- Title: WEST BANK: Palestinians clash with Israeli soldiers in anti-barrier protest
- Date: 30th May 2009
- Summary: BILIN, WEST BANK (MAY 29, 2009) (REUTERS) PALESTINIAN AND INTERNATIONAL PROTESTERS MARCHING FROM VILLAGE OF BILIN TOWARDS BARRIER SITE, WAVING PALESTINIAN FLAGS PROTESTERS APPROACHING PALESTINIAN YOUTHS CARRYING BANNERS AND WAVING FLAGS ISRAELI SOLDIERS STANDING BEHIND BARBED WIRE PROTESTERS APPROACHING BARRIER SITE ISRAELI SOLDIERS SHOOTING TEAR GAS YOUTHS THROWING ROCKS GAS SHOT AT PROTESTERS, CREATING WHITE SMOKE / CAMERAMAN EMERGING FROM SMOKE PALESTINIAN LEGISLATIVE COUNCIL MEMBER KAIS ABU LAILA COUGHING ISRAELI SOLDIERS SHOOTING TEAR GAS AT DEMONSTRATORS AS SEEN FROM A DISTANCE AMBULANCE ARRIVING TO SITE MAN BEING TREATED FOR INJURIES IN AMBULANCE BANDAGED INJURIES HILL OF BILIN DURING DEMONSTRATION AS SEEN FROM A DISTANCE SKAT VILLAGE, WEST BANK (MAY 28, 2009) (REUTERS) PALESTINIANS CLASHING WITH ISRAELI SOLDIERS GUN OF ISRAELI SOLDIER BODY OF ABDEL MAJID DUDIN, TOP HAMAS OPERATIVE WHO WAS KILLED BY ISRAELI FORCES, LYING IN FIELD ISRAELI SOLDIERS ON SITE PALESTINIAN PARAMEDICS EVACUATING BODY FROM FIELD MORE OF EVACUATION OF BODY MEDICS TAKING BODY INTO AMBULANCE ARMY JEEP AND AMBULANCE DRIVING AWAY AL BIRA VILLAGE, WEST BANK (MAY 29, 2009) (REUTERS) WOMAN WAVING LARGE GREEN FLAG PRIOR TO FUNERAL PROCESSION CHILD KISSING DUDIN PHOTOGRAPHERS AND MEDIA CREWS ON SITE GIRL KISSING DUDIN FAMILY MEMBERS AND FRIENDS TAKING CASKET / BEGINNING OF FUNERAL PROCESSION HUNDREDS TAKING PART IN FUNERAL PROCESSION MOURNERS CARRYING BODY BODY OF DUDIN IN CASKET HUNDREDS MARCHING AND CHANTING DURING FUNERAL PROCESSION
- Embargoed: 14th June 2009 13:00
- Keywords:
- Topics: Crime / Law Enforcement
- Reuters ID: LVA98JSPR956GZB7XDP2TZWXKLO9
- Story Text: Hundreds of Palestinian and international peace activists demonstrated on Friday (May 29) against the Israeli-built separation barrier in the West Bank village of Bilin.
The demonstrators marched from the village towards the construction site of the separation barrier and confronted Israeli soldiers who fired tear gas at them.
Palestinian legislative council member Kais Abu Laila participated in the demonstration, in which a cameraman was wounded and given first aid treatment in an ambulance.
The Israeli army spokesperson unit said that 150 demonstrators were rioting and were hurling rocks at the soldiers, who responded with riot dispersal means.
The barrier in Bilin cuts some 3 kilometres (2 miles) into the village, separating some farmers from their fields.
Israel has said that the barrier, a mix of electronic fences and walls that encroaches on West Bank territory, is meant to keep suicide bombers out of its cities.
Palestinians call the barrier - the course of which encompasses Israeli settlements in the West Bank - a disguised move to annex or fragment territory Palestinians seek for a viable state.
The World Court in The Hague ruled in 2004 that Israel's building of the barrier was illegal.
Meanwhile, In the West Bank town of Hebron, hundreds of Palestinians held a funeral procession for a Palestinian militant who was shot dead by Israeli troops on Thursday (May 28). His body, which was lying in a field right after he had been shot, was evacuated from the site by Palestinian medics.
An Israeli military spokesman named the dead gunman as Abdel Majid Dudin, 45, a top operative of the Islamist Hamas faction whom he said was responsible for the deaths of a number of Israelis in attacks in the past.
A Palestinian official said that Palestinian security forces loyal to President Mahmoud Abbas's Fatah movement had been looking for Dudin as well.
The Israeli army spokesman said that Dudin was first put on Israel's wanted list in 1995 when he was accused of planning two suicide bombings on Israeli buses in which 10 people died and scores were wounded.
Palestinian security forces arrested Dudin soon after the bus bombings and held him in a Palestinian jail in the West Bank town of Jericho, but he was released at the start of a violent uprising in 2000, the army spokesman added.
Abbas and Fatah largely control Palestinian affairs in the West Bank and maintain some security cooperation with Israeli forces, who have overall control of the occupied territory. - Copyright Holder: REUTERS
- Copyright Notice: (c) Copyright Thomson Reuters 2011. Open For Restrictions - http://about.reuters.com/fulllegal.asp
- Usage Terms/Restrictions: None
