Police pledged yesterday to stop more than 20,000 marchers, including teens with backpacks and parents pushing strollers, who were en route to the Gaza Strip to protest the summer's planned withdrawal -- in the tensest showdown yet between protesters and the security forces.
After a first day of marching and a night spent in sleeping bags and tents, demonstrators wrapped in white shawls held morning prayers yesterday at their roadside camp near the farming village of Kfar Maimon, about 16km east of the border with Gaza. Police were deployed nearby.
Police Commissioner Moshe Karadi said he would not permit marchers to move any closer to Gaza, setting the stage for possible confrontations later in the day. Police have declared the march illegal, and on Monday tried to stop buses with protesters at their departure points to thin the crowd, to little avail. Settler leader Pinchas Wallerstein said the protest could last many days.
"As long as this terrible decision stands [to withdraw from Gaza], there will be a constant presence to prevent this," he told Israel Army Radio. He said the protesters would try to keep moving toward Gaza.
"Wherever they stop us ... we will stay," he said.
Marcher Avraham Ravi, 33, brought along his four children, ages one to eight. Yesterday morning, Ravi, his wife and children were sitting under a tree in Kfar Maimon, getting ready for the second day of the march.
"We walked all night. It wasn't easy with the kids," said Ravi, from the West Bank settlement of Tel Menashe. "But we tell them [the children] that this is to block those people who want to divide Israel."
The marchers want to reach the Jewish settlements in Gaza, and to participate in resisting the withdrawal, set to begin the middle of next month. Police last week declared the Jewish settlements a closed military area, meaning only residents can come and go. Police also beefed up barricades at the Kissufim crossing, the gateway from Israel to the Gaza settlements, adding rolls of barbed wire and concrete blocks.
In the West Bank, two Palestinian militants were killed in a gun battle with Israeli troops yesterday, the military said. Security forces surrounded the militants' hideout in the village of Yamoun, and after the firefight demolished the building with bulldozers. Residents identified the dead as members of the Al Aqsa Martyrs' Brigades, a violent group tied to Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas' Fatah movement.
Israel has intensified arrest raids of militants after six Israelis were killed last week, five in a suicide bombing by Islamic Jihad and one in a rocket attack by Hamas. Militants also fired a barrage of rockets and mortar rounds at Israeli communities in and near Gaza. Israel carried out several air strikes last week, killing six Hamas militants.
The weekend violence left a five-month-old truce in tatters, but Israeli and Palestinian leaders said Monday they would try to stop the escalation. Abbas warned the militants that they must refrain from acting on their own.
"Nobody has the right to take the law into his own hands, nobody," he said Monday.
Yesterday, Hamas gunmen and Palestinian security forces exchanged fire after two Hamas-affiliated research companies were burned down, witnesses said. Six people were wounded in the shootout. During the fighting, Hamas activists burned two cars belonging to members of Abbas' ruling Fatah movement, and fired a rocket-propelled grenade at another vehicle. Fatah activists burned a car belonging to Hamas.
In a clash between Hamas and Palestinian police last week, two bystanders were killed.
Tensions between the sides have been rising as Abbas comes under increasing US and Israeli pressure to rein in and disarm militant groups.
Seven people sustained mostly minor injuries in an airplane fire in South Korea, authorities said yesterday, with local media suggesting the blaze might have been caused by a portable battery stored in the overhead bin. The Air Busan plane, an Airbus A321, was set to fly to Hong Kong from Gimhae International Airport in southeastern Busan, but caught fire in the rear section on Tuesday night, the South Korean Ministry of Land, Infrastructure and Transport said. A total of 169 passengers and seven flight attendants and staff were evacuated down inflatable slides, it said. Authorities initially reported three injuries, but revised the number
‘BALD-FACED LIE’: The woman is accused of administering non-prescribed drugs to the one-year-old and filmed the toddler’s distress to solicit donations online A social media influencer accused of filming the torture of her baby to gain money allegedly manufactured symptoms causing the toddler to have brain surgery, a magistrate has heard. The 34-year-old Queensland woman is charged with torturing an infant and posting videos of the little girl online to build a social media following and solicit donations. A decision on her bail application in a Brisbane court was yesterday postponed after the magistrate opted to take more time before making a decision in an effort “not to be overwhelmed” by the nature of allegations “so offensive to right-thinking people.” The Sunshine Coast woman —
BORDER SERVICES: With the US-funded International Rescue Committee telling clinics to shut by tomorrow, Burmese refugees face sudden discharge from Thai hospitals Healthcare centers serving tens of thousands of refugees on the Thai-Myanmar border have been ordered shut after US President Donald Trump froze most foreign aid last week, forcing Thai officials to transport the sickest patients to other facilities. The International Rescue Committee (IRC), which funds the clinics with US support, told the facilities to shut by tomorrow, a local official and two camp committee members said. The IRC did not respond to a request for comment. Trump last week paused development assistance from the US Agency for International Development for 90 days to assess compatibility with his “America First” policy. The freeze has thrown
PINEAPPLE DEBATE: While the owners of the pizzeria dislike pineapple on pizza, a survey last year showed that over 50% of Britons either love or like the topping A trendy pizzeria in the English city of Norwich has declared war on pineapples, charging an eye-watering ￡100 (US$124) for a Hawaiian in a bid to put customers off the disputed topping. Lupa Pizza recently added pizza topped with ham and pineapple to its account on a food delivery app, writing in the description: “Yeah, for ￡100 you can have it. Order the champagne too! Go on, you monster!” “[We] vehemently dislike pineapple on pizza,” Lupa co-owner Francis Wolf said. “We feel like it doesn’t suit pizza at all,” he said. The other co-owner, head chef Quin Jianoran, said they kept tinned pineapple
RSS