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Beita, Nablus

Coordinates: 32°08′37″N 35°17′15″E / 32.14361°N 35.28750°E / 32.14361; 35.28750
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Beita
Arabic transcription(s)
 • Arabicبيتا
 • LatinBayta (official)
Beita
Beita
Beita is located in State of Palestine
Beita
Beita
Location of Beita within Palestine
Coordinates: 32°08′37″N 35°17′15″E / 32.14361°N 35.28750°E / 32.14361; 35.28750
Palestine grid177/172
StateState of Palestine
GovernorateNablus
Government
 • TypeMunicipality (from 1996)
 • Head of MunicipalityArab ash-Shurafa
Area
 • Total76,000 dunams (76.0 km2 or 29.3 sq mi)
Population
 (2017)[1]
 • Total11,682
 • Density150/km2 (400/sq mi)
Name meaningBeit, "a house"[2]

Beita (Arabic: بيتا, translation: "Home") is a Palestinian town in the Nablus Governorate in the northern Israeli-occupied West Bank located 13 kilometers (8.1 mi) southeast of Nablus. According to the Palestinian Central Bureau of Statistics, the town had a population of 11,682 in 2017.[1] It consists of five clans which branch out to thirty families. There are many houses dating back to the Roman era.[3] The current mayor, elected in 2004 is Arab ash-Shurafa.[4]

The town contains four mosques and three clinics.[5] Since 1967, under the Israeli occupation of the West Bank, more than 77 Beita villagers have been shot dead by Israeli forces, many during protests,[6] 7 were killed between May and September 2021 during the suppression of demonstrations against the establishment of an Israeli outpost on Beita lands.[7]

Location

[edit]

Beita (including Za'tara locality) is located 9 kilometers (5.6 mi)–11 kilometers (6.8 mi) south of Nablus. It is bordered by Osarin and Aqraba to the east, Awarta and Odala to the north, Huwwara and Yasuf to the west, and Yatma and Qabalan to the south.[8]

History

[edit]

There are two historical centres in Beita; Beita el-Fauqa ("The upper Beita") to the North-East and Beita et-Tahta ("The lower Beita") to the South-West.[9] In Beita el-Fauqa, pottery sherds from the Iron Age II/Persian. Persian and Mamluk era have been found,[10] while at Beita et-Tahta sherds from the Iron Age II, Persian, Roman/Byzantine, Byzantine, and Mamluk era have been found.[11]

Ottoman era

[edit]

Beita was incorporated into the Ottoman Empire in 1517 with all of Palestine, and both in Beita el-Fauqa and Beita et-Tatha sherds from the early Ottoman era have been found.[9] In 1596 Beita appeared in the tax registers as being in the Nahiya of Jabal Qubal of the Liwa of Nablus. It had a population of 50 households, all Muslim. The villagers paid taxes on wheat, barley, summer crops, olive trees, occasional revenues, goats and/or beehives, and a press for olives or grapes; a total of 8,000 Akçe.[12]

In 1838, Edward Robinson noted Beita as a "large village",[13] located in the El-Beitawy district, east of Nablus.[14]

In 1882, the PEF's Survey of Western Palestine described it as "A large village, with a kind of suburb to the south, near which are ancient tombs. It is supplied by wells, and surrounded by olives. It stands upon the hills east of the Mukhnah plain, and is the capital of the district named from it."[15]

British Mandate era

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In the 1922 census of Palestine conducted by the British Mandate authorities, Beita had a population of 883, all Muslims,[16] increasing at the time of the 1931 census to 1,194, still all Muslim, in 286 houses.[17]

In the 1945 statistics Beita had a population of 1,580 Muslims,[18] with 17,542 dunams of land, according to an official land and population survey.[19] Of this, 5,666 dunams were plantations and irrigable land, 6,916 used for cereals,[20] while 76 dunams were built-up land.[21]

Jordanian era

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In the wake of the 1948 Arab–Israeli War, and after the 1949 Armistice Agreements, Beita came under annexed Jordanian rule.

