When COVID-19 Aid Needed, Netanyahu Regime Brutalizes Palestinians

by Stephen Lendman (stephenlendman.org - Home - Stephen Lendman)

At a time of increasing COVID-19 outbreaks in the West Bank, Gaza, and East Jerusalem, along with many Palestinians quarantined for being in close contact with infected individuals, the Netanyahu regime continues to brutalize Palestinians for not being Jewish.

On Tuesday, the Electronic Intifada reported that Israeli soldiers "continue(d) to attack Palestinian communities" as they struggle to stay safe from COVID-19 infection.

Arrests, abductions, beatings, and disappearances happen multiple times daily throughout the Occupied Territories.

Pre-dawn home break-ins happen with disturbing regularity, entire families terrorized, young children traumatized.

On Tuesday evening, Israeli security forces stole a convoy of trucks carrying food and medical supplies for Palestinians in the East Jerusalem Sur Baher community without income because of COVID-19 crisis conditions.

Reportedly they split stolen supplies with Israeli police. Four Palestinians involved in delivering the aid were beaten and arrested — for the crime of humanitarian service to their countrymen.

Similar incidents happened many times before. According to B'Tselem, Israeli forces demolished over a dozen Palestinian buildings in the Wadi al-Humos eastern extension of Zur Baher last summer — part of longstanding Israeli ethnic cleansing to make way for exclusive Jewish development and use.

About 25,000 Palestinians live in Zur Baher on land Israel wants for its own use.

Wadi al-Humos appealed to Israel's Supreme Court to save the community homes to no avail. It ruled that no legal barrier stood in the way of destroying the property and dispossessing owners from their land.

The Gaza-based Palestinian Center for Human Rights (PCHR) reported that Israel gunboats attacked Palestinian fishermen last Sunday for the crime of fishing in their own waters.

A fisherman shot and injured with a rubber-coated steel bullet was hospitalized for treatment.

Another fisherman was attacked, the gear of both boats confiscated.

PCHR explained that Israeli naval forces conduct "daily chases of Palestinian fishermen in (Gazan waters), opening fire at them in order to terrify them and prevent them from sailing and accessing the zones rich in fish."

Israeli high crimes against defenseless Palestinians are the cross they bear for not being Jewish in an apartheid state that hates and persecutes Arabs.

According to the Euro-Med Monitor human rights group, Israeli authorities expelled thousands of Palestinian workers from their West Bank jobs, explaining:

"Most of the deportations took place without medical examinations or special arrangements with the Palestinian authorities, to ensure that workers are treated and examined upon return to ensure their well-being, which amounts to racial discrimination."

These practices "pose a public health threat and make it easier to spread COVID-19 among Palestinians."

Many Palestinians infected with the virus contracted it while working in Israel or illegal settlements.

The Addameer prisoner support and human rights group expressed concern for thousands of Palestinian prisoners, saying:

"Our growing concern for Palestinian prisoners and detainees during the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic grows out of the systematic and routine medical negligence inside Israeli detention and interrogation centers."

The group called for releasing them to avoid widespread infections, the vast majority held for political reasons.

OCHA stressed that "(t)he capacity of the Palestinian health system to cope with an expected increase in patients remains severely impaired by longstanding challenges and critical shortages, particularly in the Gaza Strip," adding: 

"People in refugee camps and other poor, densely populated areas across the (Occupied Territories) face a higher risk of contagion due to overcrowding and inadequate sanitation."

Separately, Netanyahu agreed to give Gantz the justice ministry in a new coalition government as long as there's a partnership in appointing ministry officials and justices.

In other words, Netanyahu wants control over his trial if held and who'll preside over proceedings.

Once a new coalition government is formed, a new state prosecutor will be appointed. Netanyahu wants someone he approves of for the job.

When a new attorney general is appointed in less than two years from now, he wants to be in a position to choose who gets the job.

He's charged with bribery, fraud, and breach of trust. Criminals don't get to choose their judges or prosecutors.

Netanyahu wants the system changed, including say over who'll sit on Israel's Supreme Court when new appointments are made.

He's a cancer infecting the Ziofascist apartheid state — COVID-19 mere sniffles by comparison.

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