Review of Events – December 2015

• Israel will begin asking countries with whom it has friendly ties and who want Israeli cooperation to change their anti-Israel voting patterns at the UN. (1 Dec.)
• Head of the Quartet Office in the Middle East, Kito de Boer, said that one million new jobs would be needed in Palestine during the next 15 years. (2 Dec.)
• Israeli President Rivlin said that the solution to the Israel-Palestinian conflict is the establishment of a confederation with defined borders and land swaps but one army. (3 Dec.)
• US Secretary of State Kerry said that if the PA disintegrated, Israel would be forced to assume all governance in the West Bank. (5 Dec.)
• President Barack Obama said that the United States will keep working towards Middle East peace despite slim chances for near-term success. (9 Dec.)
• The Al-Quds Centre revealed that at least 412 fixed or random military roadblocks have been installed by Israel in Jerusalem and the West Bank in the last few years. (10 Dec.)
• PLO Secretary-General Saeb Erekat said that the conviction of Khalida Jarrar is a reflection of the daily oppression and apartheid policies imposed by Israel. (11 Dec.)
• Palestine announced that it was submitting its instrument of accession to the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change. (13 Dec.)
• EU Heads of Mission in Jerusalem and Ramallah visited Hebron to gain a first-hand impression of developments in Hebron. (15 Dec.)
• An Israeli government official said that Israel would continue to hold discussions with the Quartet even though it had suspended talks with the EU. (15 Dec.)
• Israel has banned the activist group Breaking the Silence from speaking in schools or to groups of soldiers. (17 Dec.)
• UN Special Rapporteur Forst expressed grave concerns that human rights defenders are being subjected to physical attacks, harassment, arrest and detention, and death threats. (18 Dec.)
• COGAT relaxed movement restrictions on Palestinian Christians during the Christmas holidays. (21 Dec.)
• Around 4,000 sick Palestinians in Gaza need to travel through the Rafah crossing with Egypt, Gaza’s Ministry of Health said. (22 Dec.)
• Peace Now reported that Israel’s Ministry of Housing had been working on plans for 8,372 housing units in the “E1” area. (28 Dec.)
• The Palestinian Ministry of Health said that Israeli forces had killed 142 Palestinians, including 27 minors and seven women, since early October. (29 Dec.)
• The Palestinian Detainees and Ex-Detainees Committee said that Israel had detained 2,179 in 2015. (29 Dec.)
• OCHA said that 170 Palestinians and 26 Israelis had been killed in 2015 in attacks and clashes in the Occupied Palestinian Territory and Israel. (30 Dec.)

1 December, 2015

Israeli armed forces opened fire at Palestinian farmers to the east of Gaza city, but there were no reports of casualties. (WAFA)

A 19-year-old Palestinian woman attempted to stab an Israeli army officer at a checkpoint near the settlement of “Enav” east of Tulkarem in the West Bank; she was shot and killed. A 16-year-old Palestinian allegedly tried to carry out a stabbing attack at the “Gush Etzion” junction, west of Bethlehem in the West Bank, and was shot and killed by Israeli security forces. (Ynet News, WAFA, Ma ‘an News Agency)

Israeli soldiers searched homes and arrested 27 Palestinians in the West Bank, of whom 5 were detained in Hebron and another 5 in Jenin district. (Ma ‘an News Agency, IMEMC)

Israel threatened to review its cooperation over European Union projects that benefit Palestinians in the West Bank, citing the organisation’s labelling of exports from Israeli settlements. Foreign Ministry spokesman Emmanuel Nahshon expanded the scope of Israel’s steps against the EU by saying it could be frozen out of some initiatives aimed at bettering Palestinian lives. (Reuters)

Israel will begin asking countries with whom it has friendly ties and who want Israeli cooperation to change their anti-Israel voting patterns at the UN, Prime Minister Netanyahu said after speaking with numerous heads of state at the climate conference in Paris. After leaders from around the world —including Arab states — approached him to talk about counter-terrorism and technological issues, the time has come for the friendship and cooperation of these countries to come out in votes in international institutions, Netanyahu said. (Jerusalem Post)

Google denied a report from Israel’s foreign ministry that it has reached an agreement with the government to jointly monitor YouTube videos inciting attacks. The ministry last week said that Google, which owns YouTube, had agreed a joint mechanism to monitor online materials — including videos encouraging attacks on Israelis — after a meeting between Google executives and the Israeli Deputy Foreign Minister Tzipi Hotovely. But the firm said no such agreement had been struck. (AFP)

The Palestinian Authority urged the Egyptian authorities to allow humanitarian cases to leave the blockaded Gaza Strip, saying the Rafah crossing has now been closed to such cases more than 100 straight days, and only been open for 19 non-consecutive days during 2015. It was last opened for three days at the beginning of September and again for one day later that month so as to allow Palestinians to take part in the Haj pilgrimage to Mecca. However, the PA committee said that no humanitarian cases were allowed to leave the blockaded coastal enclave through that period. (Ma ‘an News Agency)

The Palestinian labour ministry has urged Palestinian workers in Israeli settlements to quit their jobs, especially since EU member states have started labelling products from these places. According to the ministry’s undersecretary, the Palestinian economy could absorb those workers but the Palestinian General Federation of Trade Unions, Workers and Labourers announced that this “is not feasible because the PNA cannot offer alternatives.” (Gulf News)

The Israeli Jerusalem District Court sentenced Yitzhak Gabai, a Jewish extremist who was convicted of carrying out an arson attack on a Jewish-Arab integrated school in Jerusalem last year, to three years in prison. (The Jerusalem Post)

UNRWA launched its annual winter fundraising campaign titled #shareyourwarmth to support the Agency’s winterization efforts for Palestine refugees in Syria, Gaza, the West Bank, Lebanon and Jordan. The campaign, which runs from 1 December to the end of February 2016, aims to raise awareness of the dire humanitarian situation of vulnerable Palestine refugees during the winter season and to raise USD 2 million to help them endure the coming months. (UNRWA)

Tear gas canisters were fired into a hospital after clashes broke out between Israeli soldiers and Palestinian youths in the Al-Tur neighbourhood in East Jerusalem. Several patients suffered from tear gas inhalation. (Ma ‘an News Agency)

Israeli authorities notified Palestinians in the towns of Surif and Jaba’a, north-west of Hebron, of an order to confiscate 244 dunums of land. (WAFA)

2 December, 2015

In the Shu’fat refugee camp in East Jerusalem, Israeli forces demolished the family home of a Palestinian who was shot dead after driving his car into a crowd in Jerusalem in November 2014, killing two. During the clashes that broke after the demolition, Israeli forces shot and injured 13 Palestinians. (Haaretz, Ma ‘an News Agency)

Israeli forces detained 28 Palestinians during raids across the West Bank and 10 others in Jerusalem. (IMEMC, Ma ‘an News Agency)

UN Special Coordinator Nickolay Mladenov issued a statement expressing his concern about the slow pace of the investigation of the arson attack against the Dawabsha family in the West Bank village of Duman on 31 July, which killed three including a toddler. (www.unsco.org)

On 1 December, PLO Secretary-General Saeb Erakat said that a Quartet delegation would visit Palestine next week. (Xinhua)

Belgian Foreign Minister Didier Reynders postponed a planned visit to Israel this week after it was made clear to him that Prime Minister Netanyahu refused to meet him over Belgium’s support of labelling settlements goods. The Minister was one of the 16 EU Foreign Ministers who signed a letter last April calling on EU High Representative Federica Mogherini to push forward labelling guidelines. (Ynetnews)

A group of extremist settlers stormed the Al-Aqsa Mosque compound under the protection of Israeli forces. (Petra)

It was reported on 30 November that the National Women’s Studies Association of the United States had voted to join the BDS movement. (JTA)

Israeli forces shot and critically injured an elderly Palestinian woman near Al-Bureij refugee camp in central Gaza. Although clashes between Palestinian youth and Israeli forces have been common in the area east of the camp, it is unclear whether the woman was shot during such clashes. (Ma’an News Agency)

A total of 107 Palestinian protestors suffered injuries and suffocation from teargas during clashes that broke out west of Qalqilya in the West Bank, while 5 others were hit with rubber-coated metal bullets. (WAFA)

