Palestine-Israel Conflict

Nablus and Jenin

Eyewitness Report: Israeli forces shoot U.S. peace activist Brian Avery in Jenin

Source: Information Clearing House

On April 7, Democracy Now! host Amy Goodman interviewed Tobias Karlsson, a member of the International Solidarity Movement. On Saturday Karlsson was standing next to Brian Avery, the 24-year-old New Mexico resident who was shot in the face by Israeli forces. Goodman also talked to Danny Muller who knew Avery in Chicago.

AMY GOODMAN: Can you tell us exactly what happened and where it happened?

TOBIAS KARLSSON: This incident took place in central Jenin on Saturday. I want to give you some brief background to put this into context. Jenin had, at this point, been under curfew for over 48 hours and there had been some disturbances in the central part of the city with the children of Jenin throwing stones and other objects at the heavily armed Israeli vehicles in which they were firing live ammunition at the children. No one had been injured within these 24 hours, but less than two weeks before, they killed two boys -- 14 and 15 years old -- under similar circumstances. We here at ISM try to be out on the streets during situations to monitor and to try to prevent the Israelis from firing on these kids. They are still considered civilians under international law, even if they are throwing stones, and it’s a violation of the law for Israelis to fire live ammunition on civilians.

So, Brian and I were sitting on the roof of our apartment at around 6:15 p.m. on Saturday, and we heard vehicles, we couldn’t tell if they were tanks or APC’s, approach the area and turn into a street about two blocks away from where our apartment is located. So they stopped on this street, and shortly after we heard two bursts from what we could tell is the main mounted machine gun on these vehicles. Concerned about this firing -- we couldn’t see where they were -- we decided to go out onto the street to check on the situation and the possibility that they were firing on civilians.

It is important to emphasize that at no time during this incident could we hear any kind of firing from any Palestinian resistance fighters; we can easily distinguish between M-16 live fire and the heavy caliber mounted machine guns. During this entire 48-hour curfew, there had been no armed resistance whatsoever by the Palestinians. Me and Brian went out on the street and decided to wait for some of our colleagues, international volunteers, to join up with us before we approached these vehicles at the scene. So, we are standing in a crossroads some blocks from our building waiting for our friends to approach from a different direction when we suddenly hear these vehicles moving towards us.

After they become visible to us, the situation, which I would describe as normal for our operations in Palestine, there is nothing unusual about this, to face the Israeli army vehicles and we do it all the time. They are driving towards us at a very slow speed, about 10 kilometers per hour, and at this time there is no one on the street except for me and Brian and our friend, who is a Palestinian medical volunteer. Brian is clearly identified by a fluorescent red vest with reflective detail, and our Palestinian friend is hiding around the corner for fear of these vehicles, so they can never see him at any time. And now our friends are now approaching from a different direction from the armed vehicles.

When these vehicles are approaching us, Brian and I are standing in the street making ourselves as visible as possible, which is normal procedure for us; we are standing with our hands in the air and we have the vehicles visible to us and we are visible to the vehicles for 10 or 15 seconds before they suddenly opened fire at us -- in our direction and in front of our feet from a distance of about 50 meters. International volunteers here, we are sort of used to Israelis firing in our general direction, in the air above our heads or to the sides of us, but this situation is different because they are firing directly in our direction, and they were also firing from a moving vehicle without them stopping to take proper aim.

Of course these bullets bounce into the ground and they come in straight towards us. At this point, I feel lots of objects showering all over my body and I ended up with some small scratches and bruises, and instinctively, I take a few steps to the side and I jump away for maybe 3 or 4 steps, and I turned looking in the direction where Brian was standing and I can see him lying on the ground face down with a big pool of blood spreading around his face. What the soldiers do, I mean there is no doubt whatsoever in my mind, that before firing they identified us as international volunteers or international observers. They are very used to our presence and we have interfered with these soldiers on many occasions prior to this incident. There is no doubt that they knew who we were; there were no Palestinians in the area who could have been their target -- they were firing directly on us.

