Saturday, April 06, 2002

"The Peace Initiative in Turkey has called for the cancellation of the tank upgrading agreement


The appeal of the Peace Initiative :

While there is still time...

Israel is murdering the Palestinian people right before the eyes of the whole world, led down the war path by the United States of America, who started to bomb Afganistan to eradicate terrorism. Since the 11th of September, the most basic human rights and the tenets of international law are being trodden upon, while the aggressors seem to need no other justification than that “might makes right.” We, members of the Peace Initiative who have come together saying that we “refuse to bow down to the might of terror and the terror of might,” call upon everyone to raise their voices in support of the Palestinian people, whose country and whose very existence are threatened with annihilation, and of the peace forces in Israel, who continue to struggle under extremely adverse conditions.



As the first concrete act of solidarity, we call for the anullment of the tank upgrading agreement, signed by the Turkish Government with Israel, in the heat of this conflict. We believe that such measures also undertaken by other parties, could perhaps provide an indication of the concern felt for Palestine and a deterrant for further acts of violence.

Let us rally public opinion to put pressure on the governments of the United States, and of Turkey, as one of the most powerful nations in the region, as well as those of other countries, to oppose Israel’s unbridled aggression; to halt all military aid and support to Israel; to call upon the United Nations to intervene in the region, and to lift the occupation as a precondition to peace.

Now the whole world is Palestine and we are all Palestinians.

Let us raise our voices in a world which day by day surrenders to the terror of power and the powerful, before the bombs start dropping on our heads; before we are executed against a wall or perish by the bullets of sharpshooters, or terrified, in a city under siege; before the hope for peace or for a humane future is completely extinguished.

The Peace Initiative of Turkey
AROUND THE CLOCK COVERAGE


News Update from 8:00 PM GMT to 12:00 AM GMT

Nablus Oldest Mosque Bulldozed: In order for it to open a new battlefront and to penetrate the Old City, the Israeli army bulldozers destroyed the Khadra Mosque in Nablus completely. The mosque, aside from its spiritual value is the oldest mosque in the historic city of Nablus. Over 14 Palestinians were shot dead in today’s attacks on Nablus. Hundreds more were wounded yet denied medical care.

The massacre in Jenin continues: Three Palestinians were reportedly executed after being captured by Israeli troops in Jenin. Over 100 Palestinians, mostly civilians were killed in the Jenin refugee camp’s battles. Hundreds of Israeli army tanks, currently surrounding the camp, have failed to invade the small refugee camp as residents and fighters have managed to defend the camp from numerous invasion attempts. The head of the Israeli military, Shaoul Mofaz is leading the ‘military operation’ himself against the refugees.

Three Israelis wounded: Three Israelis were wounded today when several shells fired from South Lebanon fell in the Israeli northern border. Israeli responded with heavy shelling and warplanes raids on Lebanese villages near the border.

News Update from 12 PM GMT to 8 PM GMT

Real Massacres in Palestine: Scores of Palestinians were killed and hundreds wounded in various parts of the West Bank today. So far, 30 Palestinians have been killed in Jenin’s refugee camp. News reports indicate that the death toll in Jenin is only reported from one street. In other words, there is a possibility of many more deaths in other parts of the camp. Israel’s failure to invade the small refugee camp using hundreds of tanks. F-16’s and Apache helicopters compelled Shaoul Mofaz, the head of the Israeli military to lead the attack himself. Palestinians in the camp say that despite the high death toll, the actual massacre would start if the soldiers managed to penetrate the camp, warning of another Sabra and Shatilla (where more than 4000 Palestinians were killed under then General Ariel Sharon).

Hundreds of wounded have also been reported in the camp. They have been unable to receive any medical attention, as the Israeli army is preventing any attempts to rescue the wounded. Jamal Abu Hayjan, the head of one of the resistance groups at the camp said that the camp residents and fighters have agreed to fight for their camp until the last man. A Palestinian call to the international community to interfere and to end the massacre generated little response.

Arafat’s Headquarters Under Fire: Four of Arafat’s aids and bodyguards were shot at President Arafat’s headquarters. One of those shot by the Israeli soldiers sustained serious injuries. None of the wounded were allowed to leave the compound in order to receive medical attention. Some analysts predict that this may be the beginning of the final raid on President Arafat’s compound.

14 Killed in Nablus: 14 Palestinians were killed and dozens wounded in the ongoing Israeli attack in the West Bank city of Nablus. However there are growing fears that 60 people taking refuge in a building in the city all perished when the building collapsed under heavy Israeli shelling.

Internationals Protest in Bethlehem: Humanitarian organizations, medical workers and International protesters demonstrated in the front of Bethlehem’s Church of the Nativity, calling on the Israeli army to allow the wounded inside the church to leave to receive medical attention. The Israeli army refused. The protesters were confronted by Israeli tanks, although no one was injured, There are currently 200 clergy, residents and fighters trapped inside the Church of the Nativity. Church authorities state that all fighters inside the church left their weapons outside the church.

Balata Bombed: With the exception of Jenin and Nablus, the refugee camp of Balata, near Nablus, has received the most intense bombing by Israeli warplanes today. Palestinians report numerous casualties, however no precise numbers can be proved at this time.

Gaza Strip Bombed: The Gaza Strip was awaiting an Israeli attack in recent days. The attack manifested today, although on a limited level, as the Tel Al-Sultan neighborhood was attacked in Rafah came under heavy shelling. Three Palestinians were killed in the attack, including a 3 year-old girl.

Israel Snubs Bush: Israel reacted to Bush’s call to withdraw from Palestinians cities “without delay”, saying that Israel has to finish military operations first. Meanwhile, chief Palestinian negotiator Sa’ab Erekat said that Bush needs to stop “playing with words”, and call for an “immediate” Israeli withdrawal.

Flashpoints News Radio


Saturday Apr 6, 2002 - Start Audio
-00:00 Dennis Bernstein ongoing coverage on the slaughter going on in the West Bank.. the BBC reporting heavy fighting going in Jenin.. residents fear a massacre is taking place.. fierce clashes in Nablus.. now w Adam Shapiro in Ramallah.. Adam: army said men, women, and children have to come out of Balata and Jenin refugee camps with their hands up.. the Israelis demolishing homes with people inside.. Red Cross says catastrophic.. Balata one of the most packed refugee camp, 1 kilometer square, 15,000 people live there.. there are fighters in the camps, there to defend the camps.. using old rifles, Israelis using tanks, shelling.. they are indescriminate.. now w Abu Salam Al-Sayat: a lot happening.. they are surrounding Balata with tanks, they warn the loudspeakers the people to come out with a white flag over their heads, no one came out.. THEY ARE NOW DESTROYING THE HOUSES WITH THE PEOPLE INSIDE.. I am 150 meters from the camp.. they are using tanks, 6 heliocopters over the camp.. 20-30,000 residents.. (noise of tanks in background).. I see a lot of smoking houses.. 25-30 tanks, 4 heliocopters.. attacking everyone in the camps.. I have a small video camera.. but no international media here.. yesterday I was video taping from the roof, they started shooting at the roof.. the old city of Nablus, very big, big as Jerusalem.. the soldiers have not entered yet.. 35 people killed in the old city of Nablus.. 60 people buried in the ruins.. they can not be rescued.. Dennis: US weaponry being turned on camps.. Adam: the attack on Jenin the same.. they ordered the people out and when no one came out, they started destroying the camp.. just a last few minutes we started hearing shooting.. explosions all day, the Education Building on fire.. ambulances are prevented from moving.. people bleeding to death in the streets.. downtown Ramallah looks like Beruit in 1982.. rubble and glass everywhere.. all windows broken.. Dennis: internationals tried to form a human shield for an ambulance, carrying a sign referencing the 4th Geneva Convention.. turned back with tear gas and sound bombs, unable to reach the Church.. Adam: reports from the Zinni meeting with Arafat.. Zinni tried to get Arafat to sign a truce.. but Israel escalates.. TIME FOR AN INTERNATIONAL PEACEKEEPING FORCE.. Abu Salam: more tanks are coming.. no one is surrendering.. the attack is starting again, can you hear?.. many houses on fire.. a densely populated camp, 1 kilometer square with 40,000 people normally, more crowded than Cairo (sounds of automatic shooting).. Abu Salam: a huge fire in the camp.. Dennis: the US has supplied the tanks, the heliocopters for this ongoing slaughter, your tax dollars at work.. Adam: people may be wondering why people are not coming out.. in 1948, and 1967 the Isreali forced people out of their homes, into the West Bank and Gaza, and Lebanon and beyond.. they have decided they will flee no more..
-26:00 Dennis: now w Sam Bahour in Ramallah.. Sam: the media has been reduced so much, only a small percentage of what is happening.. Jenin is facing a massacre.. a phone message from someone in Jenin.. Sam reads: heavy bombardment by tank and heliocopters.. wife and kids are screaming.. no water, no food.. where is the conscience of the world?.. tanks firing into the city, I can hear kids screaming everytime that happens.. Adam: Israel is claiming that this is defence, but this is obviously an offensive action.. END THE OCCUPATION, ABANDON THE SETTLEMENTS.. WE HAVE SEEN THIS KIND OF THING BEFORE.. WHERE IS THE UN, WHERE IS NATO?..
-31:29 end first audio segment

