Dozens of Palestinians injured during protest against settlers’ march
Jerusalem, Apr 10 (EFE).- Dozens of Palestinians were injured Monday in clashes with Israeli security forces during a protest against a massive march by Jewish settlers towards a West Bank outpost.
The outpost is illegal under both international and Israeli law.
The protest took place in the Palestinian town of Beita, adjacent to the settlement of Evyatar, which was evacuated by Israeli authorities in 2021 and has become a symbol of the settler movement and a focus of political tension in the country.
Palestinian emergency services reported that 22 people had to be treated for wounds from rubber bullets, including three who were hospitalized.
Another 10 protesters also had to be taken to nearby medical facilities and 185 were treated on the spot for tear gas inhalation.
Local media reported that at least three of the injured Palestinians were journalists covering the demonstration.
An army spokesman said Israeli troops had used dispersal methods to clear “violent riots”, adding that two soldiers sustained minor injuries after they were struck by stones thrown by protesters.
The clashes occurred on the sidelines of a massive march by thousands of Israeli settlers towards the outpost at Evyatar. The settlers want the government to allow them to return, organizers told local media.
Several ministers and parliamentarians from the most right-wing parties in the coalition government, including National Security Minister Itamar Ben Gvir, attended the march.
“We will not surrender to terrorism, not in Evyatar, not in Tel Aviv. If you surrender to terror, you will surrender everywhere, but we are here to say that the Jewish people are strong,” Ben Gvir said in a video message from the march broadcast via his social media channels.
The reference to “terrorism” comes after two deadly attacks on Friday, one in the West Bank and the other in Tel Aviv.
The first was a shooting attack on a road in the northern West Bank that killed two sisters, aged 15 and 20 respectively. Their mother died of her injuries on Monday.
The second came later on Friday when an Arab citizen of Israel killed a 36-year-old Italian tourist in a suspected intentional car-ramming in Tel Aviv, in which seven other tourists were injured.
These incidents were followed on Monday by the death of a 15-year-old Palestinian during clashes with Israeli troops triggered by a military raid on a West Bank refugee camp.
The West Bank is experiencing its bloodiest start to the year since 2000. A surge in violence between Israelis and Palestinians since the beginning of 2023 has seen 96 Palestinians and Arab-Israelis killed in violent incidents with Israel, while 19 people have died on the Israeli side as a result of Palestinian-led attacks. EFE
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