ISRAELI forces shot dead a Palestinian man on Sunday after he allegedly stabbed and injured an Israeli police officer near Damascus Gate in occupied East Jerusalem, an Israeli police spokesperson said.
Micky Rosenfeld said the alleged attacker was a 38-year-old Palestinian from Nablus district in the northern occupied West Bank. Local sources named him as Baseem Abdul-Rahman Mustafa Salah. The Israeli police officer who was injured during the attack is reportedly in light to moderate condition, a Magen David Adom medical service spokesperson said.
Witnesses near the scene said that Israeli police shot the Palestinian man at least 11 times during the incident, adding that Israeli forces did not allow medics to reach him. At least 100 Palestinians have been killed since the start of last month. Many were killed during alleged attacks on Israeli military and civilians, although Palestinians and rights groups have disputed that a number of these cases actually were attacks.
The attacks that have taken placed have killed 19 Israelis in the same time period. Meanwhile, Israeli forces issued an order for the closure of a Hebron radio station on Sunday morning, the third news outlet to be shut by Israel this month in the occupied West Bank city. Director of of Dream Radio station, Talab Al-Jaabri, said that Israeli forces stormed the station, destroying equipment and damaging offices.
Al-Jaabri said Israeli forces told him the radio station would be closed for six months due to alleged ‘incitement against Israel’. Following the closure, Al-Jaabri called on the Palestinian Authority to take action against ‘the violations’. Last week Israeli forces shut down Al-Khalil Radio (Hebron Radio) on the same grounds of incitement.
The Palestinian government, at the time, denounced the Israeli military raid on the station, describing it as ‘violation of international law’. Secretary-general of the Palestinian cabinet, Ali Abu Diak, had said in a statement that the attack was part of Israel’s policy to ‘oppress the voice of Palestinian rights’ and to prevent publication of the truth about ‘the ongoing ugly crimes Israel is committing against the Palestinian people’.
The closures of the two stations marks the latest violation of press freedoms in the occupied Palestinian Territory. Earlier this month, Israeli forces ordered the closure and ban on broadcasting from Manbar al-Hurriyya (Freedom Tribune) radio station, also located in Hebron and reportedly affiliated with Fatah. The Israeli army accused the radio station of encouraging ‘stabbing attacks’ and ‘violent riots’, and reporting ‘false and malicious claims of security forces executing and kidnapping Palestinians in order to provoke violence’.
The incident came a day after a Palestinian press freedoms watchdog condemned more than 450 violations of media freedoms since the beginning of the year. The watchdog, MADA, has repeatedly reported violations against the press – both international and Palestinian – while reporting from the occupied Palestinian territories.
Such violations are carried out by both Israeli and Palestinian security forces, according to MADA documentation. MADA said that while press violations had not reached last year’s proportions, when 17 Palestinian journalists were killed by Israeli forces in Gaza, violations in 2015 had ‘witnessed an enormous escalation’.
Palestinian anger at attacks by Zionist settlers saw a female settler stabbed and injured during an attack in Jerusalem on Sunday. Israeli police spokesperson Micky Rosenfeld said the woman was evacuated to the hospital for treatment, while the attacker initially fled and was later detained.
A spokesperson for Israeli medical service Magen David Adom said the stab victim was in her 30s and in mild condition.
Hebrew media reported that the victim was an Israeli settler, adding that the attacker fled into a nearby building. Footage of the scene was uploaded on social media soon after the attack. Meanwhile Palestinian prisoners in Israel’s Ramon jail refused to comply with orders from prison guards on Sunday to protest against ‘Israeli violations’, the head of the Palestinian Authority Committee for Prisoners’ Affairs said.
Issa Qaraqe said that prisoners in Ramon were refusing to participate in cell checks and have vowed not to obey employees of the Israeli Prison Service, following the imposition of curfews in jail wards and an increase in cell raids. The prisoners’ committee added that prisoners said they would escalate their resistance if the ‘violations’ did not cease.
Qaraqe stressed that Ramon prison’s service is fully responsible for the well-being of prisoners, and that violations against them showed that the Israeli authority is in a state of disarray. He called on Israel to stop the most recent ‘violations’ in Ramon, which he bluntly referred to as ‘stupid’, adding that applying extra pressure on prisoners would not break their will, but would reflect badly on Israel.
In August, prisoners at Ramon prison and nearby Nafha prison declared a ‘campaign of disobedience’ in response to sanctions imposed on hunger strikers, as well as other restrictions. Ramon prison is located in southern Israel and is one of several Israeli jails where more than 6,700 Palestinians are currently being held.
• Israeli forces detained at least 15 Palestinians from the occupied West Bank overnight Saturday, most of which were from Hebron, and raided several houses, an Israeli army spokesperson and locals said. An Israeli army spokesperson said nine of those detained in the occupied West Bank were from the southern district of Hebron, three of which were detained for allegedly being ‘Hamas operatives’.
The spokesperson did not provide details on the other six who were detained. In the Hebron village of Beit Ummar, Israeli forces detained Muhammad, 19, and Muhannad Awad, 17, both of whom are the sons of Palestinian prisoner Murshid Muhammad Awad, a spokesperson of a popular committee in Beit Ummar, Muhammad Ayyad Awad, said.
The spokesperson added that during the raid, Israeli forces closed the main entrance to Beit Ummar and ransacked the homes of Ahmad Hammad Abu Maria, Sameer Sadeq Abu Maria, Sami Hassan Manousr Sabarna, Yousif Abdul-Hamid Abu Maria, Ahmad Mahmoud Musa and former Palestinian prisoner Turkey Muhammad Mahmoud Alami, 37.
Israeli forces also raided the family home of Omar Arafat Issa al-Zaaqiq, a Palestinian who was shot dead on Friday after attacking several Israeli soldiers with his car. The forces measured al-Zaaqiq’s home in preparation for demolition, locals said. Others detained from Hebron have been identified as Muhammad Azmi al-Sweeti from the village of Dura, Muath Manaa Masalmah from Beit Awwa village, and two brothers, Ayman and Muhammad Waleed Masharqa, from Der Samet village.
During the first 12 days of November, Israeli forces detained 416 Palestinians, including 122 minors, the PPS reported earlier this month. In October alone, just short of 1,000 Palestinians, including 147 children, had been detained by Israeli forces, according to Addameer. Before the crackdown, there was a weekly average of 78 Israeli army ‘search and arrest operations’ carried out across the occupied West Bank in 2015, according to United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs, however there has recently been a sharp increase in such operations.
