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<h1><font size=4><b>Special Report:<br>
</u>
<a href="http://members.stopthewall.org/sites/all/modules/civicrm/extern/url.php?u=724&qid=203316">
Palestinian Authority police brutality against anti-Mofaz
protests</a></b></font></h1><font size=1>
<a href="http://www.stopthewall.org/2012/07/02/palestinian-authority-police-brutality-against-anti-mofaz-protests" eudora="autourl">
http://www.stopthewall.org/2012/07/02/palestinian-authority-police-brutality-against-anti-mofaz-protests<br>
<br>
</a></font><font size=3><b>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.<br><br>
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.<br><br>
</b>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.<br><br>
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.<br><br>
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.<br><br>
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.<br><br>
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.<br><br>
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.<br>
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.<br><br>
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.<br><br>
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. <br>
<br>
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.<br>
<br>
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.<br><br>
For Videos from Saturday and Sunday's demonstrations:<br><br>
<a href="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</a><br>
<a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Tvg76s1ShgM" eudora="autourl">
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Tvg76s1ShgM<br>
</a>
<a href="http://members.stopthewall.org/sites/all/modules/civicrm/extern/url.php?u=727&qid=203316">
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PMTwcwQdkY8&feature=plcp</a><br>
<a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?NR=1&v=eMDqOb4rTkk&feature=endscreen" eudora="autourl">
http://www.youtube.com/watch?NR=1&v=eMDqOb4rTkk&feature=endscreen<br>
<br>
<br>
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