Israel’s occupation forces kill and injure (894) Palestinian Civilians in Gaza in 7 days
August 20, 2024
During August 13-19, 2024, the Israeli occupation forces systematically bombed civilian areas, particularly those populated by the displaced, killing 257 Palestinians, mostly women and children, and injuring 637 in the Gaza Strip and the West Bank. This raised the total number of fatalities since the beginning of the Israeli aggression on the Gaza Strip until August 17, 2024, to 40,707 Palestinians. Last week, the Israeli occupation forces conducted airstrikes in Deir al-Balah, wiping out entire families and homes in the Nuseirat and Maghazi refugee camps, as well as in Az-Zawayda and other areas where the displaced took refuge.
In recent developments, there have been numerous instances of settlement activities in the West Bank and the occupied city of Al-Quds, including the construction of a settlement road between the villages of Yasuf and Iskaka in Salfit, excavation work for a new settlement outpost in Jericho, and the expansion of the Rahalim settlement in the villages of Nablus through the bulldozing of agricultural lands. Additionally, settlers have erected tents and mobile homes in the Jamjoum area, Al-Minya village in Bethlehem, and Tubas villages with the intention of establishing settlement outposts. In the village of Qaryut in Nablus, lands were bulldozed to expand the settlements of Eli and Shilo. Moreover, settlers have closed and fenced off a dirt road in Nab’ Al-Ghazal in the northern Jordan Valley and restored the ancient Ma’in water well east of Yatta in Hebron, where Talmudic rituals were performed to signify its seizure.
The occupation forces have also confiscated 338 dunums of land in Beit Jala and Battir for the expansion of the Nahal Heletz settlement and another 18 dunums of land each in the villages of Bani Hassan and Haris in Salfit.
In the occupied Al-Quds, the occupying forces demolished structures, including barns, a gas station, commercial stores, a horse stable, a shed, and a car wash to make way for the construction of a settlement road in the area. Settlers also seized a building of five apartments in the Silwan neighborhood, claiming that it was built on “Jewish” land. The occupation forces also demolished 14 houses in Al-Quds, Ramallah, Hebron, and Nablus, while settlers burned 4 houses in the villages of Qalqilya.
During the past week, the occupation forces killed 13 Palestinians in the West Bank, arrested 140, demolished livestock pens in Beit Dajan in Nablus and Jenin, and commercial facilities, caravans, tents, water tanks, solar energy units, and water networks in Yatta, a solar energy room in the Arab Al-Malihat community in Jericho, bulldozed a building materials store, and confiscated a private vehicle and two cement mixers in Salfit and Jenin, and sums of money and gold jewelry in Qalqilya and Ramallah.
There were a total of 44 attacks by settlers, including the theft of sheep in Tubas and a water tank in Bethlehem, as well as the destruction of six vehicles in the villages of Qalqilya. Additionally, water sources in the village of Al-Auja in Jericho were targeted, and there were incidents of arson on agricultural lands and pastures and deliberate uprooting of fruit trees in the villages of Tulkarm, Tubas, Bethlehem, Salfit, and Hebron.
On the other hand, the blessed Al-Aqsa Mosque witnessed 5 consecutive incursions during the same period, the most prominent of which was a group of extremist settlers led by Itamar Ben-Gvir, the extremist Israeli Minister of National Security, and the Yitzhak Wasserlauf, Minister for the Development of the Periphery, the Negev, and the Galilee. They stormed the blessed Al-Aqsa under the protection of the occupation police, performed Talmudic rituals, and made provocative tours in the courtyards of the mosque. The number of crimes and violations from August 13-19, 2024, totaled 1728 in the Gaza Strip, the West Bank, and occupied Al-Quds. These incidents included killings, injuries, arrests, demolitions, and raids.