RAMALLAH, Monday, June 01, 2020 (WAFA) – The funeral of the unarmed autistic Palestinian man who was fatally shot by Israeli police in Jerusalem’s Old City on Saturday dominated the front page headlines in today’s issue of the three Palestinian Arabic dailies.
The dailies reported that massive crowds gathered to attend the funeral of Iyad Hallak in Jerusalem.
Al-Quds and al-Ayyam added that the autopsy results refutes the Israeli police version of events, and shows that Hallak was hit with two bullets in the abdomen and the ribs.
Al-Quds added in this regard that UN Special Coordinator for the Middle East Peace Process Nickolay Mladenov condemned Hallak’s killing as “a tragedy that should and could have been avoided.”
Mladenov was also reported in the same daily warning that Israel’s annexation move threatens to fuel the Palestinian-Israeli conflict.
The Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi was reported in al-Quds and al-Hayat al-Jadida reiterating his country’s rejection of Israel’s illegal plan to annex parts of the West Bank.
Moreover, al-Quds and al-Ayyam said that Israeli police clamped down on two peaceful Palestinian sit-in marking the 19th anniversary of the death of Faisal Husseini, a Palestinian civic leader from Jerusalem, and protesting the killing of Hallak.
The dailies added that police rounded up 16 Palestinians, including the Palestinian Authority’s East Jerusalem Governor Adnan Gheith.
The dailies reported Palestinian Health Minister Mai Alkaila announcing that another Palestinian tested positive for coronavirus in the northern West Bank district of Qalqilya.
She was also reported in al-Ayyam saying that four COVID-19 patients recovered from the pandemic in Beit Aula town, northwest of Hebron city.
According to the dailies, Fatah Central Committee convened to discuss the means to establish mechanisms to follow-up on the implementation of the leadership’s decision to no longer be bound by all agreements with Israel and the US.
The latest spate of home demolition and demolition orders also dominated the front page headlines.
Al-Quds and al-Hayat al-Jadida said that Israeli occupation authorities delivered military orders to evict and demolish some 200 Palestinian structures in the East Jerusalem neighborhood of Wad al-Joz.
The dailies added that the occupation authorities also delivered military orders to demolish five residential structures and a municipal building in Biryan village, located near Yatta town, south of Hebron.
Al-Quds printed a feature story spotlighting the escalation of Israeli settlers’ attacks against Palestinians in the markets of Hebron’s old town.
It said that Sami Janazreh, a Palestinian prisoner currently held in Israeli solitary confinement, has been on a hunger strike for 21 days protesting his administrative detention.
Al-Quds and al-Ayyam highlighted a World Bank’s report warning that the financial situation in the occupied Palestinian territories was expected to become more difficult following the coronavirus crisis.
Al-Ayyam reported the global body saying that overall, the Palestinian economy is set to shrink between 7.6 percent and 11 percent.
Al-Ayyam and al-Hayat al-Jadida said that thousands of Palestinian worshipers performed the dawn prayer at Al-Aqsa Mosque compound in Jerusalem as it was reopened after 70 days of closure as part of the precautionary measures to battle the coronavirus outbreak.
Al-Ayyam said that 223 Israeli settlers also forced their way into the flashpoint mosque compound.
Al-Hayat al-Jadida reported Palestinian local authorities affirming their partnership with the Palestinian leadership in facing the Israeli occupation authorities’ annexation plans.
K.F./M.K.
