The Only Democracy in the Middle East: 09.04.2010

This Friday’s demos were themed in respect to the Deir Yassin massacre. In Bil’in, the village committee and B’tselem photographer (who’s videos you often see here) and dear friend, Haitham Al-Khatib, was abducted near the end of the demonstration. Al-Khatib was returned home, battered and bruised, after over 24 hours in which he was unreachable.

In Nil’in the protests continue despite the continual arrest of the entire local committee. Rubber and live rounds are the norm, and this week, a new type of gas grenade.

In Nebi Salah, I joined the march and planned sit-in, only to see it crushed by the army. Before we even had a chance to bend our knees, the army fired its cannon of gas grenades, which fires approximately 35 grenades at once. After running to safty, at a top of a hill, I got a glimps of what happened next; The army infiltrated the empty streets of the village with the “Skunk”, a tanker of putrefied water and  soaked the houses unfortunate enough to be first on the main street, until it the tanker was empty (apologies for the low quality mobile footage):

“It is not resistance, it’s our living they were targeting!” Said one of the residents of the soaked houses.

The uprizing continued until 18:00 in the evening, after which we were invited to dinner in one of the committee member’s homes, but the army had progressed inside the village, using passing Palestinian cars as human shields and shooting gas into backyards.

More nonviolent demonstrations took place during the week in the villages Beit Jalla, Ma’asara, Beit Ummar and many others.