Monthly Archives: May 2021

Haifa Intifada Diary: The General Strike

22 Saturday May 2021

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The General Strike in Haifa was a defiant display of unity across all sectors of the Palestinian community, even as ongoing governmental repression intensifies.

(The following is the 3rd dispatch from the Intifada in Haifa that was published in Mondoweiss)

While many around the world are aware of Israel’s ethnic cleansing in al-Quds (Jerusalem) and the massacre of innocents in Gaza, little is known about the fate of Palestinians in the areas that were occupied by Israel since 1948. Yet, for the Palestinian struggle, the uprising in what is called for short “48” is one of the most important developments over the past two weeks. In this third dispatch from Haifa for Mondoweiss, I try to describe the events as they developed day by day (you can find the previous reports here).

Events in Haifa took a sharp turn on Sunday, May 9, when police attacked a Palestinian demonstration in the German Colony in solidarity with Sheikh Jarrah. The Palestinian protests and clashes with the police in the German Colony continued for three days. On Tuesday there was a fascist mobilization to confront the Palestinian protest, and they were encouraged by the police to attack Palestinian in the neighborhood. The same day Palestinian youth took control of many streets far beyond the original center of the clashes.

The fascist attacks continued for three consecutive days, until Thursday. They were looking mostly for Arab residents that live outside the Arab neighborhoods. At the same time Palestinians all over the city were urgently organizing self-defense. The fascist didn’t dare attack the Arab neighborhoods, but the police, reinforced by the military “border guards”, launched a campaign of terror against the population at large: roadblocks, detentions, beatings, throwing stun grenades and teargas at homes and bystanders, and patrolling the streets in a provocative way.

The call for a general strike

The daily bombing in Gaza and the images from al-Quds aroused strong feelings in the local Palestinian population, but it was the need to mobilize a defense against fascist attacks that moved many people to action who would normally sympathize with the struggle but choose not to take part. 

One sign of the deep impact of this threat was the news that many Arab soldiers and policemen (30 of them, according to some commentators) announced their resignation from the army and the police. One of them, in an interview (here, in Hebrew), described how he passed by our demonstration in Haifa and heard the slogan “Why are we quiet about Arabs serving in the army?”, before hearing the voice of his conscience and quitting the service.

POSTERS ALERTING PEOPLE TO THE STRIKE FILLED THE WALLS

By the end of the week, the question among the activists was how we go on from here. How do we utilize mass mobilization not only for self-defense, but also to stop the daily massacre in Gaza? The idea of a general strike started circulating in the networks. On Sunday, The High Follow-Up Committee, the united leadership of the ‘48 Palestinian population, declared a general strike for Tuesday, May 18. In the same meeting they also issued an unprecedented call for the international community to take responsibility for the protection of the Palestinian population, including in the ‘48 territories.  (The committee’s announcement is here in Arabic.)

The activists are used to distrusting the leadership of the Follow-Up Committee, and some thought that a one-day general strike was not enough. But, soon, in the spirit of unity and empowerment that enabled the current uprising, all energies were united for the success of the strike. Politically, the strike was a great opportunity to involve many more people in the struggle and show that Palestinian society is united beyond a common goal.

Organizing

During the last couple of weeks, we witnessed the almost total disappearance of the traditional political parties and a surge of new initiatives organized by the youth through social networks. There are multiple groups in WhatsApp, Telegram, and Signal where people connect, share information, discuss and organize. From time to time there were last-minute calls for face-to-face meetings that were held in the street or in friendly spaces. After the activists decided what the next activity would be, the news was spread through Facebook and through personal, family, neighborhood and professional chat groups.

All of this frenzied organizational network was working throughout Monday to mobilize for the success of the strike. We thought that it would be necessary to stand by the entrance of local schools in order to ask the parents and pupils to strike, but soon we were informed that the parents and pupils were organizing the strike themselves! We were leafleting around the neighborhoods and everywhere we met shopkeepers that told us “yes, this time we will be on strike!”

After all the fear from fascist attacks and the terrorizing of the people by the police, it was important to revive the self-confidence of the people in the neighborhoods and to reclaim the public space. For this purpose, the activists organized cultural activities in six neighborhoods, including lectures, activities for children, musical programs and more.