At the beginning of 1930s Shaikh Rezeq Abdelrazeq Elyan Open the first school in Beita Al-Tahta and it was names (Beita National School) and the student from beita and around used to come and get education in it.[citation needed] In 1952, Beita opened an elementary school, which served the town and surrounding villages. In 1954, an elementary school for girls only was established and since then, four other schools have been built - including two secondary schools.[22]

The Jordanian census of 1961 found 693 inhabitants in Beita Tahta ("the lower Beita"), while Beita Fauqa ("the higher Beita") had 1,498 inhabitants; a total of 2,191 inhabitants.[23]

Post-1967

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Since the Six-Day War in 1967, Beita has been under Israeli occupation.

After the 1995 accords, 89% of the village land was classified as Area B, and the remaining 11% as Area C.[24]

Beita municipality

Although the town was considered a Fatah stronghold,[25] Arab ash-Shurafa, a member of Hamas, was elected mayor in 2005. Shurafa was arrested by the IDF, along with Nablus mayor Adly Yaish and Education Minister of the Palestinian National Authority Nasser al-Shaer in 2006 for their membership in Hamas.

Israeli-Palestinian conflict

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In January 1988, 20 men from Beita and Huwara, identified by a GSS report after clashes with Israeli troops to have been involved in stone throwing, were assembled, bound, without their resisting, with plastic handcuffs and had their bones broken by soldiers, and then were abandoned at night in a muddy field. The International Red Cross made a formal complaint, after local press reports had been ignored.[26] The army did not prosecute the matter initially. Lieutenant-colonel Yehuda Meir was reprimanded, and forced into retirement, with his officer's rank and pension rights intact. He was prosecuted only after the Association for Civil Rights in Israel made an issue of the matter by appealing to the Supreme Court which ruled that he had to stand trial, which then took place in April 1991. Meir was the local Nablus district commander overseeing the operation, and testified that he had acted under orders directly coming from Yitzhak Rabin and that when he had objected to bone-smashing, Rabin had replied: "You do the work, I'll take care of the media." His superiors testified that orders were only to use force in pursuit and arrests. The court believed the latter and found that the orders were legal, but that Meir had deviated from instructions.[26][27][28]

Beita and other Palestinian enclaves (yellow), Israeli settlements and Israeli-controlled Area C (magenta and blue)

On 10 April 2023, an estimated 15,000[29]- 20,000 ultranationalist settlers, protected by a full battalion (1,000) of IDF soldiers and joined by the Israeli Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir, Bezalel Smotrich, 7 other ministers, and 20 parliamentarians, staged a march towards Evyatar, reportedly to pressure the new government under Benjamin Netanyahu to legalize the outpost. The given reason for their march was to retaliate for the murder of three members of the Dee family, British settlers, three days earlier, on 7 April, at the Hamra junction. Beita villagers protesting the march suffered 191 casualties, in large part from tear-gas intoxication. 17 were injured by rubber bullet shots fired by the army,[30] while two were wounded in the head by gas canisters.[31] Le Monde reported that journalists covering the event were also targeted, with one wearing a press vest also injured by a rubber bullet.[29]

Beita Incident

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On April 6, 1988, 16-20 teenage hikers from Elon Moreh, an Israeli settlement 10 kilometers (6.2 mi) north of Beita, set out for a trek. Nature-hiking among settlers was a symbolic means of demonstrating their control of the land.[32] They were accompanied by two guards, both with a reputation for being aggressive Zionists:[33] Roman Aldubi, a 26-year-old known extremist and religious militant banned by the IDF from entering Nablus for 6 months, after he had been convicted of obstruction of justice for hiding a gun used by another settler to kill an 11 year old Palestinian child, 'Aysha Bahash, in her father's bakery, during a stone-throwing incident;[32][34][35] and Menahem Ilan (55), the organizer,[32] were crossing village land in a show of strength, "to show them that we are the masters of the country", as one of the hikers later told ABC correspondent Barrie Dunsmore.[33][36] (Ilan had previously been convicted in 1984 of obstructing justice and destroying evidence in a prior settler killing of a Palestinian girl.[37][38]) When the settler group sat down to make breakfast near a spring, or a local well,[32] local farmers sowing their spring crops[26] became alarmed at the presence under armed guard, and one of them went to the village, a kilometre away, and the villagers were notified over the mosque's loudspeaker.[25] The village lands were under military closure at the time, and, according to their accounts, they feared, based on other precedents in the area, that the local well might be poisoned.[38] On such walks permission was never asked of villagers, furthermore, to trek through their fields, and Menachem Ilan had not alerted the IDF of his hiking plans in a remote Arab area.[32] Several dozen farmers, among them some teenagers, gathered in proximity of the hikers.[32] What took place was contested at that time.[25][38]

