Israeli forces fired on Palestinians in Gaza every day during the month of February, particularly in the so-called Access Restricted Areas along the Gaza-Israel boundary, the United Nations monitoring group OCHA reported.
The Rafah crossing with Egypt — the sole exit and entry point for the vast majority of Gaza’s 1.8 million residents — remained closed throughout the month. According to OCHA, an estimated 30,000 Palestinians in Gaza were waiting to cross into Egypt, including medical patients and students.
The crossing was was opened only 158 days last year and was last opened in both directions between 20 and 22 January, OCHA reported.
Protests were held across Gaza to demonstrate “widespread frustration over the deteriorating situation,” particularly the slow pace of reconstruction after Israel’s destructive assault on Gaza last summer, the non-payment of salaries to public employees, the closure of Rafah crossing and the longstanding siege, OCHA added.
Only ten trucks of exports were allowed to leave Gaza via the Israeli-controlled commercial crossing between 3 February and 2 March. “Since the imposition of the blockade in June 2007, Israel has banned almost completely the exit of goods from Gaza to the West Bank and Israel, which were the main markets for Gaza products,” OCHA stated.
Settler attacks
Meanwhile, in the occupied West Bank, Israeli settlers reportedly set fire to a Greek Orthodox Church in East Jerusalem and to a mosque in Jaba village near Bethlehem on 25 February. “In both incidents, racist graffiti was sprayed on the buildings’ walls,” OCHA reported.
“Death to the Arabs” was among the hateful messages sprayed on the walls of a secondary school in Urif village near Nablus late last month.
A ten-year-old Palestinian boy was beaten with an iron bar by a group of settlers in Hebron late last month; the following day the child was detained by Israeli forces for allegedly throwing stones at an Israeli soldier, OCHA reported.
Israeli settlers beat a 55-year-old shepherd in the Hebron area while he was grazing his sheep near Susya settlement in late February. A group of settlers physically assaulted a Palestinian man with a metal pipe in Jalud village near Nablus on 17 February.
Earlier in the month, on 5 February, a five-year-old Palestinian boy in Hebron was seriously injured in a hit-and-run incident involving a settler vehicle.
“This is the second such incident so far in 2015,” OCHA stated. “During the whole of 2014, 23 Palestinians, including 17 children, were injured and two others were killed in traffic-related incidents involving Israeli settlers.”
On 4 February, Israeli forces raided a secondary school near Nablus while students were still in class, and fired sound bombs in the school premises, forcing all pupils to leave the school, OCHA reported.
Two days later, in the South Hebron Hills, Israeli forces beat and detained two fifteen-year-old children overnight after the head of Maon settlement complained that they were grazing their sheep on land planned for the expansion of the settlement, according to OCHA.
The Month in Pictures: February 2015 | The Electronic Intifada
Do you think the world would be in better shape if the Soviets were at the winning end of the cold war.
Satan used to murder all the Indians and take their land.
Satan dropped nuclear bombs in japan.
Satan massacred millions of Jews in the holocaust.
Satan is everywhere and can be used to justify any bad situation depending on who is behind the mike stand.
If the shoe was on the other foot and people who live in glass houses are perfect sayings to describe this corrupt world that we live in..everyone has been guilty in history from every continent of this globe but who set the seed in the first place..?
It was eve.
Paid for the reconstruction? Try telling that to modern day Iraqi's and ask them if they feel they have got value for money. I would use a smiley, but that would just be perverse. It's bewildering how people want to defend the most insidious of regimes, but get all irate when psycho's like Netanyahu want to go for Iran and the lunatic media wants to report it as news. Iran isn't really the problem is it now?
The man is telling the truth.
What is really sad is that even Hitler allowed aid to Norway during ww2.
Kucinich is a nerdy little elf
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