Mohammad Samhouri has been assigned the task of coordinating the withdrawal on the Palestinian side. Samhouri, a US-educated economist by training, oversees a team of 40 experts who are handling the post-disengagement process, including what’s to be done with the evacuated land and remaining assets. Al Jazeera’s Laila El-Haddad spoke with Samhouri in his Gaza office about the disengagement that is set to start August 15, the importance of free access for Palestinians and the future of Palestinian economy. Mohammad Samhouri: Before we begin, I just want to give you some advice to make your job easier. Don’t ask me political questions, because I don’t have political answers. Read more about Interview: Mohammad Samhouri is handling the Gaza disengagement
With less than two weeks left before Israel evacuates the Gaza Strip, Palestinian factions are gearing up for celebrations with publicity campaigns that are equally intended to win Palestinian votes. The Palestinian Authority, which is spending an estimated $1.7 million on withdrawal celebrations, kicked-off its campaign on Thursday with an event it called a liberation and evacuation festival, held in front of Gaza city’s Legislative Council. In addition to the festival, the PA’s Withdrawal Committee, headed by Dahlan, launched a massive UNDP-funded publicity campaign this week under the slogan Gaza - Reclaiming Our Gem. They plan to wave 20,000 Palestinian flags during the evacuation. Read more about Palestinian factions are gearing up for celebrations with election campaigns
Israeli soldiers have injured five Palestinian villagers after firing tear gas at the group protesting against a settlement road project threatening their land. Palestinians from the village of Kfar Harrs, along with foreign and Israeli activists, were marching towards a roadblock that cuts off traffic to the entrance of their village, when they were approached by Israeli forces on Monday. Soldiers then fired tear gas canisters directly at the crowd, according to Nasfat Khofash, coordinator of the Palestinian Committee Against the Wall in the Salfit area. Four adults and one child were injured, said Khofash. An Austrian peace activist was also arrested and detained in the nearby settlement. Read more about Tear gas injures Palestinian protesters
Though one of Gaza’s oldest active fishermen, Suheil Sa’dallah spends most of his time loitering around Gaza’s makeshift fisherman’s port, where dozens of docked boats, including his own, bob gently in the sea. In the face of stringent Israeli restrictions on Palestinian fishing zones, and the absence of a modern industrial port, many fishermen there, like Sa’dallah, can no longer make a living. He talks about the days their catches exceeded 700kg a day “of every fish your heart desires”, when the only limit on fishing zones were as far as the eye could see. A new port would mean better equipment, modern storage facilities for importing and exporting fish, and assuming Israeli restrictions are lifted, improved catches. Read more about Gaza fishermen's livelihood on the line
Palestinians have burned rubber tyres along the trail of the Israeli separation barrier in the West Bank in a symbolic protest against its ongoing construction under the smokescreen of the Gaza pullout. Black smoke seen rising along the wall’s path from the areas of Marda to Qalandia in the Central West Bank on Thursday was an “SOS to the world” to take action to stop Israel’s annexation of their land and “imprisonment of the Palestinian people”, according to Ayed Morrar, coordinator of the Popular Committee to Resist the Wall in Ram Allah. Read more about Palestinians protest Gaza smokescreen
A Palestinian teenager has been shot dead while trying to pass an Israeli occupation forces checkpoint in the Gaza Strip. The shooting on Monday occurred as Israel continued its closure on the Gaza Strip for the fifth day in a row, dividing the strip into three areas and shooting at commuters who try to cross. The Matahen and Abo Holi checkpoints, just north of the town of Khan Yunus, have been closed since Thursday, a day after a Qassam rocket killed an Israeli woman in the Negev town of Sderot, according to Palestinian police officials. The two checkpoints divide southern Gaza from the central and northern parts of the strip. Read more about Teenager killed at Israeli checkpoint
I spent much of the day talking to Palestinians trying to cross the Netzarim checkpoint today. It is a 6m deep trench dug deep into Gaza’s coastal road, which has in recent days been ripped apart by nocturnal armoured bulldozers that come out from behind the lone sniper in he distance, and dissappear before dawn when their work is done. The checkpoint, along with one further south at Abo Holi, has divided Gaza into three isolated segments for over five days now: Rafah and Khan Yunis in the south; dair al-Balah, Maghazi, and Nseirat refugee camps in the central Gaza Strip; and Gaza city, Beit Hanun, and Jabaliya in the north. Read more about When Will it End?
After a bloody day that saw 10 Palestinians killed, the fragile five-month Israeli-Palestinian truce seems to be in danger of unraveling. But analysts on both sides say this is simply a game of chicken weeks before Israel’s planned Gaza disengagement. Analysts say the violence is only intended to test the limits of the fragile truce. Sharon does not want to be seen as evacuating under fire, and Palestinian factions want the disengagement to appear as a victory. In the end, analysts say, it is in neither side’s interest to officially abandon the ceasefire before disengagement. Both sides are pushing it to the very edge. Israel’s mass of forces will not lightly decide to go in.” Read more about Israeli-Palestinian truce put to test
A Palestinian boy was shot dead by an Israeli security guard in the West Bank, officials and witnesses said. Fifteen-year-old Muheeb Ahmad Assi was pronounced dead at the scene after being shot by an Israeli security guard, according to Mohammad Hawani of the Sheikh Zayed Hospital in Ramallah. Hawani said Assi died of a bullet wound to his chest. Witnesses said clashes broke out between Assi’s group of friends and an Israeli security guard near a part of the Wall in the village of Beit Lakiya, where he lived. The guard shot at them with live ammunition, and Assi was hit. Palestinians were not allowed near the teen until over an hour had passed, by which point the Assi had bled to death, medics said. Read more about Palestinian boy shot dead, demonstrations mark one year ICJ ruling
“You can’t just come storming in here,” barks Neta Golan to foreign activists who walk casually into her kitchen during their lunch break. “This is someone’s house you know - there’s a kitchen in the other apartment,” she tells them. “They don’t understand it’s rude to just barge into someone’s home here - they have a lot to learn,” says Golan about the internationals who have come to help support Palestinians in non-violent resistance. Just another day in cultural training for Golan and the ISM, during which the 34-year-old Israeli activist explains to foreign volunteers when they can snap pictures, how to behave in people’s homes and how to respect local Palestinians. Read more about Israeli activist bridges worlds
