Mika Minio-Paluello

Since being deported from Palestine in the summer of 2005, I’ve been living and working in London. Yet even here, Palestine doesn’t leave you. At dawn on the morning of Friday, 25 January, a friend of mine was shot and left to bleed to death by Israeli soldiers in the West Bank’s Balata refugee camp. When I read the email sent from a friend at 10:23am that stated “I don’t know if you heard, Ahmed Sanaqra was killed yesterday in Balata,” my fist clenched and hit the wall. Mika Minio-Paluello writes from London.

The Israeli invasion and siege of Nablus city ended two weeks ago now (Wed Jan 7), with a return to the nightly machine gun fire from the mountains, daily mini-incursions, and deadly proddings by jeeps and the occasional tank. With the invasion competing with the horrific Iranian earthquake, aircrashes, Sharon’s speeches and the Christmas holiday, media coverage was minimal, in Israeli, international, Arab and even Palestinian media, adding to the Nablus perception of abandonment by the world. Mika Minio-Paluello writes from occupied Nablus.