Bi-Weekly Brief for May 3, 2021
“As Palestinians face the pandemic unprotected, Israel’s vaccination rate is worthless” says Haaretz
Total cases in the partially locked down Gaza Strip have surged above 100,400, and hospitals are buckling under the strain. On May 1, Gaza had nearly twice as many active cases as the West Bank, with a tally of some 1,500 new cases per day. There were 325,967 cases in the West Bank and Gaza and 3,525 deaths. As of April 24, 134,496 West Bankers had received at least one dose of a vaccine, and 35,464 in Gaza. According to PA Minister of Health Mai al-Kaila, 7.1% of people in the West Bank and 2.2% of Gazans have been vaccinated. In Israel 62% have been vaccinated and there are 1,313 active cases. That number could increase following the tragedy that took place on Mount Meron in northern Israel on April 30, where a pilgrimage of up to 100,000 ultra-Orthodox culminated in a stampede that took 45 lives. Haaretz has meanwhile urged Israel, which has “ten million Astra Zeneca vaccines it doesn’t intend to use,” to give them to Palestinians, both as its legal obligation and for its own self-protection.
Ramadan in East Jerusalem marked by bloodshed and chants of ‘death to Arabs’
At the start of Ramadan, Israeli police erected barriers around the Old City’s Damascus Gate preventing Palestinians from gathering in the plaza as they traditionally do during Ramadan. This became the site of daily clashes, and on April 21 the Deputy Mayor of Jerusalem urged police to execute protestors rather than simply disperse them. Violence escalated on April 22, when the Kahane-inspired Jewish supremacist group Lehava joined by ultra-Orthodox “Neo-fascist thugs” marched through Jerusalem chanting ‘death to Arabs’ as they attacked Palestinians. 105 Palestinians were wounded and 50 arrested. For 3 nights Israeli police and settlers deployed a range of weapons at Damascus Gate and in the East Jerusalem neighborhoods of Isawiya and Sheikh Jarrah (where 6 Palestinian families face eviction in early May to make way for a new settlement and 7 other families are due to be evicted on August 1), and flooded the Tur neighborhood with wastewater. Clashes also took place at the Qalandia checkpoint and at Rachel’s Tomb in Bethlehem, where drones dropped tear gas canisters on protestors. On April 25, Palestinians celebrated as police removed the barriers outside the Damascus Gate. But as they gathered over the next few days and raised Palestinian flags, they were again attacked by security forces. On April 30, Israel prevented Palestinians from the West Bank from entering East Jerusalem for Friday Ramadan prayers.
Gazans protest attacks on Jerusalem and collective punishment is ratcheted up
Ramadan in Gaza has seen Covid surging, and the population under an evening curfew. The IDF has continued to fire live bullets and tear gas at farmers and shepherds (April 19), and at fishing boats (April 20). On April 21, military vehicles and bulldozers moved into Gaza and leveled lands while shooting at residents. The Al Aqsa Martyrs’ Brigade and the PFLP Abu Ali Mustapha Brigades took responsibility for dozens of rockets fired from Gaza on the night of April 23 and subsequent days to protest the attacks on Jerusalem. They reportedly were either intercepted by Israel’s ‘Iron Dome’, or fell in uninhabited areas or within the Gaza Strip itself. In response, Israeli warplanes and tanks fired missiles and artillery shells at several sites in Gaza, and the army massed along the border. On April 26, Israel ordered the complete closure of the Mediterranean to Gaza’s fishermen, depriving 4,160 fishermen of their livelihood. On the following 3 days, the Israeli navy shot live bullets at anyone who ventured out to fish along the shore. On April 29, Israel again opened the sea to fishermen.
“We will strike our enemies forcefully”
This was Netanyahu’s vow after 3 Israelis were wounded on May 2 in what appeared to be a drive-by shooting at Tapuah Junction in the West Bank. The Israeli army fired tear gas and stun grenades at farmers in the South Hebron Hills who were being attacked by settlers (April 26), and shot two Palestinians - a man it said was holding a broken bottle, and a 60 year old woman with a knife who died at the hospital. It continued to suppress protests around the West Bank.
Human Rights Watch accuses Israel of apartheid; Israel says its report is “preposterous”
Following in the wake of the report on Israeli apartheid by the Israeli group B’Tselem, Human Rights Watch has issued a report detailing how Israel’s policies and practices qualify as “the crime of apartheid” as defined by the Apartheid Convention and Rome Statute. White House press secretary Jan Psaki said that this is “not the view of this administration.” Before the HRW report was issued, Bernie Sanders declared that Americans do not want to see the aid it gives Israel “being used to support policies that violate human rights and that treat the Palestinian people as second class human beings” and a Gallup survey revealed that 53% of Democrats think Israel should be pushed on its human rights record. This is what the ‘condition aid’ legislation introduced by Rep. Betty McCollum (HR 2590) aims to do. It now has 18 co-sponsors. On April 22, 330 Representatives reacted to the McCollum bill by signing a bipartisan letter supporting unconditional aid to Israel.
President Abbas ‘postpones’ Palestinian legislative elections
Having waited 15 years to cast a vote, Palestinians are now faced with an ‘indefinite’ hold on the elections that were scheduled for May 22. On April 30, with his power threatened by the fracturing of Fatah, Abbas announced that elections would be postponed due to uncertainty about voting in East Jerusalem. Hamas denounced his decision as ‘a coup’ and the EU Foreign Minister called it “deeply disappointing.” According to Israeli journalist Amira Hass, Abbas has demonstrated that he is “closer to Israel’s interests than his own people” by postponing an election contested by 1,400 candidates, 39% of them under age 40.
Time is running out for Netanyahu to form a new government
There appears little chance that Netanyahu will cobble together a coalition government by May 5, when the opportunity to do so could pass to Yair Lapid and Yesh Atid centrists, or to the right-wing leader of Yamina, Naftali Bennett, who has been busy wooing members of the ‘anti-Netanyahu bloc.’ On April 28, Netanyahu failed in his attempt to appoint a Likud ally as Justice Minister who would then be in a position to absolve him from corruption charges.
UAE to buy $1.1 billion stake in the Israeli Tamar gas field
Eight months after the UAE and Israel signed the Abraham Accords, it was reported on April 26 that the Israeli energy company Delek Drilling was selling a 22% share of the offshore Tamar gas field west of Haifa to UAE-owned Mubadala Petroleum.
Water Fact
On April 22, following Ramadan prayers, an armored vehicle sprayed Palestinians gathered near the Old City’s barricaded Damascus Gate with foul-spelling ‘skunk water’ to disperse them. An invention of the Israeli firm Odortec, skunk water was first used against demonstrators in the West Bank in 2008. Since then it has been frequently used against Palestinians and has been sold to several US police departments, including the St. Louis Metropolitan police after the Ferguson uprising. Called a “whiff from hell” by The Economist, it smells like a “mixture of excrement, noxious gas and a decomposing donkey.” Its nausea-inducing odor can last for days. “How unbearable it must be,” an Israeli eye-witness wrote, “to break the fast on Ramadan night after being soaked by the skunk’s putrid sewage.”
Compiled by The Alliance for Water Justice in Palestine
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