US President Barack Obama renewed a presidential waiver suspending the relocation of the US Embassy in Israel from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem for another six months. In 1995 the US Congress had passed the Jerusalem Embassy Act, which demands the relocation. But every president since then has signed a presidential waiver every six months in order to keep the embassy in Tel Aviv, citing concerns that a move to Jerusalem would upset the prospects for an Israeli-Palestinian peace deal. (The Times of Israel)

During an economic seminar held in Ramallah, the Head of the Quartet Office in the Middle East, Kito de Boer, said that one million new jobs would be needed in Palestine during the next 15 years. “The declining economic growth rate in Palestine is not sufficient to create enough jobs at the local market. … The market needs to grow more than six per cent in order to outweigh the new entrants’ opportunities,” he said. (Alray)

Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu on told a group of young German leaders visiting Israel that “Eventually there will be, I believe, a Palestinian leadership that will emerge and will embrace a genuine peace,” “Not a false peace. Not a tactical peace, but a genuine peace.” (The Times of Israel)

Leading lawmakers of the German-Israeli Parliamentary Friendship Group of the German Bundestag, who represent Germany’s large parties, sent a letter to Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu, asking him to block the so-called “transparency” bill, which would impose restrictions on Israeli leftist NGOs receiving funding from abroad, saying that if such a bill passed, it would make it more difficult to fight boycott attempts against Israel in Germany. (Haaretz)

Israeli Channel 2 reported that a document was issued under the directive of Israeli Deputy Foreign Minister Tzipi Hotovely and distributed to Israeli diplomats across the world, which states that Israel has “valid property claims” to West Bank territory, as “Jewish affinity” with the region and in cities such as Hebron is thousands of years old. According to the document, “These are not new communities, and not ‘colonization,’ and therefore, the “section of the Geneva Convention which prohibits the transfer of a population to occupied lands does not apply” in the case of the West Bank. “Never at any point of time in history were Jerusalem or the West Bank under Palestinian Arab sovereignty,” according to the document. It notes that Jewish communities beyond the Green Line “were established in a judicial proceeding under the supervision of [Israel’s] Supreme Court.” It states that Israel’s disengagement from the Gaza Strip in 2005 was a “unilateral political decision,” and does not exhibit a “realization of any sort of legal obligation.” The document concedes that Israel “recognizes that the Palestinians also have claims in the area,” and that for that reason, “the two parties expressed an explicit agreement to settle all outstanding disputes, including the future of the settlements, within the framework of direct bilateral negotiations.” The document was reportedly drafted at Hotovely’s behest after she discovered that the Foreign Ministry’s directives on the country’s official stance on the West Bank had not been updated in 14 years. The Prime Minister’s Office would not comment on the new directive. (The Times of Israel)

Israeli High Court rejected an appeal against the re-sentencing of seven Palestinian prisoners previously released in the 2011 Gilad Shalit prisoner exchange deal. All seven prisoners were re-detained during the summer of 2014, with six of the men sentenced to 40-year sentences, and one to a 45-year sentence. (Ma ‘an News Agency)

3 December, 2015

Israeli forces arrested 35 Palestinians in the West Bank. (WAFA)

A number of Israeli youths were arrested for the arson attack that killed three members of a Palestinian family in Duma in the West Bank in summer. The arrests were revealed after a gag order was partially lifted. Several details concerning the case remain under a media gag order. (Haaretz, The Jerusalem Post)

Eight Palestinians, including two children, were injured by Israeli security forces’ fire during a raid in Qabatiya, south of Jenin in the West Bank. (Petra Jordan News Agency)

A 21-year-old Palestinian from Tulkarm stabbed and wounded an Israeli police officer near the Damascus Gate in Jerusalem. The attacker was shot dead. (Ynetnews)

A Palestinian was shot and killed after getting out of his car and opening fire on Israeli soldiers stationed near the Hizma military checkpoint north of Jerusalem. Two Israelis were injured in the incident. (Ma’an News Agency)

Israeli forces demolished the Nablus home of a Palestinian man suspected of organizing an attack in October that left two Israeli settlers dead. (Ma’an News Agency)

Egyptian authorities opened the Rafah crossing for humanitarian cases for two days, after a near permanent closure during 2015. Over 25,000 Palestinians in Gaza have registered as humanitarian cases to use the crossing. The crossing has only been open for 19 days in 2015 and was last open for 4 days in August to Palestinians seeking medical treatment, during which 2,579 people were able to leave. (Ma’an News Agency)

Members of a “Jewish terror group” have been arrested over a July arson attack on a Palestinian home in the West Bank that killed a toddler and his parents, Israeli police said. A police statement said a court order banning disclosure of suspects’ names and other details of the case was in effect. Investigators still do not have enough evidence to press charges against the suspects arrested, said Public Security Minister Gilad Erdan. (Reuters, The Times of Israel)

Israeli President Rivlin, in a meeting with foreign journalists, said he believes that the appropriate solution to the Israel-Palestinian conflict is the establishment of two states, Israeli and Palestinian, in the context of a confederation, with defined borders and land swaps but one army, Israel Radio reported. (Haaretz)

Israeli Justice Minister Ayelet Shaked wrote to the German-Israeli Parliamentary Friendship Group to defend the bill she is endorsing, stressing that the bill is needed due to the fear that non-profits will be used by foreign governments and organizations to influence Israeli politics. (Haaretz)

The BDS movement announced a victory as the UNHCR office in Jordan confirmed to journalists that it no longer does business with the British private security firm G4S. (Mondoweiss)

The Turkish Presidency of Religious Affairs announced that it had started rebuilding nine mosques in the Gaza Strip after they were destroyed during the 2014 Gaza war. (Middle East Monitor)

4 December, 2015

A Palestinian knife attacker, 27, was shot and killed after stabbing and injuring an Israeli, 20, in the village of A’abud, in the Binyamin region of the West Bank. (The Jerusalem Post)

Two IDF soldiers were lightly injured by a vehicle ramming attack near “Ofra” settlement in the West Bank. Soldiers on the scene shot and killed the Palestinian driver who carried out the attack.(Ynetnews)

Two Palestinians attacked an IDF soldier at the Jilber position in Tel Romeida near Hebron. The attackers were shot and killed on the scene, the IDF soldier sustained light injuries. (Ma’an News Agency, The Jerusalem Post)

Three Palestinians were injured by shrapnel in the Al-Fukhari area east of Khan Younis in southern Gaza, after reports of Israeli tank shelling in the area, medical officials said. (Ma ‘an News Agency)

Israeli naval forces opened fire at Palestinian fishermen off the coast of northern Gaza, no injuries reported. (Ma’an News Agency).

The EU missions In Jerusalem and Ramallah in a statement expressed deep concern, once again, at an increasing number of demolitions and confiscations of Palestinian structures in Area C in recent days. (PNN)

The European Union made a contribution of €19 0 million to the payment of November salaries and pensions of over 67,000 Palestinian civil servants and pensioners in the West Bank and the Gaza Strip. (www.europa.eu)

Egyptian authorities re-sealed the Rafah border crossing between the Gaza Strip and Egypt, upholding a near-permanent closure of the border this year. Egyptian authorities had permitted Palestinian movement through the border for a two-day window, when dozens of trucks passed through the crossing, carrying medical supplies and materials for reconstruction of Gaza. (Ma’an News Agency)

5 December, 2015

A Palestinian was shot dead after he allegedly wounded three Israelis in a stabbing attack in West Jerusalem’s Romema neighbourhood, Israeli police said. (albawaba.com)

Israeli military forces shot and injured a Palestinian teenager during a demonstration in the West Bank town of Kafr Qaddum, west of Nablus. Palestinians were protesting against the expansion of illegal settlements when Israeli soldiers fired tear gas canisters as well as live rounds to break up the protest. (albawaba.com)

Israeli forces detained 12 Palestinians, including minors, across the occupied West Bank during separate raids in Hebron city, Dura village and Der Samet village. (Ma’an News Agency)

An official PLO delegation arrived in Cairo to take part in a five-day Arab League conference that will discuss a range of Palestinian affairs, including challenges faced by Palestinian refugees and the latest round of violence in the Occupied Palestinian Territory. (Ma’an News Agency)

