According to Hafez Nupal, on Monday at around 6 pm he and his son were working in their fields when two settlers riding an ATV approached. “One of them yelled ‘what are you doing on this land? God gave us this land and no Arab dog will set foot on it’,” he recounted.

“When the argument began to heat up, one of the settlers pulled out a gun and the other beat me up. I was able to fight back a little, but then the other settler began to beat me up as well.”

Nupal said the settlers, residents of the illegal outpost of Zait Raanan, proceeded to throw him to the ground, tie his hands and legs together and then tie his son to the ATV, adding that another Palestinian fled the scene and informed the Ras Karkar council, which reported the incident to the IDF’s Coordination and Liaison Office in Beit-El.

Nupal said that at this point another settler arrived and led him, his son and another 10-year-old Palestinian at gunpoint to the illegal outpost. There, according to Nupal, the settlers physically assaulted the boy and his teenage son, who was evacuated to a Ramallah hospital for treatment.

Ras-Karkar council member Ayad Masloum told Ynet that the army informed him that the three settlers had been detained after approaching an IDF firing range, but were released later that evening. [“I spoke with a Druze officer named Atef in the Coordination and Liaison Office and he had promised to resolve the problem,” Masloum said, adding that he did not understand why the Palestinians were beaten. “They were very far from the military outpost, but even if they approached it—which is impossible given the geography of the area—is it the settlers’ role to beat them, threaten them with guns, and arrest them?”]*

[The three settlers were released at about 10 pm after the commander of the Coordination and Liaison office intervened. The family filed a preliminary report with the Red Cross. A complaint was filed with the police that night and they investigated the incident.]*

Sources in the defense establishment said they were unfamiliar with the incident.

*The sections in brackets appeared in the Ynet Hebrew version of this article, but not its English version—ed.

Reader responses to the article

After 41 years of occupation, is anyone surprised anymore? War crimes and the thuggery of settlers have become as normal as air—Yonatan Bar-Sheshet, Ashkelon.

The land of Israel for the people of Israel, and Saudi Arabia for the Arabs—Shlomo Ben-David.

I serve in the territories for my reserve service every year. Arab culture orders one to lie about Jews. I know many fake Arab stories, so you should ignore their complaints—Reservist.

Source: www.ynet.co.il

Israeli Comments

Article translation from Ynet

August 12, 2008

By: Ali Waked