Dear friends,
yesterday a group of approximately 50 Palestinians participated in a "car protest" in the Occupied West Bank. The protest sort to challenge Israeli Apartheid and Occupation, highlighting the fact that Palestinians can not drive an certain roads which have been designated by the Israeli Occupation Roads as roads which can only be used by Israelis, in particular Israeli settlers. Four Palestinian activists were arrested during the non-violent protest and another one after the protest, simply for wanting to drive their cars.
I have included below two videos from the protest, as well as the commentary from Haithem Khatib from Bil'in village which was attached to his video of the protest. In addition, I have included the +972 report on the protest.
In solidarity, Kim
***
Report by Haithem Khatib: "Israeli Occupation forces arrested Khaled Atallah Al-Tamimi (Nabi Saleh), Azmi Shyoukhi (Hebron), the young Omar Saleh Al-Tamimi (Nabi Saleh) and a Palestinian girl by the name of Anwar. Further the Israeli intelligence services demanded confiscated the id and car of Mahmoud Zwahre. When he managed to evade arrest, Israeli army called him telling him he would be put on wanted list if he does not turn himself in for arrest within 30mins. Mahmoud is now also arrested, 10mins ago, he was at the DCO in Jericho, to be taken to Ma'ale Adumim. In addition, the IOF apparently held the identity card of Naim Marar intending to force him to turn himself in to the occupation authorities. In addition, since last night, ITF imposed a tight security cordon on the village of Nabi Saleh... Many people joined to show their rights to pass the road freely at Jericho checkpoint today, israeli soldiers were not accept to go trough the road"
yesterday a group of approximately 50 Palestinians participated in a "car protest" in the Occupied West Bank. The protest sort to challenge Israeli Apartheid and Occupation, highlighting the fact that Palestinians can not drive an certain roads which have been designated by the Israeli Occupation Roads as roads which can only be used by Israelis, in particular Israeli settlers. Four Palestinian activists were arrested during the non-violent protest and another one after the protest, simply for wanting to drive their cars.
I have included below two videos from the protest, as well as the commentary from Haithem Khatib from Bil'in village which was attached to his video of the protest. In addition, I have included the +972 report on the protest.
In solidarity, Kim
***
Video by Fadi Arouri
Video by Haithem Khatib
Report by Haithem Khatib: "Israeli Occupation forces arrested Khaled Atallah Al-Tamimi (Nabi Saleh), Azmi Shyoukhi (Hebron), the young Omar Saleh Al-Tamimi (Nabi Saleh) and a Palestinian girl by the name of Anwar. Further the Israeli intelligence services demanded confiscated the id and car of Mahmoud Zwahre. When he managed to evade arrest, Israeli army called him telling him he would be put on wanted list if he does not turn himself in for arrest within 30mins. Mahmoud is now also arrested, 10mins ago, he was at the DCO in Jericho, to be taken to Ma'ale Adumim. In addition, the IOF apparently held the identity card of Naim Marar intending to force him to turn himself in to the occupation authorities. In addition, since last night, ITF imposed a tight security cordon on the village of Nabi Saleh... Many people joined to show their rights to pass the road freely at Jericho checkpoint today, israeli soldiers were not accept to go trough the road"
***
Palestinians attempted to set out in a motorcade of about 50 cars from Jericho en route to Ramallah this morning, to protest and challenge the system of Israeli-only roads throughout the West Bank, according to Twitter updates over the last few hours with the hashtag #carprotest.
According to an Israeli Ta’ayush activist I spoke to who was there and who prefers not to be named, dozens of cars manned by Palestinians from the West Bank tried to leave Jericho this morning in a non-violent protest action, but were stopped by Israeli forces, who blocked the four lanes entering and exiting the Palestinian city.
There are hundreds of checkpoints in the West Bank that are used to control and restrict Palestinian freedom of movement. According to a report from the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs in the occupied Palestinian territories, there were 522 roadblocks and checkpoints in 2011 throughout the West Bank, and four out of the five roads that lead into the Jordan Valley are not accessible to Palestinian vehicles. Some more facts from the report indicate that in 2011:
So far, according to unconfirmed Twitter reports from about 2:30 P.M. local time, at least three men and one woman were arrested for driving on the road, among them, Khaled and Omar Tamimi from Nabi Saleh. The motorcade has been stopped by Israeli forces in Jericho but there are indications on Twitter that the protestors are trying to regroup and try different tactics and locations.
Similar direct action protests took place in November when Palestinians reenacted the
US civil rights “Freedom Rides” by getting on a bus serving only Jewish settlers in the West Bank on its way to East Jerusalem
Palestinian car protest stopped in Jericho (Photo: Israeli Ta'ayush activist)
Border Police used excessive force on several protestors, and at least two Palestinians were arrested, one man and one woman and we heard of more being detained later on. After about an hour and a half, the forces began allowing cars to pass through at a very slow pace, and about two kilometers further on, another “flying” checkpoint was created that was stopping and inspecting the vehicles
There are hundreds of checkpoints in the West Bank that are used to control and restrict Palestinian freedom of movement. According to a report from the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs in the occupied Palestinian territories, there were 522 roadblocks and checkpoints in 2011 throughout the West Bank, and four out of the five roads that lead into the Jordan Valley are not accessible to Palestinian vehicles. Some more facts from the report indicate that in 2011:
An additional 495 ad-hoc ‘flying’ checkpoints obstructed movement around the West Bank each month (on average), compared to 351 in the past two years. 200,000 people from 70 villages are forced to use detours between two to five times longer than the direct route to their closest city due to movement restrictions; One or more of the main entrances are blocked to Palestinian traffic in ten out of eleven major West Bank cities.
Similar direct action protests took place in November when Palestinians reenacted the
A woman being taken by soldiers from the protest scene (photo: Fadi Arouri)
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