Reclaiming the public space

On Tuesday morning all the networks were sharing images of closed shops from all around Arab Haifa, even areas that never participated in strikes before. But it was not only Arab shops and businesses that closed. Many people that work for Israeli companies and organizations were on strike also. So, there were also other types of images that were shared around: threats from managers to their workers, a picture of a chat where an Arab engineer told her boss that she would not come to work this day and his answer was “wishing her success” in finding new work, etc. There were also announcements from big Israeli companies telling their customers that because of the strike they would not be able to provide the expected services. Sharing all these gave a sense of the power of Palestinian workers to make an impact on the Israeli economy.

The activities in the neighborhoods were a great success. In ordinary days, Arab Haifa is pretty much a divided city, mostly along class lines, between marginalized workers and their families who live in poor neighborhoods and the middle class. The struggle, and especially the general strike, created a sense of unity. In my neighborhood, Halisa, the committee that organized the strike was half from local youth and half from volunteers from the activist community. At the designated hour people began to gather in the small commercial center, mostly women and children. Neighbors brought with them food and water and invited everybody.

Strike activities in Halisa

I didn’t want to bring the Palestinian flag with me – I thought that if it should be raised over the activity it should come from the “ordinary” people and not from the “political”. But the first round of activities for the children included “free painting”, so soon we had plenty of Palestinian flags drying in the sun as well as images of Sheikh Jarrakh, al-Aqsa, and the bombing of Gaza. 

In the middle of the activities, a heavily armed patrol of border guards stopped their car near us and came to check what we were doing. Seeing all the children around they went back to their car. They made some calls and apparently were told to leave us alone.

As we were gathering in the commercial center, we heard that there are police harassing the residents in Hussein St, just 200 meters away. I went there and found about a dozen policemen in civil, with completely unmarked cars, searching some homes. They also brought with them police dogs. I started filming them with my phone and they were very unhappy about it.

Back in the commercial center, there was a group of musicians that came to raise our spirits. Some of them fill concert halls in ordinary days, but now they were sitting on the bare ground with Halisa’s children and were singing and playing their instruments. In many songs the whole crowd was singing together. They even prepared a special satirical song for the event that criticized the Palestinian leadership for complacency and praised the unity of the masses all over Palestine in the general strike. (A video from the activity may be seen here).

Similar activities took part with mass participation in other neighborhoods, big and small.

Another demonstration

As I described in previous dispatches, after the attacks on the Herak demonstrations during the previous week, there was some fear of holding a new demonstration. On Saturday there were two demonstrations, one in Wadi Nisnas and the other near the court, but the numbers were smaller, about a hundred participants in each demonstration, and no streets were closed. Now, as the momentum started to accumulate again on our side, Tal’at (the feminist Palestinian movement) called for a new demonstration at 18:00 on Tuesday. It was labeled “The march of the dignity strike”, after the name of the general strike. The march had to start near “al-Midan Theater” – on the border between Wadi Nisnas (the center of Arab Haifa) and Hadar (the old commercial center with mixed population). There was at least one mindful consideration in this selection: if there was to be mayhem again, it wouldn’t hurt the same businesses that suffered with us the previous week.

At the designated hour hundreds of Palestinians, mostly youth, gathered with Palestinian flags on both sides of Khuri St., about the same number that was in the Herak demonstration a week ago. Spirits were high again and everybody was chanting slogans and singing freedom songs. The police also brought a big force for the event, but didn’t try to prevent us from gathering.

The Demonstration in Khuri St on the day of the General Strike

After about half an hour, the demonstrators started to march toward Wadi Nisnas. Because the police were concentrating in Khuri St. the demonstrators tried to reach the Wadi through a side-street, but soon their way was blocked by a cordon of mounted police. After standing for some time face-to-face in front of the police, the demonstrators returned to Khuri street, but now they occupied the street itself, blocking the main passage from the Wadi to Hadar.

