Israeli forces used tear gas and physical force to corral Palestinian women attempting to push through a checkpoint at the Qalandiya crossing into Jerusalem from the West Bank, Al-Jazeera English reports.
This scuffle comes on the second day of a 48-hour security lock down of the West Bank. This is the first time in more than a year that the West Bank has been closed for reasons other than a Jewish holiday. The women gathered at the crossing chanted, "Jerusalem is Arab, our eternal capital." Jerusalem stood as a multi-religious city of Christian, Muslim, and Jewish indigenous to the Middle East for hundreds of years before Israel was founded in 1948.
The clash resulted in four protesters being detained, but there were no injuries. AJE's Nour Odeh said from Ramallah of the lock down: "What this closure does is raise tensions and so we've seen clashes at the Qalandiya checkpoint."
Israel reportedly imposed a 48-hour closure for concern of protests around al-Aqsa Mosque in East Jerusalem after Friday Prayers. As such, tensions ran high in Jerusalem Friday when men under the age of 50 were not allowed into al-Aqsa compound. Some Palestinians threw rocks at IDF troops in retribution, and hundreds of men prayed outside the gates of Jerusalem's Old City.
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13 Mar 2010 7:39 AM
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