Anti-fence protest
Photo: Ata Awisat
Leftists commemorate Palestinian dead
Israeli anarchist group puts up posters of Palestinian children killed by the IDF since the start of the Palestinian Intifadah
TEL AVIV - Left-wing anarchist activists put up dozens of posters around Tel Aviv on Wednesday that showed pictures of Palestinian children killed by the army during more than four years of violence.
The protest aimed to emphasize Palestinian losses in the face of the more than 21,000 Israelis commemorated during the annual Memorial Day for fallen soldiers and terror victims.
A source from the “Anarchist Committee to Remember the Forgotten” group distributed the pictures to “remind Jewish residents of Israel of the losses whose names are not mentioned on Memorial Day” – Palestinians killed by soldiers since the start of a Palestinian uprising in September 2000.
“This day does not represent me,” the source said. “The connection between Memorial Day and Independence Day is cynical because the people who died in the wars have nothing to do with independence. Even the War of Independence was a war about creating a country based on prejudiced and non-democratic principles.”
One of the posters, produced by Palestinians from the West Bank village of Beit Likiya, showed a picture of Jamal A'asi, 14, and Waudi A'asi, 15, who the group member said had been killed by Israeli troops during their soccer game. The picture reads “We remember” in Arabic and Hebrew.
Soldiers killed two Palestinian youngsters in a village earlier this month after they started throwing stones at the troops in the middle of their soccer game. The IDF's Judge Advocate General ordered an investigation into their deaths after learning the soldiers had used live bullets to stop the confrontation.
'Bad things happen because of Israel'
Another poster of Palestinian children read: “The Israeli terror forces shot tear gas and rubber-coated bullets at them for protesting the uprooting of their olive groves and stealing of their land. Hundreds of Palestinians have been injured in such demonstrations, including 150 children.”
Palestinians are often injured, mostly lightly, in confrontations with troops during almost weekly protests against a barrier Israel is building in the West Bank that it says keeps out suicide bombers but which Palestinians say snakes into land they want for a future state.
Another source within the anarchist group said the posters were placed to present an “alternative member” to Israel’s Memorial Day for Fallen Soldiers.
“There are very bad things happening because of Israel, and this is an attempt to bring up the subject of the children who have been killed and the protesters who have been arrested, as well as the Israelis,” the source said. “But the Palestinian demonstrators are still in prison, only because they are Palestinians.”
