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Israeli Hospital Raid in West Bank Angers Palestinians
Israeli Hospital Raid in West Bank Angers Palestinians
(about 2 hours later)
RAMALLAH, West Bank — Palestinians were outraged after footage emerged Thursday showing Israeli forces disguised in traditional Arab outfits, including one impersonating a pregnant woman and others appearing to have fake beards, bursting into a West Bank hospital overnight and killing a Palestinian man in a raid caught on video.
JERUSALEM — About two dozen men wearing bulky jackets, woolen caps, hoodies and checkered kaffiyehs barged into a hospital in the West Bank city of Hebron before dawn on Thursday, pushing what appeared to be a very pregnant woman in a wheelchair.
The raid late Wednesday took place in Hebron, a volatile city in the southern West Bank that has been a frequent flash point of violence during weeks of Israeli-Palestinian unrest.
But they were not headed to the delivery ward.
Jihad Shawar, director of Al-Ahli hospital, said more than 20 undercover Israeli soldiers entered the hospital overnight. They went to the surgical unit, where they pulled out their guns and stormed a room where Azzam Shalaldeh was being treated for gunshot wounds, he said.
The people caught on the hospital surveillance cameras were, in fact, undercover Israeli security officers. About 10 minutes later, the Israelis were on their way out, leaving behind a Palestinian man whom they had fatally shot in the raid and wheeling out his cousin, a wounded patient whom they had come to arrest, according to hospital officials.
The Israelis handcuffed Mr. Shalaldeh and one of his brothers, who was in the room, then shot and killed a cousin, Abdallah, 27, as he emerged from a bathroom, Mr. Shawar said.
The raid at Al Ahli Hospital in Hebron was the latest in a string of Israeli raids on Palestinian hospitals during the recent upsurge of violence, and proof, according to Israeli officials, that there will be no safe haven for Palestinian suspects. Hospital officials were livid.
“This is an outright crime,” Mr. Shawar said. “No one should violate hospitals, but Israel did.”
“Hospitals are supposed to be the safest places on earth,” Jihad Shawar, the hospital director, told the official Voice of Palestine Radio. He said the relatives of the two cousins were “very angry.”
Osama Najjar, the spokesman for the Palestinian Health Ministry, called the incident an “assassination.”
“They want to know how their sons could be killed and arrested while in our hospital,” Mr. Shawar said. “But what can our security men do when guns are pointed in their faces?”
The Israeli military said troops had shot a man at the hospital while they were there to arrest a suspect in a stabbing attack. It claimed the man had tried to attack the troops, but gave no further details and would not say whether undercover troops had participated.
The Israeli military said in a statement that officers had arrested Azzam Azat Shaaban Shalalda, 20, a resident of the village of Sair, near Hebron.
The hospital, however, provided security camera video to The Associated Press showing about a dozen men walking down a hospital corridor, pushing someone covered in a blanket in a wheelchair. The person in the wheelchair flings the blanket off, stands up and, with the other men, draws a gun and continues walking.
Mr. Shalalda, they said, stabbed an Israeli civilian in the chest in the West Bank last month, severely wounding him. As he tried to flee, Mr. Shalalda was shot and wounded by his victim, but he managed to reach the Ahli Hospital, where he was taken in for treatment. He was in the surgery ward on the third floor when the raid was executed.
The men are joined by what appear to be two women, one wearing a niqab, a garment covering the face and body, and the other appears to be pregnant, and has her hand on her lower back as she walks with the group of men.
Referring to Mr. Shalalda’s cousin, Abdallah Shalalda, 27, the military said that during the hospital raid, “a suspect attacked the force, which responded to the assault and fired at the attacker.”
Minutes later, the men, some wearing traditional Palestinian scarves and others with what appear to be fake beards and mustaches, push a man in a wheelchair — apparently the arrested suspect, Azzam Shalaldeh — back down the hall, as perplexed nurses look on.
The military described Mr. Shalalda’s family as “known Hamas operatives,” referring to the Islamic militant group.
Later, the military said Mr. Shalaldeh had seriously wounded an Israeli man when he stabbed him in the chest in the West Bank last month. “During his escape, the assailant was shot and injured by his victim,” the military said. It said Mr. Shalaldeh is about 20 years old and comes from a family of “known Hamas operatives.”
Bassem Natshe, the hospital’s public relations director, said by telephone that he did not know whether Abdallah Shalalda had assaulted the Israeli forces before he was shot. But he said there had been at least 10 armed Israelis in the room who should have been able to subdue and arrest him.
The incident is not the first time Israel’s undercover forces have been caught on camera since a current wave of Israeli-Palestinian violence began two months ago. Last month, a group of men posing as Palestinian protesters and mingling with rock-throwers in the West Bank were filmed suddenly drawing their weapons and arresting a protester.
“They had their fingers on the trigger,” Mr. Natshe said of the Israelis. “They terrorized the hospital, shooting in the department. We are talking about a hospital here, not a nightclub.”
The Israeli army and police both maintain undercover units that are used primarily in arrest raids. The operations are meant to take place quickly, and Israeli troops are typically stationed nearby to provide backup. The units have spawned a prime time drama in Israel called “Fouda,” which tells the story of fictional undercover agents.
According to hospital officials’ accounts, the first Israelis arrived about 2:40 a.m. Four people came in saying they had a pregnant woman in labor and were directed to the obstetric department on the second floor. A minute later, they said, about 25 security officers disguised in civilian clothes rushed in and went straight to the third floor, where Azzam Shalalda was recovering in the surgery ward. The “pregnant woman” was presumably a male officer in disguise.
Undercover forces also entered a hospital in the West Bank city of Nablus last month to arrest a Palestinian who was wounded after he and others were suspected of shooting to death two Jewish settlers. The police have entered a hospital in Jerusalem to extract files about patients involved in rock throwing.
Mr. Shalalda’s brother was asleep in the bed next to him, and he was immediately handcuffed to the bedframe. Abdallah, their cousin, came out of the bathroom and was shot five times in the head and chest. The hospital staff tried unsuccessfully to resuscitate him. There is no indication that he was armed.
The raid took place as a nearly two month outburst of Israeli-Palestinian violence showed no signs of abating. Twelve Israelis have been killed in a spate of attacks by Palestinians, while 78 Palestinians have been killed, 50 of them said by Israel to be attackers, and the remainder killed in clashes with Israeli forces.
Then the forces whisked away Azzam Shalalda. Hospital officials said that he had arrived in critical condition, having been shot several times in the neck and stomach, and that he had undergone several operations. Abdallah Shalalda and Azzam’s brother were not patients, but had been staying overnight with Azzam in the hospital room, officials said, possibly to protect him.
The violence erupted in Jerusalem over tensions surrounding a holy site sacred to both Jews and Muslims and quickly spread throughout Israel, the West Bank and the Gaza Strip.
Hebron, the largest West Bank city, has been a particular flash point. Several hundred Jewish settlers live in fortified enclaves in the city, amid tens of thousands of Palestinians.