'>Saturday Apr 6, 2002 - Start Audio
-00:00 Dennis Bernstein ongoing coverage on the slaughter going on in the West Bank.. the BBC reporting heavy fighting going in Jenin.. residents fear a massacre is taking place.. fierce clashes in Nablus.. now w Adam Shapiro in Ramallah.. Adam: army said men, women, and children have to come out of Balata and Jenin refugee camps with their hands up.. the Israelis demolishing homes with people inside.. Red Cross says catastrophic.. Balata one of the most packed refugee camp, 1 kilometer square, 15,000 people live there.. there are fighters in the camps, there to defend the camps.. using old rifles, Israelis using tanks, shelling.. they are indescriminate.. now w Abu Salam Al-Sayat: a lot happening.. they are surrounding Balata with tanks, they warn the loudspeakers the people to come out with a white flag over their heads, no one came out.. THEY ARE NOW DESTROYING THE HOUSES WITH THE PEOPLE INSIDE.. I am 150 meters from the camp.. they are using tanks, 6 heliocopters over the camp.. 20-30,000 residents.. (noise of tanks in background).. I see a lot of smoking houses.. 25-30 tanks, 4 heliocopters.. attacking everyone in the camps.. I have a small video camera.. but no international media here.. yesterday I was video taping from the roof, they started shooting at the roof.. the old city of Nablus, very big, big as Jerusalem.. the soldiers have not entered yet.. 35 people killed in the old city of Nablus.. 60 people buried in the ruins.. they can not be rescued.. Dennis: US weaponry being turned on camps.. Adam: the attack on Jenin the same.. they ordered the people out and when no one came out, they started destroying the camp.. just a last few minutes we started hearing shooting.. explosions all day, the Education Building on fire.. ambulances are prevented from moving.. people bleeding to death in the streets.. downtown Ramallah looks like Beruit in 1982.. rubble and glass everywhere.. all windows broken.. Dennis: internationals tried to form a human shield for an ambulance, carrying a sign referencing the 4th Geneva Convention.. turned back with tear gas and sound bombs, unable to reach the Church.. Adam: reports from the Zinni meeting with Arafat.. Zinni tried to get Arafat to sign a truce.. but Israel escalates.. TIME FOR AN INTERNATIONAL PEACEKEEPING FORCE.. Abu Salam: more tanks are coming.. no one is surrendering.. the attack is starting again, can you hear?.. many houses on fire.. a densely populated camp, 1 kilometer square with 40,000 people normally, more crowded than Cairo (sounds of automatic shooting).. Abu Salam: a huge fire in the camp.. Dennis: the US has supplied the tanks, the heliocopters for this ongoing slaughter, your tax dollars at work.. Adam: people may be wondering why people are not coming out.. in 1948, and 1967 the Isreali forced people out of their homes, into the West Bank and Gaza, and Lebanon and beyond.. they have decided they will flee no more..
-26:00 Dennis: now w Sam Bahour in Ramallah.. Sam: the media has been reduced so much, only a small percentage of what is happening.. Jenin is facing a massacre.. a phone message from someone in Jenin.. Sam reads: heavy bombardment by tank and heliocopters.. wife and kids are screaming.. no water, no food.. where is the conscience of the world?.. tanks firing into the city, I can hear kids screaming everytime that happens.. Adam: Israel is claiming that this is defence, but this is obviously an offensive action.. END THE OCCUPATION, ABANDON THE SETTLEMENTS.. WE HAVE SEEN THIS KIND OF THING BEFORE.. WHERE IS THE UN, WHERE IS NATO?..
-31:29 end first audio segment

UPDATE: War in Jenin


April 06, 2002 1800: Yesterday at Al Razi hospital in Jenin, doctors and medics watched on helplessly as 28-year-old Nidal Al Haj bled to death inside the hospital yard. Dr. Ali Jabareen from the hospital explained how;the medics waited for a long time, but they could get to him because of the shelling;. Hospitals report a shortage of oxygen and other medical supplies. Our sources in Jenin report the a dreadful humanitarian situation. The Israeli army has attacked continuously throughout the night, the refugee camp and the city. Apache helicopters have attacked and seriously damaged around 50 houses in the western side of the camp, 20 people are reported injured, bleeding in the street. Reports from the inhabitants are that there are 15 dead bodies in different locations, but again ambulances came under attack when trying to gain access to these bodies; this time with ammunition from the helicopters.

The latest news from Jenin is that the Israel army is systematically bulldozing houses in the refugee camp, which is home to some 15,000 Palestinians in an area of one kilometre squared. This is happening at the same time they are dropping tear gas from helicopters on the camp.
For two days the camp has resisted the Israeli invasion so now the nature of the invasion has changed. In an unprecedented breach of human rights, Israeli occupation soldiers announced in the afternoon that they would cease their fire in order to allow the women and elderly to get water only to arrest them and use them as human shields later on.
Since the residents have had no water for days, a number of women and elderly men came out of their homes. However, as they reached the camp's entrance, where Israeli tanks and personnel carriers are, they were all detained. Shortly after that, residents reported hearing the Israeli forces calling out on the microphone to the resistance fighters and security officers to surrender in order to save the lives of the detained civilians.
The detainees were seen strapped to the tanks and personnel carriers, which resumed their bombardment campaign shortly after that call for surrender.. Strikingly, the Israeli officer previously heading the Jenin reoccupation offensive was reprimanded and removed from his duty after having failed to take over the camp in the past four days. Currently, Shaul Mofaz, Israel's Chief of Staff, heads the brutal operation personally. Palestinian officials have thus held him directly responsible for the atrocities taking place in the Jenin refugee camp.

Thinking ahead


Anyone with any connection at all to Palestine is today in a state of stunned outrage and shock. While almost a repeat of what happened in 1982, Israel's current all-out colonial assault on the Palestinian people (with George Bush's astoundingly ignorant and grotesque support) is indeed worse than Sharon's two previous mass forays in 1971 and 1982 against the Palestinian people. The political and moral climate today is a good deal cruder and reductive, the media's destructive role (which has played the part almost entirely of singling out Palestinian suicide attacks and isolating them from their context in Israel's 35-year illegal occupation of the Palestinian territories) greater in favouring the Israeli view of things, the US's power more unchallenged, the war against terrorism has more completely taken over the global agenda and, so far as the Arab environment is concerned, there is greater incoherence and fragmentation than ever before.

Sharon's homicidal instincts have been enhanced (if that's the right word) by all of the above, and magnified to boot. This in effect means that he can do more damage with more impunity than before, although he is also more deeply undermined than before in all his efforts as well as in his entire career by the failure that comes with single-minded negation and hate, which in the end nourish neither political nor even military success. Conflicts between peoples such as this contain more elements than can be eliminated by tanks and air power, and a war against unarmed civilians -- no matter how many times Sharon lumberingly and mindlessly trumpets his stupid mantras about terror -- can never bring a really lasting political result of the sort his dreams tells him he can have. Palestinians will not go away. Besides, Sharon will almost certainly end up disgraced and rejected by his people. He has no plan, except to destroy everything about Palestine and the Palestinians. Even in his enraged fixation on Arafat and terror, he is failing to do much more than raise the man's prestige while essentially drawing attention to the blind monomania of his own position.

Update.........on Ramallah water situation


Ramallah/Al-Bireh, 9:10PM Palestinian Time (GMT+2) -- The water issue is still outstanding in Ramallah. This morning the water crew was able to visit the pumping station after a lot of coordination with Israeli DCO (district coordinating office), even though most times even this coordination does not guarantee protection from Israeli soldiers and tanks. But the situation is so tense they tried to get some assurances that the Palestinian repair crew would not be injured.

It did not work. An Israeli tank tried to smash one of JWU "Jerusalem Water Undertaking" cars while they were attempting to reach the damaged pumping station.

The Red Cross is not cooperating with the Palestinian JWU at all and the repair crew had to move alone. The crew reports that they "were about to be killed many times". Israeli gunfire took place on one of the JWU cars.

JWU repair crew were forced to take to the ground for long periods every time they faced a tank.

Upon reaching the station late morning, they found the doors have been damaged, the pump monitoring cameras shot, the control system shut down, two pumps burned (due to the heavy Israeli Apache shelling that took place two nights ago), another pump was strangely broken. The fourth pump was damaged but repairable.

The Palestinian JWU crew were able to operate the fourth pump today before being forced to leave the station due to Israeli gunfire in their direction.

This will greatly minimize the possibility of a human catastrophe in Ramallah although the pressure will not probably reach all homes.

Sharon tries to destroy all traces of Arafat rule




Two monuments to destruction awaited Palestinians when Ramallah briefly came to life yesterday during the relaxation of the Israeli army curfew: the wrecked compound of Yasser Arafat, and the battle-ravaged headquarters of a powerful security commander.
The ruins provide compelling evidence that the Israeli prime minister, Ariel Sharon, is not only pursuing a war against suicide bombers - as he claims - but wants to erase history: the eight-year interlude when Mr Arafat's Palestinian Authority had some control over the West Bank and Gaza.

In tandem with the physical destruction of Mr Arafat's diminished realm - which included the ransacking of the Palestinian statistics bureau, the education ministry, and the ministry of local government in Ramallah as well as hospitals and office buildings - Israeli soldiers last night stormed the house of one of his most eloquent defenders, the Palestinian information minister, Yasser Abed Rabbo.

Gaza waits for attack


The mood in Gaza is pre-apocalyptic.

There have been rumours in the past week of tanks pushing into the closed territory, of F-16s readying for another round of bombardment, and of plans to re-occupy refugee camps such as Jabalya, and even Gaza City itself.

In some areas, likely to be on the frontline of any exchanges, large numbers of gunmen have been out on the streets by night

People have stayed off the streets, and away from school and work, so as not to be caught away from home when any attack begins.

Normally busy streets packed with students and workers have been silent.

Meetings have been cancelled, and planned activities - such as dinners with friends - postponed.

