The 'Tunnel People' of Gaza

DesertPeace - Full article

Hundreds of tunnels under the border between the Gaza Strip and Egypt are keeping many of the Palestinian territory’s 1.5 million impoverished residents supplied with food and fuel.

Sources say there are more than 6,000 Palestinians employed in the clandestine industry, which merchants say is heavily controlled by the Hamas authorities.

Strict rules are imposed on what can be brought in - weapons, drugs and people-trafficking are prohibited - and tunnel operators are taxed.

The tunnels were previously used to smuggle weapons to fight the Israeli occupation, but the blockade that was enforced after Hamas seized control of the Gaza Strip in 2007 has made the smuggling of basic supplies a necessity.

Sometimes Your Friends End Up Duct-taped and Suicided

Progressive Independent

Suicide by duct-tape? But we're not utter fools. I just hope the shockwaves are channeled into a more constructive fight instead of fear that shuts people up even more. You're so right about "simply arrogant with the idea that there is little we can do". I'm determined to fight that even more now. Riad has a daughter who lives not too far away from me. I can't imagine what she's going through. I weep for his daughter and his family.

15 Yr Old Palestinian Boy Found Mutilated in Israeli Settlement

uruknet

At 3pm on Wednesday, 16th April, the mutilated body of 15 year old Hammad Nidar Khadatbh was found in lands of the illegal Israeli settlement of Al-Hamra by his father, who was out searching for his missing son.

Hammad had left the house at 9am on Tuesday, 15th April to work on the family’s land, located near the stolen agricultural lands of the settlement. As the second eldest son, he was picking cucumbers for the family rather than going to school, to help with the income of his struggling family. At evening he failed to return home, and so his father and other family members immediately went searching for him. They found nothing. They set out again the next day, Wednesday, and found his body in a place they had searched the day before - clearly dumped overnight.