Palestine-Israel, more news of AAtW from a war zone

Saturday 27.12.2008 Tel Aviv demonstration video at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bB23y9WQOWE
Saturday, in response to Gaza Bombings in Manhattan just hours after our demo in Tel Aviv, there
was one in New York. "A demonstration today in front of the Israeli consulate ---- When news from
the destruction of Gaza- which has claimed more than 200 (now already more than 300) lives- reached
New York City, communities jumped into action. ---- Not wanting to waste time, an assorted group of
Israeli activists came together that afternoon to hold signs in front of the consulate. Most of
them knew each other from past demonstrations, but they were never united under one banner. They
were members of Breaking the Silence, Anarchists Against the Wall, and Combatants for Peace back
home.
Today, the day one demonstrator called "the bloodiest day of the Intifada", the Israelis
found themselves without an organization for immediate response. They called their friends from
home and staged a small traffic rally in Manhattan.
Sunday, the motley group will join forces with Al-Awda- a Palestinian organization with a base in
New York- among others, to march from Rockefeller Center to the consulate.
Hopefully, the size of the group will increase (today saw roughly twenty demonstrators), but the
civility of the police will remain. The protesters were put in a "little cage" (policeman's words),
but there was no threat of arrest.
Waving signs in Hebrew and English and one-fiftieth the size of some demonstrations in Israel,
these young activists have maintained their passion for justice and brought it with them to New York".

SUNDAY

The AAtW comrades arrested Saturday while trying to block the road in front of the war ministry during the big demonstration of the radical left were released with a bond equal 100.- ERO and two weeks restricting from approaching the site of the demo. (Still lenient "democracy for Jews"). However when few of us joined demonstrations of our Palestinian partners in Ni'ilin there was another level of suppression. In spite of the regulations not to use live ammunition when Israelis join Palestinians demonstration, such ammunition was used in Ni'ilin - four Palestinians were hit two of them fatally.
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Following is a rough translation of report on the murder in Ni'ilin in the Sunday 26-12-08 shooting, written for the Human rights Btselem by an AAtW member:

"I wrote down the details of what happened for Btselem and thought that
people on the list may be interested too... Hebrew only, sorry.

On Sunday, the 28/12/08 there was in Ni'ilin a demonstration in protest of the massacre in Gaza.
Very fast the demonstration escalated into confrontations in few locations between the army &
gendarmes that shoot bullets covered with rubber & tear gas and villagers that threw stones on the
state force.

The biggest focus of confrontation was in the main entrance to the village, near the intersection
between road 446 and road 4460, and there were concentrated lot of gendarmes. A second focus was a
bit to the south-west of the 4460 in an olive plantation adjacent to the village houses. The most
marginal building - a poultry, is already within the olive plantation and around it were
confrontations. The soldiers were on one side of the poultry and the demonstrators - about 15-30
young villagers on the other side.

I stood near the second focus of confrontation, about 30-40 meters from the stone throwers.

For a long while the state force used tear gas and rubber coated bullets. [which are much less
lethal - I.S] At a certain moment, the noise of shooting changed into that of non automatic live
ammunition (based on my experience). I approached to the stone throwing people to warn them that
the state force started to use live ammunition.

At that moment, the demonstrators stood behind a high pile of stones adjacent to the poultry and
about 4-5 soldiers who were about 20 meter from them, were walking freely to and fro behind a low
field wall ("terasa").

It was clear from their behavior they did not perceive any danger to their life*. The shooting of
live ammunition (not upward in the air) continued for few minutes.

Because of the danger, after warning few of the youth there of the danger I started to retreat
backwards looking all the time towards the confrontation. After about 5 meters of retreat one of
the demonstrators was hit in his leg. I run to him and was the second to reach him. We carried him
about 15 meters backwards, towards a team of para-medics who were there. About 30 seconds or less
passed and we heard shouts about another casualty. I run back but half way I saw four people
carrying a limp body - a person that was shut at his back and seemed dead. Later I learned it was
Arafat Khauagha.