While the previous Tuesday the police closed the whole area more than an hour before our demonstration, clearing the space for a battle, now they didn’t close the street for cars even as it was already closed by the demonstration. Some cars were stuck between us and the police and had to move slowly to cross through the crowd. During the event, all the people in those cars were making “V” signs and chanting with us to show their support for the demonstration…

Apparently, the Haifa police put in their mind that their task is to prevent the demonstrators from marching. So, while if we would have held a march in the small streets of Wadi Nisnas the “disturbance” to the city’s routine would be minimal, they actually let us occupy and block a central route in a much more visible location. The demonstration lasted for almost two hours and we left feeling that the message of our protest was heard loud and clear.

* * *

As I write these lines the clock is showing 2:00 am and the ceasefire is expected to take hold. I hope the current bloodshed will stop, but I know that the killing of Palestinians on a daily basis by the racist army and police, in the West Bank and “48”, is not going to stop. And the siege of Gaza, preventing medical supplies, electricity, clean water and all economic development is killing more people and causing more suffering than the bombing itself. In “48”, due to poverty and long social neglect, organized crime, encouraged by the Israeli police, became an epidemic that daunted Palestinian society. During the last two weeks violent crime fell sharply. We have a long struggle ahead until people here would be able to live safely in freedom, but the Palestinian people are now more united and self-confident than they have been for many years.

To my American audience I must say that even the Israeli leadership wanted the ceasefire for at least a week, as Netanyahu achieved his political goal to prevent the “pseudo-opposition” from creating a government without him. Netanyahu said he would continue the attacks until “the goals would be achieved”, but he couldn’t say what those goals are… The bloodshed continued just because Israeli leaders couldn’t let themselves seem soft on the Palestinians while the USA president avoided calling for a ceasefire and actually pushed them to continue bombing Gaza.

Intifada Diary, Haifa, Palestine

20 Thursday May 2021

Posted by in Herak Haifa, Palestine 48, Popular Struggle, Uncategorized

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The uprising in Haifa is drawing from all sectors of the Palestinian community, as the Israeli government brings in the Shin Bet to help smash the protests.

(The second report about the Intifada in Haifa, as appeared in Mondoweiss)

On Saturday it seemed that Haifa is somewhat calmer. But that is only relatively to the last stormy six days. But the Israeli massacre of Gaza’s children continues in all its ferocity.

After the first days of fear, shock, and rage at the attacks on isolated Arab homes in mixed neighborhoods by the fascists, and at the attacks on the Arab population at large by the police and the army, people are now closely following all the developments in the struggle. Almost all Palestinians in Haifa are involved in the struggle in this way or that. Wherever you go you meet more people that were attacked by fascists or by the police, and hear more stories about friends and relatives who have been injured or detained (or both).

In this short dispatch I will try to convey some of the events from the 7th and 8th days of the intifada in Haifa.

Saturday, May 15

This was the 7th day since the current intifada reached Haifa. The fascist mobs were not on the streets. But the police, reinforced by heavily armed “border guards”, patrolled the Arab neighborhoods with a clear intention to “take revenge” on the people. It is not only against Gaza that the Zionists want to “restore deterrence”. On the other side, the activists wanted to restore the self-confidence of the people by developing mutual solidarity and social activity, sometimes avoiding direct confrontation.

I went with a group of activists to check the situation in Halisa, where we heard of a campaign of detentions overnight. We climbed our way to an old crumbling house just a hundred meters from the massive buildings of the Haifa police headquarters. In the house we found a mother and her daughters, as the family’s father and three sons were all arrested in a police raid on their house. They show us videos how the police attacked the house, broke in and beat them cruelly in their own home, even after they were laying flat on the ground. They tell us that the police accused them of attacking their religious Jewish neighbors. They told us that they are on very good relations with those neighbors. Actually, the neighbors themselves came to the court to testify with them in the remand hearing! The neighbors waited with them for hours, but the court refused to hear them and remanded the detention of all four of the detainees. (They were later released on Sunday, after the judge finally agreed to witness the videos and was shocked by the police’s violence).

The evidence of harsh treatment was evident on the bodies of the released detainees in Halisa

We climbed the hill to Hussein St. where we met a group of youths sitting on the pavement. They told us how on Friday night, at about 1:00 am, as they were sitting near their houses, the police fired tear gas into the street without any provocation. After the tear gas came the border guards and started beating people randomly and detaining some of them. As we were trying to check with our volunteer lawyers what happened with the detainees, some of them came walking from the police headquarters. Some of them spent the night in the hospital after the beating. Now they were released on the condition that they stay out of Haifa (where they live and work) for the next 15 days. The bloodstained signs of the beating could be clearly seen on their bodies.

