AT-TUWANI: Israeli soldiers and Border Police assault Palestinian shepherds and prevent them from working their lands
March 19th, 2008
CPTnet
19 March 2008
AT-TUWANI: Israeli soldiers and Border Police assault Palestinian shepherds and prevent them from working their lands
On 14 March 2008, while Palestinian shepherds grazed their sheep and tended their olive groves in the Khoruba valley, near the Palestinian village of At-Tuwani, Israeli police assaulted them and the internationals accompanying them, and threatened them with arrest. A Border Police officer twisted the wrist of one shepherd and pushed him to the ground. Police grabbed another by his collar and shoved around several other Palestinians. They also stomped on the feet of five internationals, called one of them a whore, twisted the wrists of two volunteers in an attempt to grab their video cameras. and pushed another international into a rock.
Palestinians were attempting to graze their sheep and repair olives trees damaged by Israeli settlers over the previous month.
When international volunteers approached the police and invited them to observe the damaged olive trees, an officer of the District Coordinating Office [a branch of the Israeli military that deals with civilian affairs in the Occupied Palestinian Territories] told them that the area was a closed military zone.
The next day, 15 March, Israeli police threatened to arrest Palestinian shepherds grazing their sheep on Palestinian land near the settlement outpost of Avigail. Israeli border police then declared again the area to be a “closed military zone.”
Police officers refused to give a reason for the order or define the boundaries of the closed area. Israeli border police and Israeli civilian police then threatened to arrest Palestinians, as well as the international volunteers and Israelis accompanying them.
According to rulings by the Israeli High Court, outlined in “The Right to Access Agricultural Lands,” from the Association for Civil rights in Israel (ACRI), Palestinians have the right to access their agricultural lands, and the Israeli military is obligated to defend their rights.
Use of a “closed military zone” order is legally restricted to very specific times and locations. It is illegitimate for the Israeli military to prohibit Palestinians from entering land within 500 meters of a settlement. Also, a “closed military zone” order may not be used under the pretext of protecting Palestinians from settler violence.
Palestinians living in At-Tuwani have said that the increased use of “closed military zone” orders will seriously interfere with their work as farmers. They also worry that these events may mark a return to past oppressive conditions, when the Israeli military declared much of the South Hebron Hills closed.
in:
CPTnet
19 March 2008
AT-TUWANI: Israeli soldiers and Border Police assault Palestinian shepherds and prevent them from working their lands
On 14 March 2008, while Palestinian shepherds grazed their sheep and tended their olive groves in the Khoruba valley, near the Palestinian village of At-Tuwani, Israeli police assaulted them and the internationals accompanying them, and threatened them with arrest. A Border Police officer twisted the wrist of one shepherd and pushed him to the ground. Police grabbed another by his collar and shoved around several other Palestinians. They also stomped on the feet of five internationals, called one of them a whore, twisted the wrists of two volunteers in an attempt to grab their video cameras. and pushed another international into a rock.
Palestinians were attempting to graze their sheep and repair olives trees damaged by Israeli settlers over the previous month.
When international volunteers approached the police and invited them to observe the damaged olive trees, an officer of the District Coordinating Office [a branch of the Israeli military that deals with civilian affairs in the Occupied Palestinian Territories] told them that the area was a closed military zone.
The next day, 15 March, Israeli police threatened to arrest Palestinian shepherds grazing their sheep on Palestinian land near the settlement outpost of Avigail. Israeli border police then declared again the area to be a “closed military zone.”
Police officers refused to give a reason for the order or define the boundaries of the closed area. Israeli border police and Israeli civilian police then threatened to arrest Palestinians, as well as the international volunteers and Israelis accompanying them.
According to rulings by the Israeli High Court, outlined in “The Right to Access Agricultural Lands,” from the Association for Civil rights in Israel (ACRI), Palestinians have the right to access their agricultural lands, and the Israeli military is obligated to defend their rights.
Use of a “closed military zone” order is legally restricted to very specific times and locations. It is illegitimate for the Israeli military to prohibit Palestinians from entering land within 500 meters of a settlement. Also, a “closed military zone” order may not be used under the pretext of protecting Palestinians from settler violence.
Palestinians living in At-Tuwani have said that the increased use of “closed military zone” orders will seriously interfere with their work as farmers. They also worry that these events may mark a return to past oppressive conditions, when the Israeli military declared much of the South Hebron Hills closed.