Instead, televisions have been running hot, bringing pictures of the human and material wreckage of the Israeli campaign in the West Bank.
Pictures of Palestinian gunmen stepping into the street to surrender before Israeli tanks, of scared families only daring to look from their windows, and of bodies lying bleeding in the streets.


Battle rages in Palestinian camp





Fighting between Palestinians and Israeli troops is raging through densely populated refugee camps in the West Bank, with reports of heavy loss of life in the northern town of Jenin.

Residents at the Jenin refugee camp said they feared a "massacre" was taking place, and one Palestinian fighter said he had counted 30 dead bodies.

Israeli air force commander Dan Halutz told a news conference that seven soldiers had been killed over the past two days in Jenin.

Fierce clashes were also reported in Nablus, the biggest Palestinian city in the West Bank, where Israel forces attacked targets in its historic market area and surrounded the Balata refugee camp.

The Palestinians have appealed for international intervention

Israeli forces pushed ahead with its military offensive despite an American warning to stop incursions into Palestinian towns "without delay" ahead of US Secretary of State Colin Powell's tour of the region.

Walk of death in the search for daily bread



CARMEN Danielle Darwish cuts a lonely figure as she hurries down the backstreets of Bethlehem, hugging the sides of pock-marked buildings, to seek food for her family.
It is her daily mission. Ignoring the dangers, the young Romanian-born wife risks her life to get supplies for her Palestinian husband, Mohammed, and his family.

Determined to provide for them, she walks to Jerusalem, through military check-points, praying that soldiers will let her pass.

Although the troops seem to be in most parts of the West Bank, the number of tanks suggests that the battle of Bethlehem has become one of the fiercest of this military campaign aimed at crushing Palestinian terrorism.

Now it is the ordinary people who are terrified and who clearly have no wish to see more bloodshed.

“Sometimes I am scared but I believe in God that this makes me strong,” said Mrs Darwish, who has remained an Orthodox Christian even after marrying a Muslim. “If I die, at least it will be on holy land.”

'We are losing them. There is no blood, no electricity'


AS APACHE helicopter rockets and tank shells smashed into surrounding buildings yesterday, doctors were working at emergency medical stations in Nablus’s mosques while Israel intensified its bombardment of the town’s old city and refugee camps.
The attacks, repeated across the West Bank in Jenin, Hebron and elsewhere, killed 14 in Nablus alone and injured dozens. Among those killed was Muhammad El Aloul, the Governor of Nablus.

Unable to reach her home five minutes away, Dr Zahra al-Wawe pleaded for help over a failing mobile telephone, saying that she could not save the lives of patients dying in front of her because she had neither equipment nor supplies.

“We are in a very critical situation in the old city. We have many, many serious injuries. Four people have died and we are in a critical situation. We are losing them. There is no blood, no electricity and no connection between us and the outside world. Many of them are civilians.”

One of the dead, she said, was an off-duty ambulanceman who had run into the street to rescue a mentally handicapped man, only to be shot by a sniper who was in the surrounding hills.

A dark and dangerous undercurrent in U.S. society


Adam Shapiro is a harmless pacifist who believes he serves a purpose in life by being a human shield.
I met him on a recent visit to Ramallah where he and other members of the International Solidarity Movement, including a number of Coloradans, were protesting the presence of Israeli tanks outside Yasser Arafat's headquarters.
The protests were always peaceful but the Israelis always responded with teargas and rubber bullets.
The “internationals,” as they call themselves, oppose violence of any kind. They do not condone Palestinian suicide bombings, just as they do not condone Israeli military assaults on Palestinian communities. They distribute food, volunteer as medics and stretcher bearers and believe their presence, as foreigners, helps protect the Palestinians from Israel's superior firepower.
When I met Shapiro he wasn't getting much publicity. Most of that was reserved for his fiery fiancee, Huwaida Arraf, a Palestinian-American born in Michigan, and Neta Golan, a 30-year-old Jew born of Canadian parents in Israel. The two women, co-founders of ISM, were hogging so many headlines that Shapiro wryly referred to himself as “the unnamed guy with Huwaida.”
All that changed when Israeli troops punched into Arafat's compound on March 29. Shapiro, trapped inside while trying to evacuate the wounded, spent a night there and was invited to have breakfast with Arafat the next morning. He then described his experience in numerous TV and newspaper interviews.
That enraged militant Jews in his hometown of New York, who denounced Shapiro as the “Jewish Taliban” and “Sheepshead Bay's John Walker Lindh.” His parents, both public school teachers, had to move out of their Brooklyn home because of death threats and his brother, a lawyer, is now being called a “fake Jew.”
The New York Post did not help with a column headlined: “Our Latest Traitor Must Live With His Vile Choice.”
To its credit, the Anti-Defamation League leaped to the family's defense. Calling the threats “sinister and serious,” Abraham Foxman, national director of the Jewish group, said it was “reprehensible to target anybody based on what they believe or what they stand for, whether or not we believe in their actions.”
But what happened to the Shapiros illustrates a dark and dangerous undercurrent in American society.

Images of an Execution


The killing of Mohammed Salah by Israeli police on 8 March 2002
The following material relates to the extrajudicial killing of Palestinian Mahmoud Salah by a Israeli Border Police unit, on Friday 8 March 2002, in Beit Hanina, Jerusalem.

Included, images of the execution with the article and original captions as published in today's Al-Hayat Al-Jadeeda (Palestine), two wire service reports from Agence France Presse, and other articles.

Together -- through visual evidence and eyewitness interviews, juxtaposed next to a record of official statements made by Israeli police spokesmen -- a picture emerges that clearly contradicts the Israeli version of events.

Please note. It is unclear whether the images are still photographs or screen captures from a video. In either case, the answer lies with Agence France Press who distributed the still images via its wires.

Ground Zero/Electronic Intifada


17 March 2002: Sick and tired
Just tell me the number of crimes at which I can lay my pen to rest and demand the world to end the impunity.


1 March 2002: Moving across checkpoints
When we reached Kalandia, four Israeli soldiers on each side of the checkpoint were facing in the direction of the entrance, blocking anyone who dared even to go near. We heard shots at the end of the checkpoint, the direction of Ramallah, as Israeli soldiers shot at Palestinian cars that were approaching the checkpoint to see whether they could get through.


11 February 2002: Leveling Gaza
Two little girls, Manar and Sabine are showing us around blocks O and J of Rafah refugee camp, the site of Israel's largest home demolition operation since the start of the uprising in September 2000. "What's your name?", I asked a little guy walking around the rubble of demolished homes in Rafah's refugee camp. "I am Mahmoud," he said. The boy, perhaps 10-years-old, looks disturbed.


18 December 2001: Interactive Holiday
It's the first day of Eid al-Fitr, the "feast of fast-breaking", marking the end of the holy month, during which Muslims fast and reflect on self-discipline and compassion. Although the sun shines, the blue sky does not speak of the difficult times Palestinians have to endure.


16 September 2001: Taking advantage of human tragedy
More than ever before, there is a free rein for Israel to "kill, destroy and expell", as some American columnists have propagated in two months ago in the Washington Post. There should be no doubt that Israel takes every advantage of the current situation. The eyes of the world are on New York and Washington and there is no single country that condemns Israel's gross human rights violations or restrains Israel's racist policies against the Palestinians.


16 August 2001: Fighting for equal rights and justice
An old woman with tears in her eyes told us the homes were being destroyed "because a colony appears opposite". On the demolition-day she was beaten by a female soldier and her 23-year old son was arrested. Israel is particularly keen on enforcing its demolitions of Palestinian homes that border settlements.

Around The Clock Coverage


Latest Update: Arafat completely cut off; French activists leave Arafat’s office; new invasions; Peres says invasion may end next week; Ahmed Yassin says Arafat will not yield to US pressure; death toll up to 36; attack on settlement in Rafah; details inside..

Editor's Note: The PalestineChronicel.com will keep you updated around the clock. This report will be regularly updated with news as they happen. Make sure to refresh the page for newer updates.

Around the Clock Update:

News update from 1 AM GMT to 8:30 AM GMT:

Death toll up to 36: The number of Palestinians who were killed since yesterday have reportedly increased to 34, including a child. 20 of the dead fell in the city of Nablus alone. Nablus is the largest Palestinian city in the West Bank. Several Palestinian villages were invaded today, including Kabatia and Tubas in the West Bank. More Israeli tanks have been amassing near the Jenin border.

Arafat completely cut off : Palestinian sources say that all lines of communication have been cut off by Israel with PA President Yasser Arafat. Electricity has again been cut off from his office. Meanwhile gunfire and sound bombs were heard echoing near President Arafat’s office. Palestinians are worried that Israel might be planning to raid Arafat’s office today.

attack on settlement in Rafah : Two Palestinians were killed today when they penetrated into a Jewish settlement in the Gaza Strip, near the southern town of Rafah. A clash was sparked at the settlement where also four settlers were wounded.

French activists leave Arafat’s office : After negotiations between the French embassy and Israel, seven of the French activists who were staying in Arafat’s office were evacuated. Several others however, decided to remain. Over 35 international activists broke the Israeli siege around Arafat’s office a few days ago and have remained with him ever since.

New invasions: New Israeli invasions took place early this morning. Large Israeli forces took over the villages of Yatta and Fwar, near Hebron and a village near Tulkaram, and another near Jenin. Two Palestinian fighters died in the Yatta invasion.

