Month: August 2021

A total of 16 Palestinian prisoners in Israeli detention currently remain on hunger strike in protest of their unfair administrative detention without a charge or trial, according to the Detainees and Ex-Detainees Affairs Commission.

The Commission said some of the hunger-striking prisoners have been on hunger strike for 18 days, while others have been hunger striking for 17, 12, 11 or 10 days in a row. The longest hunger-striking of the 16 prisoners is prisoner Salem Ziadat, 40 years old, who has been on hunger strike for 20 days in protest of his detention without a charge or trial.

Israel’s widely condemned policy of administrative detention allows the detention of Palestinians without charge or trial for renewable intervals usually ranging between three and six months based on undisclosed evidence that even a detainee’s lawyer is barred from viewing.

Currently, Israel is holding some 540 Palestinians in administrative detention, deemed illegal by international law, most of them former prisoners who spent years in prison for their resistance of the Israeli occupation.

Over the years, Israel has placed thousands of Palestinians in administrative detention for prolonged periods of time, without trying them, without informing them of the charges against them, and without allowing them or their counsel to examine the evidence.

Palestinian detainees have continuously resorted to open-ended hunger strikes as a way to protest their illegal administrative detention and to demand an end to this policy which violates international law.

Source: Palestinian News & Info Agency

Algerian and international media outlets have reported that Algeria has officially begun forming an African block to reject Israel’s membership in the African Union.

The online newspaper Rai Al-Youm reported that South Africa, Tunisia, Eritrea, Senegal, Tanzania, Niger, the archipelago of Qamar, Gabon, Nigeria, Zimbabwe, Liberia, and the Seychelles have all agreed with the decision.

Rai Al-Youm further wrote that Algerian Foreign Minister Ramtane Lamamra is expected to discuss the issue of Israel’s membership in the African Union in his upcoming trips to the four African countries of Tunisia, Ethiopia, Sudan and Egypt.

Lamamra has stressed that these diplomatic moves are in fact a reaction to Tel Aviv’s membership in the African Union as an observer member and that this is a development that Israeli diplomats have been working on for years.

Lamamra noted that Israel had previously gained membership as an observer in the Organization of African Unity, but in 2002, the title was taken back from the regime as the African Union replaced the Organization of African Unity.

The Israeli Foreign Ministry said in a statement on July 22 that Adamsu Alali, Tel Aviv’s ambassador to Addis Ababa, had submitted his credentials as an observer member of the African Union.

Source: Palestinian News & Info Agency

Dozens of hardcore Israeli settlers, heavily guarded by Israeli police, broke into the Al-Aqsa Mosque compound in occupied Jerusalem today and performed rituals, according to witnesses.

They said that the fanatic settlers entered the holy compound in groups since early morning and performed rituals and provocative tours through the Islamic holy site.

Located in occupied Jerusalem, the Al-Aqsa Mosque is the third holiest site for Muslims. It was also Islam’s first Qibla, the direction towards which Muslims must turn to pray, before that was changed to Mecca, in Saudi Arabia.

Settler incursions into the holy mosque compound coupled with the systematic takeover of church property in Jerusalem are perceived as part of a plan to transform a multi-religious and multi-cultural city into a “reunified” Jewish city under the exclusive control and sovereignty of the occupying state of Israel.

Israel captured East Jerusalem, where Al-Aqsa Mosque is located, during the Six-Day War in 1967 in a move never recognized by the international community.

Source: Palestinian News & Info Agency

Minister of Health Mai Alkaila said today that 111 new cases of COVID-19, three deaths and 111 recoveries were registered in Palestine during the past 24 hours.

In her daily report on the coronavirus pandemic, Alkaila said three deaths from COVID-19 were reported in the Gaza Strip, while no deaths were reported in the West Bank.

A total of 3,171 COVID-19 tests were conducted during the last 24 hours. In the Gaza Strip, 71 coronavirus tests came out positive, while the West Bank had only 40 new cases.

No update was available regarding the situation in occupied Jerusalem.

The health minister said nine patients of COVID-19 are under intensive care, but none of them is intubated. In addition, 14 patients are hospitalized for coronavirus.

