[News] PA Police Brutality Against Anti-Mofaz Protests

[Anti-Imperialist News]

Special Report:
<http://members.stopthewall.org/sites/all/modules/civicrm/extern/url.php?u=724&qid=203316>Palestinian 
Authority police brutality against anti-Mofaz protests

http://www.stopthewall.org/2012/07/02/palestinian-authority-police-brutality-against-anti-mofaz-protests

For two consecutive days, EU and US-trained Palestinian Authority 
(PA) police and un-uniformed thugs attack Palestinians protesting 
against the invitation of Israeli war criminal Shaul Mofaz to Ramallah.

Saturday 30th June started as a protest against the invitation of 
Palestinian Authority (PA) president Mahmoud Abbas extended to former 
Israeli Occupation Forces (IOF) Chief-of-Staff and former Israeli 
Defence Minister Shaul Mofaz. Following massive opposition to the 
visit, from the independent Palestinian youth movements, as well as 
from political parties across the board , the PA postponed the visit. 
Mofaz was Chief-of-Staff of the IOF from 1998 until 2003, and then 
Israeli Defence Minister from 2003 until 2006, making him directly 
responsible for Israeli war crimes during the Second Intifada and the 
during the 2006 war against Lebanon. Under his command, the IOF 
carried out numerous atrocities, such as the massacre in Jenin 
refugee camp in 2002 and the murder of thousands of Palestinian 
civilians, including hundreds of children.

Despite the alleged postponement of the meeting, the demonstrators 
decided to continue with the planned protest in order to underline 
their fury that such an invitation was issued in the first place, and 
to stress that no such meeting should occur with representatives of 
the Israeli occupation. Some 200 people gathered at Al-Manara Square 
in the centre of Ramallah, and began to move towards the Muqata'a, 
the fortress-like base of the PA. On their way people in the streets 
joined the protest and the crowd swelled to almost 1000 people. 
Before the protestors could reach close to the Muqata'a, lines of PA 
police formed human chains to block the road. Protesters managed to 
break through these and continued as far as the taxi stations on 
Al-Irsal street, where they were met by a second line of police. 
Demanding to reach the Muqata'a to deliver a message that they refuse 
to return to negotiations under the current conditions, and that the 
invitation of Mofaz to any area at least formally under PA control is 
an insult to all who have been murdered by the IOF, and to the 
thousands of prisoners still in Israeli jails.

Women led the Saturday demonstration from the front, and faced the 
initial onslaught of the PA police and mukhabarat. The repression 
started with plain-clothed thugs attacking members of the crowd with 
telescopic batons and metal chains, dragging people along the ground 
to the police station next to Al-Manara Square. There the protesters 
were beaten and then released to be treated at hospital for their 
injuries. From witness reports, the majority of Saturday's violence 
was perpetrated by the mukhabarat, the plain-clothed secret police 
who often outnumber uniformed police at political events in Ramallah 
and other Palestinian cities.

While the pale-blue shirts of the PA civilian police delegated much 
of the brutality to the plain-clothed mukhabarat on Saturday, 
yesterday (Sunday 1st July)'s violence surpassed that of the day 
before, with the PA police enthusiastically demonstrating their 
complete opposition to popular manifestations of discontent within 
Area A. While Saturday's march was organised specifically to protest 
Mahmoud Abbas's invitation to Mofaz, yesterday's demonstration was in 
response to the regime's violence, which resulted in some 20 people 
being treated in hospital for their injuries and three seriously injured.

Starting from Al-Manara Square, demonstrators, numbering around 500, 
marched in formation towards the scene of Saturday's worst violence. 
Linking arms and stamping their feet in defiance of the line of 
baton-wielding police who awaited them, the demonstrators stopped 
some ten metres from the police lines. The chief of the PA police in 
Ramallah remonstrated with the crowd for about ten or fifteen 
minutes, but the crowd moved forward. Many mainly female protesters 
managed to move past the police lines, causing the police line to 
temporarily break and reform twenty metres behind its original 
position. At this point the police, who had their batons drawn from 
the very start, started to beat protesters.

People tried as best as they could to defend themselves, but the 
police surged forward, striking people as they held their hands in 
the air. The police operation was chaotic and didn't appear to have 
any purpose other than to inflict as much pain and violence as 
possible on the crowd. Female protesters, many barely in their 
twenties, were not spared the violence, with many falling to the 
ground and being trampled by the police. As protesters went to the 
defence of others, they themselves became the target of this police 
rage. The situation was chaotic, with mukhabarat punching protesters 
in the face, and several police officers seeming to temporarily lose 
control of their own actions, screaming and lashing out at anyone 
within striking distance.

There were horrifying scenes as people had to negotiate the many cars 
in the street as they tried to escape the surges of police beatings, 
with people being beaten as they tried to scramble over cars and jump 
over fences. Many people were crying, and the pavement along Al-Irsal 
Street saw several people lying on the ground being treated for their 
wounds, with some police officers continuing to chase protesters 
along the street.
As with Saturday, around over 20 people were treated in hospital for 
their injuries with another three seriously injured. At least one 
protester had to be treated for a head injury sustained after being 
struck on the head with a baton. One protester was kidnapped by 
police and mukhabarat, beaten, and then released, receiving X-rays 
and treatment for his injuries. Around fifty demonstrators marched 
from Al-Manara Square to the hospital, and stayed in the courtyard to 
offer solidarity with the injured, and to defend the injured from 
further police violence and kidnapping.

As with Saturday, journalists, Palestinian and foreign, were also 
attacked by the police and mukhabarat, with several being struck with 
batons and at least three cameras being stolen by police.

We condemn unreservedly the brutal violence of the PA police and 
mukhabarat against unarmed protesters, the kidnappings and beatings, 
and the attacks on journalists and theft of their property.

We offer our complete solidarity with all those who were at Saturday 
and Sunday's demonstrations, all those who were beaten, kidnapped, 
injured and brutalised by the PA police and mukhabarat. To see 
Palestinian police, with the Palestinian flag on their uniforms, 
beating unarmed Palestinians in the streets of Ramallah, is a 
particularly shocking sight that forces a deep examination of the 
role of PA security forces in occupied Palestine.

Stop the Wall fully supports the right to protest and assembly and 
the right to freedom of expression. We believe in the importance of 
the movement against normalisation of the occupation, and its 
committees throughout Occupied Palestine will participate in the 
broad movement in the organising of further protests against police 
and mukhabarat violence and repression.

For Videos from Saturday and Sunday's demonstrations:

<http://members.stopthewall.org/sites/all/modules/civicrm/extern/url.php?u=725&qid=203316>http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pbKgxct3Hnk&feature=youtu.be
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Tvg76s1ShgM
<http://members.stopthewall.org/sites/all/modules/civicrm/extern/url.php?u=727&qid=203316>http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PMTwcwQdkY8&feature=plcp
http://www.youtube.com/watch?NR=1&v=eMDqOb4rTkk&feature=endscreen



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