CPTnet
12 August 2008
HEBRON: Violence Increases in Wadi Nasara

Settler attacks in Wadi Nasara, a neighborhood bordered by Kiryat Arba and a "settlers only" road, have increased recently, with at least six attacks reported in the first ten days of August.

Reported attacks include the following:

1 August

A group of about twenty settlers attacked a wedding party at the Jaabari family home. They injured five Palestinians with stones or beatings. Three people, including a pregnant woman, went to the hospital for treatment of their injuries.

2 August

A group of twenty-five to thirty settlers entered the Jaabari land and attacked Palestinians passing in the street. Again five Palestinians went to the hospital with injuries.

4 August

Settlers threw stones at two families' homes in Wadi Nasara.

5 August

Settlers threw stones at a seventy-nine-year-old man as he picked almonds on his land and then beat him. Two CPTers visited him four days later and saw that his arm was covered in bruises.

6 August

Settlers threw stones at a home next to the Kiryat Arba settlement.

8 Augusta

Settlers stoned the home of the Jaabari family and stole four of the family's sheep.

"The problem is the soldiers," said Issa Amro, a Palestinian human rights worker with the Israeli organization B'Tselem. "They are backing the settlers up in a horrible way."

Soldiers detained Amro on 1 August when he tried to film the attack on the wedding party. He said soldiers in the area consistently allow attacks to continue.

Contributing to the recent escalation were two tents that settler youth erected on Palestinian land in Wadi Nasara, which soldiers removed on 9 August. According to Palestinians living nearby, the youth--including some from outside Hebron-had slept in the tents for more than three weeks. They attacked Palestinians living in Wadi Nasara as well as pedestrians passing by the tents.

On 8 August, settler boys told a group of CPTers and Palestinians that the road running next to the tents, which both settlers and Palestinians use, is now for "Jews only." They shouted threats when the group continued to pass.

CPT and other human rights workers have been visiting Wadi Nasara regularly since February because of the attacks against Palestinians living there.