I looked at the location where the people were shot and I have seen another one shot at and
collapsing. The people around him carried him and cried that he was shot at his head. Later I
learned that his name is Muhamad Khawaga.

The fire continued. The head of the injured was covered with blood that was flowing in a big
stream. The people who were carrying him were covered with his blood.

I run towards Arafat Khawaga and replaced one of these who carried him. I held his left shoulder
and his head so it will not be shaken. My hand that held his shoulder and back was covered with his
blood. Then, one of the youth replaced me. There was no ambulance at that place at the moment and
he was evacuated in a car of one of the villagers. The ambulance arrived a minute later and
evacuated the other three injured ones to the Ramallah hospital.

I will stress again that the use of live ammunition was not of short duration and was not because
of any distress of the soldiers that could have been interpreted as threatening their live[**].
The duration of that shooting was along few minutes in which the soldiers were behind a cover with
out retreating. In addition, a short distance from them there was a much bigger force - tens of
border guard gendarmes, that had not come "to save them" - proving that no danger was felt there.

In addition, Araphat Khawaga was shot at his back, meaning his back was towards the soldiers while
he was shot at - hardly any threat to them at all.

====================
** The spokesperson of the Israeli army declare each time the state forces murder a Palestinian that
"they were just protecting themselves as there was a threat on their lives..."
-------------------------
In the evening, few hundreds people participated in a vigil in the center of Tel Aviv, with a small
counter demonstration of the nationalists.

An enlarged meeting of AAtW happened after the end of the vigil and various activities - including
joining these of the wider radical left.


MONDAY

Comrades traveled to Ni'ilin to participate in the funeral of Arafat Khawagah who was shot at his
back with live ammunition during the Saturday demo in solidarity with Gaza.

After learning about meetings of organization about future protests against the assault on Gaza the
state declared the region along the north of Gaza strip as in status of emergency rule so they it
will be legal for them to prevent us from demonstrate and/or do direct actions there.

Rumors say it is really intended to block the media from exposing their military maneuvers to the
public...

Some comrades participated in the solidarity with Aza demonstration in the Jafa suburb of Tel Aviv
- where Palestinians who were not transfered 1948 are concentrated.

video of Monday 29.12.2008 funeral and confrontation at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SdamN9vNdxc

TUESDAY
At the evening we did again a big vigil at the city center with our drumming circle and hand-loudspeaker with about 200 participants at its pick.

WEDNESDAY
At center of town, small group of 30 tried to give our "color" to the new year night.
Tel-Aviv Happy New War March Photos: https://israel.indymedia.org/newswire/display/10096/index.php

THURSDAY
Invitation:
Israel's attack on Gaza, kills hundreds of Israeli and Palestinian people. This Thursday, January
1st we will take our dissent to the streets of Tel Aviv with a Critical Mass Against the Occupation
to say "No!" to the War , "No!" to the Siege and "No!" to the Israeli occupation of Palestine.
Please join us with a bicycle, inline skates, or any other non-propelled vehicle.

About 40 of us converged afternoon at the city municipality square. A police force of about 20 was
waiting for us, making it clear by loudspeaker that any organized activity - even driving along the
bicycles spathes will result with arrest and damage to the bicycles.

We decided to re-converge in another place - informed to most of the participants that could be
trusted. From there we started our critical mass against the war in Gaza along the main boulevard and
then along the main road.

