[This is a roundup of news articles and other materials circulating on Palestine and reflects a wide variety of opinions. It does not reflect the views of the Palestine Page co-editors or of Jadaliyya. You may send your own recommendations for inclusion in each roundup to Palestine@jadaliyya.com.]
The Occupation Forces
PJS: 690 Israeli Violations Against Palestinian Media in Two Months A report by the Palestinian Journalists Syndicate said that since the beginning of 2019 and until the end of November, Israeli Occupation Forces carried out 690 violations against Palestinian media. The violations include shooting of live ammunition and other bullets towards journalists, leading to the injury of seventy-two media professionals, some of them still under medical treatment.
IOF Arrest Schoolgirl in Hebron Israeli Occupation Forces on Sunday morning arrested a fourteen-year-old school student as she was passing by the Abu al-Reesh checkpoint near the Ibrahimi Mosque in the center of Hebron. Hebrew media quoted a statement of the occupation army that its soldiers arrested fourteen-year-old student in Hebron, under the pretext that she was bearing a knife.
Israeli Forces Injure 27 Gazans As ‘Great March of Return’ Rallies Resume The Gazan Health Ministry said the twenty-seven people were injured, four by gunshots, by the Israeli forces in the eastern part of Gaza on Friday. A number of people staged a protest east of Khan Yunis in the southern Gaza Strip last Friday and were met by Israeli fire, which left a sixteen-year-old dead.
Israel Air Raids in Gaza Strip After Rocket Attacks The air raids targeted two sites belonging to the Qassam Brigades, the Hamas military wing, in northern Gaza with another series of sorties at a Qassam site west of Gaza City, Hamas officials said.
Israel Arrests Palestinian University Students The Israeli army is accusing the occupied West Bank's most prestigious university, Birzeit, of being a recruitment center for what it calls "terrorism." Dozens of students are currently in Israeli jails. The university denies the accusations but has told Al Jazeera that it fears there are more raids to come.
Five Workers Injured by Israeli Gunfire Near Tulkarm Five Palestinian workers were injured on Tuesday morning while dozens of others suffered from suffocation after Israeli forces opened fire towards them to the west of Nazlat Issa village, located to the north of the West Bank city of Tulkarm.
Israel Army Holds Major Drill Simulating Multi-front War The Israeli military has carried out a major practice drill simulating a war against Lebanon’s Hizballah and Palestine’s Hamas movements involving thousands of troops.
Domestic Policy
Knesset to Be Dissolved And Third Elections Will Be Held The early election will be held on 2 March 2020, the third in one year amid an unprecedented political deadlock in Israel’s history. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his challenger Benny Gantz, the leader of the Blue and White alliance, failed to form a government after the September polls.
Indicted Netanyahu to Quit Ministries, Remain Israel PM: Lawyers Israel's embattled Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, facing criminal charges and a new general election, will resign from all other ministerial positions he holds but remain the premier, his lawyers said on Thursday. Israeli law stipulates that ministers facing criminal charges resign but has no such provision for prime ministers.
Hamas Denies Talks About Long-term Truce With Israel Hamas has denied that Egypt proposed a long-term truce with Israel during their visit to Cairo. Hamas described these reports as “an extension of the incitement and smear campaigns targeting Hamas.” “We speculate that this came as part of an effort to keep public opinion busy and provide a cover for serious concessions made by certain sides.”
Foreign Policy
Luxembourg Pushing For EU Recognition of Palestine Luxembourg Foreign Minister Jean Asselborn last week urged his European Union counterparts to recognize a Palestinian state in the West Bank and Gaza Strip, as a response to US support for the illegal Israeli settlements in the occupied Palestinian territories.
EU to Discuss Recognition of State of Palestine in January Meeting Ireland and Luxembourg are among the European Union member states seeking to raise the issue at the European Union Foreign Affairs Council meeting in Brussels on 20 January 2020.
'Misleading narrative': ICC War Crimes Report Angers Palestinians Palestinian officials have expressed concern over a report by the International Criminal Court's chief prosecutor that includes a warning that Palestinian stipends to the families of those killed or imprisoned by Israeli forces could constitute a war crime.
Foreign Ministry Following Up Death of Palestinian in Moldova The Palestinian Foreign Ministry stated today that it was following up on the case of a Palestinian from Gaza, Ihab al-Hasheem, who was found dead in his apartment in the Republic of Moldova.