Addressing a conference at the Brookings Institute, US Secretary of State Kerry said that if the Palestinian Authority disintegrated, Israel would be forced to assume all governance in the West Bank and potentially accept a one-state solution that would compromise Israel’s future as a Jewish state. (AP)

Over the weekend, the PLO’s Executive Committee and Fatah’s Central Committee met in Ramallah to discuss putting in place mechanisms to “define” the Palestinian Government’s relations with Israel. The PLO Executive Committee during a meeting chaired by PA President Mahmoud Abbas entrusted a special committee to discuss the issue. The Fatah Central Committee also met in Ramallah to discuss “defining security, economic and political relations” with Israel. (The Jerusalem Post)

6 December, 2015

Israeli forces detained a Palestinian schoolgirl, 15, who was allegedly carrying a knife near the Wadi Helwa area of East Jerusalem’s Silwan neighbourhood. Subsequent clashes broke out in the area and one youth was reportedly injured from shrapnel after a stun grenade exploded nearby. (albawaba.com)

A 21-year-old Palestinian man was shot and killed in Jerusalem after he ran over an Israeli and stabbed another, Israeli police said. (Xinhua)

Dozens of Palestinian schoolchildren suffered from severe tear gas inhalation in Hebron as Israeli forces fired the gas at multiple schools, the director of the Palestinian Ministry of Education in Hebron said. Israeli forces raided a medical centre while the children were receiving treatment for tear gas inhalation and allegedly beat and detained a 14-year-old student. (albawaba.com)

Israeli forces shot and wounded at least four Palestinians, including a child, with live rounds during clashes across the West Bank, Palestinian sources said. Meanwhile, in the central Gaza Strip, a Palestinian was reportedly shot and wounded during clashes near the border with Israel east of the Buriej refugee camp, locals said. (Ma’an News Agency)

During a Cabinet meeting, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said, “I would like to make it clear – Israel will not become a binational state. But in order for there to be peace, the other side needs to decide that it also wants peace. To my regret, this is not what we see.” (www.pmo.gov.il)

Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu condemned as “scandalous” comments made by Sweden’s Foreign Minister Margot Wallstrom on 4 December, in which she denounced the almost daily Palestinian knife, gun or car-ramming attacks but urged Israel to avoid disproportionate use of force. “And likewise, the response must not be of the kind, and this is what I say in other situations where the response is such that it results in extrajudicial executions or is disproportionate in that the number of people killed on that side exceeds the original number of deaths many times over,” she said addressing Swedish lawmakers. (Reuters)

43 Israeli settlers entered the Al-Aqsa Mosque compound under the protection of Israeli forces. (Ma’an News Agency)

The Grand Mufti of Jerusalem, Sheikh Mohammad Hussein, warned against the implications of calls made by Jewish organizations upon their followers to organize visits to Al-Aqsa Mosque from Sunday to Thursday to celebrate the Jewish holiday of Hanukkah. He said, in a press release, that such provocative visits dismiss Israel’s claims that it is maintaining the status quo there. He also condemned Israel’s setting up of Jewish structures at the site of Al-Buraq Wall (Western Wall) outside the Mosque, a practice which he said constitutes a blatant violation against Islamic sanctuaries. (WAFA)

Khalida Jarrar, a senior member of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine and a well-known political figure and activist, was sentenced to 15 months in jail at the Ofer military court near Ramallah. She was arrested in April on a series of charges, including encouraging attacks against Israel and violating a travel ban. (Al Jazeera)

Hamas rejected calls to let the Palestinian Authority reassert control on the Gaza side of the Rafah border crossing with Egypt. The statement came in response to a social media campaign urging Hamas to relinquish control over the terminal. (The Jerusalem Post)

7 December, 2015

An Israeli man was seriously wounded in a stabbing attack near the Cave of the Patriarchs in Hebron. The assailant was reportedly shot dead by a border police force and later identified as an 18-year-old Palestinian from Hebron. (Haaretz)

Fresh clashes broke out between dozens of Palestinians and Israeli security forces in the West Bank and East Jerusalem, leaving three Palestinian students wounded. The Palestinians were protesting against the Israeli killing of a young man in East Jerusalem overnight. (Xinhua)

Israeli forces have arrested eight Palestinian children from Al-’Eesawiyya, Silwan, and the Old City of East Jerusalem, in addition to a Palestinian man in Beit Hanina town, north of Jerusalem. (IMEMC)

Israeli forces shot and injured five Palestinians during a student demonstration near the Palestine Technical University in Tulkarem, also known as Al-Khadouri University, medics said. Clashes erupted near the university after Israeli military forces fired tear gas canisters and live rounds at students. (Ma’an News Agency)

Israeli forces detained at least 22 Palestinians across the occupied West Bank in predawn raids, including three children, Palestinian and Israeli sources said. (Ma’an News Agency)

The Israel Air Force struck targets in the Gaza Strip. According to reports in Gaza, the strike targeted sites associated with Hamas. (Haaretz)

German President Joachim Gauck during his visit to Israel met with Prime Minister Netanyahu and President Rivlin. He urged Israelis and Palestinians to coexist peacefully while expressing understanding for Israel’s security needs. (Ynetnews)

Israeli forces raided the West Bank homes of several Palestinians suspected of carrying out attacks on Israelis in preparation to demolish the properties, locals said. (Ma’an News Agency)

8 December, 2015

Medical sources said that Malik Akram Shahin, a 19-year-old Palestinian who was shot dead by Israeli forces in Bethlehem earlier in the day, had been killed by an explosive bullet fired at his head, which indicated that Israeli forces had shot at him with every intention to kill. (Ma’an News Agency)

Israeli naval forces detained two Palestinian fishermen off the Gaza coast. (Ma’an News Agency)

Israeli forces seized and levelled 26 dunams (6.4 acres) of Palestinian farmland in the village of Izbet Shofa in Tulkarm, destroying a greenhouse and uprooting more than 200 olive trees. (Ma’an News Agency)

The Director-General for Multilateral Relations of Indonesia’s Foreign Ministry, Hasan Kleib, said that the Indonesian Government would continue its support for an independent Palestine by hosting an international conference on the question of Jerusalem in Jakarta to be organized by the UN Committee on the Exercise of the Inalienable Rights of the Palestinian People in cooperation with the Organization of Islamic Cooperation on 14 to 15 December, followed by a UN Civil Society Forum on 16 December. (The Jakarta Post)

9 December, 2015

An Israeli soldier and a civilian were wounded in a stabbing attack near a checkpoint in Hebron. The Palestinian assailant was shot and killed. (Ynetnews)

Israeli forces detained at least 31 Palestinians in the West Bank and East Jerusalem. Three Palestinians were injured by live fire. (Ma’an News Agency)

Israeli military vehicles entered a border area east of the Al-Bureij refugee camp in the central Gaza Strip and levelled Palestinian agricultural land. (Ma’an News Agency)

Around 30 Israelis entered the Al-Aqsa Mosque compound via the Moroccan Gate under the protection of Israeli police forces and performed prayers there. (Ma’an News Agency)

Gunmen presumed to be Palestinians fired bullets at an Israeli car in in the West Bank, wounding an Israeli couple. The Israelis were identified as Shaul and Rachel Nir. Mr. Nir was a leader of the so-called Jewish Underground that carried out attacks against Palestinians in the 1980s. Shortly after the incident, Israeli troops broke into Tulkarm, provoking clashes with youths. At least three Palestinians were injured by Israeli live fire during the clashes, while several others suffocated due to inhaling excessive teargas fired by Israeli soldiers. (The New York Times, WAFA)

During a meeting with Israeli President Reuven Rivlin at the White House, President Barack Obama said that the United States will keep working towards Middle East peace despite slim chances for near-term success. He added that the US wants to be helpful in reducing tensions between Israelis and Palestinians and it was critical for Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas to “unequivocally condemn” the attacks, fight incitement and pursue dialogue with Israelis. (AP)

The Israeli municipality of West Jerusalem launched a campaign to remove stores’ signs with Arabic text in Al-Mosrara market near the Damascus Gate in Jerusalem. (WAFA)

The General Assembly adopted eight resolutions on Israeli-Palestinian issues. (UN press release GA/11737)

