Israeli invasion into southeastern Gaza kills 4, injures 8, destroys a home and ravages farmland

On 26 March, fighting erupted between Palestinian resistance and invading Israeli soldiers when IOF jeeps, tanks, and bulldozers invaded, supported by F-16s, Apache helicopters and unmanned drones from above.

Two Israeli soldiers were reported killed and 2 more injured. Medics with the Red Crescent report that three Palestinian resistance fighters were killed, along with 1 civilian, Haitam Arafat, 22 years old, shot on his land.

Eight more Palestinians were injured, according to Muawiyya Hassaniin, director of emergency services in Gaza. The injured include Osama Abu Dagga, a child of 6 years, shot in the head while in his home 2 km from the border. He is in critical condition.

While the invasion was underway, locals reported several F-16 Israeli warplanes, Apache helicopters, drones, roughly 20 tanks and 6 bulldozers.

During the Israeli invasion, Palestinian ambulances were unable to reach the injured, delayed and unable to attain coordination from Israeli authorities to retrieve the injured, although international law obligates Israel to accord this permission.

Long after the fighting between the resistance and invading Israeli soldiers, 3 Israeli bulldozers destroyed the home of Hashem Abu Daggma and surrounding farmland, all well over 500 metres from the border.
Jaber Abu Rjila, a resident of Faraheen in the greater Abassan area, watched the Israeli invasion from a rooftop in the village a kilometre away.

“There were up to 20 tanks at the height of the invasions. The F-16, Apaches, drones and tanks were firing rockets, missiles and machine gun fire. I really felt that they might come into Faraheen again.”

Rjila’s house and chicken farm, 500 metres from the border, was ravaged in May 2008, his chicken barn destroyed, all but a percentage of the birds, farm equipment, and crops.

Rjila and other farmers in the border regions are constantly subject to Israeli soldier gunfire from border jeeps and towers.

“Many people are worried that Israel might come back and do something worse,” said Rjila. Today, the day after the invasion, Israeli bulldozers were visible waiting along the border.
http://ingaza.wordpress.com/

IOF troops bulldoze land in Gaza, detain Jerusalemites for planting olives

Israeli occupation forces (IOF) advanced east of Shujaia suburb in Gaza city afternoon Tuesday and bulldozed Palestinian plantations, local sources said.
They told the PIC reporter that the IOF troops escorted three military bulldozers, noting that the IOF soldiers fired three projectiles at cultivated lands east of Shujaia inflicting material damage.
Meanwhile, IOF soldiers detained three Jerusalemite farmers on Tuesday to the northwest of occupied Jerusalem while planting olive trees in their lands.
Local sources said that the soldiers arrested the farmers to terrorize their colleagues into refraining from tending to their lands in the same area.
The Israeli occupation authority had seized control of vast areas of the Beit Egza village in the area to build three settlements.
The village is only five kilometers away from the holy city and is inhabited by 2,000 citizens. It is surrounded by the racist, separation wall and no one is allowed to enter it except its inhabitants with IOF road barriers permanently set on its entrances.
http://farmingunderfire.blogspot.com/