9 Palestinians shot dead at fence
Israeli fire wounds hundreds more protesters at Gaza border
KHUZAA, Gaza Strip — Thousands of Palestinians protested Friday along Gaza’s sealed border with Israel, engulfing the area in black smoke from burning tires to try to block the view of Israeli snipers and cheering a Hamas strongman who pledged that the border fence will eventually fall.
Israeli troops opened fire from across the border, killing nine Palestinians and wounding 491 others — 33 of them seriously — in the second mass border protest in a week, Gaza health officials said. Hundreds more suffered other injuries, including tear gas inhalation, the officials said.
The deaths brought to 31 the number of Palestinians killed by Israeli fire since last week.
The latest casualties were bound to draw new criticism from rights groups that have branded Israel’s open-fire orders on the border as unlawful, after Israel’s defense minister warned that those approaching the fence were risking their lives.
The U.N. human-rights office said Friday that it has indications that Israeli forces used “excessive force” against protesters last week, when 15 Palestinians were killed or later died of wounds suffered near the border.
An Israeli military spokesman defended the rules of engagement.
“If they are actively attacking the fence, if they are throwing a molotov cocktail that is within striking distance of Israeli troops or similar activities, then those persons, those rioters, become — may become — a target,” said Lt. Col. Jonathan Conricus.
Friday’s crowds suggested that Hamas, the Islamic militant group that has ruled Gaza since a 2007 takeover, might be able to keep the momentum going in the next few weeks.
Hamas has called for a series of protests until May 15, the anniversary of Israel’s founding when Palestinians commemorate their mass uprooting during the 1948 war over Israel’s creation.
Israel has alleged that Hamas is using the marches as a cover for attacking the border fence, and it has vowed to prevent a breach at all costs.
The military said that on Friday, protesters hurled several explosive devices and firebombs, using the thick plumes of smoke from burning tires as a cover, and that several attempts to cross the fence were thwarted.
Gaza’s shadowy Hamas strongman, Yehiyeh Sinwar, told a cheering crowd in one of the protest camps Friday that a border breach is coming.
The world should “wait for our great move, when we penetrate the borders and pray at Al-Aqsa,” Sinwar said, referring to the Muslim shrine in Jerusalem.
The protests are perhaps Hamas’ last chance to break a border blockade enforced by Israel and Egypt since 2007, without having to succumb to demands that it disarm. The blockade has made it increasingly difficult for Hamas to govern.
It has also devastated Gaza’s economy, made it virtually impossible for people to enter and exit the territory, and left residents with just a few hours of electricity a day.
Israel argues that Hamas could have ended the suffering of Gaza’s 2 million people by disarming and renouncing violence.
Friday’s marches began before Muslim noon prayers when thousands of Palestinians streamed to five tent encampments that organizers had set up several hundred yards from the border fence.
In one camp near the border community of Khuzaa, smaller groups of activists moved closer to the fence after the prayers.
Demonstrators torched large piles of tires, engulfing the area in black smoke meant to shield them from Israeli snipers; the faces of some of the activists were covered in black soot.
Israeli troops on the other side of the fence responded with live fire, tear gas, rubber-coated steel pellets and water cannons.
The death toll since last week includes the seven people killed Friday, the 15 killed exactly a week earlier — both times during protests at the border — and one killed during a protest Tuesday.
The six other deaths include three Palestinian gunmen killed in what Israel said were attempts to attack the border fence, and three men who were struck by Israeli tank fire.
For a second week in a row, the United States, Israel’s closest ally, blocked a U.N. Security Council statement supporting the right of Palestinians to demonstrate peacefully and endorsing Secretary-General Antonio Guterres’ call for an independent investigation into the deadly protests in Gaza.
A White House envoy urged Palestinians to stay away from the fence. Jason Greenblatt said the U.S. condemns “leaders and protesters who call for violence or who send protesters — including children — to the fence, knowing that they may be injured or killed.”