The breadth of the protests

We hardly know what happens in other towns around Haifa and beyond. We are very busy with the events, the Israeli media hardly write anything about Palestinians suffering from Israeli oppression or resisting it, and the Arab media can hardly catch up with the events. In normal days when there is a demonstration or a clash with the police you can expect to read an article about it in Arab48. Now there are dozens of demonstrations and clashes every day. The daily report only gives a list of seven or eight places where they happened, and mention that it is only a partial list. At best you can find a few lines about some of the events. 

Luckily, the police are obliged by the law to bring detainees to court within 24 hours of their detention (more or less). It means that people that were detained on Friday are brought to court on Saturday night. As most courts are closed, detainees from many Arab towns around Haifa are brought to Haifa, and it is an opportunity for us to meet families of the detainees and some of the activists, and hear some news about other fronts in the battle. Everybody that we talk with is in high spirits. We hear of daily demonstrations and clashes with the police in every location. Everybody agrees that all the attempts to wipe out Palestinian identity and make the people, especially the youth, care only for their personal fate completely failed. The youth are leading the struggle and have their own network of organizations, outside the influence of all the traditional frameworks.

We hear of one town where the municipality begged the police to prevent the selling of dangerous fireworks toward Eid al-Fitr. The police did nothing of the sort. Now there is no Eid and all the fireworks are directed at the police.

The same story repeats itself on Sunday morning, as it is the eve of the Jewish Shavuot holiday, and on Monday night after all courts were closed for the holiday.

Demonstrations again

Long before the current uprising, Herak Haifa planned to commemorate the Palestinian Nakba, in coordination with other Palestinian movements all over Palestine and the diaspora, with a special event with lighting the torch of return. The activity was planned to take place in Prisoner’s Square, in the German Colony, where the clashes started in the first three days of last week. Now, as Palestinians in Haifa are under attack, the German Colony is not regarded a safe place. The fascists issued calls for attacking the Herak activity, and we know very well that the police would be more than happy to take part in such an attack. The youth in the Arab neighborhoods are mobilized for self-defense of the population, but the Herak didn’t want to farther strain their efforts and cancelled the activity.

Tal’at demo in Habibi Circle, Wadi Nisnas

Meanwhile, many women activists felt that they were sidelined while the main forms of activity are clashes with the police or physically confronting attackers. In the last few years, we have witnessed several very significant struggles led by “Tal’at”, a feminist Palestinian initiative that unites Palestinian women in all different localities. Now Tal’at called for a 15th of May Nakba demonstration in Emil Habibi Circle in the middle of Wadi Nisnas. Many were afraid, after the experience of the last days, that any demonstration would be attacked by the police. But more than a hundred activists, around 80% of them women, came anyway to the demonstration. The police were watching from the other side of the circle and the demonstration took place without being interrupted.

At the end of the demonstration, most of the participants walked through downtown Haifa to the court, and held another lively demonstration there. As we arrived near the court, we found that the police and border guards concentrated heavy forces in front of the building. There was a big gathering of the families of detainees from all the towns in the Haifa district, and the police kept the demonstrators separated from the families. There were even police dogs ready to bite us. Later we learned that the police mobilization was probably due to the fact that Sheikh Kamal Hatib, the deputy leader of the banned Islamic Movement, was also brought for remand. He was arrested the previous night from his home in Kafr Kanna (Cana of Galilee) near Nazareth in a very violent way, which included firing live munition at protesters, wounding many, several of them dangerously.

Nightly demonstration in front of the Haifa court, Saturday, May 15

Sunday, May 16

In the morning we went to the court again, to see who was arrested the previous night, to support the families of the detainees, and to encourage the volunteer lawyers. There are many Arab lawyers that are volunteering to defend the detainees from the protests. Their presence is a very strong message to the detainees and their families: you are not alone; you are part of a society that is under attack and stays strong by caring for each other. We, in Haifa, are lucky to have a special team of young female lawyers that organized prior to the current crisis in order to defend Palestinian political prisoners. Now they work day and night, giving consultations to detainees before they are interrogated and representing them in the remand hearings.