Peres says invasion may end next week: Israeli Foreign Minister Shimon Peres said in an interview published in Paris that the Israeli army's offensive in Palestinian-controlled areas of the West Bank could end as early as next week. Peres told the Figaro newspaper that US Secretary of State Colin Powell would not arrive in Israel until the second half of next week. Peres defended Israel’s delay in withdrawing from the West Bank saying Bush “didn't say that the army had to withdraw immediately. He said he wanted it to withdraw, but he understood the need for Israel to defend itself.”

Ahmed Yassin says Arafat will not yield to US pressure: The spiritual head of the Islamic movement Hamas, Ahmed Yassin, rejected Friday US peace moves in the Middle East, saying neither the "resistance" nor Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat would yield.


News Update from 6:30 PM GMT to 12:00 AM GMT:

Massacre underway in Jenin: Palestinian sources confirmed that Israel is committing a massacre in the Jenin refugee camp in the West Bank. Death toll in the camp, following repeated Israeli attempts to enter the area has rose by the hour. Medical sources are unable to confirm the exact number of dead, but they say that dozens have been killed or wounded, mostly without any medical attention. Eyewitnesses say that over 30 bleeding Palestinian, in one spot in the camp are denied medical attention.

Friday, April 05, 2002

6 Palestinian citizens severely beaten by Israeli police in protest outside US embassy


Six Palestinian citizens of Israel were severely beaten by Israeli police and Special Forces in a protest outside the US Embassy yesterday, 4 April. Two of the injured were arrested, along with four others. The arrested injured protesters were denied medical treatment. Around 20 more were moderately injured. They did not request medical treatment, fearing their names would be handed over to the police.

Today's events appears to be a clear repeat of the October 2002 events, where 13 Palestinian citizens of Israel were killed by Israeli security forces and other Israeli-Jewish citizens.

Some 600 Palestinian citizens, along with a small group of international volunteers and Israeli-Jews protested outside the US Embassy at 2pm today,

voicing their anger at the US's open support for Israel's bloody assaults in the Occupied Palestinian Territories. The protest was called by the Arab Higher Follow Up Committee, in a string of demonstrations to take place in the next few days.

Around 60 police lined up facing the protesters armed with batons and large sticks. A short time later, another 60 police arrived as reinforcements, along with 9 men from a special riot unit, "Yassam."

10 minutes later, without any provocation from protesters, the police charged at demonstrators. Protesters began to run away, police chasing

them and beating those they caught around the head and back. It was clear the police had orders to attack and maim protesters.

Israel strikes at top militants


Israeli forces have stepped up attacks on West Bank towns in their operation to root out Palestinian militants.

More than 20 Palestinians are said to have been killed in the fighting on Friday, which focused on Nablus and Jenin and two refugee camps nearby.

In the village of Tubas, near Jenin, rocket-firing helicopters were reported to have killed six militants including Qais Idwan, a senior member of the Hamas organisation.

As diplomatic efforts to end the crisis continued, US Secretary of State Colin Powell told Israel on Friday it should withdraw from Palestinian areas "without delay".

Around the Clock Update


News Update from 12:30 PM GMT to 5:45 PM GMT:

Massacres in Jenin and Nablus: “It’s a real war”, said one of the Palestinian fighters in Jenin, one of many who have successfully prevented an easy invasion of the city and its refugee camp. However, Israel’s response to the tough resistance was reflected in random bombing and shelling that have resulted in the death of many. The city of Nablus and its refugee camps, mainly Askar, have also witnessed fierce fighting. 24 Palestinians have been confirmed dead in today’s attack. The number however is expected to increase since means of communications with the camps are limited.

There are reports of two bombings executed by a Palestinian woman fighter in Jenin and another one in its refugee camp. Palestinian sources talks about many casualties among the Israeli soldiers. Only two soldiers have been confirmed dead. Dozens of the Palestinian wounded in the refugee camps remain with little or no medical attention. More military vehicles are moving toward these areas. Meanwhile, Israeli US-made Apache helicopters have continued their shelling of Palestinian homes.

Reports in Nablus indicate that Israeli soldiers are setting fire in many homes, factories and commercial buildings. Similar to their action in Ramallah, the Israeli army (according to eyewitnesses) have looted many shops in the business district and inflicted great damage on the city, which once was perceived as the capital of Palestinian industry.

Saeb Erekat describes Zinni-Arafat meeting in Ramallah: "The meeting concentrated on the necessity to move toward implementation of the Tenet plan. President Arafat informed General Zinni of our acceptance of the political outline of President Bush, namely implementation of Security Council resolution 1-4-0-2, implementation of Mitchell [confidence building measures], stopping [Jewish] settlements, and meaningful negotiations that would lead to ending the Israeli occupation and to establish a Palestinian state," Erekat said.

Bethlehem latest: A stand-off continues in Bethlehem where Israeli forces surround Palestinians holed up in the Church of the Nativity since Tuesday. More explosions and gunfire have been heard in Bethlehem. There is no word about exactly where, or if there were any casualties or damage. Israeli forces are not allowing journalists to enter the city.

Individual Accounts of Crisis


Dear friends:

I just wanted to write all of of you and let you know what is going on for myself and my family...I am hoping that you may pray for us and hopefully pass this message along to anyone who may be able to pray for us and perhaps help out in any way.....Here goes:



Due to the Palestinain and Israeli conflict I was on the news with my Aunt on Friday March 29th.

The Israeli army went into may aunts home in Ramallah as well as her children's homes, kicked them out and made them stay in the basement, shutting off water, electricity, and chaining up the doors to their homes. The Israeli army shot at my cousins for trying to go into their homes to get their clothes to change and some belongings. They chained up everything and took the keys, ripping up the carpets and destroying their homes. 30 Palestinian males in Ramallah this weekend were stripped, humiliated and murdered in the streets. The media was turned away so this was unable to be shown on television. Noone knows what Sharon's army did with the bodies or where they put the bodies of the dead Palestinian civilians. The tanks are all over my aunts neighborhood where Arafat lives. My cousins may get killed if they are killing random men! I called Hillary Clinton's office and made a statement that is getting sent to Washington. The American media doesnt protray what Al Jezireh shows on Arabic satellite. Its way way way toooo graphic and morbid. I am so mad and upset and scared for my family. My family is petrified!!!!! This weekend has been emotional and tough. My family is living under a war zone. It's really sad. The churches are even being bombed and shot at. What kind of a world is this that condones this type of violence?



We can't move my family here. No travel is allowed and their green cards have been revoked.

I am so sad about what is going on!! I just cry about the whole thing. I have contacted the NY Times and Channel 5 News has contacted me for another interview with my family. I feel that these acts of uncivilization, wrong, and violence from the Israeli army need to be protested. Today on the news (MSNBC) about 200 Israeli males were drafted and chose to go to jail rather than serve in the war because they disagreed with what is going on in Israel and the tactics of the army against innocent Palestinians. The Arab American group talked to Powell today and voiced their opposition agains Bush's lack of involvement and lack of efforts to help Palestinans. I am so scared for my Aunt, her children, and their children. This is so not fair and I feel so helpless!!!! My family is so scared and every time we call Ramallah to speak with them, all they do is cry. I cant stand it.

Somebody needs to step in. George Bush's complacency is ludicrous! The Palestinians have no food, no medicine, no electricity, nothing. A Palestinian's home was randomly shot at today and through their front doors they were shot. A mother and her son bled to death beause the Israleli army wouldn't let them call for help!!!!

I don't know what more to say.

Plunder in Ramallah


From: giacaman@baraka.org
Hello: evidence is mounting that the Israeli Army is stealing people's belongings as they search homes. Even the very precious stores of foods that remain in Ramallah are being plundered.



We have been hearing about this since the beginning of this occupation on Friday the 29th of March, 2002. It took some time for the picture to develop clearly. Here is what they do: they enter to search a home, place all family members in one room, search and leave. When they leave, family members come out of their room and realize that their belongings are missing.

Examples:

1.Stealing Money, Equipment and other Items, and eating people's food.

Saturday March 30, 10 a.m. right behind the Muqata'a in al-Bireh:

" They broke everything when they came in, and stole as well. we are merchants and have money at home always, they stole all the money we have, lots of money, at least 25,000 USD, and also batteries, 3 mobiles and expensive watches. It is crazy, but they also stole our prayer rugs and Qur'an! "

At around 11 am the same day:

"They came in, placed us all in one room, searched the house, and when we came out we realized that the following was missing: 3000 USD, NIS 1800, pens, a watch, a video camera battery, brand new in its box... they left the box, and took also my 050 (Israeli) mobile phone".

At around 12 of the same day:

"When they left I went to see if they took anything, as we have been hearing about this... they stole my two diamond rings, my gold, my money, 1000 USD and 1000 Jordanian dinars, three watches and a video camera and two ordinary cameras, they even stole the precious 800 USD that the Sri Lankan maid has saved to get back home"

At around 1 pm in the same area:

"They searched and stole my money, 23,000 IS that I kept for emergencies... I realized this quickly and came out running after them and told the commander. he told me he will get back to me.. instead, they ran over my BMW car, parked right outside the house, and then burned it. It seems that this was done because I complained."

Nobel's regrets on Peres award



Members of the Norwegian committee that awards the annual Nobel Peace Prize have launched an unprecedented verbal assault on Israeli Foreign Minister and Nobel peace laureate Shimon Peres.

Mr Peres accepted the peace prize jointly with the Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat and Israel's late prime minister, Yitzhak Rabin, in 1994.

In an interview with a Norwegian newspaper, committee members said they regretted that Mr Peres' prize could not be recalled because, as a member of the Israeli cabinet, he had not acted to prevent Israel's re-occupation of Palestinian territory.

One member said Mr Peres had not lived up to the ideals he expressed when he accepted the prize.

