Unrest spread like wildfire today from the strike-paralyzed Gaza Strip to the West Bank where youths burned tires, threw rocks at Israeli military vehicles and raised Palestinian flags. Israeli soldiers entered a Ramallah school and tore down a Palestinian flag.
A general strike was called in Gaza five days ago to protest the new Israeli policy of transferring authority from the military to a local civilian administrative body. Passions were further inflamed when Israeli troops killed a 16-year-old Arab youth and wounded three other teen-agers during a violent demonstration Monday in Rafah at the southern extremity of the Gaza Strip.
The military said the soldiers fired in self-defense when surrounded by a stone-throwing mob. The dead youth, Mohammed Sullieman Nahle, was buried this morning under tight security guard. Only members of his family were permitted to attend the funeral. A curfew imposed on Rafah was still in effect at the end of the day.
Yesterday, Israeli soldiers using welding torches, sealed off 170 shops in Gaza as a punitive measure against their owners who refused to open for business. The strike was supposed to have ended yesterday but the Arab municipal authorities extended it for two more days to protest the military’s action. Meanwhile, the Supreme Court handed down an interim order today barring the Military Government from linking the West Bank village of Salfit in the Hebron region to Israel’s national electricity grid. The court gave the government 30 days to show cause why the change should be allowed.
The army claimed that it was intended only to improve service for the villagers who presently get their electricity from a local power station. The Mayor of Salfit and the town council said the local station had never malfunctioned and provided efficient service. They contended, in their appeal to the high court, that the Israeli move was a politically motivated step to further strengthen Israel’s grip on the occupied territories.
In Response to Appeal from Begin:
JTA has documented Jewish history in real-time for over a century. Keep our journalism strong by joining us in supporting independent, award-winning reporting.
The Archive of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency includes articles published from 1923 to 2008. Archive stories reflect the journalistic standards and practices of the time they were published.
