Celine Hagbard
IMEMC NewsThu, 08 Oct 2015 02:09 UTC
© www.imemc.orgUndercover soldiers turn on demonstrators in Beit El. (Image from video by AFP)
A Reuters camera operator
captured on film a group of Israeli undercover agents dressed as Palestinian youth during a demonstration in Beit El on Tuesday. The soldiers are seen throwing stones alongside demonstrators, then turning around, drawing their guns and shouting orders at the crowd. Around 20 seconds into the video, the Israeli infiltrators turn on the rest of the demonstrators and threaten to shoot them.
Another incident on Wednesday afternoon was described on the website 'Mondoweiss.net' as follows:
"Videos of the incident ...reveal eight Israeli security forces dressed as protesters with their faces covered, and one with a Hamas flag. After participating in the protest confronting uniformed soldiers and throwing stones, the undercover forces suddenly drew their weapons against the Palestinian demonstrators. The Israeli forces began backing up towards the Beit El checkpoint and a cluster of army Jeeps. Palestinians sprinted in the opposite direction.
"Next a group of five
undercovers are filmed detaining a Palestinian by throwing the youth to the ground, and punching and kicking him. While in custody one of the officers
shoots the Palestinian in the leg. He is then dragged away, bleeding from his face, and soldiers detained him for questioning. Later the youth was transferred to an Israeli medical facility." See more on this incident at
the Mondoweiss website.
The website Electronic Initifada documented other incidents in which soldiers dressed as Palestinians are
seen in the crowd, then photographed again among the Israeli soldiers, working with them and drawing guns against the Palestinian demonstrators.
On Sunday, undercover Israeli agents dressed as Palestinian civilians were able to enter a Palestinian hospital in Nablus and snatch a wounded boy from his hospital bed, allegedly because he was 'wanted' by Israeli forces for resisting the military occupation in some way. These tactics are being utilized in the context of escalating protests across the West Bank, Jerusalem and inside Israel itself, which
some analysts are terming a 'third intifada (uprising)' by Palestinian youth who have taken to the streets in large numbers to oppose the ongoing Israeli occupation of Palestinian land and denial of basic human rights for the Palestinian people.
An estimated 600 Palestinians have been wounded by Israeli forces since Saturday, and hundreds have been abducted by Israeli forces. At least four Palestinians have been killed in the protests, including a 12-year old schoolboy in Bethlehem. The tactic of infiltrating Palestinian protests with undercover soldiers dates back to the first intifada in the late 1980s, when the undercover forces regularly entered Palestinian towns and villages dressed as Palestinians in order to carry out
extrajudicial assassinations against Palestinians suspected of organizing demonstrations against the military occupation of their land.
Comment: Stones versus guns...not even an automatic or accidental reaction, given the covert nature of the operation and how many times these tactics have historically been replayed by Israeli military in different locations without ramification. As Palestinians escalate their protests, Israel finds new and abhorrent ways to obliterate, not only those who defy the imperial control, but also the innocent in order to serve their pathological purposes and paranoia. There is no justice when no one stands up for humanity and irrefutably confronts the tyrant, not even the least we can do to make a difference.
Comment: Stones versus guns...not even an automatic or accidental reaction, given the covert nature of the operation and how many times these tactics have historically been replayed by Israeli military in different locations without ramification. As Palestinians escalate their protests, Israel finds new and abhorrent ways to obliterate, not only those who defy the imperial control, but also the innocent in order to serve their pathological purposes and paranoia. There is no justice when no one stands up for humanity and irrefutably confronts the tyrant, not even the least we can do to make a difference.