Israeli forces tear gas Palestinian wedding procession

Source :  Al Akhbar English

Israeli forces on Saturday broke up a wedding procession organized at a West Bank checkpoint to challenge Israeli laws preventing Palestinians in the occupied territories from living with their spouses in the Jewish state.

The incident was one of a wave of attacks against Palestinians with Israeli citizenship which have recently made the news in Israel.

Two buses filled with guests for the wedding of a Palestinian-Israeli from Nazareth and a Palestinian from Ramallah met at opposite sides of a checkpoint northeast of Jerusalem on Saturday.

The groom was identified by Ma’an news agency as Abu Dis from the West Bank. The bride’s identity was unknown.

Both buses were stopped by Israeli forces before reaching the checkpoint and Israeli forces fired sound bombs at guests who had begun singing and dancing on the West Bank side of the Hizma checkpoint, an organizer told Ma'an.

"While they were dancing and singing for the groom, Israeli occupation forces started throwing sound bombs and pushing people back. They then fired tear gas, forcing people to run away," organizer Najwan Berekdar said.

Over 200 people participated in the wedding, including founder of the Palestinian National Initiative Mustafa Barghouthi and Palestinian author Rima Nazzal Kitana.

An Israeli army spokeswoman said that "100 rioters at Hizma threw stones at security services, who used riot dispersal means, including tear gas, to disperse the riot."

The wedding was organized by the "Love in the Time of Apartheid" campaign, a grassroots initiative set up by Palestinian youths to challenge the “Citizenship and Entry into Israel” law. The law denies residency status in Israel for West Bank Palestinians married to Palestinian-Israelis.

Meanwhile, Israeli police reported on Saturday that three Israeli teenagers were arrested for spitting at a Palestinian women in Nazareth Illit, a Jewish town overlooking the majoritarily Arab Nazareth.

The suspects, all aged 14, were detained on suspicion of spitting at a woman in her 60s and shouting racist slogans at her to leave “the Jewish neighborhood,” according to Ynet.

The teenagers will reportedly be made to participate in anti-racism programs in schools, with police officers saying "we preferred the educational element to standard punitive action," the Israeli news website reported.

Separately, Israeli teenagers on Wednesday were arrested and quickly released after attacking two teachers, one of them Palestinian. They pelted their car with objects, smashing the vehicle’s back windshield and slashing its tires, Haaretz reported.

And on Tuesday, three Israeli teenagers were arrested on suspicion of shouting racial slurs and assaulting a Palestinian cleaner in Tel Aviv on February 24.

In late February, a group of Jewish women attacked a Palestinian woman, tore off her hijab while she was waiting at a light rail station in Jerusalem and beat her severely.

An Israeli court decided to release the three suspects found guilty of the attack, and banned two from entering Jerusalem for 45 days and the third for 30 days.

These types of hate crimes have been euphemistically called “nationalistically motivated” by some Israeli police sources and publications such as Ynet.

Israeli Police Commissioner Yohanan Danino has called the recent wave of attacks “despicable and criminal” and called for more serious police reaction to such crimes, Ynet reported. However, due to the young age of many offenders, court-ordered punishments remain light.