Over 100k Palestinians Under ‘Israeli’ Siege in Shufat, Anata

By Staff, Agencies

The ‘Israeli’ occupation forces have trapped more than 100,000 Palestinians in the Shufat refugee camp and the nearby Anata town amid an ongoing search for the resistance fighter who killed a Zionist soldier.

According to Palestinian news outlets, the Shufat refugee camp and the town of Anata, northeast of al-Quds, have been besieged by ‘Israeli’ occupation forces since Saturday night, after an ‘Israeli’ soldier was killed and two others were injured in a heroic shooting operation that took place at the checkpoint leading to the camp.

Entrances and exits to the camp and town have been closed as ‘Israeli’ occupation forces began search and arrest raids in the area as part of a large-scale campaign to find the suspect.

Reports from the refugee camp said at least 20 people were kidnapped since the operation, including, according to what the ‘Israeli’ military claims, members of the family of the perpetrator.

Anata mayor Taha Rifai told the Palestinian WAFA news agency that the Zionist forces continued on Monday to break into homes, terrorize families, stop people in the streets and check their papers while forcing shops to shut down.

Since the beginning of the Zionist blockade, Palestinians have been unable to leave to receive necessary health treatments, and many basic supplies like flour are running low. Education within the camp has been suspended as well.

Thaer al-Fasfous, an activist and member of the camp’s popular committee, told Middle East Eye that the situation within Shuafat is “tragic” and that many patients need to go to hospitals in al-Quds to receive dialysis or chemotherapy, but have been unable to do so.

Shawan Jabarin, chair of Alhaq, a Palestinian human rights group, described the siege as a “collective punishment” in which the Zionist occupation authorities “feel they are immune from accountability.”

“The life of a Palestinian has no sanctity to them, as well as their livelihoods and dignity. This is embedded in the [‘Israeli’] occupation’s mindset,” he said, adding that “from a legal point of view, this collective punishment amounts to a war crime and violates the Geneva Convention.”

The ‘Israeli’ occupation forces have been recently conducting near-nightly raids and killings in the northern occupied West Bank, mainly in the cities of Jenin and Nablus, where new groups of Palestinian resistance fighters have been formed.

More than 150 Palestinians have been martyred at the hands of ‘Israeli’ occupation forces in the ‘Israeli’-occupied territories since the beginning of the year, including 51 in the besieged Gaza Strip during the Tel Aviv regime’s three-day assault in August.

More than 30 of the martyrs were either from Jenin or were martyred in the Jenin region.