"What is happening today in Palestine is grotesque and unbelievable," said Hanna Kvanmo.

"Peres is responsible, as part of the government. He has expressed his agreement with what [Israeli Prime Minister Ariel] Sharon is doing," she said.

If Arafat were killed by Israel, Peres could "share in the blame"

"If he had not agreed with Sharon, then he would have withdrawn from the government."

Israeli operations bring 'wanton destruction


Ariel Sharon's stated objective for Israel's current operations in the West Bank is to "destroy the Palestinian terrorist infrastructure".

But reports from inside the Israeli-occupied towns suggest that the civilian infrastructure - roads, water pipes and the electricity supply - is also being badly damaged, or destroyed, by the actions of the Israeli Defence Force.

Officials from the United Nations agency for Palestinian refugees have told the BBC that the agency's staff are reporting "wanton destruction" of Palestinian infrastructure across the West Bank.

There have also been reports of looting of food and personal items by Israeli soldiers carrying out house to house searches.


Israel ignores Bush as offensive continues


Despite calls by the US president, George Bush, and the United Nations security council for Israel to halt its incursions, today Israel tanks rolled into new territory. A 14-year-old girl was killed by Israeli tank fire as she stood on her balcony watching soldiers enter Tubus, a West Bank town with about 20,000 residents, witnesses said.

Today Hebron and Jericho remained the only main West Bank towns still under Palestinian control as Israeli forces continued an eight-day-old offensive aimed at capturing Palestinian militants and weapons. Operation Protective Shield, which has resulted in the deaths of at least 78 Palestinians and 63 Israelis, was launched following a wave of suicide bombings aimed at Israeli civilians, including an attack last week that killed 26 Israelis gathered to mark the start of the Passover holiday.

Hundreds of Palestinian gunmen battled with Israeli soldiers in the streets of Nablus, the West Bank's largest and most militant city. Palestinians said the army had blocked access by emergency services, making a precise death toll impossible to calculate and forcing doctors to open a makeshift hospital in a mosque.



Israeli troops attack foreign journalists


Israeli troops have thrown stun grenades at a convoy of 25 foreign journalists and consficated some of their identity cards during a confrontation in the West Bank.
The journalists, who were travelling in six armoured cars, were on their way to cover a US envoy's meeting with the Palestinian leader, Yasser Arafat, this morning.

The press pack spotted two Israeli jeeps and an unmarked vehicle blocking the access road to Mr Arafat's compound in Ramallah, according to a Reuters correspondent, who was travelling with the group.

The soldiers inside the jeeps then threw stun grenades at the journalists. The grenades are used to disorient and frighten their targets by creating a loud noise and a giving off a bright flash.

As the convoy turned back, some of the journalists left their vehicles and fled on foot but the Israeli border police gave chase and confiscated the identification cards of some of the journalists.

A bullet hole was later discovered in the car used by the CNN crew. The Israeli army had no immediate comment on the incident.


on PBS is Zbigniev Brzezinski, stating the obvious, on April 1. "The fact of the matter is that three times as many Palestinians have been killed, and a relatively small number of them were really militants. Most were civilians. Some hundreds were children In the course of the last year, we have had Palestinian terrorism but we have also had deliberate, overreactions by Mr. Sharon designed not to repress terrorism but to destabilize the Palestinian Authority, to uproot the Oslo Agreement, which he has always denounced, in a manner which contributed to the climate, that resulted in the killing of one of the two architects of the Oslo Agreement."
After predictable dissent from Henry Kissinger, Brzezinski went on, "It's absolute hypocrisy to be claiming that Arafat can put a stop to the terrorism - and it's -- let's put it mildly -- poor information on the part of the President to be maintaining that. This guy is sitting isolated. Sharon is trying to repress the Palestinians and terrorism is not stopping. How is Arafat supposed to put a stop to it? but the fact of the matter is that his ability to control the situation would be greatly increased if there was serious movement towards political process, towards a political settlement and that the United States took the lead."

Between this brisk statement of the obvious and the eloquent courage Adam Shapiro and his brave fellow internationalists, the truth is getting out, not fast enough, not loud enough, but better than twenty years ago.

Israelis, Arab Lawmakers Injured In Clash with Police

Thursday, April 04 2002 @ 05:27 AM GMT

JERUSALEM: About 20 humanitarian activists, including at least two Arab members of the Israeli parliament, have been injured in a clash with Israeli police near Jerusalem.

The crowd of Jewish and Arab activists were trying to take truckloads of food to the besieged West Bank city of Ramallah Wednesday.

Police blocked their path, using tear gas and rifle butts to disperse the crowd of 2,000 activists at an Israeli military checkpoint. voa

Please visit the Palestine Chronicle Exclusive Photo coverage of the event and the clashes: The Chronicle at Al Ram Checkpoint


Jordan: No Bones are Spared


When Jordanian riot police break up a peaceful demonstration, no bones are spared. Two days ago, students demonstrated against Israeli atrocities at the University of Jordan. Riot police were called in and the bashing of heads and bones began. As a result, 89 students were admitted to the hospital and one student died. One female student suffered a broken pelvis after she was savagely beaten.

Thousands of people have been demonstrating against Israeli violence inspite of the bad weather in Jordan and inspite of the fact that Jordanian police attack and arrest many of the demonstrators. Jordanians want their government to close the Israeli embassy and to cut off ties with the Israeli government.

Toujan Faisal, who has become a symbol of courage for speaking out against the Jordanian government was rearrested the day before she was scheduled to have a press conference in which she had planned to talk about what had happened to her. The government warned her not to attempt holding the conference and when Toujan defied the order, she was violently grabbed from her home the night before the conference was to take place. Her brother, who was visiting her at the time was also beaten and arrested.

Violence and Excuses in the Mideast


Many are calling for the Bush administration to intervene in the Israeli-Palestinian struggle. And such intervention could help. Yet the Bush administration is making no effort to conceal that its heart lies elsewhere: in creating a coalition in the Islamic world that will support forthcoming U.S. attempts to overthrow Saddam Hussein. Though little evidence links Saddam to Osama bin Ladin or al-Qaeda, the White House has used the cover of outrage at terror to legitimate a new war in Iraq that will complete what the last Bush administration left unresolved.
All the more reason to ask the United States to move beyond its narrow concerns with overthrowing Saddam and instead show the Israeli people that they have no alternative but to end the occupation. The real pro-Israel forces are those willing to push Israel to change its policies.

Bush and the Saudis would like to set up negotiations, restoring the image of calm while the United States pursues its Iraq adventure, meanwhile allowing Bush to weigh in on the side of peace and rational discourse. Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon will appear to be making a major concession to his Labor party allies by sitting in negotiations. Meanwhile, he will block any concessions that weaken Israel's hold over a substantial part of the West Bank. And Bush can then have his war.

This strategy faces some severe limitations. Yasir Arafat is not going to be able to quiet outrage among millions of Palestinians at the latest round of carnage. No matter what he agrees to, it's unlikely he can stop acts of revenge against Israelis. And many Palestinians will see the next round of talk as just another smoke screen to prolong the occupation.


U.S. Mediator Meets With Arafat



RAMALLAH, West Bank (AP) - Renewing a truce mission, a U.S. mediator met with Yasser Arafat (news - web sites) at the Palestinian leader's besieged headquarters Friday, as Israel's offensive against Palestinian militants entered its second week despite U.S. demands that troops withdraw from West Bank cities.

U.S. envoy Anthony Zinni became the first senior official in eight days to meet with Arafat, who has been confined by Israel to a few rooms in his West Bank headquarters since the start of "Operation Defensive Shield" last week.

Israeli soldiers fired tear gas and stun grenades at journalists trying to cover the meeting. Soldiers surrounded the journalists, keeping them about 100 yards away from the compound. Around 30 tanks surrounded the building, and some pointed their barrels at the journalists.


Norway grocery chain boycotting Israeli goods

Friday, April 05 2002 @ 03:47 AM GMT

Nazareth (MENO): Israeli Radio reported today that the largest grocery chain in Norway has announced that it is imposing a boycott on goods produced in Israel.

Company officials of the Co-op chain also urged other firms in Scandinavian nations to follow suit.

The radio added that there would be discussions in Sweden later in the day over a possible widening of the reported boycott.


2002 (Middle East News Online)


UPDATE: War in Bethlehem


April 05, 2002 1230: An emergency medical ambulance team delivered a Palestinian man with gunshot wounds to the emergency ward of al-Husayn Hospital after a humiliating and frightening experience. The ambulance driver and attendant were detained at gunpoint for three hours with their hands tied behind their backs and guns to their heads before being warned not try to save anyone else and allowed to retrieve the wounded man and return to the hospital.

April 05, 2002 0310: In the past half hour there have been 9 male martyrs at The Church of the Nativity. This report has been confirmed by Palestinian sources from inside the church. The men were shot through the hole in the back where the door once was and through windows broken by constant gunfire.

April 05, 2002 2400: REPORTS FROM UN CLINIC NEXT TO
IBDA'A SOCIAL CENTER DEHEISHE CAMP, NEAR BETHLEHEM
These are only a couple of the incidents that the medical personnel at the UN Clinic located next to Deheishe experienced today.
- 6pm: A pregnant woman from Deheishe went to the clinic because she was having contractions. The UN medics helped her give birth, but the baby was born sick. Both the mother and the baby needed to be rushed to the hospital, but the IDF patrols told the UN clinics that the ambulance was not allowed to move. As a result, the baby died 2 hours later.
- Today, during clashes, three boys under the age of 15 were shot by Israeli Occupation Forces. One was shot in the ankle, one was shot in the wrist, and one was shot in the neck. All three are in recovery thanks to the United Nations clinic.
- Also today, one of the ambulances at the United Nations clinic was targeted by IDF soldiers, and hit with automatic gunfire. Many windows were broken out, but the vehicle can still run. There is currently an ambulance shortage in Palestine. All Palestinians are requesting medical supplies as well as unrestricted access for medical personnel to reach the injured.