At first, according to one version Aldubi fired warning shots from his Uzi at the farmers, some of whom threw stones. One of these shots is said, in one account, to have killed Mousa Saleh Bani Shamseh.[39] In the IDF investigation, it was determined that Aldubi shot Mussa Saleh in the back at a distance of about 10 yards while the latter was fleeing.[40] In another version, Ilan reprimanded him, and led the hikers away down a riverbed, where one girl was hit in the thigh by a stone and then Aldubi opened fire with Ilan's M-16 shooting Mousa Saleh in the head, killing him[25] and wounding another farmer.[41] Aldubi later said the man had tried to grab his rifle,[26] a claim the IDF investigation later stated was unsubstantiated by any evidence.[40] In one version, the hikers continued on and walked into the village, despite the incident.[39] In the other, the villagers surrounded them, and led them to Beita.[26]

When the Israelis entered Beita they were met by a crowd of villagers who had learned of the killing. The villagers were frightened by the sight of guns: the teenagers, in their account, were equally apprehensive on seeing furious villagers reportedly brandishing knives, pickaxes and clubs.[26] The army investigation found that the villagers had no firearms.[33] As the Israelis moved in a tight group through the village, the car carrying Mousa Saleh's corpse arrived, and stones were thrown. At one point, while her husband Taysir was burying his brother-in-law,[39] Munira Daoud, who was also the deceased's sister, hit Aldubi in the head with a rock. Several villagers pushed through the crowd to save the teenagers.[26][42][43] According to one report, Aldubi while falling sprayed his Uzi machine gun and killed Hatem Fayez Ahmad Al-Jaber and severely wounded several other villagers.[25][44] The IDF investigation found that instead Aldubi squeezed off several shots as he turned around after being hit by a rock, and then fired again when one of the villagers tried to wrest his rifle from him.[40]

As Aldubi fired, Tirza Porat, a 15-year-old member of his own group, was killed by a shot to the back of the head.[27] He and Menachem were disarmed by the villagers, who smashed his gun. He received a serious head wound, and several others youths were hurt in the clash. One villager, Azzam Bani Shemseh, tried to revive Tirza by heart massage. The same family brought water to the teenagers, and another family gave refuge to three Israeli girls in their home. The villagers called for ambulances[45] and guided the rest to the main road where they flagged down cars.[26]

Initially, Israel media reported that Tirza Porat had been killed in an incident by bloodthirsty Arabs throwing stones.[25] The Gush Emunim teenagers said Porat had been killed by a rooftop sniper.[27] An official statement spoke of the group falling "into the hands of pogromists and murderers". Ariel Sharon called for the village to be emptied and for more settlements to be built.[46] Israeli prime minister Yitzhak Shamir attended her funeral where cries of revenge were uttered and where Knesset member Haim Druckman declared that "the village of Beita must be wiped off the face of the earth,"[47][48] a remark that was met with "amens" from the crowd.[26] The following day the Israel Defense Forces revealed that she been shot in the head by an M16 carbine belonging to Aldubi. It was also revealed that "the young settlers, instructed by their elders, had rendered untruthful accounts."[49] Despite knowing from the start who was responsible, the Israeli first bulldozed six homes and then, after the report indicated Porat had not been killed by Palestinians, destroyed another eight[33] in Beita, "giving people ample time to leave". Noam Chomsky states this was "a total lie", counting double the number of buildings destroyed including all their contents. On his own visit to Beita, 30 houses were either 'totally demolished or virtually destroyed.'[50] They also killed a sixteen-year-old boy, Issam Abdul Halim Mohammad Said, and arrested all male adult residents, six of whom were deported on April 19.[3][25][47][51][52]

