Clashes broke out between Palestinian youths and Israeli security forces in the West Bank on Tuesday, just a day after Israel’s Prime Minister announced new security measures to address a wave of violence that has gripped the region.
Hundreds of Palestinian youths hurled rocks at Israeli security forces in Bethlehem after the burial of 13-year-old Abdel Rahman Obeid Allah, a schoolboy reportedly shot and killed by Israeli security forces Monday.
Israeli forces responded with tear gas, rubber bullets and live bullets that left at leave five wounded, according to the Palestinian Red Crescent. Israeli authorities said its forces had dispersed riots near an Israeli military base in Bethlehem and did not report any injuries there.
“The rioters hurled IED’s, Molotov cocktails and rocks at Israeli civilians,” an Israeli military spokesperson, who was not named as a matter of policy, told CNN.
“Forces on scene recognized the danger and responded with riot dispersal means.”
Across Palestinian territories, at least 90 Palestinians suffered injuries, according to the Red Crescent. The Israel Defense Forces tweeted about two such cases — a 1½ year old child in Nablus hit by a rock thrown at an Israeli vehicle and a Palestinian man, struck by rocks near Hebron, was treated by Israeli troops.
On Tuesday night,
The violence continued Wednesday, Israeli police said, when a 35-year-old Jewish man was stabbed in the Old City of Jerusalem by an Arab woman.
The man was “lightly wounded after being stabbed in the upper part of his body,” police spokeswoman Luba Samri said.
She said the stabbing victim “managed to shoot the woman terrorist, who has been evacuated to hospital in serious condition.”
The rash of violence is the latest flare-up in an area where for decades many Palestinians have viewed the Israelis as an occupying force while, on the other side, Israel has been on guard for terrorist and other attacks.
It intensified after last Thursday’s fatal shooting of an Israeli couple — as their four children looked on — in the West Bank, which spurred Israeli authorities to step up their security measures.
On Sunday, Israel’s security cabinet expanded the use of administrative detention to apply to those participating in riots.
Administrative detention is a controversial practice that allows Israeli authorities to hold a person without charge or trial. It is usually applied to criminal suspects. It has rarely been used against protesters in recent years.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has also urged expedited passage of a law that would establish minimum punishments for minors (and their parents) who throw stones and Molotov cocktails.
“The police are going deeply into the Arab neighborhoods, which has not been done in the past,” Netanyahu said Monday. “We will demolish terrorists’ homes.
“We are allowing our forces to take strong action against those who throw rocks and firebombs. This is necessary in order to safeguard the security of Israeli citizens.”
The Israeli government made good Tuesday on its promise to tear down the homes of two men accused of deadly attacks last year and sealing off the residence of a third man, according to a statement by the Israel Defense Forces.
United Nations Secretary General Ban Ki-moon condemned the move.
“(Ban) does not believe that the demolition of Palestinian houses or the construction of new Israeli settlements on occupied Palestinian land will do anything other than inflame tensions still further,” his office said.
Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas urged calm Tuesday at a gathering of the Palestine Liberation Organization as his government sought to avoid further bloodshed.
“We tell them (the Israelis) that we do not want either military or security escalation,” Abbas said from his compound in Ramallah. “Israel has to stop and accept our hand reached out for a political solution in a peaceful way and not other way.”