PHOTOS | Palestinians demonstrate against sewage settlers spill onto their land
March 29, 2013 by occupiedpalestine
+972 Magazine | by Haggai Matar | March 29, 2013
About 100 Palestinians from the ancient village of Sebastia and their supporters held a demonstration today to protest against settlers spilling their sewage onto the village’s agricultural lands. This was the third demonstration in two months, and villagers are also starting weekly demonstrations, much like the ones against the wall and settlements that take place every Friday in Bil’in, Ni’ilin, Ma’asara, Nabi Saleh and Qaddum. Demonstrations took place in all of those villages as well Friday, some of them with violent confentations with army forces. In addition, activists in the newly formed popular committee say they are planning to take the matter to the Supreme Court.

Demonstrators convened in the center of the village at around noon and were joined by Palestinian MP Mustafa Barghouti (of the Mubadara party), activists from the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine, some from popular committees in other villages and Israeli and international solidarity activists. Several speakers talked about the sewage that has since December, been flowing into their fields from the nearby settlement of Shavei Shomron, but also stated that the sewage was only one symptom of the occupation alongside land grabs, uproot of tress, limitations on freedom of movement and they stressed that the protest was against the occupation as a whole.

“Settlers offered [to] avoid spilling the sewage onto our lands if we let them connect to our sewage system,” explained Ahmed Qaid, a computer engineer, football trainer and activist in the popular committee. “We refused because they are sitting on lands that were stolen from us and four neighboring villages, and we want them out of our lands – not to welcome them and offer them use of our infrastructure.”
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