[News] Israel forces Gaza fishermen to undress in attack violating ceasefire deal

[Anti-Imperialist News]

  Israel forces Gaza fishermen to undress in attack violating ceasefire deal

Joe Catron <http://electronicintifada.net/people/joe-catron>
*http://electronicintifada.net/content/israel-forces-gaza-fishermen-undress-attack-violating-ceasefire-deal/13888* 

23 September 2014

Nearly a month after Israel's military offensive against the Gaza Strip 
<http://electronicintifada.net/tags/gaza> ended in an indefinite 
ceasefire on 26 August, Israeli forces continue to shoot at and detain 
Palestinian fishermen <http://electronicintifada.net/tags/gaza-fishermen>.

The Israeli military has captured ten fishermen and confiscated four 
fishing boats, while firing live ammunition in dozens of attacks on both 
the sea and shore of the besieged coastal enclave.

A day before its security cabinet ordered the military operation on 7 
July, and two days before its forces started intensely bombarding the 
Gaza Strip, Israel unilaterally reduced 
<http://www.middleeasteye.net/news/gaza-braces-israel-declares-operation-protective-edge-and-resumes-house-bombings-1554935452> 
the permitted zone it had imposed on Palestinian fishermen to three 
nautical miles from the shore.

Its navy had previously allowed them to sail as far as six nautical 
miles after a ceasefire ended eight days of Israeli attacks on Gaza and 
retaliatory Palestinian rocket fire in November 2012.


    "War against livelihoods"

In a statement released to media, the Palestinian agriculture and 
fisheries ministry called the reduction "a war against thousands of the 
Palestinian fishermen and their livelihoods."

During this summer's offensive, Gaza fishermen endured severe losses. 
Only during occasional lulls in the violence did a few dare sail, 
sometimes keeping their boats in the relative safety of the Gaza seaport.

By 10 August, the United Nations' Food and Agriculture Organization 
estimated <http://www.fao.org/news/story/en/item/240924/> that Gaza's 
fishing sector had already lost 234.6 tons of fish, or 9.3 percent of 
its annual catch.

On 28 August, two days after the ceasefire agreement, Israel once again 
extended its limit to six nautical miles.

Nizar Ayyash, chairperson of Gaza's General Union of Fishermen 
<http://electronicintifada.net/tags/general-union-fishermen>, hoped the 
change would indicate further improvements. At the time, he told 
<http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/world/2014-08/29/c_133603877.htm> 
reporters the area "will be nine miles by next week and will increase to 
twelve miles within the next month according to the agreement reached in 
Egypt <http://electronicintifada.net/tags/egypt> on Tuesday."

Instead, Israel began to reverse the shift as soon as attention from 
international media and foreign governments dissipated, reducing 
<http://www.aa.com.tr/en/gaza/385854--45-gaza-children-go-to-germany-austria-for-treatment> 
the zone back to five nautical miles on 8 September.

By then, its navy's attacks had already resumed in earnest. Regular 
bursts of machine-gun fire and the occasional thuds of naval artillery 
punctuated the silence of early mornings along the Gaza coast.

The first capture of fishermen came on 3 September. At 6:00am that 
morning, Muhammad Ishaq Zayid told The Electronic Intifada last week, he 
and his cousin Mousa Talal al-Soltan had paddled their fishing boat off 
the coast of Sudaniya in the northern Gaza Strip.


    Escape attempt

"We were gathering our nets, which we had thrown into the sea the day 
before," Zayid said at his family's home in the northern Gaza town of 
Beit Lahia <http://electronicintifada.net/tags/beit-lahia>. "This was 
only one mile away from the shore. Then two Israeli gunboats came and 
started shooting. They ordered us to take off our clothes and jump into 
the water."

Despite their craft --- a small, motorless boat known as a /hasaka/ --- 
the cousins' first reaction was to flee from the Israelis' sophisticated 
vessels, Zayid said.

