By Yesh Din, written by Yossi Gurvitz

A masked Jewish settler uses a slingshot to throw stones at Palestinians [illustrative photo] (Oren Ziv/Activestills.org)

K. said he encountered a group of about 10 men, who he thought were settlers. They were not hooded. Another person at the scene, Y., noted that some of the settlers were armed; Y. is certain he can identify them.

The settlers began throwing stones at K., hit him in the head, and he collapsed. Y. saw them approaching K. and throwing another stone at his head, even after he fell. This shouldn’t be surprising: a similar incident was documented in June, 2005 (Hebrew). Settlers threw one stone after the other at the head of an unconscious Palestinian boy, while IDF soldiers on the scene did little. This incident, noted mostly because it was captured on film, caused some outrage at the time; then, as usual, it was forgotten. Israelis are good at forgetting such incidents.

Y. rushed to help K., since he feared for the latter’s life. As a result, he says, the settlers began stoning him too. He retreated and the settlers used the opportunity to try and drive some of his sheep towards Adei Ad, an outpost adjacent to the pasture land. Some of them preferred killing the sheep: one of the settlers threw stones at the heads of the sheep, while another slaughtered some with a blade. Some of K.’s sheep were stabbed to death; some of Y.’s were wounded by stones, and may die.

The villagers rapidly reached the scene. K. was evacuated to a hospital, and a scuffle broke out between the pogromchiks and the Palestinian residents. As soon as police arrived, the settlers fled. It should be noted that when the police and the IDF reached the scene, they used tear gas and other crowd-dispersal weapons – against the Palestinians, of course. Some of them were hurt.

About two weeks ago, Israel was enraged when a brave military judge, Amir Dahan, ruled that throwing stones is not necessarily attempted murder. He chose to convict the Palestinians arraigned before him of stone-throwing, and not with the inflated charge of attempted murder, as submitted by the military prosecution. For the judge’s trouble, he was publicly reprimanded by a brigade commander, who has probably never heard of the principle of independence of the military justice system (Hebrew).

Throwing stones can indeed in some cases, for instance, when a person is lying down and a hoodlum is throwing stones at his head, be considered attempted murder. We can rest assured, however, the Shai District Police will manage to botch this investigation as well. In this, there is certainly experience.

Written by Yossi Gurvitz in his capacity as a blogger for Yesh Din, Volunteers for Human Rights. A version of this post was first published on Yesh Din’s blog.

Related:
Settlers accuse ‘Haaretz’ of calling for violence against them 

According to B’Tselem, the incident started at around 16:30 Saturday, when a group of settlers descended from the extremist settlement Itzhar towards the Palestinian village (as seen in the first video below). According to eye witnesses the settlers – some of them masked and some armed – started fires in the fields near the village and threw stones at Palestinians who moved towards them, who also started throwing stones at the settlers.

Videos shot by residents of Asira al-Qibliya and B’Tselem show a fire in the fields, settlers and Palestinians in confrontation, and soldiers standing near the settlers, yet mostly uninvolved. Amongst the settlers are three people armed with two rifles and one hand-gun, one of them wearing what seems to be a police hat. According to B’Tselem, one of the rifles is a Tavor – commonly seen in the hands of Israeli soldiers.

At one point (between 0:40-0:55 in the video below) one of the settlers is seen aiming his rifle at something, then Palestinians start throwing stones at him, and then he and his partner open intensive fire towards the stone throwers. A soldier nearing the settlers is seen running away back to the direction he and other soldiers were coming from, not preventing the shooting in any way. After a man in a green shirt is hit the soldiers pull back, Palestinians evict the man, and the woman with the camera is heard saying the man was shot in the head (Arabic). It would later be found out that the man is 24 year-old Fathi Asira, who is now in a hospital in Nablus. His condition is defined as stable.

It is worth mentioning that throughout the video soldiers are not seen trying to stop the settlers, nor disperse the two crowds in any way, although their intervention could have prevented the injury. It is unclear from the videos who exactly started the fire, as one can see several settlers trying to put it out, and also a Palestinian fire truck. However, the fire is destroying Palestinian fields very close to the village, and did not appear in the first video showing the settlers’ approach – two facts that might support the Palestinians’ claim that it was started by settlers.

The settlement of Itzhar is notorious for its radical extremism, as well as for the many attacks carried by settlers against Palestinians in neighboring villages. The settlement was also attacked itself by Palestinians, including residents of Asira al-Qibilya.