Maureen Clare Murphy
The Electronic Intifada / October 11, 2022
An Israeli soldier was shot and killed while guarding a march by settlers demanding a military crackdown on Palestinian armed resistance on Tuesday.
The fatal shooting was reportedly claimed by a group of armed Palestinians from varied political factions based in Nablus dubbed the Lion’s Den.
The suspected shooter remained at large on Tuesday, as did the gunman who killed a soldier and critically injured a guard at Shuafat checkpoint near Jerusalem over the weekend.
Israeli media, citing the military, reported on that “a gunman apparently opened fire from a passing vehicle and fled the scene at a high speed” on Tuesday.
The settler march, which “occurred several kilometers away,” continued after the shooting, according to The Times of Israel.
Israeli media published security camera footage said to show the alleged shooter driving away from the scene:
The slain soldier was identified as Ido Baruch (21), a staff sergeant in the military’s Givati brigade, which has been involved in serious crimes against Palestinians in the Gaza Strip.
Shuafat under siege
Meanwhile, Palestinians residing in Shuafat refugee camp and other areas of occupied East Jerusalem have been subjected to intensive Israeli movement restrictions and other oppressive measures after the fatal shooting of a soldier at a nearby checkpoint on Saturday.
The soldier was killed amid an escalation of violence in the West Bank, with Israeli forces killing several Palestinians since the beginning of the month.
The soldier killed on Saturday was identified as Noa Lazar (18). Additionally, a security guard who was seriously injured during the shooting was in a medically induced coma, Israeli media reported on Tuesday.
The injured guard was identified as David Morel, a 30-year-old from Brazil who had joined the Israeli military as a “lone soldier.”
The alleged Palestinian gunman was identified as Udai Tamimi, a 22-year-old from Shuafat.
Israeli police reportedly believe that Tamimi is hiding out in Shuafat refugee camp.
The Shuafat area, already encircled by Israel’s wall and cut off from the rest of Jerusalem, has been under siege since late Saturday as occupation forces carried out a manhunt for the suspected gunman.
Israeli forces blocked all roads leading to the camp, “including passage at the checkpoint between Shuafat and the rest of Jerusalem, which is used by thousands of people daily,” the Tel Aviv newspaper Haaretz reported on Tuesday.
The Israeli closures prevented thousands of Palestinians in the affected areas from “accessing the rest of the city for work, school and medical care and other necessities in severe violation of their basic rights,” the Israeli group Ir Amim stated.
Ir Amim added that the checkpoint at the entrance to Shuafat was reopened on Tuesday but “the constant raids and heavy presence of Israeli forces have generated a hostile environment, forcing all businesses and schools in the area to close.”
Meanwhile, shops have run out of essentials such as bread, according to residents and Ahmad Tibi, a Palestinian lawmaker in Israel’s parliament who visited Shuafat camp on Tuesday.
The Palestinian state news agency WAFA said that the Israeli restrictions affected some 130,000 people and that occupation forces had turned neighborhoods into war zones, firing gas and sound grenades and rubber-coated bullets.
WAFA added that by Monday, around 20 people had been detained since late Saturday while paramedics were being prevented from driving ambulances into the besieged area.
Israel detained Tamimi’s mother, father and brother, according to Israeli media.
Video showed scores of people marching in Shuafat camp on Tuesday night as Palestinians pledged to reject the Israeli blockade.
Palestinians in Shuafat called for a general strike and civil disobedience until conditions return to normal in the camp.
Shaked seeks to revoke residency
Ayelet Shaked, Israel’s interior minister, announced that she ordered authorities to examine whether Tamimi’s Jerusalem residency could be revoked “if unfortunately he is caught alive,” Haaretz reported.
Shaked, notorious for once promoting a genocidal call to murder Palestinian mothers, also said she would also consider whether to revoke the residency permits from members of Tamimi’s family.
A 2018 law allows Israel’s interior ministry to revoke the permanent residency of Palestinians living in East Jerusalem who are accused of having committed attacks or found in “breach of allegiance” to the state.
“Under the law, the state can deport anyone whose residency status is withdrawn,” according to Haaretz.
Israel occupied the eastern sector of Jerusalem in 1967 and annexed the territory in violation of international law.
The 2018 law “is intended to result in the illegal expulsion of Palestinians from Jerusalem” and is a “severe violation” of their basic rights, human rights groups have stated.
Human Rights Watch recently said that residency revocations “are among the policies that make up Israeli authorities’ crimes against humanity of apartheid and persecution against millions of Palestinians.”
Late last month, Shaked ordered several relatives of Fadi al-Qanbar, who killed four soldiers in a car ramming attack near a Jerusalem settlement in 2017 before he was shot dead at the scene, to leave the country.
Dani Shenhar, an attorney with HaMoked, an Israeli human rights group that is providing legal representation to some of al-Qanbar’s relatives, told media that “this is a clear case of collective punishment.”
Child succumbs to injury
On Monday, a 12-year-old boy succumbed to injuries sustained after he was shot during an Israeli raid in Jenin in late September.
Mahmoud Muhammad Khalil Samoudi was among a group of youths who threw stones and Molotov cocktails at Israeli military vehicles stationed some 150 meters away, according to Defense for Children International-Palestine.
“Mahmoud allegedly threw a few stones at the Israeli military vehicles, then Israeli forces shot several live bullets at the group of Palestinian youth,” DCIP stated.
“One bullet struck Mahmoud in the left side of his abdomen and exited the right side, causing severe bleeding and damage to his colon, kidneys and bladder.”
Four other Palestinians were killed during the 28 September raid. Mahmoud was the fifth Palestinian child to die as the result of Israeli fire since the beginning of October.
Israeli forces and settlers have killed 27 Palestinian children in the West Bank so far this year. More than a dozen additional children were killed during three days of Israeli bombing across Gaza in August.
Some 100 Palestinians have been killed by the Israeli military and settlers in the West Bank, including East Jerusalem, so far this year amid “a massive increase in military raids,” as described by the BBC.
More than 50 Palestinians were killed during Israel’s assault on Gaza during August, including around a dozen who perished in ambiguous circumstances or as a result of Palestinian fire from the territory.
An additional eight Palestinians were killed during or after alleged or actual attacks inside Israel during the year.
Two dozen people in Israel and Israelis in the West Bank, several of them soldiers and police officers, were killed in attacks by Palestinians during the same period.
Maureen Clare Murphy is senior editor of The Electronic Intifada
