Palestine weekly wrap: ‘Master of the house’ says Ben-Gvir as Al-Aqsa opens 

The announcement of a ceasefire between the United States and Iran has led to the reopening of holy sites to worshippers in occupied East Jerusalem and the removal of some movement barriers in the occupied West Bank.

On Friday, April 9, more than 100,000 Muslim worshippers streamed into the Al-Aqsa Mosque compound for the first Friday prayers since before the war started on February 28. The Church of the Holy Sepulchre, shuttered throughout Holy Week, also reopened in time for Holy Fire Saturday – held the day before Easter is celebrated by Orthodox denominations. After weeks of empty streets, children performed music in the Palestinian Scouts’ procession through the Christian Quarter.

But the celebrations also came with an overwhelming Israeli security presence, and police violently detaining Palestinian Christian scouts during the processions. Palestinian Authority officials said Israeli forces removed Palestinian flag patches from scouts’ uniforms.

Even the April 9 reopening of Al-Aqsa after 40 days of closure was tempered by growing settler incursions, including on both April 7 and April 12, when Israel’s National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir stormed the compound under police protection, performing Jewish religious rituals.

Ben-Gvir declared from the site that “today, you feel like the master of the house here”, as he celebrated the increased normalisation of Jewish prayer on the site, despite the official ban on it. The next day, settlers stormed the Al-Aqsa compound again. Jordan’s Foreign Ministry condemned both incidents as violations of the site’s status quo. Jordan officially holds the custodianship of the shrine.

Gaza: Strikes and starvation amid stalled peace process

Despite the Iran ceasefire, Israeli air strikes and artillery fire continued across the Gaza Strip throughout the week. On April 8, Israeli forces killed Al Jazeera journalist Mohammed Wishah in a drone strike on his vehicle as it travelled along the coastal road in Gaza City – bringing the total number of Palestinian media workers killed since October 2023 to at least 262, the highest such toll in any recorded conflict. Wishah is the 12th Al Jazeera journalist or media worker in Gaza to have been killed by Israeli forces during that time.

On April 9, nine-year-old Ritaj Rihan was shot and killed in northern Gaza by Israeli soldiers while studying in a tent used for classes. The same day, an additional two Palestinians were killed and five others wounded in a strike in Jabalia refugee camp in northern Gaza, with two others killed in separate drone attacks in central Khan Younis and the Bardawil area of al-Mawasi, in southern Gaza.

On April 11, a strike on a police checkpoint in central Gaza’s Bureij camp killed at least six people, and another person was killed during a second strike in Beit Lahiya the same day. Then, on April 13, another three Palestinians were killed by an Israeli drone attack at a security checkpoint in the al-Mazraa area east of Deir el-Balah, followed by another Palestinian killed by Israeli fire later in the day in the al-Mawasi area.

According to Gaza’s Ministry of Health, since the October ceasefire, 754 Palestinians in Gaza have been killed and more than 2,100 injured, as of April 13. Since October 7, 2023, the cumulative official death toll stands at 72,333.

The killing on April 6 of a Palestinian driver of a World Health Organization (WHO) vehicle by Israeli forces triggered the suspension of all medical evacuations through the Rafah crossing for several days. Evacuations resumed on April 12, with 27 medical patients and 42 companions crossing – a trickle against a reported backlog of more than 18,000 people awaiting evacuation, according to the WHO.

Al Jazeera has reached out to the Israeli military for comment, but has not received a response.

It’s now been six months since the October “ceasefire”, and yet in Gaza, “the ceasefire has failed to end the genocide against Palestinians in Gaza, with Israeli authorities continuing to impose conditions intended to destroy conditions of life”, said Claire San Filippo, emergency manager for Doctors Without Borders, known by its French initials MSF, in a statement this week.

Those restrictions continue to impact civilian life, with the Nasser Medical Complex announcing this week that a main generator had shut down due to fuel shortages, with staff rationing electricity to critical departments. The Gaza Ministry of Health had warned on April 2 that complete fuel unavailability posed “a genuine threat of death to hundreds of patients” in intensive care, neonatal units and dialysis wards.

Long bread lines grow across the Strip as incoming aid remains severely insufficient and the vast majority of water wells, greenhouses and arable land in Gaza have been rendered inaccessible or destroyed by Israeli forces.

On the diplomatic front, the Hamas negotiating delegation began meetings with Board of Peace envoy Nickolay Mladenov in Cairo this past week to discuss implementation of the ceasefire’s second phase. Hamas has stated it will not discuss disarmament until Israel commits to a full military withdrawal from Gaza. According to Israeli media reports, several ministers in a recent Israeli security cabinet meeting called for military action if Hamas refuses to disarm.

Newly approved settlements and expanding outposts

In the West Bank, the government of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is pressing on more aggressively than ever with plans to seize land. News went public this week of Israel’s approval of 34 new settlements across the West Bank – many in remote areas – bringing the total approved by the current government to 102, an 80 percent increase over the 127 official settlements that existed when it took office, according to Peace Now.

The office of the Palestinian Authority’s presidency said the approvals are a “flagrant violation of international law”, echoing further condemnations from the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation (OIC), the European Union, Sweden and others.

Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich marked the occasion by attending the inauguration of a new settlement near Ramallah, boasting that “30 new settlements have been built in the vicinity of Ramallah alone during the current government’s tenure”.

On the ground, outpost expansion continued in defiance of the Oslo Accords and international law.

Meanwhile, Israel’s internal intelligence agency is reported to be in an internal crisis over its handling of settler violence. According to Haaretz, Shin Bet chief David Zini has referred to settler attacks as “friction” rather than “terrorism”, reduced resources allocated to the agency’s Jewish Division, and failed to prioritise enforcement. The reporting coincided with an open letter signed by 22 former security chiefs — including former heads of the army, Shin Bet and Mossad — warning that “the rampant Jewish terrorism” in the West Bank “carried out under governmental auspices is not only a moral disgrace but also a severe strategic blow to Israel’s national security”.

Against this backdrop, settler and military violence against Palestinians continued at an unrelenting pace throughout the week.

At least two Palestinians were shot and killed by Israeli settlers attacking villages – Alaa Sobeih, on April 8, near Tayasir in Tubas governorate, and Ali Majed Hamadneh, on April 11, in Deir Jarir, northeast of Ramallah.

A 68-year-old woman, Sabria Shamasneh, also died on April 7 after suffering a cardiac arrest following an incident where Israeli soldiers beat her son in front of her in Jayyous, east of Qalqilya.

And, on April 9, 12-year-old Mohammed al-Sheikh was shot in the head during a military raid on Jalazone refugee camp near Ramallah and was evacuated to a hospital in critical condition.