Palestine

RAMALLAH, Aug. 6 (Xinhua) -- A senior Palestinian official said on Thursday that Palestine will address official letters to the United Nations over the Israeli violations against the Palestinian people in their territories.

Omar Awadallah, head of public administration for UN human rights organizations with the Palestinian Foreign Ministry, accused Israel of expanding the cycle of its violations against the Palestinian people.

RAMALLAH, Aug 5 (NNN-WAFA) – A senior Palestinian official said, Israel is accelerating its move to implement the annexation of the West Bank.

Walid Assaf, head of the National Commission to Resist the Wall and Settlements in the West Bank, told reporters that, the West Bank witnesses unprecedented Israeli escalation, mainly the confiscation of lands and settlement expansion.

“The Israeli government officially postponed the implementation of its annexation plan, but what is happening on the ground is, a large preparation for implementing the plan,” he said.

RAMALLAH, Aug 3 (NNN-WAFA) – Palestine welcomed a letter, signed by European Union diplomats, to protest against Israel’s construction plans in an East Jerusalem area, urging the EU’s “actionable decisions.”

On July 31, representatives and ambassadors of 15 European countries, sent a protest letter to the Israeli Foreign Ministry, on the government’s decision to start the construction in the settlement of Givat Hamatos.

AL BIREH, West Bank (Reuters) - A section of a mosque in the occupied West Bank was set on fire on Monday, and Palestinian officials accused Israeli settlers of being behind the attack.

“The Land of Israel for the People of Israel,” read part of a slogan sprayed in Hebrew on the mosque’s wall, a reference to a biblical, historical and political claim to an area that includes the West Bank.

RAMALLAH, July 10 (NNN-AGENCIES) — Israeli troops killed a Palestinian civilian in the West Bank on Thursday, the Palestinian health ministry said.

The ministry did not give any details as to the circumstances of the killing, stating only that “a civilian was killed by Israeli forces” after being shot in the neck at Kifl Hares, a village south of Nablus.

Provincial governor Abdullah Kamil named the victim as Ibrahim Moustapha Abou Yacoub, 29.

RAMALLAH, July 8 (NNN-WAFA) – Palestine hailed the latest resolutions of the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organisation (UNESCO), that call for the protection of Palestinian heritage sites from Israeli moves.

Member of the Palestine Liberation Organisation, Hanan Ashrawi said, the decision is important at a time of “increasing Israeli actions against Palestinian heritage sites,” specifically within its annexation plan that is likely to take over historical and archaeological sites in the West Bank.

RAMALLAH/GAZA, July 4 (NNN-WAFA) – Dozens were injured on Friday, during clashes between Palestinian demonstrators and Israeli armed forces, in a protest in the West Bank against the Israeli annexation plan, medical sources said.

The sources said that Israeli soldiers shot and wounded a Palestinian young man during the protest, near the northern West Bank city of Nablus, against building two Israeli settlement posts in the area.

RAMALLAH, West Bank (Reuters) - The Palestinian Authority (PA) said on Thursday it will slash the wages of tens of thousands of its employees after its protest action against Israel’s annexation plans in the occupied West Bank deepened a cash crisis.

Its economy already battered by the coronavirus pandemic, the PA, which has limited self-rule in the West Bank under interim peace deals, last month rejected handovers of taxes that Israel collects on its behalf.

GAZA (Reuters) - Vineyard owner Haidar al-Zahar recalls with joy the day in 2005 when Israel removed its settlers and troops from the Gaza Strip, part of a withdrawal that few Palestinians thought they would ever see.

“I felt like a prisoner who suddenly found himself a free man,” he said.

A decade and a half later he is on the warpath as Israel considers whether to annex its settlements in the occupied West Bank, 40 km (25 miles) away, divided from Gaza by Israel and which Palestinians seek as the heartland of a future state.

RAMALLAH, June 22 (Xinhua) -- Palestinian Foreign Minister Riyad al-Maliki announced that the UN Human Rights Council (UNHRC) adopted on Monday three resolutions in favor of Palestine.

A resolution against the Israeli settlements in the occupied Palestinian territories won the support of 26 member states of the UN council, while two voted against and nine abstained, al-Maliki said in a press statement.