Palestinians clashed with Israeli soldiers at Beit Umar on the outskirts of Hebron in the West Bank as they marked Nakba day with rallies and protests.
Nakba Day, commemorated annually on May 15, is traditionally marked by protests and marches across the Palestinian territories.
Rallies throughout the occupied Palestinian territories are held to mourn the displacement and dispossession of Palestinians.
Some 700,000 people fled or were driven from their homes when Israel was created after the 1948 war, but now as many as five million refugees and their descendants live in Lebanon, Syria, Jordan, the Gaza Strip and the West Bank, many of them in squalid camps.
In East Jerusalem’s Damascus and AlZahira Gates, two of the seven main entrances to the old city, Palestinians clashed with border policemen who fired stun grenades and tear gas at them. A police vehicle loaded with ‘skunk water’ was also spraying the protesters.
A number of Palestinians were arrested by border policemen and under cover units in Jerusalem. Medics could be seen treating injured protesters on the streets of East Jerusalem.
Also at Essawiyeh neighbourhood, home of the hunger striker, Samer AlEssawi, masked Palestinians threw stones at troops who fired tear gas, stun grenades and rubber coated bullets at the protesters.
At Beit Umar on the outskirts of Hebron, Palestinian youths closed a road that was being used by Israeli troops who arrived on site and clashed with the youths. Clashes erupted as Palestinians threw stones and Israeli border police fired tear gas and rubber coated bullets.
Refugees cling to a “right of return” and their fate is one of the thorniest issues in efforts to create a Palestinian state in Gaza and the West Bank.