Around the Clock Coverage from Occupied Palestine


Latest Update: 15 killed in Nablus and Jenin, siege tightened in Ramallah, women shot in Nahalin; Annan criticizes Israel; EU delegation leaves region; details inside..

Editor's Note: The PalestineChronicel.com will keep you updated around the clock. This report will be regularly updated with news as they happen. Make sure to refresh the page for newer updates.

Around the Clock Update:

11 killed in Nablus (9: 30 AM GMT): The Israeli invasion of Nablus has resulted in the death of 11 Palestinians. Some of those killed are reportedly fighters, and others were residents, whose homes were shelled and destroyed. Six of those killed were killed in the Old City. Israeli forces have failed to penetrate the resistance in the Old City, and the Balata Refugee Camp.

Tight siege in Ramallah(6: 30 AM GMT): The very tight siege of Ramallah has resulted in a very severe shortage of food and water. The humanitarian crisis currently developing in the city is intensifying. Israel forbids medical workers’ freedom of movement to aid the wounded. Many Palestinians were arrested in the Tireh neighborhood in Ramallah.

3 killed in Jenin (5:15 AM GMT): 3 more Palestinians were shot dead in Jenin. The Jenin refugee camp remains a stronghold for Palestinian resistance, which provoked intense Israeli bombardment from the ground and air. An estimated 3,000 Israeli soldiers and 300 tanks are surrounding the small refugee camp.

Woman shot and killed in Nahalin (4:10 AM GMT): A Palestinian woman was killed in the village of Nahalin, near Hebron. No more details are yet available.

EU Officials leaves region (3:15 PM GMT): Following a failed trip to the region by a European Union Delegation, Sharon has finally allowed Arafat to meet a foreign official. The US’s Anthony Zinni will be meeting with Arafat in his beseigned headquarters this afternoon. The Palestinian Minister of Information, Yasser Abed Rabbo said in a televison interview that the Palestainians are putting little expectations on the American inititave, although the PA has “unconditionally” accepted Bush’s speech on the Middle East.


Assault on Bethlehem church would be a massacre: Priest



VATICAN CITY: A Franciscan priest who is one of the custodians of the Church of the Nativity in Bethlehem warned on Thursday that an Israeli assault on the church to flush out Palestinians hiding there who result in "a massacre".

"What I fear is that the Israelis are preparing a commando operation. That would be disastrous. In that case we could expect a massacre," Father David Jaeger, a spokesman for the Franciscan order said.

The Franciscans, along with Orthodox Christians, are responsible for the upkeep of the Bethlehem church which for Christians marks the birthplace of Jesus.

Hundreds of Palestinians have taken refuge in the church and an adjoining convent run by the Franciscans.

Neither the Palestinians nor their religious protectors trusted the Israelis, Jaeger said.

"The Israelis have said they have no intention of attacking the convent where the Palestinian fighters are gathered in the cloister. But we can't trust them."


An Israeli View from Arafat's Compound


It is not Israeli actions which have surprised the international peace observers currently holed up within Arafat’s presidential compound. It is the inaction of the international community that most shocks us. Inside the pock-marked building surrounded by Israeli tanks and snipers, there is one question on everyone’s mind: how many international laws does Israel need to break before the UN demands a full and immediate withdrawal?

The list of violations is reaching unprecedented levels, even for a conflict with a long history of ugly behavior on both sides. International law absolutely forbids the building of the settlements, but 34 new settlements have been constructed in this year alone. Collective punishment is illegal. But Israel has now escalated from interrupting food shipments to completely shutting off water to the Palestinian city of Ramallah, endangering the lives of 120,000 people. The shelling of innocuous Palestinian civilian structures such as power plants, schools, and sewage facilities, is occuring at an alarming rate. Unarmed civilians are being killed practically on a daily basis.

There are also growing reports of Israeli troops raiding hospitals and firing on ambulances and journalists. These are grave breaches of international convention. The recent experience of American newspaper correspondent, Anthony Shadid, is hardly uncommon. First, he was shot while in a zone under full Israeli control. The area was quiet and there was no crossfire in which to be caught. Shadid was wearing the required signs on his back and front indicating that he was with the official press as he walked away from an interview in our building. Soon after Shadid arrived to the hospital, Israeli troops raided it with machine guns drawn. He was subsequently transferred for further medical treatment, and his ambulance came under fire by Israeli soldiers manning a checkpoint.

A Little Town in Judea, Besieged by Israelis and by Grief


BETHLEHEM, West Bank, April 3 — They did not know much about the Palestinian, just his name, and that he came from a refugee camp, and that they simply could not stop his bleeding.

They found him on the stony street on Tuesday morning, shortly after the Israeli ground forces invaded. He had a big hole in his right side, it seemed from shrapnel, and so they helped him into their two-room home and made him as comfortable as they could on blankets piled on the hard kitchen floor.

As the crimson stain crept over his pale blue shirt, they called for an ambulance. They called again and again. There was a hospital just a few blocks away, but no ambulance could pass through the gunfire or get by the Israeli armored vehicles that were choking the narrow lanes of Bethlehem's old city.



In chaotic Bethlehem, the dead share space with the wounded


BETHLEHEM This ancient town, revered by Christians as the birthplace of Jesus, on Wednesday was a scene of destruction and death.

In the wake of the Israeli Army's predawn Tuesday invasion, demolished cars lined the narrow hillside streets, shops had their shutters ripped away, and the dead shared space with the wounded as a military clampdown kept frightened residents locked in their homes.

In one small house, in Bethlehem's Old City, a woman named Fatheyeh Mousa was wailing at foreign reporters for help in getting a dead man's body removed from her kitchen. She did not know the man - he was from a Palestinian refugee camp in Jordan, he told her. He was wounded during the early hours of the Israeli incursion, and the woman's family had taken him in and provided shelter.

Since no ambulances were allowed on the streets, he died on a thin mat on her kitchen floor. "He kept bleeding," the woman cried, as a child of about 4 stood transfixed by the feet of the corpse in the kitchen. "We tried to find any kind of medicine to help him, but he had a hole in his waist. We didn't know who he was, but we feel like he was family already. I feel like I lost a member of my family."

The man, who told the family his name was Abdel Khader Abu Ahmad, died from his wounds just a few hours before the reporters arrived at the house.


'He Kept Bleeding:Wounded Die as Israelis Restrict Ambulances in Bethlehem


BETHLEHEM, West Bank, April 3 -- Demolished cars lined the narrow streets of Bethlehem. Shutters were ripped from the shops. And inside the homes, where frightened residents huddled for a second day, the dead shared space with the wounded.

In one small house, a woman named Fatheyeh Mousa wailed for help to get a dead man's body removed from her kitchen. She did not know the man. He was named Abdel Khader Abu Ahmad, he told her, and came from a Palestinian refugee camp in neighboring Jordan. But he was wounded during the early hours of the Israeli invasion Tuesday morning and the family took him in. With no ambulances allowed on the streets, he died on a thin mat on her kitchen floor.

Israel uses intimidation against media


RAMALLAH, West Bank, April 4 — The Israeli army has taken harsh action in recent days against news media covering its campaign in the West Bank, employing intimidation and other drastic measures to keep journalists away from its largest offensive in a generation. Reporters have been strip searched, deported from the battle zone and threatened with permanent expulsion from Israel.



Israeli armored forces occupy Hebron


JERUSALEM Israeli tanks and armored vehicles rolled into Hebron on Thursday evening, the last major West Bank city to be occupied, even as President George W. Bush called on Israel to withdraw its forces from all occupied areas.

Palestinians said the army had faced only light resistance in Hebron as dozens of tanks, armored personnel carriers and jeeps backed by helicopter gunships spread out across the city, but one Israeli officer was killed during a gun battle.

Witnesses reported heavy fighting in other parts of the West Bank, including the northern city of Jenin, where Israeli soldiers were searching house to house for weapons and wanted men. Three Palestinians and two Israelis were killed.

Guerrilla fighters in Lebanon fired nine rockets across the border into Israel, the eighth cross-border attack since March 12. This one caused no injuries or significant damage, but the Israeli defense minister warned that Israel would not refrain from retaliating much longer.


SAUDIS PREPARE TO DEPLOY INTERMEDIATE-RANGE MISSILES



WASHINGTON [MENL] -- Saudi Arabia has prepared for the deployment of intermediate-range ballistic missiles in its southern desert.

A Washington-based defense group reports that Saudi Arabia has built facilities for intermediate-range missiles in a newly-constructed complex north of the desert oasis of Al Sulayyil. The complex is said to contain two missile launch areas six kilometers apart as well as a huge support system.

Global Security, the defense group, released photographs taken three weeks ago from the Ikonos satellite of what were identified as two missile bases and a complex of 33 buildings, eight of them capable of storing Chinese CSS-2 missiles. The photographs, also published in the Israeli newspaper Yediot Aharonot, identified the missiles as the CSS-2, reported to have a range of between 2,500 and 3,500 kilometers. The missile, 24 meters long, is capable of carrying a nonconventional warhead.

