A new Israeli settlement in al-Khuder village
Palestine-Israel, Politics, 6/8/2001

The Israeli forces on Thursday broke into areas under the control of the Palestinian Authority in Rafah and bulldozed a position for the Palestinian security and two houses, while the Israeli tanks were opening their fire on the Palestinian quarters.

Eye- witnesses said that 6 tanks and several military vehicles leveled almost 200 meters of agricultural lands to the east of the port of Gaza.

Several students were hit by the bullet of the Israeli soldiers when a demonstrations started from Beir Zeit university towards the Israeli Sarda barrier which closed the main entrance of Ramullah city from the north.

The demonstrators clashed with the Israeli occupation forces using stones and six students were wounded as a result. Similar confrontations took place in the surrounding of the old town of al-Khalil city.

Palestinian sources said that the siege and closure measures imposed on the West Bank and Gaza, the airport and the coasts have been increase and that a Palestinian woman gave birth to a baby on a barrier to the north of Areiha after the Israeli forces prevented her from heading to the hospital. Despite the fact that the woman was in a very critical health condition after she has given birth, the forces of the Israeli barrier forced her to get out of the car and to continue walking on her feet to the hospital.

The Israeli defense minister Benjamin Bin Aleazer said that he had gave his instructions to the army to chase up the Palestinian citizens inside the areas supervised by the Palestinian Authority called Areas (A), noting that 26 Israeli military men were killed after Sharon has announced the cease fire.

Sharon's advisor Dori Gold said that Arafat has not yet taken any measures to halt the confrontation to enable the CIA director George Tenet to start his mission.

Meantime, Israeli settlers occupied Khallet al-Ein hill in the territories of al-Khuder town to the south of Bethlehem and placed pre-fabricated mobile houses as a nucleus for settlement on a Palestinian territory of 250 dunnums.

On the lands of al-Khuder town the settlements of Afrat, Neve Daniel, Aleazer, and Ghoushe Eitsoun were built, in addition to ring- roads linking these settlements to al-Khalil and Jerusalem areas.

The Palestinian citizen Jamil Muhammad al-Turk (46) died after he was beaten by armed Israeli settlers in Tamra city in the territories of 1948.

In this context, Israeli settlers uprooted fruit trees owned by the Palestinians in the surrounding of Nevidson settlement and set fire in the Palestinian plantation and burnt the fields.

The Israeli minister of communications Afraem Seneh said it is wrong to halt the war against the Palestinians and that there is no option before Israel but to continue the attacks of both the settlers and the army against the Palestinians.

Member of the Israeli Knesset for al-Mifdal party Shaoul Yahloum called on the government of Sharon to continue settlement and threatened of the withdrawal of his party from the government if it will give what he called concessions concerning the settlements.

On the other hand, the higher representative of the EU policy Javier Solana stressed his opposition for the building of the Israeli settlements, noting that these settlements " constitute an obstacle in the face of peace."

Solana reminded that the number of settlers in the occupied territories doubled after the signing of the self- rule agreement in 1993, adding that this matter does not contribute to achieving a just peace. He added that Europe has repeatedly warned against the negative effects of the Israeli settlement policy.

Previous Stories:
  The Palestinian who carried out the suicide attack came by an Israeli visa   (6/7/2001)
  Israeli forces broke into Palestinian villages   (6/7/2001)
  Mitchell's recommendations are not substitute for Madrid conference   (6/7/2001)

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