A 10-year-old Palestinian girl has died in hospital in Jerusalem, three days after being injured during an incident involving Israeli border police. The child, Abir Aramin, was the daughter of a prominent Palestinian peace activist Bassam Aramin. She came from the West Bank village of Anata where Israel is building a section of its West Bank barrier.

Palestinians say she was with two other girls in the village when an Israeli border police vehicle drove past. Stones were thrown in the direction of the police, who responded with tear-gas and stun-grenades. The girl was hit in the head.

The border police have launched an investigation.

Regret

An Israeli border police spokeswoman said that they had used "crowd control means against stone throwers" protesting against the construction of Israel's controversial barrier. "The border police expresses its regret over the death of the girl and hopes the circumstances of the incident are quickly revealed."

The Israeli human rights group B'Tselem has said that last year 660 Palestinians were killed by Israeli security forces. In the same period 23 Israeli civilians were killed by Palestinians.

Israel says the defensive system of concrete walls and wire fence is needed to stop suicide bombers. Palestinians say it is part of an Israeli land grab of West Bank territory.

Settlement freeze

Also on Friday, Israeli Defence Minister Amir Peretz ordered a freeze on the building of a new Jewish settlement of Meskiot in the West Bank, less than a month after saying it would go ahead.  A defence ministry official said Mr Peretz wanted to give the matter further consideration.

Last month's announcement that Israel would build its first new settlement in more than a decade prompted criticism from the Palestinians, the European Union and the United States.

The settlement was planned to house Israeli families who had moved from the Gaza Strip when settlers and troops left in 2005. All settlements in the occupied West Bank, including East Jerusalem, are illegal under international law, although Israel rejects this.

The 2003 Middle East roadmap calls for a complete halt to all settlement activity.

4 January 2007

Four dead, 20 wounded as Israeli army rolls into Ramallah

By Hossam Ezzedine

Agence France Presse

4 January 2007

RAMALLAH, West Bank, Jan 4 2007--Four Palestinians were killed Thursday in a major Israel army operation in the West Bank city of Ramallah that was slammed by the Palestinians as impeding efforts to restart the stalled Middle East peace process.

Yussef Abdel Khader, 23, Khalil al-Badawi, 20, Ala al-Himran in his 20s, and Jamal Jawela, 29, were mortally wounded in gunfire that erupted after more than a dozen jeeps and several bulldozers, backed up by two helicopters, rolled into the center of the city.

The four later died of their wounds in hospital, medics said. More than 20 people were wounded as a result, and three remained in critical condition in Ramallah hospitals.

An Israeli army spokeswoman said that forces had conducted an arrest operation and detained "four wanted Palestinians." She declined to provide other details.The incursion came as Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert was headed to the Red Sea resort town of Sharm el-Sheikh for talks on restarting the Middle East peace process with Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak.

Palestinian president Mahmud Abbas slammed the operation, warning that it endangered  fforts to restart the dormant peace process between the Israelis and Palestinians."

The operation proves that Israeli calls for peace and security are false," Abbas said in a statement."

The Palestinian people calls on the international community, United Nations Security Council and the international Quartet (for Middle East peace) to restrain Israeli aggressions that are torpedoing the establishment of a durable peace," he said.

In Sharm el-Sheikh, Olmert expressed regret for any innocent loss of life." I regret if the innocent were touched in Ramallah, but Israel is obligated to carry out such operations to reinforce its security," Olmert told a joint news conference after talks with Mubarak.

The Israeli army vehicles rolled into Ramallah's central Manara Square just before 1400 GMT, with explosions and crackling rounds of automatic gunfire rocking the city center, adorned with Christmas decorations.In an hour-long operation, jeeps drove to and from Manara Square, as bulldozers shunted aside cars in surrounding streets and clouds of thick white, green and red smoke rose above the streets.

Youths threw stones, metal trash barrels and blocks of concrete at the Israeli army vehicles from rooftops. Around a dozen lobbed rocks at the back of one bulldozer before scattering with the approach of an army vehicle.Two wounded men were rushed from the scene in the arms of colleagues. One man ran through the street waving a white piece of cloth. Israeli soldiers crouched near a vehicle, their guns raised.

Car alarms set off by the explosions added to the cacophony.With the retreat of the Israeli army vehicles, hundreds of people spilled into Manara and surrounding streets, chanting angry slogans as darkness fell.Meanwhile the Israeli army carried out an incursion in Doha, a suburb of Bethlehem. According to a Palestinian security source, one Palestinian was wounded as a result.  Thursday's deaths bring to 5,623 the number of people killed since the start of the second Palestinian uprising in September 2000, the vast majority of them Palestinians,according to an AFP count.

Women's Delegation to develop friendship links denied Entry to the Occupied Palestinain Territory by Israel

Press Release from the Birmingham Ramallah Twinning Committee

Occasion of the deportation of nine British women from Israel including a Birmingham MP on 30 July 2006

The Israeli authorities at Tel Aviv airport have refused entry to a delegation of nine women from Birmingham and they are being put back on a plane to Birmingham. The delegation includes Dr Lynne Jones MP for Birmingham Selly Oak, Yvonne Washbourne , President of Birmingham Trades Council, and Salma Iqbal, RESPECT Coalition candidate in the last Birmingham City Council elections. For some of the women, this is the second time in just over a year that they have been refused entry to Israel having been turned back on the 8th of May 2005. The Twinning Committee’s chairman Kamel Hawwash said “We are very shocked that this should happen again. The delegation’s visit was discussed at length with the Israeli Embassy in London and details of the participants and their itinerary were provided to the Embassy as requested.”

“The women had gone to develop links between the citizens of Birmingham and the citizens of Ramallah and were due to meet Palestinian women and children’s organisations. We had raised money for a children’s Library and nursery at a refugee camp in Ramallah and the women were due to check on the progress of these badly needed projects” Kamel added.

The women are due to return to Birmingham International later this evening.

For further information contact the Birmingham Ramallah Twinning Committee:

Kamel Hawwash, Chair 07765892702

Caroline Johnson, Secretary 07855645199

 Women return to Birmingham International airport having been denied entry by Israeli Authorities