A 64-year-old female resident of the East Jerusalem neighbourhood of Isawiyah, who is an activist in the all-female Murabitat group known for opposing Jewish presence on the Temple Mount [Al-Haram Al-Sharif], was detained by Israeli police for suspected ties to the newly outlawed northern branch of the Islamic Movement. (The Times of Israel)

The Israeli High Court of Justice ruled that there was no basis to indict for incitement the authors of the book “Torat Hamelech (The King’s Torah)”, which argued that, according to Jewish law, killing gentiles is permissible in certain circumstances. (The Jerusalem Post)

10 December, 2015

Four Israelis were injured, one of them severely, in a suspected car ramming attack near the “Beit Aryeh-Ofraim” settlement in the central West Bank. (Ma’an News Agency)

Israeli settlers verbally assaulted a number of students and teachers and attempted to block their access to their school in Hebron’s Old City, according to local sources. (WAFA)

The Al-Quds Centre for Palestinian and Israeli Studies revealed in its report that at least 412 fixed or random military roadblocks have been installed by Israel in Jerusalem and the West Bank in the last few years. The objective behind setting up these barriers, according to the report, falls in the context of a “collective punishment policy against two-thirds of the population of the West Bank and Jerusalem” to secure “safe movement” for Israeli settlers by imposing restrictive measures on Palestinian citizens. (Middle East Monitor)

Police officers in the northern Israeli city of Afula arrested three Palestinians from Jenin carrying large knives. (The Times of Israel)

Israeli forces detained eight Palestinians from across the West Bank. Locals told Ma’an that two Palestinian families were given notices by Israeli forces demanding that they refrain from discussing on television relatives who were deported to the Gaza Strip. (Ma’an News Agency)

The Greek Parliament is expected to recognize the State of Palestine on 22 December. The recognition will be by the Parliament and not by the State in order “not to disturb good relations with Israel,” according to the Greek Foreign Ministry. On 21 December, President Abbas will be in Athens for a two-day official visit, during which he is expected to meet with Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras and President Prokopis Pavlopoulos and visit the Parliament. (Greek Reporter)

Kuwait’s Deputy Foreign Minister, Khaled Al-Jarallah, said that the Supreme Council of the Gulf Cooperation Council discussed the Palestinian cause at its 36th summit held in Riyadh. He noted that as the peace process remains stalled, the GCC will urge the international community to push the peace process forward. (Emirates News Agency)

The 11-year-old Palestinian boy who was shot after stabbing a light rail security guard in the “Pisgat Ze’ev” settlement in East Jerusalem last month has been transferred to a juvenile detention facility, as the court deliberates how to proceed. Israel’s minimum age for legal prosecution is 12. (The Jerusalem Post)

On the occasion of Human Rights Day, the UN Coordinator for Humanitarian Aid and Development Activities, Robert Piper, and a group of UN and NGO leaders visited Hebron this week to see first-hand the situation of human rights defenders in Hebron, as well as the obstacles to Palestinian children’s right to an education in a safe environment. Mr. Piper said after the visit: “Protective presence organizations are on the front line of this work in the occupied Palestinian territory, embodying the support of the world community to the people of Hebron and defending the rights of Palestinian children, not least to a safe journey to and from school. They must be allowed to continue their work without violence, threats or retaliation.” (OCHA)

Israeli authorities released for a five-day house arrest an Israeli settler detained for suspected involvement in a fatal arson attack on a Palestinian family in July, Israeli media reported. (Ma’an News Agency)

Israeli authorities barred a member of Fatah’s Central Committee, Sultan Abu al-Einen, from leaving the West Bank into Jordan through the Allenby border crossing, telling him that he was barred from traveling for “security reasons.” (Ma’an News Agency)

Israeli military forces detained eight Palestinians after raiding several areas in the Tulkarem refugee camp, locals said. (Ma’an News Agency)

Israeli authorities released a Palestinian rights activist and journalist Nidal Abu Aker after an 18-month administrative detention. He has served a total of 14 non-consecutive years in Israeli prison. (Ma’an News Agency)

11 December, 2015

A Palestinian driver attempted to hit IDF soldiers near the West Bank city of Hebron and was shot and killed. (The Times of Israel)

A 24-year-old Palestinian man was shot and killed during clashes with Israeli forces in Hebron. His sister was shot dead by Israeli forces on 25 October, a case Amnesty International found “absolutely unjustified”. (Ma’an News Agency)

A Palestinian gunman opened fire at soldiers at the Gilboa checkpoint near Jenin before he was wounded and fled the scene. There were no Israelis injured in the attack. (Associated Press)

At least five Palestinians were injured and one was detained during Israeli soldiers’ raid in Ramallah. The soldiers also detained one Palestinian in Bethlehem. (IMEMC)

Israeli forces shot dead a 44-year-old Palestinian man and injured 17 others during clashes east of Al-Bureij camp in the central Gaza Strip. (Ma’an News Agency)

A 16-year-old Palestinian girl who attempted to stab and kill Israelis near Jerusalem’s Mahane Yehuda market last month was indicted by prosecutors at the Jerusalem District Youth Court on two counts of attempted murder and one count of possession of a deadly weapon – scissors with which she stabbed one person and attempted to stab another. (The Times of Israel)

PLO Secretary-General Saeb Erekat said in a press release that the conviction by an Israeli military court of Khalida Jarrar, a democratically-elected member of the Palestinian Legislative Council, is a reflection of the daily oppression and apartheid policies imposed by Israel, the occupying power, against the Palestinian people. (PNN)

Sweden contributed SEK 190 million ($22 million) to the Palestinian Partnership for Infrastructure Development Multi-Donor Trust Fund (PID MDTF), administered by the World Bank. (IMEMC)

Hamas is ready to hand over control of the Rafah Crossing to any party on the basis of a “political partnership, not change or replacement,” Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh told journalists in Gaza. (Middle East Monitor)

12 December, 2015

Israeli forces stormed a medical clinic in Bethlehem, seizing several computers and patients’ medical records. Israeli forces also raided and confiscated computers and other items from a scientific library in Ramallah. (WAFA)

Israeli forces shot and injured 20 Palestinians with live and rubber-coated bullets during demonstrations held in the West Bank. (Ma’an News Agency)

13 December, 2015

Israeli troops shot and injured a Palestinian girl after she allegedly attempted to stab soldiers outside the settlement of “Kiryat Arba,” east of Hebron. (WAFA)

The Israeli army shut down the headquarters of Youths Against Settlement, a Palestinian anti-settlement group, in Hebron, claiming that it was in a closed military zone. (WAFA)

Israeli forces detained at least six Palestinians and summoned 15 others for interrogation in the West Bank. (WAFA)

Israeli forces shot and injured a Palestinian farmer in his leg east of Rafah in the southern Gaza Strip. (Ma’an News Agency)

During a conference organized by Haaretz and the New Israel Fund in New York, PLO Secretary-General Saeb Erekat called on Israel “not to give up” on the two-state solution. He said the reality being created on the ground will not create a single binational Jewish-Palestinian state but “one state, two systems,” which he described as “an apartheid state.” Permanent Representative of the US to the UN Ambassador Samantha Power told the Conference that continued settlement growth raised questions about Israel’s long-term objectives and urged both Israelis and Palestinians to renew peace efforts. (Haaretz)

At the COP21 conference in Paris, the Palestinian delegation announced that it was submitting to the UN Secretary-General its instrument of accession to the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change. (The Hindu)

Israeli authorities notified two families living in the Silwan neighbourhood in Jerusalem of eviction orders claiming that their homes are owned by non-governmental Jewish organizations. (WAFA)

14 December, 2015

A 21-year-old Palestinian drove a car into Israelis at a Jerusalem bus stop, injuring eight people, before being shot dead. (AFP)

Israeli forces detained at least 30 Palestinians, including a woman and minors, in the West Bank and Jerusalem. (WAFA)

Israeli warplanes hit bases of Hamas in the Gaza Strip overnight, following a Palestinian rocket attack on Israel, the Israeli army said. (AFP)

A delegation from the International Criminal Court is expected to visit the Occupied Palestinian Territory in February to conduct investigations into cases raised to the Court by the Palestinian leadership against Israel, a Palestinian official said. (Ma’an News Agency)

