PLO official condemns Israel's 'racism and impunity' after killings

Saturday, Border Police shot and killed 32-year-old special needs student Iyad al-Halak in east Jerusalem. The day before, 41-year-old Fadi Samara was killed by Israeli security forces in Ramallah.

By ZACHARY KEYSER
An Israeli border police officer detains a Palestinian protester during a demonstration in east Jerusalem on December 16 (photo credit: AMMAR AWAD/REUTERS)
An Israeli border police officer detains a Palestinian protester during a demonstration in east Jerusalem on December 16
(photo credit: AMMAR AWAD/REUTERS)
A top Palestinian official for the Palestinian Liberation Organization (PLO), Dr. Hanan Ashrawi, made a public statement on Saturday condemning Israel for the deaths of two Palestinian civilians, who lost their lives over the weekend in altercations with Israeli security forces.
On Saturday, Border Police shot and killed 32-year-old special needs student Iyad al-Halak, a resident of Wadi al-Joz in east Jerusalem diagnosed with autism. Al-Halak was approached by Jerusalem police while passing by the Lion's Gate on his way to school.
According to an official police statement, officers stationed at the gate noticed Al-Halak holding a "suspicious object" that resembled a pistol. The Jerusalem police officers then ordered al-Halak to stop, after which he began to flee. Border Police were then called in to help the Jerusalem police chase the man on foot. After a lengthy pursuit, which came to a close in a dead-end alley, Border Police opened fire on al-Halak, killing him in the process. The "suspicious object" that sparked the episode was never found.
On Friday, 41-year-old Fadi Samara was killed by Israeli security forces while driving through Nabi Saleh, a village in Ramallah. Officers claimed that Samara was attempting to ram their position with his vehicle - Palestinian media outlets and eyewitness accounts assert that he lost control of his car.
"Israel has escalated its rate and scale of crimes against Palestinian civilians," said Ashrawi. "In the past twenty-four hours, Israeli occupation forces have committed two acts of cold-blooded and unjustified murders against defenseless Palestinian civilians, including an autistic man killed this Saturday in Jerusalem."

Ashrawi likened the most recent cases of manslaughter to "execution-style" killings, adding that there have been 21 examples of such violence between Israeli security forces and Palestinian citizens that have carried out since January of this year.
Ashrawi also noted that the recent uptick in violence coincides with Israel's plans to formally annex parts of the West Bank, "which is the ultimate and final act of land grab and mass displacement in Israel's colonial project."
"Murders, land appropriation, home demolitions, and other acts of structural violence are on the rise," Ashrawi said in her statement. "Israel will continue to act in this rogue manner and with absolute disregard to international law and Palestinian lives so long as it is shielded from legal and political accountability."
Ashrawi concluded her statement pleading with the international community to punish and condemn the killings, noting that these acts of violence "normalize these crimes" worldwide - alluding to the most recent case of blue on black violence in the United States, where African-American George Floyd was killed by former Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin.

"States must realize that allowing this structural violence to continue against the Palestinian people, including such crimes that are anchored in racism and impunity, normalizes these crimes worldwide," Ashrawi concluded. "Stopping this brutal and violent colonial regime is an international responsibility the world cannot avert any longer."