Bolivian Ex-president Says Interim gov’t Sought Israeli Army Protection Bolivia’s interim government has requested support from Israel to fight against the local leftists, the former Bolivian President demanded yesterday. On Friday, the Bolivian interior minister, Arturo Murillo, told Reuters that his government was seeking an Israeli intervention to help the country’s local authorities fight the actions of Morales supporters and Indigenous activists, which he described as “terrorism.”
Report: Israel Group Spreading Fake News About US Congresswomen Tlaib, Omar A report by The Guardian revealed that Tlaib and Omar have been subjected to far-right, Islamophobic fake news propagated by an Israeli group through twenty-one different Facebook pages, targeting readers in the United States, Australia, the United Kingdom, Canada, Austria, Israel, and Nigeria.
Settlers and Illegal Settlements
Hebron Goes on a General Strike to Protest Israeli Settlement Plans in the Occupied City A general strike was observed on Monday, 9 December in the occupied southern West Bank city of Hebron in protest against Israeli settlement plans in the occupied section of the Palestinian city, according to local sources. Called for by President Mahmoud Abbas’ Fatah movement, they stated they would do everything to stop the Israeli measures in Hebron.
Illegal Settlements: Israel Starts Constructing Road in Hebron Israeli bulldozers have started leveling some forty hectares (approximately ninety-nine acres) of Palestinian-owned land north of Hebron. They are building a bypass road connecting the illegal settlements of Hebron to Jerusalem. The completed road will make it impossible for Palestinian farmers to reach their land on the other side.
Settlers Set Up mobile Home on Palestinian Land North of Nablus Israeli settlers today set up a mobile home on Palestinian land belonging to the villagers of Burqa, located to the north of Nablus city, said a local settlement watchdog. He added that settlers set tires ablaze on Jenin-Nablus Road, also known as Route 60, restricting the movement of Palestinian vehicles and causing a traffic jam.
Boycott, Divest, and Sanction Movement
Trump to Sign Order Attacking Free Speech Critical of Israel on US Campuses US President Trump announced that he would sign an executive order defining Judaism as a nationality, allowing the Department of Education to use Title VI funding to force college campuses to censor criticism of Israel by defining it as discriminatory.
After Trump Executive Order, GOP Lawmaker Tries to Get Georgetown Funding Pulled Over ‘anti-Israel, pro-Islamist’ Bias Rep. Denver Riggleman has sent a letter to Secretary of Education Betsy DeVos asking for Georgetown University and the Center for Contemporary Arab Studies to be investigated over its alleged anti-Israel bias. Riggleman traveled to Israel as part of an AIPAC-sponsored trip in September.
New Project Aims to Establish Palestine’s Place in the Broader Progressive Movement Justice For All is a joint project recently launched by the US Campaign for Palestinian Rights and Adalah Justice Project and set forth a list of demands called Freedom is the Future. “Palestinians in the U.S. lay out a vision of justice that demands an end to U.S. complicity in the Israeli oppression of their people, as well as a set of policy demands grounded in universal aspirations for freedom, justice, and self-determination,” reads the project.
Law
185 Organizations Support Call on ICC to Act on Palestine The ICC has been engaged in a preliminary investigation on Israeli crimes for almost five years without reaching a conclusion. An impressive international coalition of one hundred eighty-five civil society organizations calls on the International Criminal Court to open a formal investigation into possible war crimes and crimes against humanity.
Palestinian Ex-prisoners Recall Torture in Israeli Detention The Shin Bet has accused Samer Arbeed, forty-four, of leading a bombing near the illegal settlement of Dolev. Shin Bet was given legal permission to employ "extraordinary measures" in its interrogation, Israeli media reported. Amnesty International said the move "effectively sanctioned the use of methods amounting to torture."
A US Human Rights Group is Being Sued By pro-Israel Organizations Over an Alleged Connection to ‘balloon terror’ The US Campaign for Palestinian Rights is the target of a ninety-million-dollar lawsuit by the Jewish National Fund that accuses the group of engaging in environmental terrorism.
Environment, Economy, and Other
Wages of Jewish Workers in Israel 35% Higher Than Arab Counterparts The data, which was disclosed on Monday, showed that the average monthly income of a Jewish worker was 11,191 shekels in 2017, compared with 7,338 shekels for the monthly income of an Arab worker.