AL-QUDS (Dispatches) – Human Rights Watch said on Tuesday Zionist regime troops used “excessive force” against peaceful Palestinian protesters in the mixed city of Lod during May unrest.
The violence in Lod, in central part of the occupied territory, came as tensions surged in Israeli-annexed east Al-Quds, where Palestinian protesters facing eviction clashed with Zionist troops, and fighting flared between the regime troops and Gaza-based Palestinian resistance fighters.
The report also found that Zionist officials coordinated with far-right Zionists during May’s unrest in the mixed city.
Lod and other cities in the occupied territories and the occupied West Bank witnessed unrest in May against the backdrop of discriminatory efforts to force Palestinians from their homes in occupied East Al-Quds, the use of excessive force by Zionist troops against protesters and worshippers at Al-Aqsa Mosque and the eruption on 10 May of Zionist aggression on Gaza.
Over the course of about two weeks of unrest, security forces detained 2,142 people across the West Bank and East Al-Quds.
According to Amnesty International, approximately 90 percent of those detained were Palestinians and residents of occupied East Al-Quds. A report into the crackdown by Amnesty in June found Zionist far-right supremacists sharing selfies posing with guns and messages such as “Tonight we are not Jews, we are Nazis.”
Among the many examples of discrimination cited by HRW in the report is the apparent cooperation between regime officials and Zionists. On 12 May, scores of Zionists who do not live in Lod entered the city, some of them armed.
An Israeli journalist reporting from Lod is cited in the report saying that municipal authorities hosted the Zionist outsiders overnight in a building owned by the city near a Palestinian cemetery. Though the mayor of the city denied having been informed of this move or approving it, these groups went onto target Palestinians. Overnight they threw stones at Palestinian houses and shops, and at the al-Omari Mosque. Video clips of some incidents show police positioned close to Zionist rioters as they throw stones but doing nothing.
During the rioting, Palestinian properties and places of worship were attacked. Scores were injured, a Muslim cemetery was vandalized, and dozens of cars burned. HRW said Zionist troops deployed to secure Lod stood by or failed to act in a timely manner to protect Palestinian residents of Lod from violence by Zionists located near them or in their line of sight.