Eyewitness: ‘Settlers carried out new Nakba’ in Huwara

Illegal Israeli settlers yesterday carried out a “new Nakba” against Palestinians in the neighbourhood of Huwara, an eyewitness has said.

Abdul Kareem, a primary school teacher, said: “There is no need to imagine how the Zionist gang carried out the Nakba in 1948. You just need to watch what Israeli Jewish settlers did in Huwara. They carried out a new Nakba,” referencing how Zionist gangs forced Palestinians out of their homes to make way for the creation of the state of Israel over 70 years ago.

During the settler attacks on Huwara, Burin, Za’tara and Asira Al-Qabliyah, Palestinian families were seen fleeing their homes either before or after they were attacked by the settler mobs.

Meanwhile, former head of the Hawara Municipality, Mansour Addamidi, said: “They raided the Palestinian homes outside and inside the neighbourhood. We were totally helplessness.”

He told Haaretz: “The Israeli army and the settlers are on the same side and no one is stopping them. We no longer recognise who’s a soldier and who’s a settler, as many of the settlers are in military uniform and carrying weapons.”

A resident of Hawara told Haaretz that “the settlers behaved without any deterrence and moved freely for several hours,” stressing that some of them carried weapons and threw Molotov cocktails and stones at Palestinian houses.

He added: “They entered the town and just went everywhere. They set fire to houses and damaged many cars… We don’t even know the extent of the damage. We only heard screams from the houses, many families rushed out of their homes out of fear of being burned alive.”

Another eyewitness said “they were equipped with cutting tools.”

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