ISRAELI SETTLERS ATTACK PALESTINIAN JOURNALISTS CAR

Ramallah, 6 Jumadil Awwal 1435/8 March 2014 (MINA) – Israeli settlers have attacked a Palestinian journalist’s car en route to cover a story in the occupied West Bank.

Several out of around 100 Israeli settlers stoned the car of the Palestinian photographer who was slightly injured in the hand and the face on Friday.

The settlers, who had gathered at the side of a road near Ramallah, also managed to crack the windscreen, said Abbas Momani, who works for AFP.

Momani said there were Israeli soldiers present on the scene but they did not intervene. Press TV quoted by Mi’raj Islamic News Agency (MINA) as reporting.

In photographs of the incident, four settlers are seen while running, with three carrying pistols. Another photograph shows the settlers stoning the car while the Israeli soldiers are watching.

Momani was on his way, along with other journalists in a separate vehicle, to cover Palestinian demonstrations in the nearby Jalazoun refugee camp.

The photographer said he intended to file a complaint with Israeli police.

Israeli settlers regularly launch price tag attacks against Palestinians.

Price tag attacks are acts of vandalism and violence against Palestinians and their property as well as Islamic holy sites.

The presence and continued expansion of Israeli settlements in occupied Palestine has created a major obstacle for the efforts to establish peace in the Middle East.

More than half a million Israelis live in over 120 illegal settlements built since Israel’s occupation of the Palestinian territories of the West Bank and East al-Quds in 1967.

The UN and most countries regard the Israeli settlements as illegal because the territories were captured by Israel in a war in 1967 and are hence subject to the Geneva Conventions, which forbid construction on occupied lands. (T/P012/P04).

Mi’raj Islami News Agency (MINA)