Israeli soldiers raid children’s center in Jenin refugee camp and destroy books, toys, plumbing – Mondoweiss

This comment appeared today in Al Jazeera. We publish it with permission, but also to add many photos of the shocking raid on the Al-Tafawk Children’s Center in Jenin six weeks ago that were made available by the center.

For the past three years the Brighton Trust, of which I am a charity, has worked with National Education Union activists in the UK to raise funds for the Al-Tafawk Children’s Center at Jenin Refugee Camp in the occupied West Bank.

Al Tafawk Children’s Center in Jenin, Occupied Palestinian Territories.

The center, run by local volunteers, is the only one of its kind in the camp that houses around 14,000 Palestinian refugees who were made homeless by the founding of Israel in 1948. It offers around 120 children between the ages of three and 16 games, education and food, as well as a warm welcome.

It is the only source of amusement they can turn to in the desolate surroundings of the camp that lost dozens of residents and more than 400 homes in a brutal bulldozing campaign in 2002 during the Second Intifada in an Israeli army massacre Palestinian civilians. Since then, the camp has been subject to regular military attacks.

The Al-Tafawk Children’s Center, founded in 2010, largely escaped the attention of the Israeli military – until recently. The first signs that the Israeli army had its eye on the center came in January when its manager was jailed for 24 hours and was severely traumatized.

After the protests in occupied Jerusalem over the Israeli attacks on believers in the Al-Aqsa mosque and the murderous bombing of the Gaza Strip, the Israeli forces increased their reign of terror in historical Palestine. It also extended to the occupied West Bank, where more than 25 Palestinians were killed by the end of May. In Jenin, as in other Palestinian cities, there were demonstrations against Israeli violence.

Israeli soldiers patrol the Jenin refugee camp in the occupied West Bank during the Gaza conflict in May 2021. Image courtesy of the Al-Tafawk Center.

Israeli soldiers patrol the Jenin refugee camp during the Gaza conflict in May 2021. Image courtesy of the Al-Tafawk Center.

On the night of May 15, the Israeli military raided the Jenin Al-Tafawk Children’s Center and completely destroyed it. Their pretext was that they were looking for weapons, but of course they couldn’t find any.

A witness said:

“They raided the center last night. At first they started shooting from outside the center. Then they blew up the front door and entered the center. They threw everything around. Damaging anything of value. “

In addition to damaging furniture and equipment, the soldiers deliberately destroyed the center’s infrastructure, making the building unsafe and unusable. They destroyed the water pipes and taps, cut off the water supply, destroyed the electric safe, cut off the electricity, damaged the stairs and doors, and broke off the handles. In total, the damage runs into thousands of dollars.

Israeli soldiers destroyed a door of the Al Tafawk Children’s Center in Jenin on May 15, 2021 during the Gaza conflict.

Israeli soldiers damaged a staircase at the Al Tafawk Children’s Center in Jenin on May 15, 2021 during the Gaza conflict.

Israeli soldiers destroyed a plumbing installation at the Al Tafawk Children’s Center in Jenin on May 15, 2021 during the Gaza conflict.

Israeli soldiers shot bullets into the wall of the Al Tafawk Children’s Center in Jenin during a raid on May 15, 2021 during the Gaza conflict. Image courtesy of the Al Tafawk Center.

Child shows broken legged toys by Israeli soldiers during a raid on Al Tafawk Children’s Center in Jenin on May 15, 2021 during the Gaza conflict. Image courtesy of the Al Tafawk Center.

Palestinians attempt to repair damage to electrical boxes and feed destroyed by Israeli soldiers at the Al Tafawk Children’s Center in Jenin during a raid on May 15, 2021 during the Gaza conflict. Image courtesy of the Al Tafawk Center.

You haven’t even spared children’s books. According to another witness, a soldier who did so said loudly that Palestinian children did not need to read books as they would grow up to be murderers and be killed.

This attitude of total racist contempt for Palestinian children – the conviction that they don’t need any education anyway, because they will soon die anyway – reminds me, as a Jew, of the Nazis’ attitude towards Jewish children.

It is clear that the Al-Tafawk Children’s Center – or any other Palestinian civil society organization – poses a threat to the Israeli occupation regime. This is because the center and similar initiatives are trying to give the Palestinians just a glimpse of the normalcy of their lives.

But an displaced and traumatized population destined for full ethnic cleansing must not be allowed to take root and experience normalcy. It must be tense, regularly expropriated and repressed at all times in order for it to cease to lay claim to its own land.

Because of this, Israel regularly bulldozes or bombs Palestinian homes; destroys Palestinian infrastructure, be it water treatment plants in Gaza or solar panels in the occupied West Bank; and harassed and attacked Palestinian Muslim and Christian believers in Jerusalem.

The destruction of the Al-Tafawk Children’s Center – as well as many other civilian buildings – refutes Israel’s claim that it is a self-defense practice. It’s a lie that fewer and fewer people in the West are willing to buy when the evidence of Israel’s genocidal intent is so clear.

When we started raising funds to repair the center and reopen it to refugee children, I decided to write to Tzipi Hotovely, the far-right Israeli ambassador in London, demanding that Israel be responsible for the damage and compensation for the children come up who are traumatized by what happened. I did not get an answer.

If you, dear reader, would like to contribute, you can do so here. You can also help by spreading the word and putting pressure on the politicians in your country so that they no longer ignore the Israeli crimes against the Palestinians and take action. It is high time Israel was held responsible for its countless violations of international law, including the murder, imprisonment and dispossession of Palestinian children and attacks on civilian homes and infrastructure.

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