GAZA CITY: Thousands of Palestinian women demonstrated Tuesday along the fence that separates the Gaza Strip from Israel, their first mass mobilization since protests erupted on the border three months ago.
Since the end of March, Gazans have been demonstrating along the heavily guarded frontier in protest at Israel’s decade-long blockade of the territory and in support of the Palestinians’ right to return to lands they fled or were driven from during the war surrounding the creation of Israel in 1948.
On Tuesday, women arrived in buses from across the enclave, many accompanied by their children, AFP correspondents said.
They moved in groups to within 50 meters (yards) of the fence that divides the Gaza Strip from Israeli territory, they reported.
Seventeen people were wounded by Israeli gunfire, Gaza’s health ministry spokesman Ashraf Al-Qodra told AFP.
“I came to finish the march that my daughter had started,” Rim Abu Irmana said, waving a picture of her 15-year-old daughter, Wasal, who was killed by Israeli gunfire on May 14.
“These demonstrations are peaceful. We are only defending our land and our rights,” added the 43-year-old, holding the hand of her young son.
Since the protests and clashes broke out along the Gaza border on March 30, at least 138 Palestinians have been killed by Israeli fire.
The majority were involved in protests and clashes but others were seeking to breach or damage the border fence.
No Israelis have been killed.
The demonstrations peaked when at least 62 Palestinians were killed as thousands approached the border fence in protest at the US decision to move its embassy to Israel from Tel Aviv to the disputed city of Jerusalem on May 14.
Israel insists the whole of Jerusalem is its “eternal indivisible capital” but the Palestinians claim the eastern sector, which Israel occupied in the Six-Day War of 1967 and later annexed, as the capital of their future state.
Thousands of Palestinian women rally on Gaza-Israel border
Thousands of Palestinian women rally on Gaza-Israel border
Katz orders West Bank raid after deadly attack in Israel
- Friday’s stabbing and car-ramming attack in northern Israel triggered the minister’s action
JERUSALEM: Israel’s Defense Minister Israel Katz on Friday ordered the military to launch an operation in the village of Qabatiya in the occupied West Bank after it emerged that a Palestinian who killed two people came from there.
The minister instructed the Israeli forces to “act forcefully and immediately against the village of Qabatiya, from which the murderous terrorist emerged, in order to locate and thwart every terrorist and strike the village’s terror infrastructure,” Katz’s office said in a statement.
“Anyone who aids terrorism or sponsors and backs it will pay the full price,” it added.
BACKGROUND
Friday’s attack comes just days after Israeli soldiers shot dead a Palestinian teenager in the Qabatiya area.
The military said in a separate statement that it was preparing to begin an operation in Qabatiya in the northern West Bank, which has seen repeated violent incidents.
Friday’s stabbing and car-ramming attack in northern Israel triggered the minister’s action.
The assault came a day after an Israeli military reservist dressed in civilian clothes rammed his vehicle into a Palestinian man in the West Bank, where violence has surged since the war in Gaza began.
“Preliminary investigation indicates this was a rolling terror attack that began in the city of Beit Shean, where a pedestrian was run over,” Israeli police said in a statement about Friday’s attack, adding that the victim was a 68-year-old man.
“Later, a young woman was stabbed near Road 71, and the suspect was ultimately engaged with gunfire near Maonot Junction in Afula following intervention by a civilian bystander,” it said, adding that the attacker was taken to hospital.
Both victims succumbed to the injuries, Israel’s Magen David Adom emergency services said in a statement.
MDA also reported that a 16-year-old was slightly injured when “hit by a vehicle.
The Israeli military said the attacker had “infiltrated into Israeli territory several days ago.”
President Isaac Herzog condemned the attack.
Friday’s attack comes just days after Israeli soldiers shot dead a Palestinian teenager in the Qabatiya area.
The military has launched an investigation into the incident after footage emerged showing the teenager not posing any threat or throwing anything at soldiers who shot him.
The attack on Friday also came a day after an Israeli military reservist dressed in civilian clothes rammed his vehicle into a Palestinian man in the
West Bank.
In videos on social media purporting to show that incident, the victim is seen praying by the roadside when the soldier rams him with his vehicle.
