Israeli Arab shot dead for banging on a police van


November 11, 2014
Sarah Benton

In this posting, 1: a brief video, taken from CCTV, of Kheir Hamdan banging on a police van, running away, then being shot on the ground and dragged into the police van is here; 2) a news report from AFP; 3) Akiva Eldar, Arab citizens still treated as ‘the enemy’ in Israel; 4)angry comment by Ami Kaufman on these ‘tough, disgusting times in Israel/Palestine’.


Israel security forces advance on Arab Israeli youths during clashes in the town of Kfar Kana, in northern Israel on November 9, 2014. Photo by Jack Guez / AFP

Angry Arabs march in north Israel after shooting

By Jack Guez, AFP
November 09, 2014

Israeli security forces detain an Arab-Israeli youth during clashes in the town of Kfar Kana, in northern Israel on November 9, 2014

Kfar Kana (Israel) – Angry Arab-Israeli protesters took to the streets across the country on Sunday and police raised alert levels nationwide amid shock waves over the fatal shooting of a young Arab-Israeli.

Shops, schools and businesses were shuttered in Arab towns and villages where a general strike was observed over Saturday’s killing of a 22-year-old in Kfar Kana near the northern city of Nazareth.

In the town on Sunday mounted police dispersed masked protesters who hurled stones and fireworks, blocked streets with burning tyres and waved Palestinian flags.


Display of defiance in Kfar Kana, November 9, 2014. Photo by Jack Guez / AFP

Police spokeswoman Luba Samri said that 22 people were arrested, among them minors.

Kheir Hamdan was shot after he attacked a police vehicle with a knife as officers tried to arrest a relative.

Police say the officers fired warning shots until they felt their lives were threatened, when they aimed directly at him.

Relatives say Hamdan was killed “in cold blood”, with CCTV images apparently contradicting the official version.

In the video he is seen banging on a police van window with a knife before starting to run off.

Then a uniformed officer gets out of the vehicle’s back door and fires his handgun at Hamdan, who falls to the ground.

Officers then drag his body into the vehicle by one arm.

Israel’s attorney general on Sunday convened an emergency meeting on the incident, hearing initial reports from the police internal affairs division, a justice ministry statement said, adding that the inquiry would continue.

– Struggling to cope –

The incident came as Israel struggled to cope with a wave of unrest which has gripped annexed east Jerusalem for more than four months, with police facing off against youths almost nightly.

Arab students protested the Kafr Kana killing Sunday in Jerusalem, the northern port city of Haifa and in Beersheva in southern Israel’s Negev desert.

In the northern Arab town of Umm al-Fahm, about 250 people rallied, among them firebrand Islamic cleric Raed Salah, an AFP photographer said.

Stones were hurled at a bus on the main Jerusalem-Tel Aviv highway alongside the Arab village of Abu Ghosh, police said.

In strife-torn east Jerusalem, clashes raged in Shuafat refugee camp for a fifth straight day as masked youths held running battles with Israeli border police, an AFP correspondent said.

Elsewhere in east Jerusalem, masked Palestinians hurled petrol bombs at police in A-Tur and threw stones in Issawiya, with police responding with “riot dispersal means” in both cases, police statements said.

No injuries were reported.

Saturday’s shooting and the outpouring of Arab anger dominated Israel’s main newspapers on Sunday.

“They killed him in cold blood because he was an Arab,” Hamdan’s father Rauf told Maariv, his words reflecting a widely held belief that police are too quick on the draw when an Arab is involved.

“If he had been a Jew, it wouldn’t have ended that way. They wouldn’t have shot him and if they had, they would have shot him in the leg and he wouldn’t be dead,” Rauf Hamdan said.

– ‘An execution’ –

Adalah, an NGO which fights for the rights of Israel’s Arab minority, called the shooting “an execution,” dismissing the police’s version about warning shots.

But Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu vowed that anyone breaking the law would be “punished severely”.

“We will not tolerate disturbances and riots,” he told the weekly cabinet meeting.


Yitzhak Aharonovitch, R with top cop Menashe Arviv, L. September 16, 2013 Photo by Gideon Markowicz/Flash 90.

He said he had instructed Public Security Minister Yitzhak Aharonovitch, to look at “revoking the citizenship” of anyone calling for Israel’s destruction, in a threat clearly aimed at the Arab minority of around 1.4 million — some 20 percent of the population.

But several Arab and leftwing parliamentarians blamed the bloodshed on Aharonovitch who said last week that any “terrorist” who harms civilians “should be killed”.

“This sweeping statement by the minister could be interpreted as taking off the gloves to allow the use of deadly force for reasons that are not justified and against the law,” Israeli rights group ACRI warned in a letter to the attorney general.

“Lethal force can only be used by police as a last resort,” it wrote.