In a message delivered by UNDP Resident Coordinator in Indonesia Douglas Broderick at the International Conference on the Question of Palestine held in Jakarta, Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon said, “Jerusalem, one of the oldest cities in the world, holds shrines sacred to billions of people worldwide — Muslims, Jews and Christians alike. What happens in Jerusalem reverberates around the world. Any action which could be interpreted as attempting to change the delicate balance, and particularly the status quo of the holy sites, carries with it the risk of conflict.” (UN press release SG/SM/17413-GA/PAL/1354)

Three new ministers in the Palestinian Cabinet were sworn in at the President’s headquarters in Ramallah. Ali Mahmoud Abdullah Abu Diyak replaced Saleem Al-Saqqa as the Minister of Justice, Ehab Yasir Aref Bseiso replaced Ziad Abu Amr as the Minister of Culture, and Mahmoud Rashid al-Shaer replaced Shawqi al-Aissa as the Minister of Social Affairs. (Ma’an News Agency)

Referring to the EU’s decision to put special labels on exports from the West Bank, EU High Representative for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy Federica Mogherini said after talks with foreign ministers: “[The EU was] united on these technical guidelines on the indication of origin, which is no way a boycott.” (AP)

The German Development Bank signed three agreements with UNRWA for contributions totalling EUR 45.8 million to support Palestine refugees in Gaza, Lebanon and Jordan. (UNRWA)

The US Government pledged more than US$ 123 million in support of Palestine refugees and UNRWA at a school inauguration event in Ein Arik near Ramallah with UNRWA Commissioner-General Pierre Krähenbühl. (UNRWA)

15 December, 2015

Israeli Defence Minister Moshe Ya’alon said that Israel did not currently have enough evidence to detain or prosecute the suspects in the Duma arson murders. (Haaretz)

The Israeli army opened fire towards Palestinian farmers who were trying to reach their farms located near the border in the central Gaza Strip, forcing them to leave. No casualties were reported. (WAFA)

Israeli forces detained 25 Palestinians in the West Bank. (WAFA)

Denmark’s largest private pension and insurance fund, FPA Pension, said that it was withdrawing its investments from the German construction materials conglomerate HeidelbergCement because of its involvement in exploiting the natural resources of the occupied West Bank. (Haaretz)

Spokesperson for the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Cécile Pouilly told reporters in Geneva: “Since the current escalation started at the beginning of October, 21 Israelis and 117 Palestinians have lost their lives (along with two foreign nationals), with thousands more injured. … The unacceptable wave of stabbings, shootings and car rammings continues to kill and injure Israelis. The response from Israeli security forces has resulted in alleged attackers, protesters and even bystanders being killed and injured. We again voice deep concern over reports of excessive use of force by Israeli forces. In the H2 area of Hebron alone, we have seen 16 alleged attacks against Israelis since 1 October. Of the 17 Palestinians involved in such incidents, 16 have been shot dead and one injured and arrested. All instances of the use of force resulting in death or injury by law enforcement officers should be the subject of prompt, independent and impartial investigations. Punitive demolitions of Palestinian houses and the withholding of bodies of alleged attackers from their families can only aggravate this situation.” (www.ohchr.org)

EU Heads of Mission in Jerusalem and Ramallah visited Hebron and met the Governor, the Mayor, the Deputy Head of Mission for the Temporary International Presence in Hebron and representatives of Palestinian civil society and international organizations. The objective of the visit was to gain a first-hand impression of developments and to express concern at the deteriorating situation in Hebron. “The situation in Hebron is alarming and underlines the urgent need for a political solution to the conflict between Palestinians and Israelis which must allow everybody to live in peace and dignity”, the EU Representative, Ralph Tarraf, said on the occasion of the visit. (http://eeas.europa.eu)

The two-day International Conference on the Question of Jerusalem was concluded after a plenary session on historical and contemporary models of coexistence. (UN press releaseGA/PAL/1356)

An Israeli government official said that Israel would continue to hold discussions with the Quartet even though it had suspended talks with the EU. (The Jerusalem Post)

Israeli authorities notified the family of a Palestinian killed after carrying out an attack in Jerusalem in October of orders to demolish their house in East Jerusalem. (WAFA)

16 December, 2015

Israeli forces shot dead two Palestinians who attempted to ram their vehicles into soldiers and border policemen raiding the Qalandiya refugee camp near Ramallah. (AP)

Israeli forces shot and injured 14 Palestinians and detained 18 others during arrest raids in the West Bank. (Ma’an News Agency)

Israeli forces shot and injured a Palestinian farmer south-east of Khan Yunis in the southern Gaza Strip. (Ma’an News Agency)

Israeli authorities demolished a house in the Sheikh Jarrah neighbourhood in East Jerusalem, displacing six Palestinians. (Ma’an News Agency)

The Jerusalem building and planning board approved a plan to construct 891 housing units in the “Gilo” settlement. (Haaretz)

Israeli forces shot and injured 15 students during protests at the Palestine Technical University in Tulkarm, according to medical sources at the Red Crescent. (Ma’an News Agency)

In his briefing to the Security Council, Assistant Secretary-General for Political Affairs Miroslav Jenča called for “unprecedented vision” by Israelis and Palestinians to take bold steps necessary for peace in the Middle East. While the current bloodshed should not be accepted as “the new normal”, a comprehensive strategy must address the primary elements motivating Palestinian anger, he said. (UN News Centre, Xinhua)

Quartet Envoys met in Jerusalem and Ramallah with Israeli and Palestinian officials. They said in a statement: “The Quartet Envoys strongly condemned all acts of terror and stressed the importance of opposing unequivocally incitement and violence and de-escalate the situation. The Quartet Envoys reiterated the need for significant steps on the ground, in line with previous agreements, which will strengthen Palestinian institutions, security and economic prospects, while respecting Israel’s legitimate security concerns.” (UN News Centre)

17 December, 2015

Israeli soldiers shot and killed a 15 year-old Palestinian near Nablus after he allegedly attempted to stab them, the Israeli military said. Eyewitnesses said the child did not carry any weapon and never attempted to attack the soldiers. The Israeli army also arrested 24 Palestinians overnight. (AP, IMEMC, Reuters, Voice of America)

Israeli forces shot and injured three Palestinians after entering a border area in the southern Gaza Strip in order to level Palestinian land, local residents said. (Ma’an News Agency)

Overnight, clashes erupted in the Qalandiya refugee camp, north of Jerusalem, after Israeli forces raided the camp. Two Palestinians were arrested. (Ynetnews)

Israeli forces shot and detained a 19-year-old Palestinian overnight during clashes in Bethlehem’s al-Obayat village. (Ma’an News Agency)

The Israeli Foreign Ministry said that envoys of the Quartet met with senior representatives of the Israeli Prime Minister’s Office and the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. The Ministry said in astatement: “A lengthy, serious and germane discussion was held on ways to stop the violence, restore security and end incitement. A discussion was also held on the matter of future prospects for the diplomatic process. … The Israeli side noted the importance that Israel places on continued dialogue with the Quartet, a responsible and moderating party.” (Times of Israel, http://mfa.gov.il)

Five Palestinian detainees, including two women, have begun a hunger strike in protest of their conditions and Israel’s arbitrary administrative detention policy. About 1,500 Palestinians were recently detained since the outbreak of the recent uprising in October. (IMEMC)

Sinn Féin’s Spokesperson on Foreign Affairs has called on the Irish Minister for Foreign Affairs to support calls for the release of Khalida Jarrar, member of the Palestinian Legislative Council, sentenced to 15 months in jail by an Israeli military court on political charges relating to her public political activity. He also called on the Minister to raise the case with his European colleagues. (www.sinnfein.ie)

Several legal academics have written a joint letter to the EU and its Member States requesting them to comply with their legal obligations resulting from the duty of non-recognition and non-assistance to Israeli settlements and their economic activity and to impose an import ban on settlement products. They stated that labelling of settlement products and services fails to recognize the obligations of third states under international law. (www.eccpalestine.org)

Israel has banned the activist group Breaking the Silence from speaking in schools or to groups of soldiers, amid a widespread campaign to clamp down on left-wing groups. (The Irish Times)

Palestinians from Hebron marched, demanding that the Israeli Government immediately return the bodies of 21 Palestinians who were recently killed by Israeli forces. Families of those killed, Hebron Governor Kamel Hmeid and a number of Palestinian officials were among the protestors. (Ma’an News Agency)

