Bi-Weekly Brief for August 24, 2020
At a time when the Corona virus crisis has crowded out other news, the Alliance is producing news briefs every two weeks to keep our members informed about the situation in occupied Palestine.
Covid-19 cases steadily increase as community spread is detected in Gaza
According to Haaretz (Aug. 23), Israel’s cases total 102,380 with 834 deaths. The Palestinian Health Ministry reports 25,577 cases, including 19,104 in the West Bank and 6,364 in Jerusalem, and 146 deaths. On August 24 authorities announced the first 4 cases of community spread in the al-Maghazi refugee camp in the Gaza Strip, bringing the total there to 109, with one death. The other cases had been detected at the Rafah border crossing where quarantine was imposed. The camp has been locked down and the entire Gaza Strip placed under a 48-hour curfew.
Israel intensifies the already brutal collective punishment of Gaza
For the last 11 days Israel has subjected the Gaza Strip to air strikes and artillery fire as a reprisal, it says, for the incendiary balloons and handful of rockets sent from Gaza to pressure Israel to end its 14-year-long siege. An UNRWA school in al-Shati camp was bombarded. On August 13 Israel stopped allowing Gaza to import fuel or anything apart from some food and medicine, leading to the shut down of the Strip’s sole power plant, and the reduction of electricity to 3 or 4 hours a day. After repeatedly firing on fishing boats along the coast, Israel on August 16 announced the closure of the sea, depriving thousands of families of their livelihoods.
Occupation business as usual in the West Bank and East Jerusalem
There was one piece of good news in the otherwise bleak picture of ongoing raids, arrests, demolitions and dispossession: the August 17th release without charge of Mahmoud Nawajaa, the coordinator of the BDS Committee in the West Bank. On the same day, Israeli private security contractors shot a hearing-impaired Palestinian who failed to react to demands to stop at a checkpoint. Many were wounded in demonstrations protesting land grabs and the ‘normalization’ deal between Israel and the United Arab Emirates (UAE) and on August 19, 16-year-old Mohammed Matar was shot and detained near Ramallah. The next day the Israeli army informed his family that he was dead. On August 24 Israel set up an outpost in the village of Birin in Hebron district, a prelude to building a new settlement.
Annexation ‘temporarily suspended’ by UAE normalization deal
While Palestinians denounced the UAE for selling them out by agreeing to establish full diplomatic relations in exchange for Israel’s ‘postponing’ annexation in a deal brokered by the Trump Administration, the UAE was praised by Germany and the UK, and several countries are expected to follow in Mohammed Bin Zayed’s footsteps. As a reward, the UAE will be able to purchase F-35 jets from the US.
See Wafa News Agency and the Palestinian Center for Human Rights
