Sugar Cubes

As if the surrounding Israeli wall with the only gate’s key with Israelis which going through requires a near-impossible to get permit from the Israeli militaries (the IOF), Qalqilia receives the new year with a newly installed portable checkpoint. The checkpoint was placed near the eastern entrance of the city and gives pleasure to Israeli occupational soldiers who don’t seem to waste a chance to humuliate and abuse Palestinians:

Happy New Year; thorough search and humiliation at military checkpoints

Only a few hours before the beginning of the New Year, Israeli soldiers installed a portable military checkpoint near the eastern entrance of the West Bank city of Qalqilia, and started to abuse the residents and humiliate them.

Palestinian Photographer Mohammad Athba was present when the army installed a military roadblock at the eastern entrance of Qalqilia, and barred the residents from crossing unless they go through procedures which could only be described as inhuman and abusive.

“I saw dozens of residents forced to empty their bags, while soldiers were throwing the belongings of the residents, carelessly and violently”, Athba said, “Soldiers were forcing the residents to lift their clothes, completely, and whenever the soldiers felt that this is not a full exposure of the body they asked the residents to do it again, and again”.

“One of the soldiers asked me to leave the area, and not to film the incident…and claimed that this is a closed military zone”, Athba added, “I refused to leave, and asked him to show me the military order which declares the area as a closed military zone”.

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By Mustafa Barghouti*

What is the current situation on the ground in Palestine? The Israeli narrative that continues to dominate the international media presents an image that is absolutely at odds with reality. The Gaza redeployment was spun as the beginning of a peace process; a great retreat by General Ariel Sharon, who was portrayed as a man of peace. Yet the fact remains that Palestine is 27,000 square kilometres, of which the West Bank constitutes only 5,860 square kilometres, and the Gaza Strip, just 360 sq km. This is equal to only 1.3 per cent of the total land of historic Palestine. So even if Sharon really had withdrawn from Gaza, this would amount to just 5.8 per cent of the occupied territories.

*Mustafa Barghouti is secretary-general of the Palestinian National Initiative