Palestinian civilians wait at the Beit Furik checkpoint southeast of West Bank city of Nablus. (AFP/Jaafar Ashtiyeh)
Saed Bannoura - IMEMC & Agencies -
Friday, 07 October 2005
Machsom Watch reported that four Israeli soldiers severely beat a Palestinian man at a
military checkpoint south of the
West Bank city of
Nablus,
on Thursday.
A Machson Watch activist was present at the checkpoint and
witnessed the incident.
The Machsom Watch organization, which is an Israeli women’s
organization that monitors Israeli military violations at military checkpoints
in the Palestinian areas, reported that resident Median Amran, 28 from Burin
village near
Nablus, was seriously
injured and hospitalized after the soldiers severely beat him for no apparent
reason.
“One officer intervened, and stopped he soldiers”, Dafna
Banai, member of Machsom watch reported.
The Israeli army claimed that Amran attempted to snatch the
gun of one of the soldiers after rejected to go through a metal detector, yet
he was released after the soldiers beat him which voids the army’s’ claim.
“At About
16:30,
I saw a young man passing through a turnstile, and heading towards a second one”,
Banai said, “One of the soldiers shouted at him, and ordered him to turn back,
but the first
Iron Gate was already locked and he could
not return”.
“The soldiers jumped on him, beat him in his face with a
rifle, and kicked him”, Banai added, “He tried to escape their beating, and
tried to run for his life but he was trapped between the two turnstiles while
the soldiers continued beating and kicking him." Amran yelled at the soldiers trying to tell him that he had
undergone a surgery and had a metal plate planted in his shoulder.
“They banged his head on the concrete and choked him”, Banai
added, “They kept trying to handcuff him without even listening to what he was
saying”.
Israeli online daily Haaretz reported that Yazid Yosef, a
military Coordination and Liaison Administration officer, who was present at
the checkpoint, intervened and separated Amran from the soldiers who were
attacking him, and shielded him with his body.
“But the soldiers kept yelling and shouting ‘don’t let him
go, cuff him, show him’”, Banai added.
Banai saw blood spilling from a cut near Amran’s eye after
the “five-minute beating stopped”, she said.
Also, Banai added that the commander at the checkpoint was
trying to keep her and another volunteer away from the site; She managed to
obtain the last name of one of the soldiers who participated in the beating;
Gurevitz, Haaretz reported.
Amran was admitted to a
Nablus
Hospital suffering from concussion
and blows all over his body, his condition also required stitches in his face.
Banai informed a senior Coordination and Liaison officer,
who phoned her, that she fears that the soldiers would abuse Amran more if his
story was reported; the officer “promised” this would not happen. Amran told Haaretz reporter that he heard a soldier talking
to a Palestinian woman in an abusive manner, and asked the soldier to speak
politely, but the soldier yelled at him and pushed him with his rifle before
other soldiers came and attacked him.