Aftermath and Punishment

[edit]

As soon as the Israeli army intervened, they shot dead a villager who they said was trying to run away.[45] Within 48 hours of the incident, Major General Amram Mitzna, who had cordoned off the village he said to protect the residents and who declared no reprisals would be taken, interrogated all males between 16 and 60, and made hundreds of the villagers stand handcuffed and blindfolded all night. They said later they had been kicked, beaten and menaced until satisfactory testimonies had been given. IDF bulldozers uprooted dozens of olive trees and an almond grove nearby, which actually belonged to another Palestinian village.[39] The army withheld the autopsy results, showing the girl had been killed by Aldubi's M-16 until the funeral was over.[26] He then ordered the demolition of 14 homes in Beita, one of which had sheltered one of the Israeli hikers, after the army had established that Tirza Porat had not been shot by a Palestinian.[53] The demolitions were ordered while the owners of 13 of the homes had not been charged with any crime.[45] Over 60 members of the village were arrested, and 6 were expelled to Lebanon.[27] Hamad Ben Ishams, whose house had been demolished, was imprisoned for seven months despite repeated evidence by his Israeli employer that Hamad had been at work with him in Israel at the time.[26] The military judge preferred the testimony of one of the hikers Rami Hoffman who identified him as an assailant.[26]

The official IDF investigation found that Ilan and Aldubi, the two escorts had 'escalat(ed) the crisis' by lack of caution and "hastiness in pulling the trigger," but the major cause for the incident was Palestinian aggressiveness and "readiness to harm Jewish hikers", and that they had a general plan to lure the hikers in their village.[40]

Aldubi was still hospitalized a year later, and confined to a wheelchair.[45] According to Noam Chomsky, who visited the village, the military commander told The New York Times that Aldubi would not be incriminated because "the tragic incidents were already penalty enough."[50] The incident radicalized the village. One local some months later was reported as saying:

"Beita is different now because the people are revengeful... Now we know how the Israelis treat Palestinians, the way a wild animal treats a victim."[39]

In May 1989, a Jaffa military court handed down stiff sentences to five of the members of the village of Beita suspected of throwing stones at Jewish hikers. The person convicted of the most serious crime got an eight-year sentence, of which 3 were to be served. Two others sentenced to five-year terms were to serve 21 months, a fourth 18 months and the fifth two years. A further 11 Beitans were slated to stand trial later on the same charges.[54]

On 14 April 1991 an Elon Moreh settler, Pinhas Assayag (22), murdered a Beita resident, Jamil Dweikat (50). Arrested on 19 June 1991, he also confessed to killing a 22 year old shepherd, Radi a-Ouna from the nearby village of 'Azmut earlier in January of that year.[55] After an investigation, he was committed to an Israeli mental hospital.[56]

May–September 2021 series of protester killings

[edit]

Beita's remaining lands were the object of a further attempt at illegal Israeli settlement early in 2020, when an attempt was made to seize an area called Jabal Orma. That venture was eventually abandoned in the wake of local demonstrations, in which two protesting villagers were shot dead.[56]

In May, 2021, in the period of the 2021 demonstrations, Israeli settlers in caravans seized the top of Jabel Sbeih, a site which Beita residents insist is privately owned Palestinian land.[57] Jabel Sbeih lies on the village's outskirts. The new illegal outpost, named Evyatar was reportedly designed to split up and fragment Palestinian areas to its north, south, east and west.[56] Over the following months, in response to repeated demonstrations against the establishment of Evyatar, Israeli forces shot dead, on different occasions, seven residents of Beita, and another Palestinian youth from nearby Yatma.[58] Over this period an estimated 1,000 have been injured in clashes with the Israeli army, while the Israeli government reportedly assisted the development of the site with paved roads, water lines, and electricity.[6]

In June, 2021, Israel destroyed $100,000 worth of vegetables in Beita by firing teargas at a vegetable storage unit.[59]

In the same month the new government of Naphtali Bennett reached an agreement with the settlers to evacuate in exchange for a promise to maintain the infrastructure and convert the outpost into a yeshiva.[6] The deal foresees the return of the settlers if Israel declares the area state land in the future. Beita and nearby villages have petitioned the Israeli Supreme Court to revoke the terms of the agreement.[60] On August 14, 2021, Beita protesters erected a wooden star of David in the center of which was a swastika, set fire to the structure and highlighted the event with a video on social media.[61][57]