The journalist

Rashad Omari is clearly the bravest Palestinian journalist in Haifa. He is the owner and editor of “Al-Madina”, a local weekly that is freely distributed in Haifa and surrounding towns. He personally covers all of the Palestinian demonstrations in Haifa, as well as many social issues. On Friday he was arrested from his home in Haifa and was accused of “incitement”. They did not say what this supposed incitement consisted of, or where and when it was published. He spent the night in prison and later the police suggested to release him on condition that he keep out of the city for the next 15 days. He refused, and as a reprisal the police brought him to court on Saturday night and requested to remand his detention. The judge didn’t find any evidence of any offense and he was released without conditions.  He was the last person to walk out of the court at 2:00 am.

On Sunday morning he was already in front of the court again, covering the remand hearings of other detainees, interviewing families and laughing with friends.

Police dogs in front of the Haifa court, May 15, 2021

The lecturer

As we were waiting in front of the court, we saw a man approaching with a sense of urgency. It was Ashraf Kortam, a well known local public figure, a lecturer on life skills. He was looking for the offices of Mahash, the special unit in Israel’s “Justice Ministry” that is responsible for investigating complaints against the police. He shows us a video, filmed by his neighbors, of how a policeman came to his house in a police car and hit him with a police baton again and again without any apparent reason. Unlike in most such cases, he knows the officer’s name. We find that Mahash is in “the missile building”, just on the other side of the avenue. He hurried there but found that the “justice ministry” is on holiday in Shavuot’s eve. He will go there after the holiday. I didn’t like telling him that the main role of Mahash is to hide evidence and close files.

Enter the Shin Bet

It was reported in the Israeli papers that the Shabak, or Shin Bet, was requested by the Israeli government to help the police in suppressing the mass protest. We have started to feel the heat. Before the police would only attack us only after we started to demonstrate in the street, now they sit tightly on our communications and arrest people that try to plan a demonstration. On Saturday they arrested two of the Herak activists just as we were discussing the proper way to commemorate the Nakba.

On Sunday morning one of the activists from Wadi Nisnas called his friends near the court to ask how many people were gathering there. He told them that he planned to bring manakish to the hungry masses. Before he had time to get out of his home, the police were there and took him with them. He was accused of an unclear charge of taking part in organizing the protests. After a few hours he finally joined the crown near the court, as a released detainee and, of course, without manakish. The cooperation between the police and the Shabak proved itself again as an efficient way to prevent “threats to Israel’s security”.

Today, Monday, (17.5.2021), we were all preparing for the general strike that was declared for tomorrow. The general strike is an opportunity for the society as a whole to stand out and prove that the protest is not only the matter of the youth activists. I hope to cover the preparations with the report about the strike itself in the next dispatch.

Six unprecedented days of resistance and oppression in Haifa

15 Saturday May 2021

Posted by in Haifa, Herak Haifa, Palestine 48, Popular Struggle, Zionist Fascists

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Israeli police joined fascist mobs in attacking Palestinian neighborhoods, but this didn’t stop Palestinians in Haifa from joining the uprising taking place across Palestine

(This article was initially published in Mondoweiss)

Since Sunday, May 9, events in Haifa are moving so fast that I couldn’t write fast enough to describe them. Every night there are mass detention of Palestinians – activists and other residents that happened to pass in the police’s trail. Every morning dozens of relatives, friends and comrades gather in front of the Haifa court, hoping to see their dear ones released, or at least to know what is going to happen with them. Every night local hospitals accept groups of detainees and other citizens that were hurt by stun grenades, tear gas, police beatings or attacks by fascist Zionist mobs. Every evening everybody is tuning to social media or patrolling the streets to find where the next attack may come from.

