Demonstrators in the West Bank on June 7 joined mass protests to mark the Global March to Jerusalem, and dozens were lightly injured as Israeli forces tried to disperse them. In al-Maasara, near Bethlehem, participants in a weekly march suffered tear-gas inhalation. Demonstrators raised Palestinian flags, pictures of prisoners and Palestinians killed by Israel to mark the anniversary of the Six-Day War. Israeli forces fired stun grenades and tear-gas canisters at the demonstrators. Activists praised the unity of Palestinian people and promised more activities to protest Israeli actions.
Dozens of others suffered tear-gas inhalation in Bilin, near Ramallah, where residents and supporters held a weekly protest against settlements, the wall and the confiscation of land. Israeli forces fired rubber-coated steel bullets, tear gas, and stun grenades at protesters near the wall. Palestinian, Israeli, and international activists who participated in the protest raised Palestinian flags, chanted for unity, and called for the release of Palestinian prisoners.
In Kafr Qaddum, another village, dozens suffered tear-gas inhalation. Spokesman of the popular struggle committee Murad Shteawy said that the demonstration began in response to posters placed by the Israeli army threatening to arrest children in the village. Shteawy said Israel invades the village in the middle of the night to āterrorizeā the villagers. Overnight, a seven-month-old suffered tear-gas inhalation after Israeli forces fired tear gas at midnight, he added.
From Ma’an News Agency, June 7
Israeli deputy defense minister calls for transfer
Deputy defense minister Danny Danon told Israel’s Channel 1 TV: “The Jewish people are not settlers in the West Bank but Israel will make the Palestinians settlers and Jordan will be the one taking control over Palestinians and that’s it.” Palestinian Foreign Minister Riyad al-Malki said Danon’s remarks exposed the “true face” of the occupation as well as the strategy followed by the Israeli government since 1967. (Ma’an News Agency, June 13)
Attackers desecrated graves in a Palestinian Christian cemetery in Jaffa and damaged property nearby, in an incident that bore the hallmarks of a “price tag” hate crime, Israeli police said June 13. Headstones in the Orthodox Christian graveyard in Jaffa, a mixed Palestinian-Jewish area in southern Tel Aviv, were sprayed with Hebrew graffiti, and the tires of five vehicles parked nearby were slashed. (AFP, June 13)