A rocket fired at Israel exploded inside the Gaza Strip, near the border with Israel, the IDF said. No injuries were reported. (Haaretz)

Israeli forces shot and injured a Palestinian man in Al-Breij refugee camp in the central Gaza Strip. The man was transferred to a hospital for treatment and his condition was described as stable. (WAFA)

PLO Secretary-General Saeb Erekat said that the Quartet delegation did not propose any initiative to calm the situation in the Palestinian territories, adding that the delegation confirmed its commitments to the Palestinians, including establishing the Palestinian state on the 1967 borders. (Xinhua)

Israel and Turkey have reached a preliminary agreement to normalize relations, including the return of ambassadors to both countries, an Israeli official said, after a deal was reached in which Turkey will drop charges against Israeli officers in the deaths of Turkish activists aboard a ship in 2010, and Israel will establish a fund for the victims’ families. (Reuters, The New York Times)

US lawmakers issued a resolution to condemn the EU’s decision to label products made in the West Bank. The resolution by a bipartisan group of four Congress members said, “Such actions undermine efforts to achieve a negotiated Israeli-Palestinian peace process.” The lawmakers emphasized that the EU, which is Israel’s main source of trade, must play a helpful role in returning Israelis and Palestinians to the negotiating table. (Ynetnews)

Israeli authorities notified four Palestinian families in Jerusalem’s Old City of lawsuits filed by Israeli settler groups to evict them from the homes they have been occupying since 1967. (WAFA)

President of the Arab Parliament Ahmad Al-Jarwan thanked UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon in a telegram for his message to the International Conference on the Question of Jerusalem held in Jakarta under the theme “Addressing the present and shaping the future of Jerusalem”. (KUNA)

18 December, 2015

Israeli forces launched a limited incursion by four Israeli bulldozers into Al-Qarara town in the southern Gaza Strip, in the second operation of its kind within the past 48 hours. (Palestinian Information Center)

Israeli soldiers attacked the weekly nonviolent protest in Ni’lin village, near Ramallah, against the Wall and settlements, wounding five, while dozens suffered the effects of tear gas inhalation. (IMEMC)

Israeli forces detained eight Palestinians during predawn raids in the West Bank. (Ma’an News Agency)

A 30-year-old Palestinian resident of Turmus Ayya in the West Bank was shot and wounded after a suspected car ramming attempt at the Qalandiya checkpoint. The suspected assailant was treated by paramedics at the scene. (Haaretz)

A suspected Palestinian assailant was shot dead after reportedly attempting to ram his car into a group of soldiers during clashes in the West Bank village of Silwad. No Israeli casualties were reported. (Haaretz)

The Italian Government has made a contribution of €2.18 million (US$ 2,390,351) to UNRWA to provide food assistance to the most vulnerable Palestine refugees in Gaza. (www.unrwa.org)

USAID and the Palestinian Water Authority announced the opening of the new Deir Sha’ar pipeline at a ceremony in Halhoul, north of Hebron. In a press release, USAID said the new pipeline improves access to a reliable supply of potable water for 200,000 Palestinians, including residents of Halhoul, Hebron City, Al-Arrub Camp, Beit Ummar, Bani Naim and Yatta in the Hebron Governorate. (WAFA)

The Israeli human rights organization, B’Tselem, said Israel’s policy to withhold the bodies of Palestinians suspected of carrying out attacks against Israeli soldiers and settlers is not only morally wrong but also undervalues Palestinians and their families. (WAFA)

The Indian-Palestinian “Freedom Jatha” theatre group, a collaboration between Delhi-based Jana Natya Manch and the Freedom Theatre in the West Bank, is to perform in 11 cities in India between 18 December and 25 January. (The Hindu)

A Palestinian was shot dead as he tried to drive his car into Israeli security forces at the entrance to the settlement of “Ofra” in the northern West Bank. (The Times of Israel)

UN Special Rapporteur the situation of human rights defenders, Michel Forst expressed grave concerns at continued reports that human rights defenders are being subjected to physical attacks, harassment, arrest and detention, and death threats, particularly in Hebron, in an apparent bid by Israeli authorities and settler elements to stop their peaceful and important work. (www.ohchr.org)

19 December, 2015

Palestinians opened fire twice at IDF troops at the Qalandiya checkpoint near Ramallah but none of the troops were hurt. (Ynetnews)

A 16-year-old Palestinian was shot and killed after drawing a knife on Israeli officers in Jerusalem when they asked for an ID. (The Boston Globe)

A Palestinian tried to stab a policeman on the outskirts of Jerusalem, but struck his bulletproof vest. The assailant was shot and killed. (The Boston Globe)

A Palestinian stabbed and wounded two Israelis north of Tel Aviv before being apprehended, police said. (AFP)

Palestinian prisoner Bassam Ameen al-Sayeh, 43, from Nablus, is in serious health condition and “may die at any moment,” the Palestinian Minister for Prisoners’ Affairs said. (Ma’an News Agency)

20 December, 2015

Shin Bet said that “in recent days, there has been progress in the investigation into the Duma terror attack”, which resulted in the deaths of 3 Palestinians. (The Jerusalem Post)

A Jerusalem court heard arguments over the mental competence of an Israeli settler who was ruled to have burned alive a Palestinian teenager last year. The presiding judge said he would make a decision in the coming days, without providing a date. (AFP)

A Palestinian woman attempted to stab Israeli soldiers in Hebron before she was shot and arrested, officials and medics said. The incident set off a clash between Palestinian residents and Israeli security forces that fired rubber bullets and stun grenades, witnesses and Palestinian medics said. (AFP)

Israelis forces arrested 12 students at Birzeit University, all members of the Islamic bloc. (Middle East Monitor)

An official from Turkey’s ruling Justice and Development Party said that no deal had yet been signed to normalize relations with Israel. (Anadolu Agency)

Turkish President Erdogan met with Hamas leader Khaled Mashaal in Istanbul, Turkish presidential sources said. (Reuters)

A multi-language international electronic campaign organized by activists to free Palestinian minors in Israeli jails is expected to kick off today, the Palestinian Prisoner’s Society said. (WAFA)

21 December, 2015

Israeli authorities are expected to hand over the bodies of Palestinians from Jerusalem killed during attacks on Israeli military and civilians in recent months, a lawyer for a prisoners’ rights group Addameer said. (Ma’an News Agency)

Several Israeli military vehicles invaded the Dheisheh refugee camp south of Bethlehem, detained a former political prisoner Saleh al-J’eidi, 24, and injured two Palestinians with live bullet rounds, while many others suffered tear gas inhalation, medical sources said. (IMEMC)

At least nine Palestinian students have been shot and injured in clashes with Israeli soldiers outside the Palestine Technical University-Kadoorie in Tulkarm. (IMEMC)

Israeli soldiers detained 26 Palestinians in different districts of the West Bank, with 11 arrested in Hebron. (Ma’an News Agency, IMEMC)

The Israeli authorities allowed a group of Gazan families of Palestinian prisoners held at the Israeli Nafha jail to visit their jailed relatives via the Erez crossing. (Ma’an News Agency)

Israeli Agriculture Minister Uri Ariel said he supports allowing Hamas more economic freedom in Gaza, adding that “we want to build a seaport in Gaza, so that they can import and export goods”. (Israel National News)

Israeli forces raided the village of Silwad east of Ramallah in preparation to demolish the home of a Palestinian killed after an attempted car-ramming attack last week, relatives said. (Ma’an News Agency)

Israel’s Coordinator of Government Activities in the Territories (COGAT) announced measures aimed at relaxing movement restrictions on Palestinian Christians during the Christmas holidays, saying in a statement that 500 Palestinian Christians would be able to leave the West Bank for Gaza, while another 800 will be permitted to make the opposite journey. (Ma’an News Agency)

Five Palestinian youths from occupied East Jerusalem were indicted for a range of “terrorist attacks,” following police investigations in coordination with Israel’s Shin Bet. (Ma’an News Agency)

Israeli police in the Jewish Quarter of Jerusalem’s Old City arrested a 15-year-old girl from East Jerusalem found in possession of a knife, on suspicion of planning a stabbing attack. (The Times of Israel)

