Two Arabs were wounded in East Jerusalem and an Israeli was injured in Hebron as demonstrations in support of several thousand hunger-striking Arab security prisoners erupted into violence Monday. Thirteen arrests were reported as police used tear gas to disperse stone-throwing demonstrators.
The hunger strike was called in the prisons to protest an alleged deterioration of conditions since a new prisons commissioner, David Maimon, took office. Arab sources said the strike was spreading. Israeli sources said it was sporadic. Maimon declared he would not give in to prisoners’ demands.
The sympathy demonstrations were well organized. In East Jerusalem, Arab women relatives of prisoners held a rally outside the Red Cross offices and later staged a sit-in. Another group of women marched from the U.S. Consulate to Damascus Gate. Eight were arrested. Police charged they stoned a police car, smashing its windshield.
A stone also smashed the windshield of an Israeli civilian car. The driver, who was armed, fired at the crowed wounding one Arab in the stomach and another in the arm. Police would not say whether he was apprehended.
Students from Bir Zeit University demonstrated outside the British consulate in the Sheik Jarrah quarter of East Jerusalem. Police dispersed them with tear gas and arrested five for alleged stone-throwing.
Security forces used tear gas to break up a demonstration at the Balata refugee camp near Nablus. In Hebron, an Israeli was injured by stones hurled at several cars.
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