Day: 5 June 2022

Weather today in Palestine is clear, dry and hot in the daytime and warm at night with no change in temperature, which remains 2°C above the seasonal average, according to the Palestinian Meteorological Department (PMD).

Winds are northwesterly and light to moderate, while sea waves are low.

Temperature in the capital, Jerusalem, and Bethlehem is expected to reach a high of 30°C and a low of 20°C, and in Ramallah and Hebron a high of 29°C and a low of 18°C are expected. In Jericho, the Dead Sea, and the Jordan Valley temperature is expected to reach a high of 38°C and a low of 25°C, while it is expected to reach a high of 29°C and a low of 22°C in Gaza and the coastal areas.

Temperature is expected to drop on Monday and becomes around the seasonal average, and sunny and warm conditions are expected to prevail.

Temperature drops further on Tuesday to around 2°C below the seasonal average, while it is expected to rise on Wednesday and return to its seasonal average.

SOURCE: PALESTINE NEWS & INFORMATION AGENCY

The Israeli Prison Service rejected today a petition submitted by the attorneys of Palestinian detainees Khalil Awawdeh and Raed Rayyan demanding their clients’ immediate transfer to hospital after 95 and 60 respectively on hunger strike, according to the Palestinian Prisoner’s Society (PPS).

Awawdeh, 40, from the town of Idna in the southern West Bank Hebron district, has been on hunger strike for 95 days in protest of his prolonged administrative detention without charge or trial.

He is reported to be suffering from headaches, fatigue, blurred vision, pain in the joints, irregular heartbeats, frequent vomiting and significant loss of weight.

Rayyan, 27, from Beit Duqqu village, northwest of Jerusalem, is also on hunger strike in protest of his detention without charge or trial. He is also said to be suffering from serious health complications due to his long fast.

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 over 500 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.

Amnesty International, has described Israel’s administrative detention policy as a “cruel, unjust practice which helps maintain Israel’s system of apartheid against Palestinians.”

SOURCE: PALESTINE NEWS & INFORMATION AGENCY

Palestinian Arabic-language dailies focused today on President Mahmoud Abbas’s call yesterday with his French counterpart Emmanuel Macron which discussed the latest political developments in the region.

Al-Ayyam said it its main headline: “President Abbas tells Macron: We’re about to take a series of steps in response to the Israeli escalation.”

Al-Quds reported on the same topic: “President [Abbas] discusses the situation [in Palestine] in a telephone call with Macron.”

Al-Hayat Al-Jadida said in its main story: “President [Abbas] stresses the importance of the French role [in Middle East politics] which the Palestinian side trusts.”

“The international community needs to take deterrent measures against Israeli practices and to stop the double standards, because the situation on the ground is no longer acceptable,” President Abbas was quoted as saying by Al-Hayat Al-Jadida.

On a different topic, the three dailies quoted PLO Secretary-General Hussein Al-Sheikh as saying that President Mahmoud Abbas was in good health and doing his work as usual.

Al-Quds and Al-Ayyam said U.S. officials stated that President Joe Biden has postponed his visit to Palestine/Israel to the next month.

Al-Ayyam said 80 US Congressmen have asked Secretary of State Anthony Blinken to clarify the steps that the administration is expected to take concerning Israeli settlements and settler violence.

Al-Hayat Al-Jadida said two Palestinian fishermen were injured yesterday in a gunfire attack by the Israeli navy while fishing off Gaza.

Al-Ayyam said that by okaying the displacement of more than a thousand Palestinians in Masafer Yatta area, south of Hebron, the Supreme Israel Court was greenlighting the Israeli government to commit a war crime.

SOURCE: PALESTINE NEWS & INFORMATION AGENCY

Palestinian residents of the village of Nabi Saleh to the north of Ramallah managed tonight to foil an Israeli settlers’ attack against their village, according to security sources.

Sources told WAFA that a group of settlers, backed by military soldiers, gathered at the main entrance to the village of Nabi Saleh in an attempt to break into the village, however, their attack was foiled by the locals.

In many cases of settlers’ attacks against Palestinians, Israeli forces offer protection to settlers and turn a blind eye to attacks committed against locals.

Settlements are illegal under international law as they violate Article 49 of the Fourth Geneva Convention, which prohibits the transfer of the occupying power’s civilian population into occupied territory.

SOURCE: PALESTINE NEWS & INFORMATION AGENCY

Israeli occupation forces stationed at Tura military checkpoint to the southwest of Jenin, in the northern occupied West Bank, forced a Palestinian mother to undress her three-year-old child because he was wearing a T-shirt with a riffle drawing on it.

The child’s parents said during a telephone call with WAFA that the mother was stopped by Israeli soldiers stationed at the aforementioned checkpoint, and forced to undress her child for having a riffle drawing on his T-shirt.

The child was left to go home shirtless after soldiers confiscated his T-shirt.

SOURCE: PALESTINE NEWS & INFORMATION AGENCY

Israeli military forces today stormed the village of Shufa to the southeast of Tulkarem, in the northern occupied West Bank, and removed all the Palestinian flags hoisted on the poles and walls throughout the village, according to the security of Fatah movement in Shufa, Murad Droubi.

Over the previous few days, the Israeli army has been storming the village and taking down all Palestinian flags, he said.

To be noted, the village of Shufa has been subjected to almost daily harassment and raids by the Israeli forces and settlers, including closing the entrance to the village and obstructing residents’ movement as well as attacking and threatening farmers and forcing them to leave their lands at gunpoint.

SOURCE: PALESTINE NEWS & INFORMATION AGENCY

A Palestinian was hurt and wounded today when his vehicle crashed while being chased by the Israeli occupation’s police in Masafer Yatta area, south of the occupied West Bank, according to local sources.

Rateb Jabour, a local Palestinian activist, told WAFA that a Palestinian from Al-Tuwani village in Masafer Yatta area was driving his vehicle in the area when he lost control of it while being chased by an Israeli police jeep, crashing into a cliff near the road.

The Palestinian, who was not yet identified, sustained bruises in the head, and was rushed to hospital for medical treatment.

SOURCE: PALESTINE NEWS & INFORMATION AGENCY

Israeli settlers tonight attacked Palestinian vehicles in occupied Jerusalem, according to local sources.

Sources said that settlers attacked with stones Palestinian cars driving on Highway 1, the main highway which separates West and East Jerusalem, causing damage to several cars.

SOURCE: PALESTINE NEWS & INFORMATION AGENCY

Israeli occupation forces opened gunfire today at Palestinian farmers and herders to the east of Khan Yunis, south of the Gaza Strip, said WAFA correspondent.

He said Palestinian farmers were forced to leave after Israeli soldiers fired several live bullets and gas bombs at areas near the Israel-Gaza fence to the east of Al-Qarara town, northeast of Khan Yunis. No one was hurt in the attack.

Under a strict siege, the Israeli occupation army keeps attacking — sometimes injuring or killing — civilians, farmers and fishermen almost on a daily basis and whenever they near the Israeli perimeter fence to the east of the Strip.

The Israeli authorities have been enforcing a buffer zone within 300 meters into the border of Gaza, leaving large tracts of Palestinian-owned land unused. Farmers predominantly put their lives at risk when seeking to cultivate their own land, and dozens of farmers were even killed in recent years as they attempted to reach their property.

SOURCE: PALESTINE NEWS & INFORMATION AGENCY