Alkaila pointed out that the recovery rate in Palestine has so far reached 98.5 percent, while active cases declined to 0.4 percent.

Deaths stood at 1.1 percent of total infections.

Concerning rollout of vaccines, the health minister said over 591,600 people have received their first jab of the vaccine in the West Bank and the Gaza Strip, of whom 416,000 were fully vaccinated.

Source: Palestinian News & Info Agency

Abdullah Seyam, the Palestinian Authority’s Deputy Governor of Jerusalem, said today that large tracts of Palestinian land in occupied Jerusalem are slated for confiscation by the Israeli occupation authorities in favor of colonial settlement projects.

He told official Voice of Palestine radio that the Israeli settlement projects in the occupied capital are aimed at changing the character of the city and blocking the view of the Islamic and Christian holy sites there.

Seyam further said the Israeli occupation authorities are escalating their measures against the Palestinian people of Jerusalem through taxes, demolitions and arrests to push them out of the city in order to achieve an Israeli Jewish majority.

The Palestinian official said the silence of the international community and the impunity granted to the Israeli occupation has encouraged it to continue its violations against the Palestinian people.

Source: Palestinian News & Info Agency

Israeli occupation authorities notified today for the demolition of two agricultural sheds in the village of al-Walaja, northwest of Bethlehem, in the southern occupied West Bank, according to local sources.

Sources told WAFA Israeli forces delivered demolition notices against two agricultural sheds belonging to two local residents in Ein Jwaizah area to the northeast of al-Walaja village.

The said village has been subjected to repeated Israeli violations by settlers and soldiers, including the demolition of homes and retaining walls, orders to stop construction and razing of land.

Israel rarely issues construction permits to Palestinians, forcing many to build without permits.

OCHA wrote in an official statement that, “The planning policies applied by Israel in Area C and East Jerusalem discriminate against Palestinians, making it extremely difficult for them to obtain building permits.”

“As a result, many Palestinians build without permits to meet their housing needs and risk having their structures demolished. Palestinians must have the opportunity to participate in a fair and equitable planning system that ensures their needs are met,” it added.

Source: Palestinian News & Info Agency

Israeli settlers have recently accelerated the construction of hundreds of housing units in the unauthorized settlement of Kida, build illegally on the village of Jaloud land, south of Nablus, said a local activist.

Ghassan Daghlas, who monitors colonial settlement activities in the northern West Bank, told WAFA hundreds of housing units were built during the past weeks inside and outside the built-up area of the settlement, which was established in 2003.

In 2016, the Israeli Supreme Court issued a decision prohibiting the expropriation of more Palestinian residents’ lands to expand the said settlement, however, settlers returned and bulldozed more land and built luxury homes there.

“Settlements amount to the transfer of a State’s population to the territory it occupies, which is prohibited by international humanitarian law,” said the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR).

To meet its international legal obligations, Israel must stop building settlements, reverse any settlement development activity and make full reparations, which include the obligation to re-establish the situation affected by the violation. The transfer of the occupying Power’s population to the territory it occupies amounts to a war crime that may lead to the individual criminal responsibility of the officials involved,” said OHCHR.

Source: Palestinian News & Info Agency

A Palestinian prisoner from Tulkarem completed today 18 years behind Israeli bars for resisting the occupation, according to the Palestinian Prisoner’s Society (PPS).

Head of PPS, Ibrahim al-Nimer, told WAFA prisoner Sami Mahmoud Soboh, 47, was detained in 2003 after two years of being pursued by Israeli forces. In 2000, he was shot by Israeli forces, causing him critical injuries to his leg, and to date, he still suffers from the long-term effects of the injury.

Soboh was held under interrogations for around 100 days after his arrest in 2003, before being sentenced to 28 years in jail, during which he was subjected to the Israeli prison service arbitrary punishment policies, including being deprived of family visits.

According to the Detainees and Ex-Detainees Affairs Commission, Israel holds about 4850 Palestinians in its prisons, including 43 women and 225 children. Approximately 540 are held as administrative detainees.

Source: Palestinian News & Info Agency