is complicity

It is shameful that the mainstream news media almost never report the daily crimes committed by Israeli Occupation forces. Our politicians also keep quiet and the Zionist regime has reason to believe that it can forever rely on the impunity it has been afforded. This year, a formal complaint was filed with the International Criminal Court (ICC), regarding Israel‘s “systematic targeting” of Palestinian journalists and labelling its failure to investigate their deaths as war crimes. Israel also kills unarmed Palestinian residents and regularly opens live-fire on protesters. Armed Palestinian Resistance fighters are killed even after having been wounded and disarmed.

Yet occasionally, the truth will out more widely. The family of Shireen Abu Akleh, the Palestinian-American Reporter killed by raiding Israeli forces in Jenin last May, have welcomed a US decision to look into her death. Investigations by The Washington Post and The New York Times, as well as the United Nations, have concluded that Israeli forces killed her. Nevertheless, Israel, whose military Occupation and population-control of Palestinians is so heavily financed by the USA, remains obdurate. Instead of accepting responsibility and apologising to the family, the Israeli Defence Minister, Benny Gantz, has declared that Israel “will not co-operate” with any US investigation, describing the enquiry as “interference in Israel’s internal affairs.” On 11 November, the United Nations’ Decolonisation Committee adopted a draft Palestinian resolution, requesting an advisory opinion from the International Court of Justice (ICJ) on Israel’s 55 years of colonising military Occupation.

Since 2002, UNESCO has documented 21 both professional and other journalists, who have died in Occupied Palestine and Israel. The Committee to Protect Journalists has also listed 25 reporters killed while reporting the Occupation since 1992. Keeping silent about racist war crimes assists and encourages Israel while shamefully disrespecting and betraying the news reporters who lost their lives in attempting to reveal them. The journalists, who are still risking their lives to report the truth from Palestine, deserve to be listened to. We have a right to be informed.