Israeli forces shot and wounded a 14-year-old Palestinian boy with live fire during clashes on the outskirts of Silwad in eastern Ramallah. The boy was reportedly evacuated by an ambulance from Israel’s emergency services. (IMEMC)

Palestinian police reportedly ordered Israeli Border Police forces out of the Beituniya area of western Ramallah, classified as Area A, locals told Ma’an. (Ma’an News Agency)

Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu told a meeting of his Likud faction that “there are ongoing talks with Turkey, but there are no understandings, and we’re not there yet”, according to a senior Government official who was present at the meeting. He added that the sides are still at odds over Hamas’ activities in Turkey and Israel’s naval blockade of the Gaza Strip. (Haaretz)

Israeli authorities issued an administrative detention order against the father of a Palestinian who was shot dead by Israeli troops earlier this month, after he rammed his car into Israeli soldiers, according to local sources, sentencing 49-year-old Bassam Hammad, from the village of Silwad near Ramallah, to six months in prison, without a charges or trial. (WAFA)

Amnesty International has sent a letter to the Israeli Public Prosecutor asking him to stop the administrative detention of Palestinian children, Arab48.com reported, naming three minors in the letter – Mohamed Gheith, Fadi Abbasi and Kazem Sbeeh – although many more are being held by Israel. (Middle East Monitor)

22 December, 2015

In a suspected Jewish extremist attack, a Palestinian home in Beitillu near Ramallah was attacked, where a couple and their 9-month-old baby boy were sleeping, with windows broken and smoke grenades thrown in. No injuries were reported. The words “Revenge” and “Greetings, prisoners of Zion” were found sprayed on the wall of an adjacent building. (The Times of Israel)

Israeli Border Police arrested a Palestinian woman, 27, in Hebron after she approached a security checkpoint near the Tomb of the Patriarchs, pulled out a knife and threatened the officers on duty, police said in a statement. (The Times of Israel)

Four Palestinians were shot and injured after Israeli forces raided the West Bank village of Tammun, hometown of the suspect of a stab attack that left three Israelis injured the day before, locals said. (Ma’an News Agency)

The Israeli military raided dozens of homes in different districts of the West Bank, and detained at least fifteen Palestinians, including two children. (IMEMC)

The Parliament of Greece unanimously voted in favour of recognizing the State of Palestine as an independent State. The vote was attended by visiting President Abbas and Greek Prime Minister Tsipras, in addition to top ranking Greek diplomats and state officials. (WAFA)

Speaking after talks with Greek Prime Minister Tsipras, Palestinian President Abbas said there are plans in a about a year to print Palestinian passports with “State of Palestine” on them instead of “Palestinian Authority”. (AP)

The World Bank approved a USD 5 million grant for the creation of jobs in Palestine through catalysing private investment in high potential sectors for job creation. (WAFA)

Around 4,000 sick Palestinians in Gaza need to travel through the Rafah crossing with Egypt, Gaza’s Ministry of Health said. (Ma’an News Agency)

The US State Department rejected calls by 32 members of Congress, including Republican presidential candidate Ted Cruz, to close the Washington office of the PLO. (Israel National News, Reuters)

Turkish Prime Minister Davutoglu said that talks on restoring ties with Israel were continuing and Ankara was insisting on its demands for compensation and for “lifting restrictions” on Gaza. (Reuters)

The General Assembly adopted a resolution on “Permanent sovereignty of the Palestinian people in the Occupied Palestinian Territory, including East Jerusalem, and of the Arab population in the occupied Syrian Golan over their natural resources,” with 164 votes in favour, five against, and ten abstentions. (Ma’an News Agency)

Palestinian Minister of Prisoners’ Affairs Issa Qaraqe reportedly called on Bulgaria not to hand over Palestinian-Bulgarian national Omar Nayif to Israel, Anadolu reported, following last week’s Israeli request to extradite him. Nayif was arrested in 1986 and was sentenced to life in prison. Four years later, he went on a hunger strike and was moved into a hospital in Bethlehem. He fled and travelled to several countries before settling in Bulgaria. (Middle East Monitor)

Israeli soldiers on the border with Gaza wounded three Palestinians, while Israeli naval forces arrested 10 fishermen while they were fishing in Gaza Sea, officials said. (Xinhua)

Former Shin Bet security services chief Ami Ayalon and Israel Police Maj. Gen. (ret.) Alik Ron published an advertisement in Haaretz Hebrew edition in support of the Israeli NGO “Breaking the Silence”, under the heading “I too am breaking the silence.” The two ex-security officials joined two other senior defence personalities who have expressed support in recent days for the NGO – Maj. Gen. (res.) Amiram Levin, former commander of the elite Israel Defence Force’s Sayeret Matkal unit, and Yuval Diskin, former head of the Shin Bet. (Haaretz)

23 December, 2015

At least three Israelis were wounded, two of them seriously, during a knife attack by two Palestinians outside of Jerusalem’s Old City. The two attackers were shot by police. One was reportedly killed and the other badly injured. Police said one of the Israelis may have been struck by police gunfire. (The Guardian)

Shin Bet announced that it had disrupted a large-scale Hamas cell based in Abu Dis, near Jerusalem, and which plotted bombings in Israel. (The Jerusalem Post)

Israeli forces detained 17 Palestinians across the West Bank, security sources and locals told Ma’an. (Ma’an News Agency)

Israeli forces detained a Palestinian woman, 23, at a checkpoint near the Ibrahimi Mosque in Hebron’s Old city for reportedly carrying a knife. (Ma’an News Agency)

The movement of residents in Ras Al-Wad southwest of Bethlehem has been cut off for three weeks by Israeli military forces, locals said. (Ma’an News Agency)

Senior Hamas official Khaled Mashaal reportedly met with Turkish President Erdogan, requesting that the President not ban the organization from operating in Turkey. (Ynetnews)

Israeli Ambassador to the US Ron Dermer sent out holiday gift packages from the Embassy that included goods produced in settlements. “This year I decided to send a gift for the holiday that would also help combat BDS,” Dermer wrote on Twitter. (Haaretz, The New York Times)

UNICEF is providing winter assistance to Palestine refugee children in Lebanon through UNRWA ATM cards. This assistance includes children up to 14-years-old of Palestine refugees from Syria currently in Lebanon. (www.unrwa.org)

Four Israeli bulldozers entered 100 meters onto Palestinian territory east of the al-Bureij refugee camp in the central Gaza Strip and levelled land in the area, witnesses told Ma’an. (Ma’an News Agency)

Israeli police announced that an investigation was underway into the wedding video that was aired on Channel 10 that showed Jewish extremists dancing at a wedding while cheering the murder of the Palestinian Dawabshe family and calling for more killings. Police said they were investigating the crimes of incitement to violence as well as other charges arising from the film, adding that the investigation had begun days before the video was aired. Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu immediately condemned the video. (The Jerusalem Post)

Israeli settlers from the illegal “Metarim” industrial zone, south of Hebron, intentionally discharged waste water from factories into Palestinian land. (WAFA)

24 December, 2015

A Palestinian man was shot dead after stabbing two security guards at an entrance to an industrial zone at the “Ariel” settlement. Both of the victims were left with moderate wounds, police said. (AFP)

A Palestinian man tried to attack Israeli forces near Hebron with a screwdriver. He was shot and killed. (VOA)

A Palestinian man tried to run over Israeli soldiers and border police officers at the entrance to the Rama outpost north of Jerusalem, and was shot dead. (KUNA, The Jerusalem Post)

Israeli soldiers raided several Palestinian communities in different parts of Nablus, Tubas and Hebron, searched dozens of homes, and detained thirteen Palestinians. (IMEMC)

In his first address to the Shura (Consultative) Council since he became the Custodian of the Two Holy Mosques in January, Saudi King Salman Bin Abdul Aziz called the international community to assume its responsibilities and take the necessary measures to protect the Palestinians from the “antagonistic Israeli actions that are a provocation to the feelings of Arabs and Muslims”. “We are also determined to defend the Palestinian people till restoring their legitimate rights and establishing an independent state with Jerusalem as its capital,” he added. (Palestinian Information Center)

The Arab League Assistant Secretary General for Palestine and occupied Arab lands Saeed Abu Ali, in a statement, welcomed the Greek Parliament’s approval to recognise the State of Palestine. (The Gulf Today)