Young Palestinians take up the protest at a rally in the northern Israeli town of Umm al-Faham on November 9, 2014. Photo by Ahmad Gharabli / AFP

Police shooting of Arab Israeli youth could ignite Israel

The police shooting of a young Arab resident of Kafr Kana proves that 14 years after the killing of protesters in the October 2000 riot police still discriminate against Arab citizens and treat them like enemies.

By Akiva Eldar, trans. Ruti Sinai, Al Monitor
November 10, 2014

Here is a short but fascinating lesson in Israeli-style democracy, equality and coexistence. Footage from a CCTV security camera documents the incident in the Arab Galilee village of Kafr Kana on Nov. 7, in which Israeli police killed a young Arab man. Now, imagine that the incident had taken place in the settlement of Yitzhar. Imagine that the 22-year-old man who banged on the windows of the police cruiser and then started backing away was not named Khair Hamdan, but rather Nir Hemed; that he was one of those known as “hilltop youth” who do not recognize government authority and who regularly harass the security forces. How would Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu have reacted to Nir being shot to death in the back by the police? Would Netanyahu have pledged to examine the option of revoking the citizenship of members of the fanatic Jewish sect, as he did with the Palestinians who were involved in rioting? Would Economy and Trade Minister Naftali Bennett have praised the policemen who killed Nir and rushed to their defence, before the Justice Ministry’s police investigations unit had even decided whether shooting the young man in the back was justified or not?

The reactions of Arab members of the Knesset were, of course, completely different. Knesset member Ahmad Tibi claimed that Hamdan’s killing was typical of police attitudes toward the Arab public as “enemies who must be destroyed.” Tibi was not being original. An inquiry commission appointed by the government exactly 14 years before the fatal incident in Kafr Kana determined that “the police must imbue its policemen with the understanding that the Arab public at large is not their enemy, and it must not be treated as an enemy.”

The commission, headed by retired Supreme Court Justice Theodore Or, investigated the events of October 2000, in which 13 Arab Israelis were killed by live police fire. In 2003, its members recommended “imbuing all police echelons with the importance of balanced and moderate conduct in relations with the Arab sector.”

The footage of the incident in Kafr Kana, and its severe result, do not point to “balanced and moderate conduct” by police in their relations with Arabs. According to a publication issued last month by the Mossawa Center for the rights of Israel’s Arab citizens, Hamdan is the 49th Arab-Israeli shot since the October 2000 riots by police, soldiers or Jewish citizens. Only two incidents ended with policemen being convicted and sentenced to very short jail terms — one receiving six months, the other 30 months. This was preceded by the decision of then-Attorney General Menachem Mazuz to dismiss complaints against all the policemen suspected in the killing of the 13 Arabs in the protests of 2000. The Israel Democracy Institute, which examined the evidence in three central cases, determined that the decision not to pursue them further “for lack of proof” was not justified and the Justice Ministry’s police investigation unit and the state prosecutor’s office failed to see the investigation through to its end.

For many in the Arab sector, the events of October 2000 and the decision to dismiss the complaints constitute a watershed moment in their attitude toward Israel. Mass arrests of Arab Israelis, including “preventive detention,” along with group trials and the use of violence and undercover agents to quash protests against the (summer) war in Gaza, have made it abundantly clear that the police have not truly understood that the Arab public is not an enemy. The trigger-happy policemen, like the young “stone happy” Arabs, get their inspiration from the very top.

The Hebrew cop and the Arab youth know that there are ministers in the Netanyahu Cabinet, among them Foreign Minister Avigdor Liberman and Internal Security Minister Yitzhak Aharonovich, who is in charge of the police, whose party clearly calls for repealing the Israeli citizenship of Arab citizens. They read in the paper that the Knesset decided to punish Arabs who mark the Nakba memorial day. They watched on television the debate in the Knesset, where it was decided to suspend Knesset member Haneen Zoabi for a lengthy period for insulting a policeman, while Jewish Knesset members stroll around uninterrupted on the Temple Mount and risk setting the country on fire. They heard that Knesset members are plotting to erase the Arab language from official state documents.

One could hardly expect this government to adopt the Or Commission’s recommendations and find ways to strengthen Arab citizens’ sense of belonging to the state by adding events and official symbols with which they, too, can identify. The supposedly obvious statement that the state is not just Jewish but also democratic, and that the principle of equality and the ban on discrimination apply to all its citizens — is apparently unacceptable to many of the 19th Knesset’s members. But, as the Or Commission noted, “The state and its successive governments have failed to deal deeply and extensively with the difficult problems posed by the existence of a large Arab minority within the Jewish state.”

