Mohammad Huraini
Mondoweiss / December 7, 2024
Despite being the victims of an attack on our own land, we now face the possibility of imprisonment. It’s not a normal way of life, but it has become the normalized reality under Israeli occupation.
Mohammad Huraini is a resident of Masafer Yatta, an area in the South Hebron Hills in the occupied West Bank home to some 1,000 Palestinians. Masafer Yatta has been the target of Israeli military and settler violence as well as relentless Israeli home demolitions for decades in an effort to ethnically cleanse the area to pave the way for settlement expansion.
November 23, 2024 was marked by terror and violence for my family. That day, we were violently attacked by Israeli settlers, only for Israeli occupation forces to raid our home shortly afterward and arrest my father while my cousin and I were at the hospital for medical treatment. After attacking and wounding us, the settlers accused us of being the ones who tried to harm them — a pattern of Israeli aggression and claiming victimization we Palestinians are unfortunately all too familiar with.
That Saturday afternoon, I was in my house in the village of at-Tuwani, one of several villages in Masafer Yatta in the southern occupied West Bank. I received an urgent phone call from a neighbour, who informed me that two Israeli settlers from the nearby illegal settlement outpost of Havat Ma’on were approaching our property. I immediately looked up to see them descending the hill heading toward our house. My father, my brother Sami, my cousin, and I all rushed to confront the settlers and prevent them from getting any closer to our home.
As I reached for my phone to document the situation, one of the settlers unexpectedly struck Sami in the stomach. At the same moment, a settler threw a stone, hitting me directly in the face. My phone fell from my hand and blood began to pour from my nose. The pain was so intense that I was unable to see clearly for several moments.
Despite the pain and disorientation, I mustered the strength to bend down and retrieve my phone. As I got up, another stone flew past me, narrowly missing my head. The situation was chaotic.
This sudden attack lasted less than two minutes, before the settlers fled in panic towards the new Israeli military base on the outskirts of Havat Ma’on that was established on our land after October 7, 2023. I ran swiftly home, desperate to stop the bleeding. Behind me, my brother and my father followed, and I was relieved to see they were unharmed. Once at home, I applied ice to my nose and sat outside, waiting for the ambulance to arrive, and I noticed my cousin had been injured in the eye. It was then that I saw the settlers had returned to the site where they had attacked us — but this time, they were accompanied by Israeli soldiers, speaking to them and pointing in our direction, which only fuelled my anger.
The ambulance finally arrived, and the paramedics worked quickly to stop my bleeding and treat my cousin’s eye injury before taking us to the hospital. The blood loss left me feeling weak and disoriented, and I could hardly comprehend what was happening around me until we arrived at the hospital. There, the medical staff took us to the emergency room, where we received the necessary treatment.
A few hours later, I attempted to contact my family to check on their condition. That’s when I learned that my father had been arrested by the Israeli army on charges of attacking the settlers.
The news left me feeling a mixture of confusion and fury — however, this was not the first time we had faced such a scenario. In September 2022, Israeli settlers attacked my father, breaking both of his arms, only for soldiers to imprison him under the false accusation that he had attempted to attack the settlers.
Seeking clarification, I called my lawyer, who informed me that the settlers had filed a complaint against us, accusing us of being the aggressors. The army is now searching for me and my brother Sami, intending to arrest us. Some two weeks after we were attacked, Sami and I still avoid sleeping at home in case of a night raid by the Israeli occupation forces.
As if the trauma of the initial raid wasn’t enough, the Israeli army subjected our home to another brutal invasion that same night. As the soldiers were searching for me and my brother Sami, my younger sister, brother, and the rest of my family were terrified by these barbaric acts.
This is not a random occurrence, but the result of a coordinated effort between Israeli settlers and the occupation army, both of which aim to force us off our land through violence and intimidation.
My father was released at 11:30 pm as there was no evidence to support the settlers’ claims. Yet we endured another home raid barely an hour after his release, during which Israeli soldiers broke into our home, conducted a thorough search, and instilled fear in every member of my family. They stole our security camera’s hard drive and damaged our car before finally leaving.
For us, the sense of safety that should come with being at home simply doesn’t exist. A home should be a sanctuary, but for us, it is a constant target. Our house has been raided dozens of times by Israeli soldiers, and while this is not a new experience for us, it is certainly not a normal one.
This latest turn of events felt like the final blow in a situation that had already been unbearable. Despite being the victims of an attack on our own land, we now face the possibility of imprisonment.
The pattern is clear: Israeli settlers and soldiers are emboldened by the lack of accountability for their actions. Their goal is not only to attack and kill us but to evict us from our land. In a sense, this is nothing new. The Israeli army’s actions, while horrific, are part of a systematic process of ethnic cleansing and displacement of indigenous Palestinians.
It’s not a normal way of life, but it has become the normalized reality under Israeli occupation. The daily violence, the lack of safety, and the absence of accountability are not isolated incidents — they are part of a broader strategy of oppression. As long as there is no real consequence for these crimes, they will continue to escalate.
Our daily life means confronting the most heinous crimes against us on a daily basis. Standing up for human rights comes at a high price, and in our case, that price often means risking our lives and our freedom.
This is Israel: a state that arms and protects terrorist settlers, shielding them from accountability for the crimes they commit against my people. It is a regime that perpetuates violence with impunity, turning our struggle for justice into a battle for survival.
For me, the question remains: Will this ever stop? Will the international community hold Israel accountable for its daily violations? Or will we, the oppressed, continue to suffer in silence, with no end in sight? This is the grim reality of life under occupation, and sadly it shows no sign of ending.
Mohammad Huraini is a Palestinian resident of Masafer Yatta in the southern occupied West Bank
