Palestinian activist Muna al-Kurd (centre) with other activists as Israeli police approach their friends repairing a mural that was defaced by a Jewish settler, in the Sheikh Jarrah neighbourhood of east Jerusalem last month
TWO prominent activists fighting the forced removal of Palestinian families from their homes in the occupied East Jerusalem neighbourhood of Sheikh Jarrar were released from Israeli police custody on Sunday, hours after their arrests.
Twins Muna and Muhammad al-Kurd, 23, have played a central role in bringing worldwide media attention to the protests against armed Jewish settlers’ attempts to expel dozens of Palestinian families from Sheikh Jarrar.
The settlers are using a law drafted in 1970 that allows Jews to seize properties lost during the 1948 war that led to the creation of Israel, a right not extended to Palestinians who also lost their homes and possessions in the same war.
Police crackdowns on Israeli peace demonstrators combined with court rulings and settler organisations are designed to strip Palestinian families of their homes and land. The Israeli state has tried to silence both Israelis and Palestinians who resist, according to Zo HaDerekh (This Is The Way) the Communist Party of Israel’s Hebrew-language weekly
Bezalel Smotrich’s measures to extend Israeli property law into the West Bank are a continuation of a decades-long project to dispossess Palestinians and preclude statehood, argues HUGH LANNING
Groups are urging the US government to secure the 16-year old’s release as his mental and physical health decline dramatically after nine months inside Ofer prison, writes LINDA PENTZ GUNTER
Taking a brief look at who the US president surrounds himself with reveals a team dedicated to the complete erasure of Palestine, not justice and civil rights for its people, writes TERRY HANSEN