QALQILIYA, Friday, January 29, 2021 – Palestinians Thursday evening shut down the Nablus-Qalqiliya Road to Israeli settler movement, according to an activist.
Fatah Spokesman in Qalqiliya Murad Ishteiwi said that members of the Popular Resistance Committees closed the road connecting Nablus with Qalqiliya, successfully preventing groups of Israeli settlers from launching planned attacks on Palestinian vehicles and property.
Israeli forces intervened and opened fire towards the Palestinian activists who kept watch that night to fend off planned settler attacks, causing a number to suffocate from tear gas and detaining two.
One of the two detainees was identified 61-year-old Khairi Hannoun, who made headlines in last August after Israeli soldiers beat him and threw him to the ground as he participated in an anti-settlement and land grab protest in Shufa village, south of Tulkarm, while a soldier pressed his knee on his neck while on the ground, a scene reminiscent of the event that led to the death of African-American George Floyd after a police officer pressed his knee into Floyd’s neck while detaining him on May 25 in Minneapolis.
Palestinian communities across the West Bank have been organizing “popular committees” to defend villages at night, and, on several occasions, these committees have defended the village successfully against night-time military raids and settler attacks.
There are over 700,000 Jewish Israeli settlers living in hundreds of colonial settlements in the West Bank and East Jerusalem in violation of international law.
Israeli severely restricts Palestinians’ freedom of movement through a complex combination of approximately 100 fixed checkpoints, flying checkpoints, settler-only roads and various other physical obstructions.
Source: WAFA