Threat grows of second front in Lebanon


The Israeli army and the Lebanese-based guerrilla group Hizbullah exchanged fire yesterday as Israeli-Arab relations deteriorated significantly amid fears that a second front could be opened in the Middle East conflict.
The Syrian president, Bashar Assad, yesterday announced the redeployment of 20,000 Syrian troops in Lebanon. British Foreign Office sources said the move could be interpreted either as a sign that Mr Assad was anxious to avoid conflict or, more ominously, that it was contingency planning.

Israel launched air strikes against Syrian military positions twice last year in retaliation for Hizbullah attacks. Syria is one of the main sponsors of Hizbullah.

Witnesses said more than 100 trucks full of Syrian soldiers began moving into Lebanon's Bekaa valley near the Syrian border from positions further west. The operation is expected to be completed within a week.



Israel set to defy US over offensive


ISRAEL was last night preparing to escalate its devastating military offensive in Palestinian regions after President George Bush’s announcement that Washington will mount a major push for a ceasefire.

The army was consolidating its positions last night after invading Nablus late on Tuesday, and conducting house-to-house searches in Bethlehem as part of its stated objective of destroying "terrorist infrastructure" in the West Bank.

The campaign is believed to be taking a heavy toll on civilians. Palestinians reported from Nablus that a man was shot dead inside his home as he opened a window, while in Bethlehem, Samir Salman, who worked at the Church of the Nativity, was shot dead by snipers while trying to enter the church.

Last night, a siege by the Israeli army aimed at armed Palestinians in the church was still under way, amid reporters that food supplies among priests, Palestinian Authority officials and the fighters and policemen were running low.

Binyamin Ben-Eliezer, Israel’s defence minister, has said Israel will not use force to enter the church, the traditional site of the birth of Jesus. However, Jamal Salman, the Bethlehem town manager, and religious leaders in touch with clerics inside said that Israeli forces had set off an explosion at one of the doors into the church.

"They tried to blow open the door of the Greek Orthodox convent," Mr Salman said. The iron door, which according to local tradition dates back more than 1,000 years, did not open, he said.


Bush tells Israel: enough is enough



In a significant shift in tone and emphasis, President Bush said Israel had to end its occupation of Palestinian cities including Ramallah ­ where Yasser Arafat's headquarters is under siege ­ and withdraw to the borders set down in a series of United Nations resolutions.

He also told Israel to stop building Jewish settlements and to make efforts to spare "innocent Palestinians daily humiliation". "The storms of violence cannot go on," he said in the Rose Garden of the White House, hours after speaking to Tony Blair by telephone. "Enough is enough."


Thursday, April 04, 2002

Israelis, Arab Lawmakers Injured In Clash with Police

Thursday, April 04 2002 @ 05:27 AM GMT

JERUSALEM: About 20 humanitarian activists, including at least two Arab members of the Israeli parliament, have been injured in a clash with Israeli police near Jerusalem.

The crowd of Jewish and Arab activists were trying to take truckloads of food to the besieged West Bank city of Ramallah Wednesday.

Police blocked their path, using tear gas and rifle butts to disperse the crowd of 2,000 activists at an Israeli military checkpoint. voa

Please visit the Palestine Chronicle Exclusive Photo coverage of the event and the clashes: The Chronicle at Al Ram Checkpoint


Latest Update: Church of Nativity Shelled; Hamas fighter killed in Jenin; Israeli flag raised on Ramallah security headquarters; Israel rejects EU request to meet Arafat; Israeli warplanes bomb Jenin; reports: Sharon gives order to kill Arafat; details inside ..

From Warsaw to the West Bank


Women throw hand grenades. Children fight like soldiers. Occupying soldiers prevent food and medicine from the civilian population. Buildings and homes are destroyed. Arms are smuggled. A relatively unarmed civilian population fights one of the most powerful armies in the world.



Welcome to the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising of April, 1943. Under the leadership of Mordecai Anielewicz, Warsaw Ghetto Jews staged the first urban uprising in Occupied Europe. Jewish fighters held out against heavy German attack for 27 days. Their arsenal consisted of nine rifles, 59 pistols, and several hundred grenades, explosives, and mines.

Clearly, Jews faced overwhelmingly superior forces. Consider the results of the Nazi’s military victory: Of the Jews captured, 7,000 were shot, 7,000 were transported to the death camp of Treblinka, and 15,000 were shipped to Lublin. Among the Nazis and their collaborators, the losses were 16 dead and 85 wounded

Humiliation sows hatred


Just before the arrival of American envoy Anthony Zinni, and in the wake of severe terrorist attacks that took many lives, the IDF is completing wide-scale operations in the refugee camps and cities of the West Bank and Gaza. On Monday, forces raided Ramallah and the Jabalya refugee camp in Gaza. A day earlier, they took over Qalqiliyah and the Deheisheh refugee camp, as well as conducting operations in Tul Karm, Nablus and Jenin. Some 160 Palestinians have been killed, many under disputed circumstances. During the course of the raids, the men of the camps were gathered, blindfolded, and their hands tied, and they were identified and interrogated before being released. Some 2,000 men were questioned, and only a few remained under arrest as suspects as belonging to terrorist groups.


Fear stalks the streets of Bethlehem:Israeli troops leave a trail of destruction in one of Christianity's holiest sites


The bodies of Samaya Moussa Abda, 64, and her son Khalid Yakoub Isa Abda, 37, were locked as if in a final embrace, sprawled against a bloody sofa on the floor of their little shop in Bethlehem's old quarter.
The Israeli soldiers who came to their door on Monday had been shouting through the metal door for Samaya and Khalid to open up.

When they refused the soldiers fired 18 bullets through the door, cutting down Samaya and her son, who had collapsed and died in the gloomy ground floor room.

Khalid's brother Yousef, who showed us the bodies where they lay, took us through his house. He showed us where a missile from an Apache helicopter had blown a hole through the wall of his children's bedroom.


Analysis: Palestinian security nerve centre hit



Israeli forces are in control of the Palestinians' West Bank security base just outside Ramallah, after heavy fighting which virtually destroyed the large compound.

Israel said it was trying to get 50 wanted men who had taken refuge inside the complex.

But the attack could have far-reaching implications. The Preventive Security Headquarters was the nerve centre of the Palestinian security apparatus, key to co-ordination with Israel and contacts with the United States.

Senior Israeli security sources say the militants were handed over to stop the fierce bombardment of the compound

This was the organisation responsible for rounding up militants behind anti-Israeli attacks.

Its head, Jibril Rajoub, was the Palestinian point man for security co-ordination with the Israelis.

The complex had a prison for those arrested in crackdowns by Mr Rajoub's forces - it seems these were among the wanted men Israel was seeking, and eventually apprehended.

Shooting erupts near Bethlehem church



Gunshots and explosions have been heard around Manger Square in Bethlehem, as Israel presses ahead with its offensive against Palestinian militants.
Palestinian fighters inside the Church of the Nativity told the BBC that Israeli forces had blown open the back door, leaving only a corridor separating them from the soldiers.

The Israeli army denied that it had stormed the church, but said its soldiers fired shots while chasing militants who had escaped from the church.

Bethlehem priest shelters Palestinians



Churches in Bethlehem are packed - not with worshippers or tourists visiting the reputed birthplace of Christ, but with local families fleeing from Israeli tanks and soldiers.
Some militants have sought shelter in the Church of the Nativity in Manger Square and Father Magdi Siryani said churches all over the town were being used as refuges.

The only place to go, the last resort, is the churches

His own Church of Our Lady Fatima was housing about 25 people, he told the BBC.

"Dozens and dozens of churches are full of people who just fled this terror," he said.

"People are terrorised, they are panicking outside.

"The only place to go, the last resort, is the churches."


Israel has lost moral superiority: Barak



HAMBURG: Former Israeli prime minister Ehud Barak warned in an interview released Wednesday that Israel has lost its "moral superiority" during the escalating conflict with the Palestinians.

"We have lost our moral superiority in the last few months," Barak told the German weekly magazine Stern in an interview released ahead of publication on Thursday.

"We cannot only be the stronger side. We must also be right."

Barak said a tarnished international image could diminish Israel's political power, adding that a military operation would not resolve its dispute with the Palestinians.

"(A military operation) can only be part of a more comprehensive policy. The other elements include the fight for unity among Jews and international legitimation for what we are doing."

He said it was not Israel's right to topple Yasser Arafat as leader of the Palestinians.

Shekel gains brief respite



Last week, the shekel sank to levels not seen in more than a decade as security concerns grew, and worries intensified about the impact on an already stretched budget of more defence spending.


Truth is a scarce commodity as propaganda war gets into its stride


Mr Peres appears to present the friendly, humanistic, honourable Israeli government which the world wants to believe in. Journalists who ask Mr Peres soft questions – which means just about all of them – have to forget that it was he who launched Israel's "Grapes of Wrath" operation, which led to the 1996 massacre of 108 Lebanese civilians at a UN camp in Qana.

Tuesday, April 2, 2002 Urgent: Eyewitness report from Ramallah


Ramallah, Occupied Palestine -- My name is Tzaporah Ryter. I am an American
student from the University of Minnesota. I currently am in Ramallah. We are
under a terrible siege and people are being massacred by both the Israeli
army and armed militia groups of Israeli settlers. They are shooting outside
at anything that moves.


I am urgently pleading for as much outside help as possible to help save
lives here.


I arrived in Ramallah last Thursday. I had come back for a visit to the
Palestinian city where I had been previously living and studying. On
Thursday afternoon, the Israeli army began sealing off each entrance to
Ramallah and there were rumors that they planned to invade.


People were rushing back home from across checkpoints and also people were
trying to flee. People were not allowed to go out and many working people --
with homes and children to return to -- were not allowed in, everyone was
trying to take cover. Those traveling in began desperately searching for
alternative ways and traveling in groups, but the Israelis were firing upon
them and everyone was running and screaming.