Those killed are

  • On 14 May, Dr. Issa Barham, a legal scholar, expert in international law, who worked for the prosecutor's office in Salfit, was shot dead after he responded to a call from the mosque for volunteers to help evacuate those wounded by Israeli army fire during a Friday demonstration. Ambulances couldn't cope, and he drove his Hyundai Tucson SUV to the scene. According to Palestinians present, as he was walking over to a group of wounded, an Israeli sniper knelt down, aimed and a single shot rang out. Barham died of a gunshot wound to the stomach.[62][63]
  • Zakaria Hamayel (26) a schoolteacher of Arabic, was shot dead while looking for a place to say his afternoon prayers in a break from a demonstration against the illegal settlement. A medic wearing the characteristic phosphorescent vest was shot in the thigh as he tried to assist Hamayel.[62]
  • 11 June. Mohammed Hamayel (16), high school student was shot in the centre of the chest at a distance of a few dozen metres by one of 4 soldiers spread out on the ground. His cousin was wounded [62]
  • Ahmad Bani Shamseh (17) was shot dead. The IDF account said he was killed for throwing an 'explosive device'.[6][62]
  • On 27 July, Shadi Shurafi, Beita's village plumber, was shot dead by a soldier from the Israeli Kfir Brigade as he stood, according to the Palestinian account, with a monkey wrench in his hand by the broken main of the village water supply. His body, according to Gideon Levy, was one of 300 Israel had yet to hand back to mourning families, apparently as exchange material for the return of the remains of two soldiers killed in battle inside the Gaza Strip. After some weeks, Israel returned it for burial. Israeli spokesmen stated that he was shot after ignoring warning shots as he charged the soldiers with a wrench in his hand.[56][64][65]
  • On 6 August, Imad Duikat (38), a father of five, was shot dead with a .22 bullet to the chest while reportedly sipping water from a disposable cup near an ambulance at the protest site. On the same afternoon, 6 other Beita residents were hit by live fire and over 100 were injured by tear gas and rubber-tipped metal bullets. The IDF said stones were thrown and tires burnt in what they termed a 'violent demonstration'.[66][56][65]
  • On 24 September Muhammad Ali Khabisa(28) became the 7th victim to be shot dead, reportedly while sitting under an olive tree,[58] during a further Friday protest over the Evyatar settlement. A sniper bullet smashed his skull.[7][58][65]

On 6 September 2024, with a shot to the head, Israel troops killed an American-Turkish woman, Ayşenur Ezgi Eygi (26), who had gone to Beita as a volunteer for an International Solidarity Group. Another American volunteer had been shot in the leg in the preceding August. Eygi's death brought the number of protesters shot dead by Israeli forces in Beita since 2021 to 10.[67]

Demography

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Local origins

[edit]

Some of the Beita's residents are Bedouins from Gaza and Hebron.[68]