Pictures: https://israel.indymedia.org/newswire/display/10097/index.php

FRIDAY

Early in the morning activists of the AAtW out smart the police, shortly blocked the road and
staged a street theater of a "die in" at the entrance to the military air port of Tel Aviv - where
the pilots and other high ranking are flayed daily to the far bases in the south and north for the
daily war crimes. 18 comrades were arrested and the shamed police avenged by asking the court judge
for three days jail time for them being dangerous and for "investigation". The judge order their
stay in jail for the two days weekend (till Sunday morning). Tel Aviv (Sdeh Dov airport)
demonstration Friday 2.1.2008 at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WpeC7P-2LfU

AATW *Press Release*
*Die-in Against the War in Gaza*
*18 activists from 'Anarchists Against the Wall" were arrested this morning, as they blocked the
entrance to the Sde Dov air force base.*

Pictures at https://israel.indymedia.org/newswire/display/10099/index.php


*The demonstrators lay on the entrance road to the base and pretended to be dead in opposition to
the killing in Gaza.*

About 20 activists from 'Anarchists Against the Wall' arrived today, Friday morning, at 6am, to the
air force base Sde Dov, and blocked the entrance to the base. The activists lay on the road and
pretended to be dead, dressed in white and covered in red paint, representing the large amount of
blood on Gaza's streets. After about 10 minutes all of the activists to joined the die-in were
arrested.

Ayala, one of the activists: "We pretended to be dead as an installation that is meant to
illustrate to the IDF's pilots the results of their actions in Gaza. A pilot who is at a hight of
thousands of feet, who aims toward a target, and presses a button, can ignore, forget or even not
grasp that in this very instant he killed innocent people. We came here to remind this.*

Since the beginning of this war, the air force has bombed Gaza 300 times. In these bombings more
than 400 Palestinians have been killed, hundreds of civilians. It is impossible to be against the
bombing of civilians in Sderot without being against massive killing of citizens in Gaza.

International Laws of War obligate as much avoidance as possible from harming civilians. The
Israeli air force's bombings on heavily populated Gaza cannot but harm civilians and are a war
crime. Every pilot that bombs Gaza bombs a civilian population and he is a war criminal.


For more details: Adar 0525-444-866

Related

* http://awalls.org
* http://activestills.org



Because of too many arrested early in the morning we participated in joint demonstrations against
the separation fence only in Jayyous - where lot of tear gas was used, and in Bil'in - which was
again an experimental field for "low lethal means for crowd control". This Friday In Bil'in, the
state force did another experiment with the noise machine and new bullets. In the experiment of the
noise machine, it replaced at the beginning most of the state repression. For long time they did
not use tear gas or shooting with rubber coated bullets in spite of intense barrage of stones thrown
by the kids. It seems the state force main task - besides the experiment, was to prevent the
recurring of the cutting of the separation fence as done on the Sunday demonstration against the war
in Gaza.

SATURDAY

During the week was distributed the call for demonstration on Saturday in the name of the coalition
of organizations against the war (in Gaza) - the Anarchists against the Wall initiative are in it:

"The killing in Gaza continues. Hundreds have been killed, thousands injured, air-strikes have
caused utter devastation and entire families are left homeless.

Civilians in the south of Israel are being held captive by a government which lies to them and
abuses them. Destruction and death in Gaza will not ensure their future, but rather lead to more
violence and killings.

Join us in protest this coming Saturday, 3.1.2009, in Tel aviv. Together we will call out:

Stop the Killing! No to the Siege! Yes to life for both peoples!

In these dark days, let us stick to our message:

Jews and Arabs refuse to be enemies!

Our demand: A full truce and the lifting of the siege on Gaza NOW!

We meet at the corner of Frishman St. and Khen Boulevard at 18:30

* Information about transportation from across the country will be published shortly.

Please note: For the past week mass arrests have been carried out amongst Palestinian citizens of
Israel who are exercising their democratic right to protest. On Saturday, at 13:00, before the Tel
Aviv demonstration, a mass protest rally will be held in Sakhnin by the High Committee of Arab
Israelis against the killing in Gaza. Please make an effort to join – your presence is of the essence!

At the evening, after the highest court forbidden the police from interfering with the content of the demonstration thousand of people converged in the city square - including many who participated at the early afternoon in the demonstration at Sakhnin in the north. Few hundreds participated in the anarchist block. The drumming circle was the center of the block all along the demonstration. Anarchist flags banners and chants were targeted along the route by rightists who failed to cause any disturbance.