"When they approached, we had already gathered our nets," he recounted. 
"We started escaping, but the gunboats shot into the water and 
surrounded us, one from the north, the other from the south. They told 
us to stop, but we didn't. We kept moving. So they shot into the water 
again and commanded us to put our hands up. This happened in seconds."

After the Israeli gunfire forced them to undress and plunge into the 
water, the pair were blindfolded, handcuffed and taken to a larger 
warship which transported them to the naval port at Ashdod 
<http://electronicintifada.net/tags/ashdod> in present-day Israel.

"They kept us in an isolated room," Zayid said. "They took me for 
interrogation for twenty minutes."

Meanwhile, al-Soltan said, "They interrogated me in the same room where 
they had been holding us."

After their interrogations, the cousins were taken by the Israeli 
military to its Erez checkpoint 
<http://electronicintifada.net/tags/erez-checkpoint> at the northern end 
of the Gaza Strip.

"We were taken from the port at 3:30pm and arrived at the Erez 
checkpoint at 4:30," Zayid said. "We were held there two hours, then 
came home. At 7:00, we reached our house."

Like many fishermen in the Gaza Strip, the cousins share both their 
profession and their experiences of detention with other members of 
their family. Zayid's father has been detained, as has another cousin, 
who sat in Zayid's courtyard repairing a net last week.


    "They have everything"

Fishing families' losses to Israeli aggression mount over time, far 
exceeding the potential catches of their days spent in captivity. 
Al-Soltan noted, "It was our first time." He then added, "They have 
everything: the boat, the nets and the fish."

Zayid, whose family owned the craft and equipment, estimated the cost of 
replacing them at $2,300.

Other detentions have followed those of the cousins, including the 
captures of four fishermen in two separate incidents 
<http://www.pchrgaza.org/portal/en/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=10638:since-the-truce-into-force-25-shooting-incidents-at-fishing-boats-detention-of-6-fishermen-and-confiscation-of-3-boats-reported&catid=131:new> 
on 9 September, and an additional four 
<http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/world/2014-09/23/c_133663721.htm> 
earlier this week.

The most recent detentions came days after Israeli naval gunfire injured 
<http://www.maannews.net/eng/ViewDetails.aspx?ID=728235> Yousef Zayif, a 
seventy-year-old fisherman, on 17 September as he waited for his sons on 
the beach at Sudaniya.

Nearly all attacks have occurred on or near the shore of the northern 
Gaza Strip, an area that, many fishermen say, Israel aims to render 
inaccessible to them, regardless of its public statements.

Gunfire continues along the length of the coast, breaking the morning 
stillness wherever fishermen sail.

By 9 September, the Palestinian Centre for Human Rights 
<http://electronicintifada.net/tags/pchr> had recorded 
<http://www.pchrgaza.org/portal/en/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=10638:since-the-truce-into-force-25-shooting-incidents-at-fishing-boats-detention-of-6-fishermen-and-confiscation-of-3-boats-reported&catid=131:new> 
25 shootings, nearly two per day since fishing resumed after the truce.

But a trade marked by at least five killings 
<http://www.ochaopt.org/documents/ocha_opt_gaza_ara_factsheet_july_2013_english.pdf>, 
dozens of injuries and countless detentions during an eight-year siege 
remains a potent symbol of history and resilience for the 3,500 who 
still ply it.

Asked if he and his cousin would return to the sea, Zayid replied 
proudly, "We have already gone."

/Joe Catron is a US activist in Gaza, Palestine. He co-edited /The 
Prisoners' Diaries: Palestinian Voices from the Israeli Gulag 
<http://>/, an anthology of accounts by detainees freed in the 2011 
prisoner exchange. Follow him on Twitter: @jncatron 
<http://twitter.com/jncatron%E2%80%9D>./

-- 
Freedom Archives 522 Valencia Street San Francisco, CA 94110 415 
863.9977 www.freedomarchives.org
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