Jenin: Palestinian Authority suppresses resistance (& Al Jazeera)
JVL Introduction
The Jenin Brigades have long disapproved of the PA’s collaboration with Israel on matters of security and believe that all Palestinians should fight to end Israel’s occupation of the city and the West Bank. The Brigades have always been keen not to get into confrontation with the PA, despite their criticism of them and especially of their collaboration with Israel over security in Area A towns, a responsibility they ostensibly gained under the heavily criticised Oslo Accords. Of course, Israel has conducted incursions, destruction, arrests and killings in Jenin Camp on many occasions but, since early December, it is the Palestinian Authority that has laid siege to and since mid December also raided Jenin Camp in its attempts to bring order and security there and to disarm the Jenin Brigades who see themselves as the resistance. The main article below describes the impact on people in the Camp as well as the tensions. (there are short videos in the original article). “Although this is not the first such PA campaign against Jenin camp, it is the first during Israel’s war on Gaza and amid ongoing Israeli attacks on the camp, which has been raided more than 80 times over the past year, resulting in more than 220 deaths and thousands of injuries, according to the Palestinian Ministry of Health.”
Now the PA has clamped down on Al Jazeera for what it considers coverage sympathetic to the Jenin Brigades. Before the full article, we also publish Al Jazeera’s condemnation of the PA’s decision to ban it from most of the West Bank. (and remember that in September Israeli forces closed Al Jazeera office in Ramallah for an initial 45 days) This too relates to what is happening in Gaza.
LL
This article was originally published by Al Jazeera on Thu 19 Dec 2024. Read the original here.
Palestinian Authority refuses to back down in fight with Jenin fighters
Residents in the Jenin camp have lived with days of clashes between PA security forces and local fighters.
Al Jazeera on being banned from (at least) the Jenin Governorate)
Al Jazeera Media Network has condemned an “incitement campaign” initiated by Fatah in the occupied West Bank against Al Jazeera and its journalists, particularly against correspondent Mohamad Atrash.
The network in a statement said the “deplorable” campaign was launched because it covered clashes between the Palestinian National Security Forces and Palestinian resistance fighters in Jenin.
“The Network has been and remains a platform for the Opinion and the Other Opinion and professional in its credible and impartial coverage. Al Jazeera has successfully maintained its professionalism throughout its coverage of the unfolding events in Jenin,” the network said in a statement.
“The voices of both the Palestinian resistance and the Spokesperson of the Palestinian National Security Forces have always been present on Al Jazeera’s screens,” the statement continued.
Fatah claimed Al Jazeera was playing a “dangerous role” with its coverage of the clashes, which spread “discord” and internal fighting between Palestinian factions, according to a statement published by the Jordan-based Roya News outlet on Monday.
The group also called on Palestinians across the occupied territory to refrain from having any dealings with the network.
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Al Jazeera Report on the Palestinian Authority and Jenin (19.12.24)
(all images are from All Jazeera)
Jenin, occupied West Bank – Nahida al-Sabbagh has endured the battles in Jenin refugee camp, where she lives, since Saturday. The fighting between local Palestinian armed fighters from the Jenin Brigades and security forces continues near her home around the clock.
But it is the identity of the security forces clashing with those fighters that is most shocking to Nahida. They’re not Israeli. In fact, they’re Palestinian, and represent the Palestinian Authority (PA).
The clashes around the al-Sabbagh family’s home in the camp’s al-Mahyoub neighbourhood are the result of an ongoing campaign launched by the PA’s security apparatus under the name “Protecting the Homeland”. The campaign has been justified as an effort to “pursue criminals” and lawbreakers and prevent the camp from becoming a battleground like Gaza, according to Anwar Rajab, the spokesperson for the PA security forces.
The Jenin Brigades, the main target of the PA, has ties to the Iran-backed Palestinian Islamic Jihad, but also has members affiliated with other Palestinian groups.
The PA raid on the camp, which began on December 14, followed a 10-day siege. During that period, security forces killed an unarmed 19-year-old civilian, Rabhi al-Shalabi, in the camp as he rode a motorcycle, a scene captured on camera that led to widespread outrage. Then, on the day the raid began on Saturday, a 13-year-old child, as well as a commander in the Jenin Brigades who was wanted by Israel, were also killed.
The PA took “full responsibility” for the killing of al-Shalabi, but no immediate action was announced to arrest the officers involved or refer them to the public prosecutor for investigation, further raising the anger on the streets.
The justifications for the operation have failed to convince the 24,000 Palestinian refugees living within the half a square kilometre (0.19sq miles) that makes up the densely populated camp. These residents have endured more than a year of Israeli incursions and raids, and many see the campaign as an attempt to eliminate the Palestinian resistance, in line with the PA’s security coordination with Israel.
