The following press release was issued by the International Solidarity Movement on 13 March 2009:

An American citizen has been critically injured in the village of Nilin after Israeli forces shot him in the head with a tear gas canister.

Tristan Anderson from California, 37 years old, has been taken to Israeli Tel Hashomer hospital, near Tel Aviv. Anderson is unconscious and has been bleeding heavily from the nose and mouth. He sustained a large hole in his forehead where he was struck by the canister. He is currently being operated on.

The Israeli army began using to use a high velocity tear gas canister in December 2008. The black canister, labeled in Hebrew as “40mm bullet special/long range,” can shoot over 400 meters. The gas canister does not make a noise when fired or emit a smoke tail. A combination of the canister’s high velocity and silence is extremely dangerous and has caused numerous injuries, including a Palestinian male whose leg was broken in January 2009.

Tristan Anderson was shot as Israeli forces attacked a demonstration against the construction of the annexation wall through the village of Nilin’s land. Another resident from Nilin was shot in the leg with live ammunition.

Four Nilin residents have been killed during demonstrations against the confiscation of their land.

Ahmed Mousa (10) was shot in the forehead with live ammunition on 29 July 2008. The following day, Yousef Amira (17) was shot twice with rubber-coated steel bullets, leaving him brain dead. He died a week later on 4 August 2008. Arafat Rateb Khawaje (22), was the third Nilin resident to be killed by Israeli forces. He was shot in the back with live ammunition on 28 December 2008. That same day, Mohammed Khawaje (20), was shot in the head with live ammunition, leaving him brain dead. He died three days in a Ramallah hospital.

Residents in the village of Nilin have been demonstrating against the construction of the Apartheid Wall, deemed illegal by the International Court of Justice in 2004. Nilin will lose approximately 2500 dunums of agricultural land when the construction of the wall is completed. Nilin was 57,000 dunums in 1948, reduced to 33,000 dunums in 1967, currently is 10,000 dunums and will be 7,500 dunums after the construction of the wall.

Related Links

• Mending the broken wing, Abdallah Mesleh (14 November 2008)
• Nilin village resists Israel’s land confiscation, IRIN (7 October 2008)
• Nilin village continues to resist Israel’s siege, Jonathan Cook (2 September 2008)
• Rights group: Deaths of two Nilin boys “willful killing”, Al-Haq (7 August 2008)
• Israeli forces mortally wound Nilin teenager after funeral, Flashpoints (1 August 2008)
• Transcript: Israeli military kills 10-year-old in Nilin, Flashpoints (30 July 2008)