Sep 19
The arrests of senior Balad party officials appears to mark a new escalation in Israeli authorities’ efforts to eliminate or stifle Palestinian activism inside the Green Line.
On Sunday morning, more than 20 individuals connected to the party, including chair Awad Abdel-Fattah and other senior members, were arrested by the Israeli police, who conducted raids of party properties, seizing documents and computers. Read more
In recent years, Israel’s military court system has been the subject of well-deserved – and long over-due – scrutiny, thanks to its almost 100 percent conviction rate of Palestinians in the West Bank. The military courts are a key part of an apartheid regime that sees Israeli settlers tried in civilian courts, while Palestinians – including hundreds of children per year – are subjected to military show-trials.
But what about Israel’s civilian courts? Comparatively little attention has been paid by human rights groups to the plight of Palestinians tried for ‘security offenses’ in Israeli courts, which includes Palestinians with Israeli citizenship, and, since the 2005 ‘disengagement’, Gaza residents. Read more
On Wednesday, Palestinian youths from a village in the northern West Bank attacked Israeli Border Police officers outside Damascus Gate, in Occupied East Jerusalem, killing one and wounding another. The three assailants were killed on the spot.
With nearly daily bloodshed, most news agencies have been using ‘copy and paste’-style paragraphs to provide context for readers. Here are three such summaries, taken from reports of Wednesday’s attack by Reuters, The Associated Press, and AFP. Read more
