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Welcome to Palestine Today, a service of the International Middle East Media Center, www.imemc.org, for Wednesday, August 19th, 2015.
Nine Palestinian refugees die of Turkish shores; meanwhile Israeli troops kidnap more than 20 Palestinians from West Bank communities. These stories, and more, coming up, stay tuned.
At least nine Palestinian refugees died on Wednesday, after an overloaded boat carrying illegal migrants fleeing the Syrian conflict capsized off the coast of Turkey, according to media sources.
According to media sources, the boat earlier set sail from the Lebanese seaport Tripoli and was destined for Turkey, but hours later, it capsized in international waters due to its overload.
Among the victims were women and children, news sources reported. In September 2014, about 15 Palestinian migrants attempting to flee the besieged and war-torn Gaza Strip died after their boat capsized in the Mediterranean Sea off the coast of northern Egypt.
Elsewhere, the Egyptian Interior Ministry has reported that unknown gunmen have kidnapped four Palestinians, on Wednesday at night, while traveling in the Egyptian city of Rafah, in the North Sinai Governorate.
According to Egyptian government, the Palestinians were traveling in a deportation bus, guarded by Egyptian security officers, in the Egyptian Rafah city, before several gunmen intercepted the bus, and abducted the four Palestinians.
In other news, Israeli soldiers kidnapped, Wednesday, ten Palestinians after storming into their homes and violently searching them, in different parts of occupied Jerusalem, local sources reported. Moreover Israeli forces, early Wednesday, abducted 10 Palestinians from West Bank districts.
Later on Wednesday, Israeli authorities demolished, on Wednesday, two residential units in Jerusalem and Ramallah.
In Hebron Israeli troops raided the apartment of Maher Hashlamoun, a Palestinian who was accused of stabbing and killing an Israeli settler in last November. According to the Hashlamoun family, the army notified them and residents of the other apartments in the building of their intent to demolish the apartment in retaliation for the murder of the settler.
Also on Wednesday, Israel’s High Court suspended a detention-without-trial order on hunger-striking Palestinian prisoner Muhammad Allan but said he must remain in hospital pending a decision on his future.
The court said that for now he should be treated like other hospital patients. Earlier, an MRI scan revealed that Allan had suffered brain damage as a result of his hunger strike. Israel’s High Court had said that if the hunger striker’s brain damage is irreversible, then, it is likely the administrative order will be completely revoked. Allan started his hunger strike two months ago.
And that’s all for today from the IMEMC News; this was the Wednesday, August 19th, 2015 news round-up from the Occupied Palestinian Territories. For more news and updates, please visit our website at www.imemc.org. Today’s report has been brought to you by George Rishmawi and Ghassan Bannoura.