I wanted to write a learned article, explaining the background and giving a political perspective, but I’m exhausted. We spent the day before the courthouse, where we heard that, in addition to 38 people that were arrested in Haifa’s streets last night, there are at list 7 more that were arrested in raids on their homes in the early morning. But there were also more than 50 political detainees from the nearby Palestinian towns that were brought for remand before the Haifa court, and the hearing of the Haifa detainees didn’t start until 3pm, even though it is Friday and the court was supposed to close by 2pm. We were sitting on the pavement before the court house, which we were not allowed to enter (only one from each detainee’s family was allowed in), discussing the next steps in the struggle. Luckily, in the best of Arab tradition, some good people brought us water, cold drinks and Falafel, so we didn’t all starve.

Families, friends and comrades gather daily before the occupation court in Haifa (here May 14, 2021)

As we came back to our poor Arab neighborhood, we went to check what happened last night in Hussein St., where the police shot tear gas at residential buildings. In these days the neighbors were supposed to celebrate Eid al-Fitr, at the end of the month-long Ramadan. But the neighborhood is quiet and there is no Eid. We find the house of the Bushkar family, and they tell us how a police unit that were stationed in the main street, on the other side of the garden, shoot without any provocation tear gas canisters toward the row of four-story residential buildings. One canister exploded in the stairway just in front of their door and another entered a room from the window. It is illegal to shoot teargas at people at closed spaces, as it becomes even more dangerous, but the police wanted to take revenge from the neighborhood at large after a police car was burned in the main street in the previous night. Everybody in the house has suffocated and the pregnant mother lost consciousness. They called an ambulance, but the police stopped it and didn’t let it enter the neighborhood. Only after a log delay, when more neighbors intervened and shouted at the police, they let a neighbor escort the ambulance in and the women was taken to the hospital. The neighbors, in the spirit of crowd-media, filmed their argument with the police and published it on Facebook.

The two gas canisters that were shot into the Bushkar family house in Halisa – Photo by Amir Bushkar, FB

Later we walked around the neighborhood to see what was going on. There was one group of police on the main entrance to the neighborhood. People told us that a patrol of the border guards just entered our street. There was hardly anyone braving to get out.

So, in short, what happened this week in Haifa?

Sunday, May 9

Five Palestinian movements called for a demonstration against ethnic cleansing in Sheikh Jarrakh. The invitation included Herak Haifa, Tal’at (Palestinian Feminist initiative), The Student’s National Democratic Alliance (Tajamou), The Haifa Youth Movement and The Alternative Palestinian Path. A few hundred people, mostly youth, gathered in “Prisoners Square” in the German Colony, Haifa’s touristic center. The police didn’t wait long before it attacked the participants with a barrage of stun grenades and started to chase protesters and detain them.

Monday, May 10

Some un-organized youth called on Facebook for another demonstration in Prisoner’s Square. I was not there but heard different estimations of the number of participants, between a few dozens and the hundreds. Police wanted to disperse them and there were clashes all over the area.

Tuesday, May 11

The five movements that organized Sunday’s demonstration called for a new protest at 20:30 in Prisoner’s Square, now also against the Israeli bombardment of Gaza. More Palestinian movements promise to join. Women in Black (which organize vigils against the occupation) called for a protest in the Bahai (UNESCO) Circle for 7:30, with big participation, and some of them join the Palestinian protesters. Some fascists organize a counter-demo in the German Colony, which is attended by only a few dozens, under heavy police protection.

As the Palestinian protest start, not even moving from the original gathering site, mounted police ride into the crowd, followed by a barrage of stun grenades. There are more protesters now and they hold their ground, disperse and gather again all along the main section of the German Colony. Clashes with sporadic detention continue in the main street for some two hours as the side streets are blocked with burning barricades.

Extremist Zionist groups were openly calling for violent attacks on the Arab population

The presence of the fascists, which chant “Death to the Arabs” and cheer the police when they attack the demonstrators is heating the atmosphere farther. After long time a big police force that was chasing the Palestinian protesters turn to the junction where they were located. To say the truth, I thought they might instruct them to disperse, to lower the tension. But, instead, the police organized the fascist in a small column and marched them through the main street of the German Colony, all with their Israeli Flags and their enthusiastic “Death to the Arab” chants. Some of them threw stones at Arab passers-by from behind the thick police wall defending them. If any Arab try to oppose them, he was chased by the police, like you can see in this video.