References

[edit]
  1. ^ a b Preliminary Results of the Population, Housing and Establishments Census, 2017 (PDF). Palestinian Central Bureau of Statistics (PCBS) (Report). State of Palestine. February 2018. pp. 64–82. Retrieved 2023-10-24.
  2. ^ Palmer, 1881, p. 226
  3. ^ a b Beita Municipality: Beita Town
  4. ^ Beita Municipality: Municipality
  5. ^ Beita Municipality: Public Foundations Archived 2007-10-24 at the Wayback Machine Beita Municipality.
  6. ^ a b c d Yumna Patel, 'Beita is undefeatable': Inside the struggle to save this Palestinian village from Israeli settlers,,' Mondoweiss 7 July 2021.
  7. ^ a b Jack Khoury, Hagar Shezaf, ' Palestinian Killed by Israeli Gunfire in the West Bank, Haaretz 24 September 2021
  8. ^ Beita Town Profile (including Za'tara Locality), ARIJ, p. 4
  9. ^ a b Finkelstein and Lederman, 1997, pp. 703-4
  10. ^ Finkelstein and Lederman, 1997, p. 704
  11. ^ Finkelstein and Lederman, 1997, p. 703
  12. ^ Hütteroth and Abdulfattah, 1977, p. 134
  13. ^ Robinson and Smith, 1841, vol 3, p. 93
  14. ^ Robinson and Smith, 1841, vol 3, 2nd Appendix, p. 128
  15. ^ Conder and Kitchener, 1882, SWP II, p. 288
  16. ^ Barron, 1923, Table IX, Sub-district of Nablus, p. 25
  17. ^ Mills, 1932, p. 60
  18. ^ Government of Palestine, Department of Statistics, 1945, p. 18
  19. ^ Government of Palestine, Department of Statistics. Village Statistics, April, 1945. Quoted in Hadawi, 1970, p. 59
  20. ^ Government of Palestine, Department of Statistics. Village Statistics, April, 1945. Quoted in Hadawi, 1970, p. 105
  21. ^ Government of Palestine, Department of Statistics. Village Statistics, April, 1945. Quoted in Hadawi, 1970, p. 155
  22. ^ Beita Municipality: Education Beita Municipality.
  23. ^ Government of Jordan, Department of Statistics, 1964, p. 25
  24. ^ Beita Town Profile (including Za'tara Locality), ARIJ, p. 17
  25. ^ a b c d e f g Lockman and Beinin, 1989, pp. 81
  26. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l Frankel, 1996, pp. 82-83
  27. ^ a b c d Conroy, 2000, pp. 138-156, 191-224.
  28. ^ Barzilai, 2002, pp. 176-177
  29. ^ a b Clothilde Mraffko, 'The show of force by Israeli settlers in the West Bank,' Le Monde 11 April 2023
  30. ^ Michele Giorgio, 'Verso Evyatar, la destra estrema detta la sua legge a Netanyahu,' Il Manifesto 11 April 2023
  31. ^ Reuters, 'Thousands of Israelis march to illegal West Bank outpost as tensions mount,' 10 April 2023
  32. ^ a b c d e f Frankel, 1996, pp. 94-96
  33. ^ a b c d Joseph C. Harsch, 'Fundamentalism and the West Bank's Beita affair,' The Christian Science Monitor
  34. ^ Lockman and Beinin, 1989, p. 84
  35. ^ "even among the militant settlers, he has consistently stood out for his provocative conduct, which has gained him the dubious honour of being the only Jew ever subjected to a military exclusion order (whereby he is banned from entering Nablus)." Peretz Kidron, Middle East International No323, 16 April 1988.
  36. ^ Chomsky, 1999, p. 495
  37. ^ Kibler, Jon (1990) [July/August 1990]. "Beita's Continuing Ordeal". Washington Report on Middle East Affairs. p. 20. Archived from the original on April 19, 2024.
  38. ^ a b c Noam Chomsky. 'Scenes from the Uprising,' Archived 2015-09-23 at the Wayback Machine Z Magazine July, 1988
  39. ^ a b c d e Joel Brinkley, 'Beita Journal; Where the Hot Rage of April Is Now Cold Fury,' The New York Times 23 August 1988.:' Apparently he had an expansive view of what constituted a warning, because one shot killed a farmer working in a nearby field.'
  40. ^ a b c d Stephen Franklin,'Israeli Army Admits Escort Shot Teenager,' Chicago Tribune 28 April 1988.
  41. ^ Conroy, 2000, p. 217
  42. ^ "Girl killed by errant bullet, Israeli army inquiry says". Tri-City Herald. April 28, 1988. p. A8.
  43. ^ "5 Sentenced In West Bank Incident". The Philadelphia Inquirer. May 25, 1989. p. A20.
