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Welcome to Palestine Today, a service of the International Middle East Media Center, www.imemc.org, for Tuesday, July 10, 2012
Palestinian prisoner ends 96-day hunger strike released from Israeli prison and a 15-year old girl appoint mayor, these stories and more, coming up, stay tuned.
Mahmoud Sarsak, the Palestinian international footballer has been re-united with his family in the besieged Gaza Strip. Sarsak had been held for 3 years without charge in an Israeli prison. He staged a 96-day hunger strike to protest his illegal detention and treatment. His case received widespread international support, with calls for his release coming from FIFA president Michel Platini, director Ken Loach, and linguist Noam Chomsky.
In other prisoner news Nabil al-Raee, director of The Freedom Theatre in Jenin, is continuing his hunger strike to protest his illegal detention in an Israeli prison. Al-Raee was arrested during a night invasion by the Israeli Army. The international community, including renowned actor American Danny Glover , has repeatedly called for his release.
In other news from Gaza, fresh Israeli airstrikes targeted resistance fighters in the southern part of the Gaza Strip. Missiles struck buildings in Khan Younis and Rafah in the southern part of the Palestinian enclave. Although there was some material damage, nobody was injured. Israeli airstrikes have killed 16 people including 4 children in recent weeks.
Meanwhile, in the West Bank, a young child was rammed by a settler’s car in the village of Susiya near Hebron. Medics reported that the child suffered a broken leg. Susiya has seen an increase in settler violence in recent weeks as the army has bulldozed homes in preparation for fresh land grabs.
In settlement news, a government-appointed committee has put forward a proposal that would grant official status to all illegal settlements in the occupied West Bank. The committee which wrote the report re-stated Israel’s claim that the West Bank is not occupied, and thus all settlements are legal. There are currently more than 200 Israeli settlements in the West Bank which are in violation of the fourth Geneva Convention, and have been denounced by the UN Security Council and the International Court of Justice.
In Jerusalem, the al-Aqsa Foundation for Endowments and Heritage reported that Israel carried out excavations under al-Aqsa mosque on Sunday night and transported dirt from the base of the holy site after the work was completed under cover of darkness. The foundation warned that the secret nighttime excavations are an attempt to destroy Palestinian and Islamic heritage in the old city of Jerusalem.
Elsewhere in the West Bank, A 15-year-old girl has been appointed temporary mayor of a northern West Bank town as part of a youth empowerment initiative. Bashayir Othman will serve as mayor of her town of Illar for the duration of her summer holiday. She will spend two months performing all of the mayor’s duties from signing official documents to human resources under the supervision of the elected mayor of Illar, Sufian Shadid.
And that all for today from the IMEMC News; this was the Tuesday July 10 daily news roundup 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 Husam Qassis and me Jack Muir