The neglect and deprivation, especially as they pertain to the allocation of state resources, as well as in law enforcement, provide the fuel for nationalistic and religious radicals in the Arab sector who regard Israel as an enemy. The fuel is borne aloft by natural feelings of solidarity on the part of Arab Israelis with their Palestinian brothers in the territories, who have lost hope of shaking off the shackles of the occupation. Just one irresponsible policeman, who gets the automatic backing of irresponsible leaders, is enough to ignite a major conflagration. Fires do not discriminate on the basis of religion or nationality. They do not respect any boundaries. This particular fire will burn us all alive.



Arab youth clash with Israeli riot police in Kafr Kanna, Israel, November 8, 2014. The protests took place after an Arab man from the village was shot and killed by Israeli policemen. Photo by Oren Ziv/Activestills.org

Netanyahu government’s true colors are shining through

Even as the flames spread from Jerusalem into the West Bank and back over the Green Line, Israeli leaders are showing no restraint in their statements and actions. It feels like they just don’t care anymore.

By Ami Kaufman, +972
November 10, 2014

These are tough, disgusting times in Israel/Palestine. The flames in Jerusalem, which were ignited well before the recent war in Gaza, seem to be climbing higher every day, spreading to the West Bank and inside the Green Line as well.

The recent events also seem to be bringing out some of Israeli leaders’ true color. Yitzhak Aharonovitch, the Israeli public security minister (something equivalent to a police minister), had some very harsh words after the last attack by a Palestinian who ran over a group of Border Police and pedestrians in Jerusalem, killing two and wounding others. After a police officer killed the attacker on the scene, Aharonovich said that, “the sentence for any any terrorist who harms civilians is to be killed.” He added that all such events should end that way. To hell with the rule of law, right guys?

But who would have thought that the police would heed their boss’ call so soon? On Saturday evening cops shot 22-year-old Khir Hamdan from Kafr Kanna (well inside Green Line) in the back after he attacked a police van with a knife. No taser, no shooting towards the legs. Just a bullet in the chest as he was running away. To make things worse, instead of calling an ambulance they dragged him into the van like he was a sack of potatoes, while still alive. I’m pretty sure I saw that scene on a Sopranos episode; I just can’t remember which season.

Obviously, the killing heated things up. As would be expected of a wise leader, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu thought this might be a good time to try and calm things down — to be the responsible adult. Oh sorry, scrap that! Instead, just like his public security minister, Netanyahu poured some more gas on this bonfire, showed his true colors as well and just hours later announced he “will instruct the interior minister to evaluate revoking the citizenship of those who call for the destruction of the State of Israel.” Or, in other words, “I don’t have anything to say about shooting Hamdan in the back and you Arabs better calm down before I frickin’ lose it.”

Then comes a Facebook post from Naftali Bennet, leader of The Jewish Home and the Economy Minister:

Naftali Bennett
Politician · 31,725 Likes · November 8 at 7:43pm ·
Supporting the policeman
**
A crazed Arab terrorist attacked our policemen’s vehicle with a knife in an attempt to murder them.
A policeman shot him.
That is what is expected from our security forces.
**
An inquiry can and should always be carried out.
This was certainly not a case of ‘murder in cold blood’.
The security forces that are sent to protect us must not be abandoned.
**
If we do not give them our support, we will see more and more Israelis murdered with knives, fireworks and vehicles.

Notice how Bennet calls Hamdan a “crazed Arab terrorist.” Not a suspect in a violent crime who should be arrested and tried in court like any other criminal suspect. No, Bennet is a minister in the “only democracy in the Middle East” that claims every other day that Arabs in Israel are equal citizens. That is, except for when they commit crimes. Then, they’re crazed terrorists. Who should be shot. In the back. While running away. From a group of armed cops in a van. With a only a knife. (This should come as no surprise, of course. Bennett has never hid his feelings on the topic.)

But for me, the best part of this feces storm came on Sunday when the government voted to support a bill extending Israeli law to West Bank settlements without formally annexing the area. For those of you who still don’t see Israel’s policies in the West Bank as apartheid, it might become a little easier for you if this bill becomes a law. It’s a nice, big step in that direction.

Looking at all these statements and actions, it feels like they just don’t care anymore. They’re really going ahead with it; they actually want this to happen. Their true colors are coming out. They’re no longer hiding.

And if I may be honest for just a moment (did you expect anything else?), I’m actually quite satisfied with this rather rapid deterioration toward a full-fledged apartheid state. There’s simply something too painful in watching it unfold so slowly, like pulling off a Band-Aid way too carefully instead of just getting it over with in one quick pull.

Seriously, why condemn every settlement expansion, every undemocratic law, every racist comment from a politician? The only thing these condemnations do is slow things down and delay the inevitable. It only keeps things in some sort of gray area that allows the rest of the world to keep debating if Israel is an apartheid state or isn’t. Why not let things worsen quicker so the world understands sooner and will be left with no choice but to finally act?

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