So, if I initially thought that the police came to prevent demonstrations or limit the freedom of expression, I proved wrong. They came to promote the right kind of un-licensed demonstrations. In fact, the police proved itself in the most open way to be the uniformed and armed vanguard of the fascist mob.

After their demonstration the fascist mob went on to attack random Arab civilians in the area. The police were defending them but at the same time there was an unprecedented popular uprising as hundreds or even thousands of Arab Palestinian youths took control of the streets, raised barricades and defended their homes and neighborhoods.

Wednesday, May 12

There was another Palestinian demonstration planned, this one by The Democratic Front, but it was abolished due to the tension. All the day we followed new in social media about a planned fascist attack on Arab neighborhoods. Toward the evening the youths took control of the streets again.

The fascists gathered in “Kiryat Eliezer” – a mostly Jewish neighborhood to the West of the German Colony (on its East is Wadi Nisnas, the center of the Palestinian population in Haifa). The police attacked the youth gathering in Wadi Nisnas and at the same time allowed the fascists to attack isolated Arab families and Arab businesses in Kiryat Eliezer and the German Colony. They chased and arrested any Arab that tried to come to the help of the attacked.

Luay shouted at the police as they were attacking his sister in the May 11 demo. He was detained and badly beaten. This image was taken on May 12, as he was released.

The Catholic Sun reports that “about 30 Jewish men attacked the three daughters of Wadie Abunassar, honorary Spanish consul and spokesman for the Assembly of Catholic Bishops in the Holy Land. The men beat the young adults with flag poles flying the Israeli flag and threw stones at their cars.”

The fascists didn’t come close to the Arab concentrations, but the police attacked there, also with violence and detentions.

Thursday, May 13

After last night’s events the Arab population was more tense than ever, everybody discussing what to do to defend against fascist attacks. At 17:00 there was an open-air meeting in the middle of the Wadi Nisnas market, with activists from the Arab parties and some maybe a hundred of the youth that were leading the action. They felt that the Arab neighborhoods are more or less safe, but the problem was how to defend Arab homes where Arabs are a minority in mixed neighborhoods. It was decided to gather in Kiryat Eliezer before the fascists come again, not in a demonstration, just stand quietly on the street side, in order to defend the residents.

The peaceful defensive gathering was promptly attacked with extra force by the police, which brought big reinforcement from the military “border guards”, trained on brutal oppression in the West Bank. Hundreds of youths dispersed all the way East to Wadi Nisnas and Hadar, and clashes erupted in many streets and alleys.

Throughout the evening the police and the soldiers were actively terrorizing the civilian population in their neighborhoods, streets and homes. Many soldiers were moving in the streets in civilian cars just to suddenly stop in the middle of the street, stopping the traffic, pointing their guns at the drivers and bystanders, pulling people out of their cars and searching them and the cars and performing random detentions. Walking patrols entered the streets, seeking violent “contact” and shooting teargas randomly at residents. You can see one such patrol, which I succeeded to film just as they shoot gas randomly in Wadi Nisnas, in this video. Later I heard how someone that was filming the soldiers nearby was shot by a rubber bullet in the chest and had three ribs broken.

Police and burning barricades in the German Colony, May 11

This night the fascist continued their rioting in Kiryat Eliezer. Later they went to another neighborhood, Wadi Jamal, and shot live bullets at Arab homes.

Friday, May 14

The police and the army still concentrate forces to terrorize the Arab population. Now they invade houses and arrest people, day and night. The fascists are planning for a new demonstration in the German Colony for tomorrow

Occupied Haifa

When I was in Barcelona in 2019, I’ve seen a writing on the wall: “When you don’t move, you don’t feel the chains”. Now that Palestinian Arabs in Haifa moved, the real nature of the Zionist state is crystal clear. Palestinian Haifa is an occupied city and its police is basically a hateful Jewish supremacist militia. The situation in other “mixed” occupied cities, al-Lid, Ramlah, Yaffa and Akka, is even much worse than in Haifa.

But when you struggle for your rights, for your freedom, you are also full of pride, solidarity, love and hope. These are historic moments and the people of Haifa moved like never before since the Nakba of 1948. And, more than ever since 1948, they are part of a united Palestinian struggle against their oppressors.

It is already 3am and I finish this report for now.