Israeli police arrest Palestinian journalist attacked by settler mob

Israeli police have arrested Palestinian photojournalist Saif Kwasmi after he was attacked and injured by a mob of Israeli settlers on Wednesday, a series of events symbolic of daily life for Palestinians under apartheid.

On Wednesday, Kwasmi was putting on his press vest and covering the annual Jerusalem Day march, in which Israeli settlers flood the streets of the city’s Palestinian neighborhoods, when a group of settlers attacked him.

Accordingly HaaretzKwasmi was attacked amid a riot by about a hundred Israeli boys, ten of whom surrounded him. They beat him, threw things at him and tried to take his cell phone. His head was “slightly injured,” the publication reported, but did not require treatment.

The Israeli police officers present at the scene only intervened when they noticed that Israeli journalist Nir Hasson was also being attacked, Kwasmi told the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ). Palestinian journalist Diala Jweihan was also the target of the attack, he said.

In fact, an Israeli police officer took part in the beating, Kwasmi said before arresting him – whereupon the police accused him of inciting the violence, which he denies. Haaretz reported that none of the members of the settler mob were arrested.

“An Israeli policeman started beating me and took me to a side street to arrest me. I told him I was a journalist and showed him my ID. They escorted the journalists out of the Old City to a place for journalists,” Kwasmi said.

Later that day, police approached Kwasmi and interrogated him for an hour and a half, telling him he did not have permission from Israeli authorities to work as a journalist and confiscating his equipment. This was done based on a tip-off from known Israeli extremist Yedydya Epstein, who encouraged police to arrest him and accused him of being affiliated with the Hamas group, a CPJ witness and Kwasmi said.

Haaretz Israeli reporter Nir Hasson said that the settlers deliberately attacked journalists during the march in order to prevent the press from covering the event – a goal that was also pursued by the Israeli police, who allowed the attack to take place.

“At one point, the settlers attacked Saif and two other journalists in front of the Israeli border police, who initially just stood there and did nothing, so I had to intervene to stop the attack. I was pushed to the ground and beaten by the settlers. I did not suffer any serious injuries,” Hasson said. “(The police) gathered all the journalists in one place away from the settlers instead of stopping the attackers. They prevented the journalists from reporting on what was happening to the residents.”

U.S. State Department spokesman Matthew Miller declined to condemn the attack when asked about it at a press conference later that day.

Many Palestinians had closed their businesses to protect themselves from the settler violence that permeates Jerusalem Day. Every year, Israeli ultranationalists attack Palestinian journalists and community members during the march and chant “Death to Arabs” – but Hasson wrote that this year’s march was “the most violent and ugly” he had seen in 16 years, given Israel’s genocide in Gaza.

Photos of Kwasmi surrounded by a mob circulated on social media, sparking outrage, with commentators pointing out that his arrest was a sign of how Israel’s apartheid system criminalizes and subjects all Palestinians to violence, only to then blame them for their own suffering and oppress them even further.

“This is what apartheid looks like. This is what,” wrote Zeteo Editor-in-Chief Mehdi Hasan.

This is the second time in a matter of months that Israeli forces have arrested Kwasmi while on the job. In April, Kwasmi was detained, beaten and arrested while reporting at Al-Aqsa Mosque when hundreds of Israeli settlers stormed the important holy site during Passover. Police questioned Kwasmi again, accused him of incitement, and then banned him from entering Al-Aqsa for a week.