In Palestine you could barely buy a shawarma yesterday. And that includes East Jerusalem, the Arab sector of the city, where virtually all activities came to a standstill as a result of the 24-hour “global” general strike to protest the Israeli massacre in Gaza and demand an immediate ceasefire. Banks, shops, restaurants, schools… everything stopped except for some taxis and intercity buses, and the hotels that remain open despite the absence of tourists.
The streets of West Bank cities, such as Ramallah, Nablus, Jenin or Hebron, where traffic jams are infernal, were empty, much more so than on a Friday – a holiday – except in the center, where there were demonstrations. At noon, this special envoy was able to observe barricades with burning containers at the exit of Ramallah, which suggested that as night and early morning arrived the atmosphere could be warm in some areas, despite the arrival of the cold of winter.
The main access to Jerusalem from Ramallah, the Kalandia check point, offered an unprecedented appearance yesterday, with only a handful of cars waiting for the rigorous control of Israeli soldiers. Already in the disputed Old City, the police force to enter through the Damascus Gate was strong in anticipation of altercations, despite the fact that the Muslim neighborhood was empty and not even some food and clothing stalls that open even on Fridays raised their blinds. Only a street vendor in East Jerusalem was trying to earn a few shekels to cope with the economic slowdown that the city is suffering without the foreign visitors, common in the pre-Christmas season.
The strike was a success in the occupied territories and also had a great following in other Arab countries where Palestinian refugees live, such as Lebanon and Jordan, where merchants from Beirut and Amman also showed solidarity with Palestine to stop the massacre, which yesterday raised the macabre counter to 18,205 dead people – a third, minors – and 49,645 injured.
“We hope that everyone will join the strike, which occurs in the context of a broad international movement that opposes the open genocide in Gaza, ethnic cleansing and colonial settlements in the West Bank,” said a statement from the National Forces. and Islamic, the entity calling for the strike, which brings together all Palestinian political parties and other social movements, including Hamas and the Palestinian Islamic Jihad. The Gaza war has managed to amalgamate all the religious formations, ideologies and creeds of Palestine, whether secular from Fatah or Islamists from Hamas, previously divided.
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However, the strike went unnoticed in Israel, whose media barely mentioned it. Until last night, Prime Minister Beniamin Netanyahu had not referred to it, further proof that the two communities live with each other behind each other, and even more so after the Hamas terrorist attack and the subsequent Israeli response.
The general strike did not stop the bombings or the fighting. The army continues to insist on mass evacuations in the south and wants the majority of Gazans to concentrate in Al Mawasi, a small Bedouin town by the sea, west of Khan Younis, the epicenter of the fighting. The United Nations and humanitarian organizations insist that there is no safe place in the strip.
Regarding the videos of alleged detained combatants, Israel assured yesterday that the army and the internal intelligence service have already detained “more than 500 terrorist members of Hamas and Islamic Jihad” in the strip who are being “interrogated.” However, he did not indicate where they have been transferred, nor if they were arrested while fighting as part of the respective armed wings of those movements or if they are civilians whom he considers sympathizers of both Palestinian political parties.
Meanwhile, Hizbullah’s harassment in northern Israel and the resulting Israeli response continue. Yesterday, a 75-year-old man died in the Lebanese town of Taiba, after a projectile hit his home. Regarding the northern border, the White House warned Israel yesterday that the white phosphorus ammunition supplied by the US can only be used to illuminate battlefields and not to attack people, after The Washington Post published that in October the Israeli army injured nine people with that substance in an attack in southern Lebanon.