Fadi expressed his outrage to Al Jazeera at what he described had happened to him. The 42-year-old said the security forces stormed his building and forced nearby residents to leave their homes, detaining them in his apartment.
“They fired at me, terrifying my children, just because I was on the balcony. And they didn’t stop there – they forcibly entered my home,” Fadi said, recounting how his children and his neighbours’ children were terrified, and how he is wanted by the PA security forces after appearing in a video on social media speaking about his ordeal.
Fadi is adamant that despite the PA’s claims, the camp is fully supportive of the Jenin Brigades.
“Anyone who doubts the popular support for resistance in the camp should visit now and see the public rallying around it,” Fadi said. “No one here will give up the resistance.”
Palestinian Authority refuses to compromise
The PA has partial administrative control over the occupied West Bank – which Jenin sits in the northern part of. However, Israel has had full military control over the Palestinian territory since 1967.
Over the past few days, the Jenin camp has been under PA siege, with no movement in or out, along with electricity and water cuts. The medical situation is dire, with ambulances unable to enter or exit, despite the large number of injuries from ongoing clashes between the two sides.
PA Interior Minister Ziad Hab al-Reeh reiterated during a meeting at the Jenin governorate’s headquarters on Wednesday that the operation would continue until its objectives were achieved.
“We will pursue anyone who tries to tamper with our people’s resources and sabotage the Palestinian national project,” Hab al-Reeh said.
Some camp residents agree with the objectives of the campaign but reject the methods used by the security forces.
Hani Hijazi, 54, who lives on al-Sikka Street in the western part of the camp, said he understands the need for the security forces to operate within the camp and address issues that have arisen, but not through the methods that have led to the deaths of innocent civilians.
Hijazi, like many others in the camp, fears that this could escalate into a larger confrontation between the two sides, potentially leading to a “civil war”.
“Both sides are responsible; fighting is not the solution. Reconciliation is,” Hijazi said.
Justifications for operation ‘untrue’
Amid the rapidly escalating events in the camp, residents have questioned the timing of the PA’s operation.
The Jenin Brigades was formed in 2021, and although the Islamic Jihad movement comprises the largest portion of it, all Palestinian factions are represented in its military wings, including the Al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigades, the military wing of Fatah – the Palestinian faction that dominates the PA.
Kifah al-Omari, 51, a resident of Bab al-Saha in the centre of the camp, wondered to Al Jazeera why the PA would intervene.
Al-Omari sat outside her home with her family as she spoke, warming herself by a wood-burning stove due to the electricity blackout in the camp and the lack of heating in its homes.
“We, the ones living in the heart of this event, know very well that all the justifications provided by the PA are untrue,” al-Omari said. “This leaves us to speculate about the real reason for this campaign and its timing.”
Like many other Palestinians, al-Omari did not rule out that the cause might be linked to major political arrangements in the occupied West Bank and Gaza, preparing the PA to extend its control over Gaza in the event of any agreement to end the war on the enclave.
The Israeli government has repeatedly stressed that it does not trust the PA to effectively fight Palestinian resistance fighters, and so many Palestinians believe that operations such as the one in Jenin are an effort to prove that the PA can in fact root the fighters out.
Rajab, the security forces’ spokesperson, rejected accusations that the PA is working with Israel against resistance fighters, saying the PA had “provided protection for 200 Palestinians who were targeted for liquidation and immediate assassination by Israel”.
Yet al-Omari claimed that offers from locals in the camp have been made to the PA to resolve the situation without bloodshed, but that these had been refused.
Instead, al-Omari said, the PA had demanded that “wanted individuals surrender themselves and their weapons”.
“This demand was not accompanied by any guarantees or offers to protect them or the camp from Israeli occupation forces, which is why the fighters and camp residents rejected it,” al-Omari added.
The Palestinian Authority, under Abbas, has already lost any semblance of credibility it may have had in the West Bank. The PA knows it is lost its grip on the Palestinians. Members of the Zionist government have already made calls for unfunding of the PA and transferring of powers over all areas of the West Bank to the occupiers. The PA is nothing more than the pub-bouncer, protecting the landlords’ property, under the pretext of maintaining “order” and “security”. It’s oppressing its own people, just like the Zionists are doing to all Palestinians across the occupied territories. I’m afraid, if the PA thinks it can use force against a people, who have suffered decades of abductions, deliberate killing, torture, violence, sexual abuse and imprisonment without trial, forced out of their homes and forced to live in the gutter – the fate of the PA and its Occupation-funded violence will meet with the same resistance as the Occupiers.
How many Israeli personnel do people think are embedded into the PA, or do the PA just do Israel’s dirty work without any actual Israeli military ?
Either way, they need to either get on code – start defending Palestinians – or step aside.