Nabuls Standstill As
Israeli Army Collectively Punish Residents
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These humiliated civilians committed one crime, being Palestinians. |
NABLUS, West Bank, Aug 2 (IslamOnline & News Agencies) – While the UN General Assembly decided to convene a special session Monday August 5, 2002, to discuss a long-awaited report detailing events at the Jenin refugee camp on the West Bank, the Israeli army continued what the Palestinian President called “crimes against humanity” in Nablus Friday, August 2.
Sitting in a line on the pavement, eight handcuffed Palestinians waited to be taken in for interrogation, as the Israeli army massively deployed across Nablus, sweeping the city for suspected militants, news agencies reported Friday, August 2, 2002.
Among them is a woman, wearing a long white veil. Her hands are free, but she was brought with the seven men arrested by the Israeli occupation troops in houses around the destroyed homes of wanted activists a few blocks away in the old city, reported Agence France-Presse (AFP).
Their gaze seems lost in a blur, as the curfew imposed by the Israeli army on the northern West Bank wraps the whole city in silence, only disrupted by the humming engines of the dozen armored vehicles guarding them.
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Abducted by Israeli forces, taken to unknown location. |
On Friday morning, the army arrested several relatives of wanted activists after Israel's Attorney General approved a controversial move to banish some relatives of resistance operatives to the Gaza Strip to deter future attackers.
Despite worldwide condemnation, Israel gave its green light Friday for the expulsion of two brothers of an activist accused of involvement in deadly anti-Israeli attacks.
In Nablus, no heads peep out from behind curtains, no cars are in the streets, after around 120 tanks, bulldozers and troop carriers stormed back into the center of the city that was reoccupied at the beginning of so-called Operation Determined Path on June 19.
Anyone who ventures out is met with warning shots from Israeli snipers.
Two more troop carriers screech around the corner, churning up the tarmac already melted by the scorching heat. Six more Palestinian men are escorted out and join the other group.
Soldiers check their identity cards one by one, as blocks of concrete from a destroyed building behind them dangle dangerously above their heads.
On the corner of the main street, there is a gaping hole in the ground where the Israeli army dynamited the entrance to the sewage network, fearing it might be used by Palestinian freedom fighters to escape.
A few minutes later, another four men are brought in by an armored vehicle. For a whole hour, more rounded up Palestinians keep trickling in.
Soldiers roll up the iron curtain of an empty shop by the municipality and herd the captives inside, waiting for instructions.
In an adjacent shop, another group of 12 is more heavily guarded and forced to kneel down with their faces to the wall. A total of around 30 are finally blindfolded and taken away in an armored bus.
The soldiers and the bus driver refuse to say where they are headed and the Palestinians say they do not even know why they were detained.
An army spokesman claimed troops uncovered two bomb factories in the old quarter.
A first building contained a home-made Qassam rocket - the trademark of the Islamic group Hamas - ready to be fired, explosives, chemical materials, pipe bombs, gas containers, gunpowder and pistols, the spokesman said, adding that it was "neutralized".
Witnesses in the town said the army blew up a four-story building, apparently the alleged bomb factory.
In a second location in the old city, the spokesman said troops found a workshop with four barrels of acid, an electronic activation mechanism and measuring tools, as well as ammunition for M-16 assault rifles and knives.
Palestinian President Yasser Arafat on Friday was furious at the Israeli “crimes against humanity” in Nablus. He repeated his call on the international community to provide protection for the Palestinians against “the continuous Israeli terror and collective punishment against our people”.
Meanwhile, the UN General Assembly is to convene a special session Monday August 5, 2002, to discuss a long-awaited report detailing the events at the Jenin refugee camp on the West Bank, the world body said Friday.
Already 17 representatives signed up to speak at Monday's session, to conclude with a vote on a resolution, Assembly spokesman Jan Fisher said.
It was on May 7 that the General Assembly asked United Nations Secretary General Kofi Annan to develop a report delving into Palestinian allegations of a massacre of more than 400 people from April 2-12 at the camp.
The 31-page report, finally released Thursday, said that based on the evidence compiled from public statements and testimony of Palestinians, UN member states and non-governmental organizations, there was nothing to suggest that so many people had been killed.
The report was internationally criticized, met with uproar from Palestinians and human rights groups worldwide.
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