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Israeli forces rounded up 520 Palestinians in raids carried out across the occupied West Bank last month, according to Palestinian NGOs on Monday.
“Sixty-nine minors and nine women were among those arrested,” read a joint statement issued by the Commission of Detainees and Ex-Detainees Affairs, the Palestinian Prisoners Society, Addameer Prisoner Support and Human Rights Association, and Al Mezan Center for Human Rights.
According to the statement, Israeli forces detained five Palestinian journalists in the occupied territory last month.
The statement said 122 of the detainees were arrested in East Jerusalem, 100 in Ramallah and Al-Bireh in the central West Bank and 75 in Hebron, while the rest of detainees were rounded up in other areas across the occupied territory.
Israeli authorities issued 36 administrative detention orders, which allow suspects to be held without trial or charge for renewable six-month periods, last month, the statement said.
According to the joint statement, some 6,000 Palestinians are currently languishing in Israeli prisons, including 53 women and roughly 300 minors.
The Palestinian Health Ministry on Monday dispatched badly-needed cancer medicine to the blockaded Gaza Strip.The shipment should be sufficient to last for three months, the ministry said, without providing details on the amount of medicine provided or its cost.“Medicine is periodically sent to the ministry’s warehouses in the Gaza Strip,” the ministry said in a statement.“Last month, it sent a shipment of cancer medicine worth some 6 million Israeli shekels [roughly $1.6 million],” it added.The ministry went on to say that it had no information regarding medicine shortages in Gaza as it has no administrative control over Gaza’s Health Ministry.On Sunday, Gaza’s Hamas-run Health Ministry suspended all chemotherapy treatments for cancer patients after running out of the necessary medicine.Israel’s 11-year blockade of the Gaza Strip has gutted the coastal enclave’s economy and deprived its two million inhabitants of many basic commodities, including medicine and medical equipment.Israeli PM slams protesters against ‘nation-state’ lawIsraeli navy detains 5 fishermen off Gaza coastIsraeli plane strikes kite flyers in Gaza
Palestinian Health Ministry sends cancer drugs to Gaza
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Sunday attacked protesters against a law recognizing Israel as the “nation-state of the Jewish people”.Thousands of people, mostly Israeli-Arabs, demonstrated in Tel Aviv on Saturday against the controversial law, which was passed by Knesset (Israel’s parliament) last month.Speaking at the opening of a Cabinet meeting on Sunday, Netanyahu said protesters who were waving Palestinian flags during Saturday’s rally were seeking to destroy Israel.“We have [here] conclusive evidence of the defiance against Israel and the necessity of the nation-state law,” he said.“Many of the protesters want to abolish the Law of Return, the anthem and the flag, and turn Israel into a Palestinian state,” Netanyahu said. “It’s clearer now more than ever that the nation-state law is needed to ensure the future of Israel as a Jewish state.”On Saturday, Netanyahu criticized the protesters, defiantly saying on Twitter “We will continue waving the Israeli flag and singing [the national anthem] Hatikva with great pride”.The Nation-State law defines Israel as a Jewish state with a “united Jerusalem” as its capital. It has also promoted Hebrew as the only official language, stripping Arabic as an official language while recognising its “special status”.The legislation risks further alienating the Arab minority who argue they already face discrimination from Israeli Jews and the government and already feel as though they are second-class citizens.Palestinians, who have Israeli citizenship make up 21 percent of the population, are known as Israeli Arabs and have members in the Knesset.Palestine decries Israel’s closure of West Bank mosqueIsrael rejects EU plan to link Gaza and West BankIsrael turning into ‘police state’: Lawmaker
Israeli PM slams protesters against ‘nation-state’ law
Israeli naval forces on Sunday detained five Palestinian fishermen off the coast of the Gaza Strip, according to a local official.“The five fishermen were detained while fishing off northern Gaza’s shores,” Nizar Ayyash, head of Gaza's fishermen union, told Anadolu Agency.There was no comment from the Israeli Navy on the report.According to the fishermen union, roughly 50,000 Gazans earn their living from fishing.After Israel's devastating military onslaught against Hamas-run Gaza in mid-2014, in which some 2,150 Palestinians were killed, Israel began allowing Palestinian fishermen to fish up to six nautical miles off the Gaza coast, as opposed to three nautical miles previously.In May, Israeli authorities increased the fishing area for Gazan fishermen to nine nautical miles.Last month, however, Israel reduced the fishing area to only three nautical miles as part of punitive measures against Gazans over the launch of incendiary balloons from the Palestinian territory into Israel as part of ongoing protests against the decades-long Israeli occupation and an 11-year blockade on the seaside enclave.
Israeli navy detains 5 fishermen off Gaza coast