On May 21, Amr Musara went out to report Israel’s attack on the Jenin refugee camp in the Israeli-occupied West Bank.
The 25-year-old cameraman worked with three Palestinian colleagues – all visibly identified as journalists.
The Israeli army fired at them.
Musara was shot in the back as his colleagues fell to the ground for cover. When the soldiers stopped shooting, Musara was rushed to the nearest hospital.
“I thought I was going to die,” Musara told Al Jazeera by phone from his home, where he is recovering from his injuries.
Musara said Israel routinely shoots at journalists across the West Bank.
“They attacked us the same way they attacked Shireen,” Musara said.
Israeli forces shot and killed Al Jazeera correspondent Shireen Abu Akleh while she was reporting on an attack in Jenin in May 2022. A United Nations investigative body concluded that the killing was deliberate.
“There was no danger [for the Israeli soldiers] around us. There were no resistance fighters.
“They just shot at us.”
Patterns of violence
Since launching the war against Gaza on October 7, Israel has killed 516 Palestinians in the West Bank, according to the Palestinian Ministry of Health.
According to an investigation carried out by the Palestinian human rights group Al-Haq and the London-based research group Forensic Architecture, Israel typically sends undercover soldiers into West Bank cities to monitor and assess the area before the army arrives. or special forces.
Last week, several disguised Israeli soldiers, pretending to be Palestinians, entered Jenin and took up positions between houses to inspect the camp.
The next morning, the army invaded the Jenin refugee camp with tanks, jeeps and bulldozers. Bulldozers were sent to destroy shops, roads and houses, said journalist and camp resident Atef Abdul Rub.
“They started shooting at a school, (…) at students and teachers,” Abdul Rub told Al Jazeera.
Ten civilians were killed during Israel’s latest incursion into the camp, including a teenager and a doctor.
Israel has repeatedly invaded the Jenin refugee camp for years, apparently to eradicate an umbrella organization of armed groups known as the Jenin Brigades, which opposes Israel’s occupation.
Israeli forces typically destroy entire neighborhoods, claiming they are harboring fighters. Civilians are punished in the process – killed, imprisoned or made homeless, residents and activists told Al Jazeera.
“What I saw in the Jenin camp is like Gaza on a smaller scale,” said Zaid Shuabi, a Palestinian human rights organizer in the West Bank.
“You don’t see roads because they are destroyed. The infrastructure,… the sewage and electricity system and the water pipes and telecommunications networks are damaged.”
Since January 2023, 88 people have been killed in the Jenin camp and 104 structures have been destroyed, according to the UN.
Resistance
Since 2021, a new group of Palestinian armed groups has emerged across the West Bank. In the Jenin countryside, the Jenin Brigades clashed with Israeli troops during dozens of attacks.
The group is loosely composed of fighters linked to Hamas, Palestinian Islamic Jihad (PIJ) and Fatah, according to Tahani Mustafa, an Israel-Palestine expert at the International Crisis Group (ICG), a think tank in Belgium.
“These groups [in Jenin] began as a community defense mechanism, so the more violent Israel’s attacks became and the more systemic [they got]bigger these groups grew,” Mustafa told Al Jazeera.
She said young people joining these groups are reacting to Israel’s deepening occupation and are disillusioned with the Palestinian Authority (PA), which administers the occupied West Bank and is seen as an Israeli aid by many Palestinians.
The PA became involved in security cooperation with Israel as part of the 1993 Oslo Accords, from which it was born.
Some senior Fatah officials in the PA support and finance some Fatah factions in the Jenin Brigades to increase their influence in any future power struggle to control the PA, Mustafa added.
The ICG has long warned of a violent succession struggle in the PA when President Mohamad Abbas, 88, steps aside or dies.
Mustafa said other members of the Jenin Brigades are also part of the PA security forces, which gives them a monthly salary.
“Originally, when the [PA] security forces were designed by the Americans and Israelis, the idea was to use security forces as a way… to disarm radicals [fighters] and give them jobs in exchange for laying down their weapons,” she said.
“Now, obviously, in the context of the occupation, this is not going to work. Many of these guys have jobs – a monthly salary – but they are still involved in the resistance.”
‘Die with pride’
Some young people join armed groups to receive a salary. PIJ pays its members between $1,000 and $3,000 a month, Mustafa said.
Financial incentives attracted young people from outside the field.
“What we have seen since last July is that many of these guys come from other locations, (…) which creates a controversial relationship because it is one thing if you are [a civilian] Dying for [the actions] your brother or son.
“Another thing is when you don’t know who these guys are,” she told Al Jazeera.
Shuabi said Israel punishes civilians in the camp in the hope that they will turn against resistance fighters. He explained that, in particular, Israel intentionally destroys neighborhoods, roads and homes as part of a broader strategy to gradually displace Palestinians from the Jenin camp.
In July, a substantial Israeli operation against the camp led to the displacement of 3,000 people, according to the UN.
Those who remained in the camp faced a severe lack of services after Israel deliberately destroyed water pumps and electrical grids.
Shuabi believes Israel’s strategy is backfiring.
More young Palestinians are joining resistance groups to avenge their loved ones or to defend their families and communities from Israeli attacks, he said.
“The families of the martyrs – even if they feel pain – understand why their brothers [or sons] or other family members are involved in the resistance,” he told Al Jazeera.
“Even if they are not members of the resistance, they are being targeted. They imagine that they could very well be proud to be members of the resistance.”
This story originally appeared on Aljazeera.com read the full story
