HEBRON, West Bank: Following Israel’s expulsion of an international observer force from the volatile West Bank city of Hebron, Palestinian activists are trying to fill the void by launching their own patrols to document alleged Israeli settler violence.
Armed with video cameras and donning blue vests, the activists say they will replace the Temporary International Presence in Hebron. The group has enlisted 18 volunteers and began its work this week.
“By expelling the international monitors, the Israeli government wanted to hide the Israeli settlers’ and soldiers’ violations, but we will not let them get away with that,” Issa Amro, an activist leader, told The Associated Press. “We will document any attack by photos and words, and we will circulate it all over the world.”
Hebron, the West Bank’s largest city, is a frequent flashpoint between settlers and Palestinians. Over 200,000 Palestinians live in the city, along with several hundred ultranationalist Israeli settlers who live in the down town area in heavily fortified enclaves protected by the military.
Palestinians frequently must pass through Israeli checkpoints in the area of the settler enclaves, restrictions that have hit the once-thriving city center and forced many businesses to close.
Adding to this combustible mix, Hebron is home to a holy site revered by Jews and Muslims as the burial site of religious patriarchs. Jews revere the site as the Tomb of the Patriarchs, while Muslims call it the Ibrahimi Mosque, after the patriarch Abraham.
The site has been divided into Jewish and Muslim prayer areas since shortly after a settler opened fire on Muslim worshippers at the shrine in 1994, killing 29 people and wounding over 100 others.
The international mission, known as TIPH, was initially established after the mosque shooting, and began operating in its latest form after a 1997 agreement between Israel and the Palestinians.
Until recently, the mission stationed unarmed civilian observers from Norway, Italy, Sweden, Switzerland and Turkey to report on alleged violations of international humanitarian and human rights laws in the divided city.
But last month, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu announced that the mission would be halted, saying Israel “will not allow the continuation of an international force that acts against us.”
The development, seen as a gesture to his hard-line base as Netanyahu seeks re-election, drew declarations of concern from the United Nations, European Union, and contributing countries.
In a joint statement, TIPH member countries said the suspension “undermines one of the few established mechanisms for conflict resolution between Israelis and Palestinians.” The EU said it “risks further deteriorating the already fragile situation on the ground.”
The mission has long had a strained relationship with the settlers.
TIPH had drawn negative press in Israel in recent years after one of its observers was deported by Israel after slapping an Israeli child and another was filmed puncturing the tires of a settler’s vehicle. In December, Israeli newspaper Haaretz reported that TIPH had produced an internal report criticizing “several and regular” Israeli violations of international law.
Amro, the activist leader, is well-known in Hebron. Saying he promotes non-violent opposition to discriminatory Israeli policies, he has run afoul of both Israeli and Palestinian authorities.
He is on trial before an Israeli military on accusations of inciting violence. In 2017, he was arrested by Palestinian authorities for a Facebook post critical of Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas.
Amro and other volunteer activists began their work on Sunday as a “human rights monitoring and protection team” by escorting Palestinian students to school in Hebron’s Israeli-controlled downtown area.
Tensions started right away, Amro said.
An AP cameraman filmed a settler cursing the activists in front of the Israeli soldiers as “dogs and sons of dogs.” An activist cursed the settler back.
Amro said he was “slapped and punched by the settlers” and vowed to file a complaint with Israeli police.
Yishai Fleisher, a settler spokesman, said the Hebron Jewish community is “fully against violence and vigilantism” and doesn’t condone its members’ altercation with Amro and the other volunteers. At the same time, he accused Amro of being an “instigator,” and the main source of tension between Jews and Arabs in Hebron.
“This is the ultimate fake observer, fake peace monitor,” Fleischer said. “He’s interested in demolishing any sense of normality that has been built up between Jews and Arabs in Hebron.”
Hundreds of Palestinian students study in schools in Hebron’s Old City. Altercations between Palestinians and Israelis are not uncommon, but Fleisher insisted that day-to-day affairs between the two communities function normally.
The students’ families expressed relief at having the volunteers in the street.
“These groups are very good; we need them after the departure of the TIPH and the foreign researchers,” said Sameh Al-Muhtasib, a father.
In response to the arrival of the activists, the Israeli military declared the area of the Old City a military closed zone on Tuesday and banned the activists from remaining there.
Izzat Karaki, another activist, vowed to continue the work. “We will stay here and support our students and people,” he said.
In Hebron, Palestinians patrol in place of foreign monitors
In Hebron, Palestinians patrol in place of foreign monitors
- Hebron, the West Bank’s largest city, is a frequent flashpoint between settlers and Palestinians
- Over 200,000 Palestinians live in the city, along with several hundred ultranationalist Israeli settlers who live in the down town area
Gaza’s living conditions worsen as strong winds and hypothermia kill 5
- Hundreds of tents and makeshift shelters were blown away or heavily damaged, the UN humanitarian office reported
DEIR AL-BALAH, Gaza Strip: Strong winter winds collapsed walls onto flimsy tents for Palestinians displaced by war in Gaza, killing at least four people, hospital authorities said Tuesday.
