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Welcome to Palestine Today, a service of the International Middle East Media Center, www.imemc.org, for Thursday, February 17 2011.

Human Rights Watch (HRW) released a video, Wednesday, showing plainclothes Palestinian police officers trapping a protester and beating him while he was taking part in a demonstration in support of the Egyptian revolution. The organization called on the U.S. and European Union, which provide direct support to the Palestinian security services, to ‘suspend such aid pending concrete steps by the Palestinian Authority (PA) to end a culture of impunity for security service abuses, including torture.’

Three Palestinians have been killed during clashes with the Israeli military in the north of the Gaza Strip.

Also in the Gaza Strip, two men were injured by the Israeli Army. Both were collecting stone aggregates east of Gaza City. Medics stated that both had suffered moderate injuries and were transported to Ash-Shifa hospital.
The Israeli military erected, on Thursday morning, many checkpoints in the town of Hebron, southern West Bank, and searched several houses. The army invaded the city of Hebron and surrounding towns, including Beit ‘Awa, Ethna, Halhoul, Sa’er, al-Shoyokh and al-Fawar Refugee Camp; stopped vehicles and checked the passengers identities; causing severe obstruction to traffic.

Jewish National Fund bulldozers re-entered the village of al-Arakib this morning and destroyed buildings that were put up after yesterday’s destruction. This is now the 18th time that al-Arakib has been destroyed in a matter of months. Police, riot police and Special Forces were involved in the operation, which occurred in the early hours of this morning. Residents were barricaded into the cemetery where they had fled for safety after yesterday’s destruction and were sleeping. Later on, residents from the nearby city of Rahat came to al-Arakib and demonstrated in support of the villagers. They were blocked from entering the village and riot police opened fire with rubber bullets and tear gas.

That sums up our news for today, thank you for joining us from occupied Bethlehem. You have been listening to Palestine Today, from International Middle East Media Center. For more updates, please visit our website at www.imemc.org. This report has been brought to you by Husam Qassis and Circarre Parrhesia