Random Thoughts From A City Under Siege


FIRST, I would like to explain that I am just like you, or anyone else for that matter, and that I am not special in any way for being where I am. While it is not simply an issue of consequence that I am sitting in the middle of the Israeli-Palestinian war, it could just as well be any one of you sitting in my place. And from where I am sitting, I constantly hear the sound of Israeli tanks pounding away in residential neighbourhoods with their high-velocity and lethal machineguns.

Hundreds, no, make that thousands of bullets flying. I wonder where they all go. Two ended up in my friend's kitchen. So far today, at least two have ended up in Palestinians who are now dead. I am sure that others are lodged in buildings, crashed through windows, etc., but think of all that damage.

It seems to me that Palestine has become Afghanistan XP (as in expropriated). Like the Taleban in Afghanistan, the rightful and legitimate Palestinian leadership has been stripped of its standing in the international community and has been deemed irrelevant by its opponent. This is not to draw a similarity between the Taleban and the Palestinian National Authority (there really is none), but rather, it seems we are entering a new era of warfare, when one nation can simply determine that the leadership of the other simply does not exist and acts to make this premise reality. And all the while, land, houses and buildings are expropriated by settlers and the occupation forces, or are simply destroyed because they get in the way.

Editorial comment: Stopping Israel's Sharon


Ariel Sharon has embarked on a military folly that bears disturbing resemblance to his ill-fated 1982 invasion of Lebanon. The US, which was seen by many at the time to have given Israel at least an amber light to pursue its destructive Lebanon war, should not repeat the same mistake. For Israel's sake, Washington must intervene to halt Mr Sharon's widening reoccupation of territories under Palestinian control.

Memories are short in Israel - and, it would seem, in Washington too. Twenty years ago, as defence minister, Mr Sharon pledged to uproot the terrorist infrastructure of the Palestine Liberation Organisation, headed by Yassir Arafat, in what he promised would be an offensive lasting a few days. His forces, however, pushed all the way to Beirut, imposing a three-month siege on the city.

Mr Arafat and the PLO were driven out of Lebanon but from the debris of war was born a deadlier enemy for Israel: the Lebanese Shia group Hizbollah. Israel was plunged into an 18-year quagmire that ended only with its unilateral withdrawal in May 2000.

The Israeli prime minister has now declared another war on terrorism, this time against the Palestinian Authority of Mr Arafat, who is accused of sponsoring suicide bombers. Israeli officials speak of a three-to-four-week occupation of areas from which Israel withdrew as part of the 1993 Oslo peace accords. But officials also say the offensive will last until "terrorism is uprooted"


Hawks Control U.S. Mideast Policy


The confusing signals coming out of the Bush administration on the escalating Israeli-Palestinian conflict reflect the latest struggle between the radical hawks -- Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld and Vice President Dick Cheney -- and the realpolitiks of Secretary of State Colin Powell.


As in so many other major foreign-policy debates inside the administration, the radicals appear to be winning decisively, both because of the relative strengths of the major players and the effectiveness of a relentless media and pressure campaign waged by pro-Likud forces -- both within and outside the administration -- to tie Arafat to Bush's larger "war against terrorism."


For months, groups like the neo-conservative American Enterprise Institute (AEI) have published, primarily through the Wall Street Journal and the Weekly, a steady drumbeat of articles attacking Arafat and his Arab allies, denigrating Saudi Crown Prince Abdullah's peace proposals, and pressing the administration to avoid the temptation to rein in Sharon.


As Sharon's tanks launched their siege of Palestinian leader's Yasir Arafat's heaquarters in Ramallah last week,the Journal wrote,"The only exit now...is to let the two sides confront each other until they decide they have no choice but to talk again. This means letting Israel defend itself against the kind of terror that Mr. Bush would never tolerate if it took place in New York. If that includes the exile of Mr. Arafat, so be it."

U.S. Urged to Step Down in Mideast


LUXEMBOURG - Declaring American mediation in the Middle East a failure, the EU executive urged the United States on Wednesday to stand down as primary peacemaker and let a broad alliance of nations mediate a cease-fire and a durable Israeli-Palestinian peace agreement.

Audio/Video
Bush Expresses Support for Israeli Action (AP)



The call came as foreign ministers from the European Union (news - web sites) were gathering for an urgent session here about the violence in the Middle East, where Israel has launched a large-scale assault in the West Bank after a string of Palestinian suicide bombings.

"It is clear (American) mediation efforts have failed and we need new mediation" before the Israeli-Palestinian conflict balloons into an all-out regional war, European Commission (news - web sites) President Romano Prodi told reporters in Brussels.

Prodi said the ministers' meeting should endorse a call for new negotiations, involving not only the United States, but also the European Union, the United Nations (news - web sites), Russia, moderate Arab states, Israel and the Palestinian Authority (news - web sites).

Wednesday, April 03, 2002

Palestine Chronicle Updates


EU supports Palestinians (12:30 AM GMT): The European union has decided to provide the Palestinian Authority with an urgent aid package of 50 million euro. Members in the Union today lashed out at Israel for its invasion of the West Bank, and France began lobbying at the United Nations to send international forces to the West Bank.

America's narrowing vision of the Middle East



Earlier this week, Stuart and Doreen Shapiro were forced to flee their Brooklyn home after receiving a spate of death threats deemed serious enough to warrant an increased police presence on the streets of their neighbourhood.

Their offence was to have as a son a humanitarian worker who had breakfasted last weekend with Yassir Arafat in the Palestinian leader's compound as Israeli forces came knocking holes in his creaking offices.

According to the New York Times, Adam Shapiro, a Manhattan lawyer, persuaded Israeli officers to let him and others into the compound to treat wounded Palestinians. Mr Arafat gave him breakfast in gratitude. Mr Shapiro's sins were visited upon the parents and they are now in hiding.

We should not make too much of the plight of the Shapiros. There have always been idiot thugs eager to dress up their psychopathic tendencies in the respectable guise of a so-called cause. And we can sympathise with those non-violent neighbours who reacted with disgust to the news that one of their own spent Passover weekend breaking bread with the Palestinian leader as he praised the suicide bomber who slew more than 20 Jews as they sat down for a seder.

EU attacks US handling of mediation in Mideast


The European Union, which for months had tried to keep open the door of diplomacy between Israel and Palestinians until Washington was prepared to become re- engaged in the conflict, yesterday said belated mediation attempts by the US had failed.

In uncharacteristically blunt language, Romano Prodi, European Commission president, said it was clear "mediation efforts have failed and we need new mediation. There is not enough action by the US. This is the reality. This is the truth," he told a news conference in Brussels.


Israel, U.S. under fire in Europe


Pope John Paul sharply criticised Israel on Wednesday for "humiliating" the Palestinians, while European newspapers attacked the United States for not doing enough to halt Middle East Israeli violence.

In a strongly-worded statement, the Vatican said it had called in the Israeli and U.S. ambassadors to the Holy See on Tuesday to discuss the crisis.

It said the Pope "rejects unjust conditions and humiliations imposed on the Palestinian people as well as the re-risals and revenge attacks which do nothing but feed the sense of frustration and hatred."

Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon has sent troops and tanks to reoccupy a string of West Bank towns and villages and besiege Palestinians.

Newspapers in Britain, France, Germany and elsewhere in Europe were scathing in their criticism of U.S. President George W. Bush, accusing him of neglecting the Middle East, siding with Israel and focusing too narrowly on his "war against terror".

In London, a Financial Times editorial urged Washington to intervene "to halt the widening reoccupation of territories under Palestinian control".

Lockdown in Bethlehem Keeps Residents Confined to Homes Military Refuses to Allow Ambulances to Collect Dead, Wounded


BETHLEHEM, April 3 – In the wake of the Israeli army's predawn Tuesday invasion, demolished cars lined the narrow hillside streets of this city today, shops had their shutters ripped away, and the dead shared space with the wounded as a military clampdown kept frightened residents locked in their homes.

In one small house, in Bethlehem's Old City, a woman named Fatheyeh Mousa was wailing at foreign reporters for help in getting a dead man's body removed from her kitchen. She didn't know the man – he was from a Palestinian refugee camp in Jordan, he told her. He was wounded during the early hours of the Israeli incursion, and the woman's family had taken him in and provided shelter. Since no ambulances were allowed on the streets, he died on a thin mat on her kitchen floor.

"He kept bleeding. We tried to find any kind of medicine to help him, but he had a hole in his waist," the woman cried, as a child of about four stood transfixed by the feet of the corpse in the kitchen. "We didn't know who he was, but we feel like he was family already. . . . I feel like I lost a member of my family."

The man, who told the family his name was Abdel Khader Abu Ahmad, died from his wounds just a few hours before the reporters arrived at the house.

Nearby, in a small mosque, the body of another man, apparently a fighter, lay partially covered under a green coat and a colorful striped blanket. The man had been wounded, and someone tried to give him first aid, apparent from the blood-stained bandages over his right arm.

The military's refusal to allow ambulances to collect the dead and wounded has drawn sharp complaints and cries of outrage from Bethlehem's residents, including medical workers and clergymen. One ambulance was allowed out for about a half an hour this afternoon, under an agreement negotiated between the Israeli military and the Red Crescent Society. The driver, Jamal Balboul, picked up three dead bodies and two wounded people – and with no room in the back, he stacked the dead in first, and put the two injured people on top.

"It's unimaginable," said the Rev. Maroun Lahham, rector of the Latin Seminary of Bethlehem. "Even in the worst of wars, the Red Cross was always allowed to come and help people."