  44. ^ Daoud Kuttab, Middle East International. No 323, 16 April 1988: 'the party approached a youth working his land to ask where there was a well. The Palestinian replied "not here" and asked the settlers what they were doing on the village land. One report said that the youth told the Israeli settlers to get out of "our country". Apparently this reply angered the extremist armed guard who shot him in the stomach.'
  45. ^ a b c d Robert Ruby, 'Resentment Still Smoldering After '88 Clash In West Bank,' The Baltimore Sun, 7 April 1989.
  46. ^ Kelly and Maghan, 1998, p. 94
  47. ^ a b Thomas L. Friedman 'In Separate Gestures, a Mosaic of Intentions,' The New York Times 17 April 1988
  48. ^ Peretz Kidron, Middle East International. No 323, 16 April 1988. page 7.
  49. ^ Peretz Kidron, MEI, No 323. page 8.
  50. ^ a b Noam Chomsky, Language and Politics , AK Press 2004 pp.679-680
  51. ^ Noam Chomsky, Power and Terror - Post-9/11 Talks and Interviews. Seven Stories Press, New York. Little More, Tokyo. 2003. ISBN 1-58322-590-0. page 93.
  52. ^ Journal of Palestine Studies, vol XVII, No.4 #68 Summer 1988, page 230: Palestine Chronology, 8 April. "Israeli army reports 15-year-old Israeli killed 4/6 died when bullet from M-16 rifle carried by Israeli guard struck her in head. Investigation has also shown guard, who was banned by the army from Nablus, killed 1 Palestinian and wounded another before Israeli group reached Bayta village. Some villagers reacted to news of killing by attacking Israelis with stones. Guard was wounded by rock thrown at head. Villagers took guards' guns and broke them. Other Palestinians tried to hide Israeli youths. Soldiers later broke into Beita hospital, beating patients in search for those suspected of involvement in clash.[NYT 4/9]. (The New York Times)
  53. ^ Cockburn, 1988, p. 496
  54. ^ 'Five from Village of Beita Sentenced for 1988 Tragedy,' Jewish Telegraphic Agency 25 May 1989.
  55. ^ 'Report of the Special Committee to Investigate Israeli Practices Affecting the Human Rights of the Palestinian People and Other Arabs of the Occupied Territories,' United Nations General Assembly 46th session A/46/522 Item 252 18 October 1991.
  56. ^ a b c d e Gideon Levy, Alex Levac, 'They Choose One Person to Kill, and Then the Protest Is Over' Haaretz 12 August 2021
  57. ^ a b Emanuel Fabian, 'With flaming Star of David and swastika, Palestinians protest illegal outpost,' Times of Israel 15 August 2021
  58. ^ a b c Gideon Levy, Alex Levac, 'If the Israeli Sniper Could See the Devastation He Caused, He Wouldn't Shoot Again ,' Haaretz 1 October 2021.
  59. ^ Soldiers Injure Many Palestinians in Beita, Jun 28, 2021, IMEMC
  60. ^ Hagar Shezaf,'Palestinians Claiming Land at Illegal Outpost Take Israel's Deal With Settlers to Court,' Haaretz 8 July 2021
  61. ^ Khaled Abu Toameh, Tovah Lazaroff, 'Palestinian rioters near Evyatar outpost put up flaming swastika,' Jerusalem Post 15 August 2021
  62. ^ a b c d Amira Hass, 'Reality of a West Bank Outpost: Four Dead Palestinians and a Drone Spraying Tear Gas ,' Haaretz 1 June 2021
  63. ^ Palestinians killed in West Bank as Israeli crackdown intensifies, Shatha Hammad, 14 May 2021, Middle East Eye
  64. ^ Gideon Levy, Alex Levac,'A Palestinian Plumber Was Shot Dead by Israeli Troops While Trying to Fix a Water Outage,' Haaretz 6 August 2021.
  65. ^ a b c Gideon Levy, Alex Levac, 'What the Israeli army does to soldiers who shoot Palestinians,' Haaretz 19 November 2021
  66. ^ Jack Khoury, 'Palestinian Protester Killed by Israeli Fire Near Illegal West Bank Outpost,' Haaretz 6 August 2021
  67. ^ 'American-Turkish woman shot dead at anti-settler protest in West Bank,' The Guardian 6 September 2024
  68. ^ Grossman, D. (1986). "Oscillations in the Rural Settlement of Samaria and Judaea in the Ottoman Period". in Shomron studies. Dar, S., Safrai, S., (eds). Tel Aviv: Hakibbutz Hameuchad Publishing House. p. 355

Bibliography

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