Day: 11 July 2021

Several demonstrations were held across the United Kingdom yesterday against Puma, a multinational corporation that designs and manufactures athletic and casual footwear, to demand the sports brand end its sponsorship of the Israeli Football Association.

The protests, called for by the Palestine Solidarity Campaign (PSC), saw demonstrators gathering in front of Puma stores in London, Brighton, Liverpool, Chester and other parts of the UK, chanting slogans that condemned Israeli apartheid in occupied Palestine.

The brand has been facing a growing boycott movement over its deal with the IFA, which includes six illegal Israeli settlement teams.

Campaigners have accused Puma of complicity in Israel’s apartheid regime by allowing its brand to “sport-wash” Israeli crimes.

Over 200 Palestinian sports teams recently wrote to Spanish football clubs FC Barcelona, Atlético de Madrid and Inter Milan to cancel their upcoming “friendly” matches in apartheid Israel.

Source: Palestinian News & Info Agency

A group of hardcore Israeli settlers last night vandalized and partially damaged electricity poles that serve Khirbet Sara, an outskirt of Jalud village in the north of the occupied West Bank, according to local sources.

Ghassan Daghlas, who monitors colonial settlement activities in the northern West Bank, told WAFA that illegal Israeli settlers broke into Palestinian-owned lands near the village and partially vandalized a number of electricity poles using manual saws. The poles are now at risk of collapse.

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

Almost everyday, attacks by the Israeli occupation forces or settlers on Palestinians are reported in the area.

There are over 600,000 Israeli settlers living in colonial settlements in the West Bank and East Jerusalem in violation of international law.

Source: Palestinian News & Info Agency

Israeli forces today confiscated a bulldozer working on the rehabilitation of land near Beit Dajan and E’in Shalabi areas, east of Nablus, the occupied West Bank, said a local activist.

Ghassan Daghlas, who monitors colonial settlement activities in the northern West Bank, said Israeli forces confiscated a bulldozer belonging to Majdi Abu Zahri while he was working on a special project for the rehabilitation of land in the said area.

Source: Palestinian News & Info Agency

More than 50 Palestinians were wounded or suffered suffocation last night by the Israeli occupation forces during clashes in Jabal Sabih mount and in the village of Qusra, south of Nablus in the occupied West Bank, according to medical surces.

Ahmed Jibril, an official in charge of ambulances and emergencies in the Palestinian Red Crescent, said the Israeli violence in Jabal Sabih mount caused more than 40 suffocation cases among Palestinian civilians, while another seven suffered bodily fractures were reported.

Jibril added that two cases of suffocation from teargas inhalation were reported in the nearby village of Qusra.

Prior to this, dozens of Palestinian teenagers demonstrated outside the illegal settlement outpost of Evaytar on Jabal Sabih, after which confrontation erupted with Israeli soldiers, which lasted for several hours.

Source: Palestinian News & Info Agency

The Israeli Cabinet approved today the deduction of the equivalent of funds the Palestinian Authority allocates to the families of Palestinian prisoners in Israeli jails and those who were killed by Israeli forces from tax revenues it collects on behalf of the Palestinians.

Israeli media sources said the Israeli cabinet approved a decision to deduct $597 million Shekels from the PA tax revenues; the sum equivalent to the amount paid by the PA in the year 2020 to prisoners detained in Israel and their families.

The withholding of Palestinian tax revenues collected by Israel on behalf of the Palestinian Authority is a recurring issue. This act clearly violates the provisions of the Paris Protocol. The 2019 UN report ‘Economic costs of Israeli occupation for the Palestinian people’ stresses how it cripples the Palestinian Authority and its ability to meet its financial obligations, in particular paying wages to public sector workers and covering current expenditures in the public budget, said the European Parliament.

Source: Palestinian News & Info Agency

The Israel occupation forces prevented the access of a relief aid truck carrying humanitarian and food supplies to Palestinian residents in Khirbet Hamsa al-Fawqa in the northern Jordan Valley, which was completely demolished a few days ago by Israeli forces for the seventh time since the end of the year 2020.

Mutaz Bsharat, an official in charge of monitoring Israeli colonial activities in the Jordan Valley, said Israeli soldiers prevented the truck’s access to Palestinians in Hamsa al-Fawqa, and forced it to turn back with its cargo to where it came from.

Located in the Jordan Valley, Hamsa al-Fawqa is one of 38 Bedouin and herding communities partially or fully located within Israeli-declared ‘firing zones.’ These are some of the most vulnerable communities in the West Bank, with limited access to education and health services, and to water, sanitation, and electricity infrastructure.

Israel constantly demolishes structures built by Palestinians in Area C, including the Jordan Valley, claiming they were built without a permit, rarely, if ever, issued for Palestinians. It does not allow any development there while using the occupied land for its illegal settlement activity.

Source: Palestinian News & Info Agency

Chairman of the Detainees and Ex-Detainees Affairs Commission Qadri Abu Baker slammed Israel’s decision to deduct and freeze millions of dollars from the PA tax revenues; a sum equal to the amount paid by the PA to the families of Palestinian prisoners and those killed by Israeli forces, a crime that reeked of racism and piracy.

He stressed that such racist measures and the policy of robbing a portion of the PA tax revenues, estimated at millions of shekels, will only increase the Palestinian leadership and people’s determination to serve those who struggled to protect their land from the ugly occupation that practices all forms of racism against the Palestinian people and their land.

The Israeli cabinet approved a decision to deduct $597 million Shekels from the PA tax revenues; the sum equivalent to the amount paid by the PA in the year 2020 to prisoners detained in Israel and their families.

Source: Palestinian News & Info Agency

President Mahmoud Abbas stressed during a telephone call with Israel’s new president Isaac Herzog the need to achieve a comprehensive truce in the Gaza Strip, the West Bank, and Jerusalem.

President Abbas affirmed the need to exert practical measures on the ground that would establish political climates to achieve a just and comprehensive peace.

Source: Palestinian News & Info Agency

Minister of Health Mai Alkaila said today that 53 new cases of COVID-19, two deaths and 221 recoveries were registered in Palestine during the past 24 hours. No deaths were recorded.

In her daily report on the coronavirus pandemic, Alkaila said two deaths from COVID-19 were reported in the West Bank, and none in Gaza.

In the Gaza Strip, 45 coronavirus tests came out positive, while the West Bank had only eight new cases. No infections were registered in occupied Jerusalem.

The health minister said 13 patients of COVID-19 are hospitalized, while another six are in intensive care.

Alkaila pointed out that the recovery rate in Palestine has so far reached 98.4 percent, while active cases declined to 0.5 percent.

Deaths stood at 1.1 percent of total infections.

Concerning rollout of vaccines, the health minister said over 541,600 people have received their first dose of the vaccine in the West Bank and the Gaza Strip, of whom 389,000 received both doses.

Source: Palestinian News & Info Agency