Day: 4 June 2021

Minister of Health Mai Alkaila said today that 311 new cases of COVID-19, two deaths and 110 recoveries were registered in Palestine during the past 24 hours.

In her daily report on the coronavirus pandemic, Alkaila said one death from COVID-19 was reported in the Gaza Strip, while another death was reported in the West Bank.

In the Gaza Strip, 273 coronavirus tests came out positive, while the West Bank had 38 new cases. No new cases were registered in occupied Jerusalem.

The health minister said 20 patients of COVID-19 are under intensive care, of whom five three on ventilators. In addition, 47 patients are receiving treatment at hospitals and COVID-19 dispensaries.

Alkaila pointed out that the recovery rate in Palestine has so far reached 97.5 percent, while active cases declined to 1.4 percent.

Deaths stood at 1.1 percent of total infections.

Concerning rollout of vaccines, the health minister said over 372,800 people have received their first jab of the vaccine in the West Bank and the Gaza Strip, of whom 234,300 received both doses.

Source: Palestinian News & Info Agency

Weather today is partly cloudy to clear and relatively hot in daytime, with steady temperature, which remains 3°C below the seasonal average, according to the Palestinian Meteorological Department (PMD).

Weather tonight is relatively cold in the mountains and moderate in other districts. Light to moderate westerly to northwesterly wind blows in daytime, and becomes moderate to occasionally active in the night. Sea waves are low to medium.

Temperature in the capital, Jerusalem, and Bethlehem is expected to reach a high of 24°C and a low of 14°C and in Ramallah and Hebron a high of 23°C and a low of 13°C. In Jericho, the Dead Sea, and the Jordan Valley temperature is expected to reach a high of 34°C and a low of 21°C, while it is expected to reach a high of 27°C and a low of 18°C in Gaza and the coastal areas.

No significant change is expected in the weather conditions on Saturday.

Clear to partly cloudy and relatively hot conditions are set to prevail in daytime on Sunday. Moderate to slightly cold conditions are set to prevail in the morning and night hours, particularly in the mountains.

Monday’s temperature is set to slightly rise, paving the way to mainly clear and relatively hot conditions in daytime and moderate to slightly cold conditions in the morning and night hours, particularly in the mountains.

Source: Palestinian News & Info Agency

An Israeli settlers Thursday night rammed her vehicle into a Palestinian near Bab al-Maghariba Gate in the occupied city of East Jerusalem, according to witnesses.

They said that the female settler sped up and rammed her car into a Palestinian near Bab al-Maghariba, also known as the Dung Gate, before fleeing the scene.

The casualty sustained wounds and bruises across his body. He was rushed to a hospital for urgent treatment.

Attacks involving Israeli settlers ramming their cars into Palestinians are a relatively regular occurrence in the occupied West Bank, and are rarely prosecuted by Israeli authorities.

Israeli police usually treat such attacks as accidents, even in cases when witnesses claim the ramming attacks were deliberate.

Source: Palestinian News & Info Agency

The public library in the Palestinian city of Beitunia earlier this week launched a section for books from Brazil following a donation of approximately 200 books by the Representative Office of Brazil in Ramallah.

The handover, according to the Brazil-Arab News Agency, is part of a project to bring the Brazilian Portuguese language and culture closer to the Brazilian Palestinian community that lives in the country. Other two cities, Al Bireh and Mazra’a Al Sharqia, which have Brazilian communities, will soon receive books.

Brazilian ambassador, Alessandro Candeas, said that part of the books donated to Beitunia are textbooks of Brazilian Portuguese, history, geography, Brazilian literature and culture, and come from surpluses of Brazil’s National Education Development Fund (FNDE) at the Ministry of Education. Others come from Brazilian institutions and range from comic books to children’s books, Brazilian literature, cookbooks, and magazines.

Candeas added the books are for every kind of reader, but most of them are focused on children. On Monday, May 31, the ambassador together with Beitunia mayor, Ribhi Doleh, participated in the opening of the space where the books will be stored. “It’s a little corner of Brazil in the Public Library of Betunia,” he said. The city is home to 500 Brazilian Palestinians.

Behind the donations, there is an ambitious project to bring back a connection with Brazil for Brazilians living in Palestine. Many Palestinians migrated to Brazil in difficult periods in the region’s history and some of them together with their descendants went back to the Arab country, thus creating an important local community. Most children of these people lost their connection with the Brazilian culture.

Candeas pointed there has been two waves of immigration from Palestine to Brazil. One of them consisted of Christians during the Ottoman Empire. Most got established in cities in the Northeast such as Recife, Natal, and Fortaleza. The 50’s and 60’s saw a second wave of immigration of Palestinians to Brazil due to the ‘conflict’ with Israel. These immigrants, mostly Muslims, moved to the South of Brazil, and some went to the Center-West.

He elaborated that the returnees from this second wave and their descendants compose almost the entirety of Brazilians who currently lives in Palestine. “They are Brazilians or children of Palestinian parents that were born in Brazil, who came back, continued to maintain relations with Brazil, speak Portuguese,” Candeas said. Most children of these people, though, don’t speak Portuguese or have any relations with Brazil.

“That’s where we, at the Brazilian Office in Palestine, come in to bring back the Brazilianness of these kids,” the diplomat said. The plan is setting up a framework to support the teaching of Brazilian Portuguese, first by training volunteers to teach the language and then training professional teachers. The library books will be part of this effort.

