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<font size=3>Year end statistics: Israeli forces killed 742 Palestinians,
injured 3,735 and arrested 5,671 <br>
<a href="http://english.pnn.ps/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=1362" eudora="autourl">
http://english.pnn.ps/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=1362<br>
<br>
</a>(Gaza City) Wisam Afifeh <br>
Wednesday, 03 January 2007 <br><br>
Official Palestinian health statistics, compared against human rights
organizations data and press reports were submitted for the final report
for the year 2006. The report was issued from Gaza this afternoon and
indicates that Israeli forces killed 742 Palestinians, injured 3,735 and
arrested 5,671 in the West Bank and Gaza Strip in the year 2006. Two
hundred and ten were killed in targeted assassinations, and 588 of the
total number of Palestinians killed were in the Gaza Strip. <br><br>
Israeli forces killed 154 Palestinians in the West Bank. The Israelis
killed 144 children, the youngest being three days old. Israeli forces
killed 52 women, including pregnant women, mothers, the elderly and five
women with special needs. Palestinians killed 23 Israelis, as reported by
the Israeli human rights organization B'Tselem. <br><br>
July was the worst month with Israeli forces killing 188 Palestinians,
while November came in second for death with Israeli forces killing 140
Palestinians, most of them in the Gaza Strip. <br><br>
Israeli forces launched psychological campaigns with threatening radio
broadcasts, holding families hostage if “wanted” family members did not
give themselves to Israeli forces, and the frequent use of air raids and
sound bombs, one of which caused a woman to die of a heart attack in the
West Bank. Israeli forces targeted the infrastructure: schools, homes,
the water and electrical supplies, and roads, particularly in the
northeastern Gaza Strip. <br><br>
Entire families were targeted this year, such as the Ghalia family blown
away by a mortar shell from an Israeli warship while they sat on the Gaza
beach, leaving a young girl Huda as the only survivor. Israeli forces
also bombed a northern Gaza Strip house with an extended family sleeping
inside, killing 18 people, mostly women and children, in a matter of
moments. <br><br>
Israeli forces conducted air attacks on 45 houses in the Gaza Strip by
claiming they belonged to members of the armed resistance. Some of them
did, however in 2006 it was still legal under international law to resist
occupation. The practice of air destruction ended only when thousands of
Gazans covered the roof tops and yards of targeted houses with their own
bodies, refusing to allow the bombs to drop without causing major deaths
and problems for Israeli forces. <br><br>
Israeli forces destroyed 24 East Jerusalem homes under the pretext of
“non-licensing” while continuing to overtake the city. Of the 5,671
Palestinians arrested in 2006, 5,425 were in the West Bank. Israeli
forces arrested 300 children in 2006, 140 of whom are still in custody as
the year 2007 begins. A total of 368 Palestinian children are in Israeli
prisons. And Israeli forces arrested dozens of elected officials for
being members of the Hamas party, and continue to hold several, including
Legislative Council Speaker, Dr. Azziz Dweik. <br><br>
Deliveries of gas were stopped, checkpoints were closed, and the Israeli
government stopped paying the taxes it owes for Palestinian trade as it
all must pass through the Israelis, causing havoc to ensue in the
Palestinian economy. The public transportation, fishing and farming
industries were all nearly destroyed due to fuel shortages, closures, and
Wall and settlement expansion and the ensuing land confiscation in 2006.
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