Dangerous living conditions persist in Gaza after more than two years of devastating Israeli bombardment and aid shortfalls. A ceasefire has been in effect since Oct. 10. But aid groups say that Palestinians broadly lack the shelter necessary to withstand frequent winter storms.
The dead include two women, a girl and a man, according to Shifa Hospital, Gaza City’s largest, which received the bodies.
The Gaza Health Ministry said Tuesday a 1-year-old boy died of hypothermia overnight, while the spokesman for the UN’s children agency said over 100 children and teenagers have been killed by “military means” since the ceasefire began.
Meanwhile, Israel’s military said it exchanged fire Tuesday with six people spotted near its troops deployed in southern Gaza, killing at least two of them in western Rafah.
Family mourns relatives killed by wall collapse
Three members of the same family — 72-year-old Mohamed Hamouda, his 15-year-old granddaughter and his daughter-in-law — were killed when an 8-meter (26-foot) high wall collapsed onto their tent in a coastal area along the Mediterranean shore of Gaza City, Shifa Hospital said. At least five others were injured.
Their relatives on Tuesday began removing the rubble that had buried their loved ones and rebuilding the tent shelters for survivors.
“The world has allowed us to witness death in all its forms,” Bassel Hamouda said after the funeral. “It’s true the bombing may have temporarily stopped, but we have witnessed every conceivable cause of death in the world in the Gaza Strip.”
A second woman was killed when a wall fell on her tent in the western part of the city, Shifa Hospital said.
Hundreds of tents and makeshift shelters were blown away or heavily damaged, the UN humanitarian office reported.
The UN and its humanitarian partners were distributing tents, tarps, blankets and clothes as well as nutrition and hygiene items across Gaza, said the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs.
The majority of Palestinians live in makeshift tents since their homes were reduced to rubble during the war. When storms strike the territory, Palestinian rescue workers warn people against seeking shelter inside damaged buildings for fears of collapse. Aid groups say not enough shelter materials are entering Gaza during the truce.
In the central town of Zawaida, Associated Press footage showed inundated tents Tuesday morning, with people trying to rebuild their shelters.
Yasmin Shalha, a displaced woman from the northern town of Beit Lahiya, stood against winds that lifted the tarps of tents around her as she stitched hers back together with needle and thread. She said it had fallen on top of her family the night before, as they slept.
“The winds were very, very strong. The tent collapsed over us,” the mother of five told AP. “As you can see, our situation is dire.”
On the shore in southern Gaza, tents were swept into the Mediterranean. Families pulled what was left from the sea, while some built sand barriers to hold back rising water.
“The sea took our mattresses, our tents, our food and everything we owned,” Shaban Abu Ishaq said, as he dragged part of his tent out of the sea in the Muwasi area of Khan Younis.
Mohamed Al-Sawalha, a 72-year-old man from the northern refugee camp of Jabaliya, said the conditions most Palestinians in Gaza endure are barely livable.
“It doesn’t work neither in summer nor in winter,” he said of the tent. “We left behind houses and buildings (with) doors that could be opened and closed. Now we live in a tent. Even sheep don’t live like we do.”
Residents aren’t able to return to their homes in Israeli-controlled areas of the Gaza Strip.
Child death toll in Gaza rises
Gaza’s Health Ministry said the 1-year-old in the central town of Deir Al-Balah was the seventh fatality due to the cold conditions since winter started. Others included a baby just seven days old and a 4-year-old girl, whose deaths were announced Monday.
The ministry, part of the Hamas-run government, says more than 440 people were killed by Israeli fire and their bodies brought to hospitals since the ceasefire went into effect. The ministry maintains detailed casualty records that are seen as generally reliable by UN agencies and independent experts.
UNICEF spokesman James Elder said Tuesday at least 100 children under the age of 18 — 60 boys and 40 girls — have been killed since the truce began due to military operations, including drone strikes, airstrikes, tank shelling and use of live ammunition. Those figures, he said, reflect incidents where enough details have been compiled to warrant recording, but the total toll is expected to be higher. He said hundreds of children have been wounded.
While “bombings and shootings have slowed” during the ceasefire, they have not stopped, Elder told reporters at a UN briefing in Geneva by video from Gaza City. “So what the world now calls calm would be considered a crisis anywhere else,” he said.
Gaza’s population of more than 2 million people has been struggling to keep the cold weather and storms at bay while facing shortages of humanitarian aid and a lack of more substantial temporary housing, which is badly needed during the winter months. It’s the third winter since the war between Israel and Hamas started on Oct. 7, 2023, when militants stormed into southern Israel and killed around 1,200 people and abducted 251 others into Gaza.
Gaza’s Health Ministry says more than 71,400 Palestinians have been killed in Israel’s retaliatory offensive.
