From Khalid Amayreh in the West Bank
An Israeli occupation army soldier earlier this month shot from a close range and injured a handcuffed and blindfolded Palestinian detainee, an Israeli human rights group revealed Sunday.
According to B’tselem, the Israeli Information Center for Human Rights in the Occupied Palestinian Territories, the incident took place on 7 July, in Nil’in, a village in the central West Bank.
Palestinians and foreign peace activists hold regular and mostly non-violent protests against the confiscation by Israel of private Palestinian land for the construction of the “Separation Wall,” the gigantic barrier Israel is building in the area.
Vast swaths of Palestinian farms, orchards and groves have been seized by Israel under the pretext of building the wall, most of which is built deep in the West Bank far away from the so-called Green Line, the former armistice line between Israel proper and the occupied Palestinian territory.
According to a B’tselem report, Israeli occupation soldiers stopped and detained Ashraf Abu Rahma, 27, who was then blindfolded and handcuffed for about half an hour.
B’tselem quoted eyewitnesses as saying that Abu Rahma was beaten by soldiers who then dragged him to an army Jeep. There, a video clip showed one soldier aiming his rifle at the Abu Rahma’s legs from a distance of about 1.5 meters and firing a rubber-coated steel bullet at him. http://www.thepeoplesvoice.org/cgi-bin/blogs/voices.php/2008/07/21/israeli_occupation_soldier_shoots_blindf
