April 17, 2024 (EIRNS)—Israel has not let up its campaign of genocide against Palestinians, neither in Gaza, nor in the West Bank where Israeli settlers have been on a rampage against the Palestinian people for days following the killing, last week, of an Israeli teenage boy. The Palestine Chronicle reported that on April 15, two Palestinian men, ages 21 and 30, succumbed to wounds stemming from an attack by settlers near Nablus. Footage widely circulated online showed hordes of settlers storming farmland in Aqraba, resulting in confrontations with the locals. It cited the Palestinian news agency WAFA as saying that the settlers, under Israeli military protection, attacked Palestinian farmers tending to their farmland and shot live ammunition at them, wounding two.
Israeli security forces arrested at least 25 Palestinians in the West Bank overnight April 15-16, including a child and former prisoners. The Detainees’ and Ex-Detainees’ Affairs Commission and the Palestinian Prisoners’ Society said arrests took place in the governorates of Qalqilya, Hebron, Jenin, as well as Bethlehem and Jerusalem, WAFA reported. Moreover, the occupation forces continue to carry out widespread raids and torture, severe beatings, and threats against detainees and their families, in addition to widespread sabotage and destruction of citizens’ homes.
In response to the escalation of violence, the UN Human Rights Council issued a statement yesterday calling on Israeli security forces to immediately end their active participation in and support for attacks by Jewish settlers on Palestinians in the occupied West Bank, reported AP. “Palestinians have been subjected to waves of attacks by hundreds of Israeli settlers, often accompanied or supported by Israeli Security Forces,” the UNHRC statement said. It said that in addition to deaths and injuries, the attacks have also included the torching of hundreds of homes and other buildings, as well as cars. “Israel, as the occupying power, must take all measures in its power to restore, and ensure, as far as possible, public order and safety in the occupied West Bank,” it said.
In Gaza, reports emerged of the discovery of mass graves around Al Shifa Hospital, destroyed by Israeli forces during a two-week siege that ended on April 1. Reports from Middle East Monitor and Truthout include reports of mass executions by IDF soldiers, with a body count as high as 1,500 people. A group of several hundred non-military operatives belonging to Hamas or Palestine Islamic Jihad (most employees of the city government, civil defense, security forces, police, etc.) had gathered there to collect paychecks and were rounded up. Anyone “suspected” of Hamas ties was executed. Later the IDF claimed they had found a large number of “terror operatives” from both the above-named groups inside the hospital, and had arrested 900. Soldiers deployed drones with speakers, announcing “come out, you animals,” addressing people inside the many hospital buildings. Jonathan Whithall, a senior humanitarian affairs officer from OCHA, told Telesur, “Al Shifa has literally become a graveyard. There are still bodies in this courtyard.”