Source: Palestinian News & Info Agency

Israeli soldiers and settlers Thursday brutally assaulted a Palestinian in the Old City of Hebron.

A video footage that has gone viral online showed Israeli troops assisting armed settlers in assaulting and beating Waseem Mansour Jaber, who did nothing, except for defending his family in the Jaber neighborhood of the old city of Hebron, where the colonial settlement of Kiryat Arba is located.

Twenty two years ago, Israeli settler Baruch Goldstein broke into the Ibrahimi Mosque and opened fire at Palestinian Muslim worshippers, killing 29. Four Palestinians were killed on the same day in the clashes that broke out around the Mosque in response to the massacre.

In the aftermath, the mosque, known to Jews as Tomb of the Patriarchs, was divided in two, with the larger part turned into a synagogue while heavy scrutiny was imposed on the Palestinians and areas closed completely to them, including an important market and the main street, Shuhada Street.

The city of Hebron, which houses the Ibrahimi Mosque, is home to roughly 160,000 Palestinian Muslims and about 800 notoriously aggressive Israeli settlers who live in compounds heavily guarded by Israeli troops.

Israel has expelled the only international monitors protecting Hebron’s Palestinians from 800 heavily guarded settlers, one of whom committed the 1994 massacre that triggered their deployment.

Settler violence against Palestinians and their property is routine in the West Bank and is rarely prosecuted by Israeli authorities.

There are over 700,000 Israeli settlers living in colonial settlements in the West Bank and East Jerusalem.

Source: Palestinian News & Info Agency

At least 19 Palestinians were injured today as Israeli occupation forces attacked and dispersed a marathon which was organized by Palestinian protesters outside the neighbourhood of Sheikh Jarrah in occupied Jerusalem.

The marathon was held to raise the voice of the dozens of Palestinian families facing an Israeli threat of eviction from their homes in Batn al-Hawa quarter, in the neighborhood of Silwan, and in Sheikh Jarrah neighborhood.

The Palestinian Red Crescent (PRC) said its medics provided medical treatment to 19 Palestinians who were wounded from stun grenades and due to beating by the Israeli police. One of the wounded was evacuated to a hospital.

WAFA correspondent said Israeli police fired teargas canisters and stun grenades at the competitors participating in the marathon, which set off from the entrance of Sheikh Jarrah neighbourhood and passed through the Lions Gate and the Batn al-Hawa Quarter in the neighbourhood of Silwan. The marathon was dispersed as a result.

Police officers also assaulted reporters and cameramen working for the Palestine TV and smashed one of their cameras.

All of the competitors who were dispersed are citizens of occupied Jerusalem and the Palestinian territories occupied since 1948.

Asaad Dari, 24, one of the participants of the marathon, told WAFA that this initiative aims to raise the voice and highlight the dangers of displacement and eviction facing many Palestinian families in the occupied capital.

He added that this marathon is part of the solidarity activities with the families threatened with eviction from their homes in Sheikh Jarrah and Silwan.

At least 28 families in Sheikh Jarrah and 86 families in Batn al-Hawa are facing an Israeli threat of eviction from their homes in favour of colonial settler groups.

The potential evictions have gained international attention amid calls by many of the world leaders upon the Israeli occupation authorities not to proceed with the arbitrary evictions.

Source: Palestinian News & Info Agency

At least two Palestinian protesters were injured today in clashes with the Israeli occupation army in the village of Ni’lin, to the west of Ramallah city in the occupied West Bank, according to local sources.

Dozens of Palestinian protesters were demonstrating near the village against colonial Israeli settlement construction, when soldiers fired live gunshots and rubber-coated rounds to disperse them. At least two were injured in the Israeli attack, and were moved to hospital for medical treatment.

Soldiers also fired teargas and stun grenades at the protesters to disperse them.

Palestinian villagers have been holding weekly protests in the same area amid fears of an Israeli plan to confiscate large tracts of Palestinian land there for the benefit of the colonial settlement enterprise.

Meantime, dozens of Palestinian protesters sustained suffocation from teargas as Israeli occupation soldiers attacked the weekly protest against Israeli settlements, which takes place every week in the village of Kafr Qaddum, near the city of Qalqilia.

Source: Palestinian News & Info Agency

About 200 employees of the social media giant Facebook have signed a letter urging the company’s administration to address concerns that pro-Palestine content on the social media platform are being censored.

The letter, which was first reported on by the London-based Financial Times daily, urges Facebook’s leadership to adopt measures that ensure pro-Palestine content is not censored or removed.

The Facebook employees urged their leadership “to order a third-party audit of enforcement actions around Arab and Muslim content, and to refer a post by Israel’s prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu describing Palestinian civilians as terrorists to its independent oversight board”, the FT said.

The letter further calls on Facebook executives to set up an internal task force to “investigate and address potential biases” in both its human and automated content moderation systems, the FT reported.

“As highlighted by employees, the press and members of Congress, and as reflected in our declining app store rating, our users and community at large feel that we are falling short on our promise to protect open expression around the situation in Palestine,” the letter reportedly said.

“We believe Facebook can and should do more to understand our users and work on rebuilding their trust,” it continued.

During last month’s Israeli aggression on Gaza, Facebook labelled words used by Palestinian users, such as “martyr” and “resistance”, as incitements to violence. It also took down posts about the Al-Aqsa Mosque after mistakenly associating the holy site with a ‘terrorist’ organisation, according to United States media reports.

Source: Palestinian News & Info Agency