Independent History & Research Box 849, Coeur d'Alene, Idaho 83816
The Israeli Holocaust Against the Palestinians
A weeping Ashia Abu Nab sits atop the rubble of her demolished home after Israelis destroyed it, in Jerusalem September 11, 2001.
Israelis Demolish Arab Homes in Rafah July 10, 2001
A Palestinian boy carries pieces of his demolished house at Rafah, in the Gaza ghetto, July 10, 2001. Israeli army bulldozers destroyed this home and 25 other Palestinian homes on July 10, leaving 155 Palestinians homeless.
RAFAH,GAZA GHETTO UNDER ISRAELI OCCUPATION, (July 10, 2001) - Rafah residents said they were awakened by the crash of bulldozers at about 1 a.m. Mohammed Abu Libdeh said he saw the Jewish bulldozers from his bedroom window, knocking down his neighbor's house. He said he grabbed his wife and five children and ran to his parents' home which was a few yards farther away. However, the bulldozers approached that house as well, and the family ran for cover again.
``The only thing I have left is the red shirt I am wearing,'' Abu Libdeh said Tuesday morning, standing on the rubble of his two-story home, his 11-year-old son Salim by his side. ``I spent all my savings to build this house.''
The demolished homes covered an area several hundred yards square, and dozens of residents were trying to retrieve belongings after daybreak.
Fatmeh Radwan, 42, was tugging at a sack of white flour she had bought a day earlier with what she said were her last $15. However, the sack was stuck in the rubble, and the flour had already been dirtied by sand. Radwan said she lost a four-room house she shared with her husband and nine children. She said she and her family fled in their pajamas, under Israeli gunfire. ``How can I convince my children not to join the resistance when they face a dark future, and our small house has been destroyed?' she said, crying.
Israelis Demolish Arab Homes in northern Jerusalem
Israeli occupation troops guard a bulldozer while it demolishes a house belonging to a Palestinian family in Shuafat refugee camp in northern Jerusalem July 9, 2001. The bulldozers flattened a dozen Palestinian homes in one of the largest house demolition campaigns in the annals of Israeli state terrorism.
JERUSALEM (July 9, 2001) - Jewish bulldozers razed 14 Palestinian homes under construction Monday, July 9, in one of the biggest Israeli attacks on civilian Arab homes in years, provoking tears and stone-throwing at a Palestinian refugee camp on the northern edge of Jerusalem.
The Palestinians said the demolitions were part of an Israeli effort at apartheid-- to restrict the numbers of Arabs in and around Jerusalem.The bulldozers and earth movers, backed by hundreds of Israeli policemen, some on horseback, destroyed 14 Palestinian homes in the Shuafat refugee camp in northern Jerusalem. City council members said it was the largest house demolition campaign in memory.
Hitam al-Fakiyeh, 30, mother of nine, mourns the Zionist destruction of her family's home in the Shuafat refugee camp; Jerusalem, July 9, 2001.
Some Arab women screamed at Israeli policemen who pushed back the angry crowd. One Palestinian woman, dressed in black, sat cross-legged on the dusty ground near her home in a desperate attempt to block the path of a bulldozer. She began moaning and weeping until relatives moved her out of the bulldozer's path. Jerusalem Mayor Ehud Olmert said the houses were torn down because the builders had no permits.
Palestinians have said it is nearly impossible to obtain permits--that Israeli regulations are aimed at limiting Palestinian population growth in Jerusalem.The demolished Palestinian homes are a few hundred yards from Pisgat Zeev, a Jewish neighborhood built on Arab land occupied by the Israelis since 1967, where several large apartment blocks reserved exlusively for Jewish residents, are under construction.
An Israeli soldier prepares to open fire on an unarmed Arab protesting the Israeli demolition of Palestinian homes in Jerusalem's Shuafat refugee camp, July 9, 2001.
Israelis Demolish Arab Homes in Rafah April 14, 2001
Palestinian civilians stand by the remains of their homes in Rafah, in southern Gaza Strip, April 14, 2001, shortly after the Israeli army leveled them to rubble
Bulldozers in the Night
When Arab residents of the south and the neighborhoods that border on the Jewish settlements encroaching on Palestinian land make their way home, they are all afraid that they won't find their homes intact. That is exactly what happened to Omer Dahir's family one morning. On October 27, 2000, the family had spent the night with a relative who lives in an orchard in the eastern section of Rafiah. The following morning they returned to their home, a house they had built on agricultural land belonging to them, beside 18 dunams of pepper and tomato greenhouses. Where their home had stood, they found a pile of rubble and twisted metal. Where their greenhouses had stood, there were only torn sheets of plastic and crushed plants.
It was their ill fortune that the Jewish settlement of Morag had been built adjacent to their home...With the outbreak of the Al-Aqsa Intifada, the IDF (Israeli army) decided to build a new road to the Jewish settlement of Morag, connecting it with the Gush Katif bloc of Jewish settlements. Do Arab people live here? Have Arabs been working this land for decades? No matter. During the night Israeli bulldozers came and destroyed the seven-room house and the greenhouses. Some 120 dunams of greenhouses and agricultural lands of other families were also destroyed. Thus, in the space of a few days, the livelihood of hundreds of souls was cut off.
Four months have passed since that destruction, and the Dahir family still has difficulty digesting what happened. They are living in a relative's orchard, in two tents given them by the Red Cross. All their land is lost. All their clothes and personal belongings were in the house. They have only the clothes on their backs. The children have trouble remembering what precious objects they have lost. They can barely relate how they burst into tears when they saw the ruins of their home. In the town of Rafiah, there was a debate as to what steps should be taken in the face of the mass destruction by the IDF of agricultural land and homes. They say that Dahir sat dumbstruck throughout the discussion.
Even now, when he tries to talk of his loss, of the years of work down the drain, of the monthly income that is gone, of the life style that was destroyed in three hours by an Israeli army bulldozer, of the family possessions he had designated for his children's future, he covers his face with his red kaffiyeh. Source: Ha'aretz, March 19, 2001
israeli holocaust against arabs / archives / news / bookstore
Send donations to:
Independent History & Research Box 849, Coeur d'Alene, Idaho 83816