Translated by Agnes Zilber
Many bruises and marks all over the body. These are the results of the repression of the police and army forces of Jordania against various young persons during the May 15th demonstration –Nakba day in Palestine (catastrophe)- in Karameh, at the border between this country and occupied Palestine. According to one of them, after having dispersed the majority of the demonstrators – around 3,000 -, the police and military officers, including a group in civilian clothes, surrounded the women and started beating them.
This 16 year old young man, from the city of Nablus on the West Bank, had run to the mountain along with others to escape the violences. He came down to the place where the women were located to help them, this is where he inhaled pepper gas thrown to disperse his group. He relates that he fell down and was helped back to the mountains by a group. The forces of repression followed them. He tried to run, but was dizzy and fell down again. “8 or 9 policemen started to hit me with punches, kicks, sticks and batons”, he recalls. “They were saying ‘You’re a Palestinian, you want to go back to your land, so take that’”.
According to the young man, there were about 200 demonstrators in the mountains who ran to a valley, where the beatings continued, including firing of rubber bullets. Other activists who had managed to escape tried to return with cars in order to save those who stayed behind. The vehicles were vandalized, but some managed to get the young people out of the torture they were subjected to. Near to 15 teenagers crammed into the few cars which had managed to pass by the repression barrier. The next day, the 16 year old man reaffirms his will to fight, but he his categorical: “Next time we have to be 50,000.”