Nearly 150 Palestinians injured amid Israel's controversial Flag March
At least 145 Palestinians have been wounded as Israeli forces and illegal settlers in the occupied West Bank as clashes erupted on the annual Flag March staged on Sunday.
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The Palestinian Red Crescent announced the figure on Sunday, saying at least 18 of those wounded had been targeted by live Israeli fire.
The entire West Bank witnesses an upsurge in unrest every year prompted by the so-called “March of the Flags.”
The yearly event features extremist settlers marching through the heart of the main Palestinian thoroughfare in East al-Quds’ Old City, and waving Israeli flags and chanting provocative slogans.
It commemorates the Israeli regime’s 1967 occupation of East al-Quds, which Palestinians want as the capital of their future state. The parade is associated with violence against Palestinians and the "display of incitement, Jewish dominance, and racism," according to Israeli NGO Ir Amim.
This year’s march was reportedly partaken by around 25,000 settlers, who were being accompanied and protected by Israeli forces.
The settlers were heard chanting Islamophobic and anti-Palestinian slogans such as "Death to Arabs" and "Shereen is dead," referring to veteran Palestinian journalist Shereen Abu Akleh, who was assassinated by the Israeli military earlier this month.
The Israeli settlers forced their way into the al-Aqsa Mosque compound, performing religious rituals there. They were accompanied this year by Israeli far-right politician Ben-Gvir.
The compound, known to Jews as the Temple Mount and located in al-Quds’ Old City, is a flash point. Under a 1967 deal between the Israeli regime and Jordan, the compound’s custodian, non-Muslim worship is prohibited at the site.
Jordan condemned Ben-Gvir’s visit to the compound, and warned that the “provocative and escalating march” could make things deteriorate further, Qatar’s Al Jazeera television network reported.
Condemning the violence, Nabil Abu Rdeneh, spokesman for the Palestinian Authority’s President Mahmoud Abbas, berated the Israeli regime for “playing with fire irresponsibly and recklessly.”
The Palestinian Authority’s Prime Minister Mohammed Shtayyeh also condemned the march, and “attacks on Palestinian citizens” in al-Quds, Wafa quoted him as saying.
