IOF Kill 2, including Student
Palestine Media Center
24 April,2003Israeli Occupation Forces (IOF) killed two Palestinians and wounded three others after raiding a school in Karawat Bani Zeid village, near the central West Bank city of Ramallah.
IOF opened fire at the students killing Faker Ezat, 18, and Ussama Hamdallah Sharif, 24, and injuring two others, residents said.
Witnesses added that IOF raided several houses in the village, which was surrounded and sealed off by Israeli occupation soldiers.
Meanwhile, IOF bulldozed on Wednesday the house of a senior Palestinian police chief and another belonging to a senior security official in the Gaza Strip, Palestinian security officials said.
An Israeli army bulldozer accompanied by two tanks smashed into the house of General Mousa Arafat, police intelligence chief in Deir al-Balah in the central Gaza Strip, the officials said.
The bulldozer also destroyed the nearby home of General Haj Mutlak, head of finance for the Palestinian General Security Service in the Gaza Strip, the officials added.
Neither of the men were in the houses, Palestinian sources said.
Earlier Wednesday, IOF Bulldozers destroyed six other Palestinians’ houses after raiding the southern Gaza town of Rafah, Palestinian security sources said.
IOF have destroyed thousands of Palestinians’ houses in the West Bank and the Gaza Strip in what human rights group describe as an act of collective punishment.
Meanwhile, a Palestinian man was killed and two others were injured on Wednesday when a mystery explosion rocked a village near the southern West Bank city of Hebron, Palestinian and Israeli sources said.
The blast killed Palestinian preventive security member Shibli al-Tmezi, 34, at his home in Idhna, 10 kilometers west of Hebron, Palestinian officials said. His two brothers were also injured and taken to a Hebron hospital for treatment.
Israel Detain ISM Member, Bars Journalist from W. Bank
Also on Thursday, the International Solidarity Movement (ISM) said that its coordinator, Osama Qashoo, and an Italian journalist, Thomaso Besavi, were detained earlier Tuesday by Israeli occupation soldiers in the northern West Bank refugee camp of Nour Shams.
The Israeli occupation army had surrounded the camp and were reportedly detaining a group of Palestinian women and beating a 15-year-old boy, when they detained Qashoo and Besavi.
Both men had cameras and were attempting to document Israeli military abuse of Palestinian civilians when they were threatened with arrest and then thrown into a military jeep, ISM sources said.
Qashoo is currently being held at a police station at the illegal Israeli settlement of “Ariel” and is facing danger of abuse, long-term arrest and maybe even torture, ISM warned.
Besavi was released but threatened with deportation if he attempted to enter the West Bank.
Recently, physical and psychological harassment of internationals and journalists by the Israeli military has been dramatically increased.
In the last month, American ISM volunteer Rachel Corrie was killed when she was run over by an Israeli military bulldozer in what witnesses say was a “deliberate act of murder”.
American ISM volunteer Brian Avery was shot in the face and will need to undergo a series of facial reconstructive surgeries, while British ISM volunteer Tom Hurndall was shot in the head and is currently on life support.
Israeli Killed, Nine Others Wounded in Suicide Bombing
In another development, Israeli sources said on Thursday that a suicide bombing in the Israeli town of Kfar Saba rendered an Israeli man dead.
The young Palestinian man blew himself up at the entrance of a railway station in the town, northeast of Tel Aviv, killing an Israeli security guard and wounding nine others, Israeli medical sources said.
Rescue workers said about half of the casualties were in serious condition. The explosion occurred during morning rush hour, as commuters entered the train station, which serves as a link between Tel Aviv and its suburbs.
The attack came a few hours after Palestinian President Yasser Arafat and his prime minister-designate, Mahmud Abbas, reached a last-minute agreement on the formation of a new government after days of negotiations.