Israeli forces razed the home of the 39-year-old Palestinian Musa Muhammad Alhadidi in the town of Beit Liqya after he hacked and wounded two Israeli workers at construction site in Modi’in city earlier this week. (The Jerusalem Post)

An Israeli court ruled to accept for consideration a psychiatric evaluation of an Israeli settler Yosef Ben-David as evidence in a case regarding his role in the death of Palestinian Muhammad Abu Khdeir, 16, who was kidnapped and burned alive in July of 2014. The evaluation reportedly reveals that Ben-David has psychological and mental disorders that make him ineligible to stand in court. (Ma’an News Agency)

The World Bank transferred US$22 million to the PA from the Palestinian Reform and Development Plan Trust Fund (PRDP-MDTF), a multi-donor budget support mechanism administered by the Bank. The funds would help support the urgent budget needs of the PA, providing inter alia support for ongoing macroeconomic and public financial management reforms. (www.worldbank.org)

Israeli forces shot dead a 23-year-old Palestinian man during a raid in the Qalandiya refugee camp near Ramallah. (Ma’an News Agency)

25 December, 2015

A 38-year-old Palestinian woman tried to ram a car into Israeli border guards in the village of Silwad, north-west of Ramallah, before being shot dead. (AFP)

A 22-year-old Palestinian man was shot in the head and killed by Israeli forces during clashes in Gaza’s Shujayyia neighbourhood, which erupted after demonstrations held in the area. Nine others were hit by live fire. (Ma’an News Agency)

26 December, 2015

A Palestinian man was shot dead after reportedly attempting to stab an Israeli police officer in Jerusalem. His family said he had suffered from mental disabilities and would not have carried out an attack. In a separate incident, Israeli soldiers shot and killed a Palestinian at the Huwwara checkpoint near Nablus after he rammed his vehicle into Israeli forces, injuring one soldier. (Ma’an News Agency)

A senior Turkish source said that Turkey intended to demand free access to the Gaza Strip as part of a reconciliation deal with Israel so that it could provide any aid necessary to Palestinians living there. (Ynetnews)

27 December, 2015

The Israeli army shot and killed two Palestinians, 23- and 17-years-old, after they reportedly stabbed and lightly injured two Israeli soldiers in the village of Huwwara, south of Nablus. (WAFA)

Israeli police detained a Palestinian man suspected of stabbing and injuring an Israeli soldier near the central bus station in Jerusalem. (Ma’an News Agency)

Israeli forces detained at least 14 Palestinians across the West Bank and Jerusalem. (WAFA)

Near the “Romot” settlement, north-west of Jerusalem, Israeli settlers pelted a car driven by a 23-year-old Palestinian woman with stones, forced her out of the car and strangled her, before she managed to escape. She sustained bruises on the neck and received treatment at an Israeli medical centre. (WAFA)

The spokesperson for Hamas’ police in Gaza said that Egyptian border guards had shot and killed a mentally disabled Palestinian trying to cross the border between Egypt and Gaza on 24 December. Palestinian policemen on the Gaza side of the border shouted at the Egyptian soldiers not to shoot but were ignored, the spokesman added. (AP)

A committee representing the Israeli Cabinet approved the “Transparency Bill” sponsored by Justice Minister Shaked, which would impose new regulations on NGOs funded mainly by foreign governments. In practice, the legislation would affect left-wing organizations almost exclusively. (Haaretz)

28 December, 2015

A 48-year-old Palestinian man died from wounds he had sustained when he was shot in the head by Israeli forces during demonstrations in the Shujayyia neighbourhood in the central Gaza Strip on 25 December. (Ma’an News Agency)

The Israeli army detained at least 12 Palestinians during raids across the West Bank. (WAFA)

In the Old City of Hebron, an Israeli settler repeatedly struck a seven-year-old Palestinian girl on her face, smashing her teeth. Israeli soldiers repeatedly prevented paramedics’ access to the scene and beat up three other children. (WAFA)

The Jerusalem District Court said that a hardline Jewish activist who raised his hands in the air while visiting Al-Haram Al-Sharif had not violated the status quo at the site, reversing a lower court’s decision to ban the man from the visiting the compound for 15 days. (Gulf News, Haaretz)

Israeli Education Minister Neftali Bennett said at a meeting of the Knesset’s Land of Israel Caucus that Israel should annex the West Bank. “The time has come to say Israel is ours. … To go from strategic defence to a process of initiating the implementation of Israeli sovereignty over the territories under Israeli control in Judea and Samaria,” he said. (The Times of Israel)

The Israeli settlement watchdog organization Peace Now reported that Israel’s Ministry of Housing had been working on plans for 8,372 housing units in the “E1” area despite the cancellation of tenders for the units in 2013. (Ma’an News Agency)

29 December, 2015

Fifteen Palestinians were detained during predawn raids by Israeli forces in the West Bank. (Ma’an News Agency)

An Indonesian-funded hospital that has 110 beds was opened in the northern Gaza Strip. (MEMO)

Israeli authorities demolished a two-story Palestinian house under construction in the village of Sour Baher, south-east of Jerusalem, citing a lack of a construction permit. (WAFA)

Ghassan Daghlas, a Palestinian official who monitors settlement activity in the northern West Bank, said that Israeli authorities planned to confiscate 500 dunums (123 acres) of land in the villages of Jurish and Qusra, classifying the land as “state land”. (Ma’an News Agency)

The Israeli military delivered an order to take over around 370 square-metres of Palestinian-owned land in the town of Beit Ummar, north of Hebron, for “military purposes”. (WAFA)

Israeli authorities issued administrative detention orders against 53 Palestinians, according to the Commission of Prisoners’ Affairs. (WAFA)

Israeli forces opened fire on Palestinian farmers east of Khan Yunis in the southern Gaza Strip. No casualties were reported. (MEMO)

Head of the Prisoners and Ex-Prisoners Committee Issa Qaraqe said that a 16-year-old Palestinian, whose body was returned on 27 December, had been beaten to death after being shot when he tried to stab an Israeli soldier south of Bethlehem on 1 December. (IMEMC)

The Palestinian Ministry of Health said that Israeli forces had killed 142 Palestinians, including 27 minors and seven women, since early October 2015. The Ministry also said that 1,887 Palestinians had been injured with live ammunition and 3,104 with rubber-coated metal bullets. (WAFA)

The Palestinian Detainees and Ex-Detainees Committee said that Israel had detained 5,934 Palestinian children over the last five years, including 2,179 in 2015. (WAFA)

30 December, 2015

Israeli forces shot and injured 24 Palestinians with rubber-coated steel bullets during clashes in Abu Dis. The clashes broke out following a funeral of a Palestinian shot dead by Israeli soldiers on 3 December, whose body was held by Israeli authorities for 26 days. (Ma’an News Agency)

Israeli forces overnight detained 28 Palestinians, including nine minors, in the West Bank and Jerusalem. (WAFA)

A 41-year-old Israeli man died; he was stabbed and wounded by a Palestinian at the Tomb of the Patriarchs in Hebron on 7 December. Speaking after his death during a Cabinet meeting, Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu said, “I say to all those who would uproot us from the Tomb of the Patriarchs: … we have been there for almost 4,000 years and we will stay there forever.” (Haaretz,www.pmo.gov.il)

The Al-Aqsa Foundation for Endowment and Heritage said that extremist settlers had broken into the Al-Aqsa Mosque compound and performed rituals under the protection of Israeli forces.(Petra)

In the village of Deir Samet, south-west of Hebron, Israeli forces issued an order to demolish the family house of a Palestinian who shot and killed two Israeli settlers in the “Gush Etzion” settlement block on 19 November. (WAFA)

The Commission of Prisoners’ Affairs said that Palestinian detainees in the Etzion detention centre run by the Israel Prison Service were routinely exposed to maltreatment, including physical assaults during interrogations, and some were left without necessary medical treatment for injuries sustained during interrogations. (WAFA)

OCHA said that 170 Palestinians and 26 Israelis had been killed in 2015 in attacks and clashes in the Occupied Palestinian Territory and Israel. OCHA also recorded 15,377 Palestinian and 350 Israeli injuries during the year. (www.ochaopt.org)

31 December, 2015

Israeli troops killed a Palestinian who had rammed them with his car in the West Bank. (RTE)