After firing, they kept driving at the same speed, and when they got to the place where Brian was lying and we were trying to help him by administering first aid, they kept driving and there was no intent to check up on our situation or to give us any kind of assistance whatsoever. At this point we call an ambulance, almost as soon as Brian hits the ground, we call an ambulance from the Palestinian Red Crescent and this ambulance arrives within 2 to 5 minutes, I would say, and takes Brian to emergency care at Jenin governmental hospital. From this hospital, he was later transferred, this process of transfer was delayed for up to two hours from the Israeli army -- we have to have permission from them to move him. After an hour or two, we transferred him, and he is currently in a hospital in Haifa, inside Israel.

AMY GOODMAN: And what is his condition?

TOBIAS KARLSSON: His condition at this time is -it’s not life threatening, to my knowledge, but still it is very serious and he has very severe facial injuries. I was very surprised when my colleagues, who were with him at the hospital, informed me that he was actually conscious and he was able to communicate by writing notes and he was using his arms. He can’t talk, of course, he has several fractures on several bones in his facial area, but I don’t at this point have the exact medical details. I am told he will have to have months of plastic surgery and medical treatment to restore his face, but I don’t know if he will suffer any permanent disabilities from this injury. This is pretty much all I know of it at this point.

AMY GOODMAN: Tobias, this is the anniversary of the Jenin slaughter a year ago. What is happening in regard to that?

TOBIAS KARLSSON: In regards to that, there was a festival planned with lots of cultural activities, exhibitions, and lectures and speeches in the Jenin camp and in the area that is now totally destroyed. It is like a desert landscape in the middle of the camp, it is totally surreal. However, the only incident that could take place was a demonstration held last Thursday and everything since that has been cancelled due to the curfew that the Israelis imposed on Jenin and the camp at 4 o’clock in the morning.

AMY GOODMAN: And what is the Israeli military saying about what happened to Brian Avery?

TOBIAS KARLSSON: I have read a report from the Israeli army spokesperson stating that there was a firefight taking places between Palestinians and the Israeli army, but to me, that is an outrageous lie to cover up the circumstances of the attempted murder of an international activist. What I can say about it is this; we have people out in the city and there were clashed between children -- and I emphasize, children -- throwing stones at armored vehicles earlier in the day, but they took place in a totally different area of the city and they had ended at least one hour before this incident took place. I emphasize again, at this point, when the armed personnel carrier opened fire on us, me and Brian are the only people visible on that street. They are not under any kind of attack from anyone, not even children throwing stones. They were driving in a slow manner and the situation is calm, to us the situation is very normal for Palestinian conditions, so I was actually very surprised that they opened fire on us at this particular moment. There was really nothing going on.

AMY GOODMAN: The Israeli military claimed that they wee being fired upon by Palestinian fighters.

TOBIAS KARLSSON: I repeat that this is not true. We are here as International Solidarity Movement volunteers, and what we try to do here is support the Palestinian civil community and there is no way we would deliberately go into an area where there is an actual firefight going on. It would be stupid and dangerous, of course, to go in and try to interfere in a situation like that -- to act as some kind of civilian human shield. That is totally out of the question that we would take any kind of action like that. So, that is simply not true.

AMY GOODMAN: We’ve been talking to Tobias Carlson, who was with Brian Avery when the Israeli military shot him -- he was shot by a tank -- in Jenin. We are also joined on the telephone by Danny Mueller in Chicago, who is a close friend of Brian Avery, who, by the way lives in Albuquerqe, New Mexico. Danny Muller is with Voices in the Wilderness and has been to Iraq. Welcome to Democracy Now.

DANNY MULLER: Good morning, Amy.

AMY GOODMAN: Can you tell us about who Brian is?

DANNY MULLER: Sure. Brian was a roommate of mine here in Chicago. We all lived in the Stone Soup community and worked on a lot of justice issues together. He went over in January and we’ve been talking by email since. He’s a really amazing person, probably one of the most non-violent people I’ve ever met. He is just so kind hearted and this is beyond shocking.

I spoke to him two days before, we had just been communicating. This person just emanates warmth and goodwill. He’s just so kind hearted -- all of us are really upset about it. This bullet that flew through the air probably came with a US red ribbon on it, it probably said ‘Made in the USA’. So that’s a part of our shock here, of our own responsibility for it and that Brian went as a representative for us, for all of us who care about this issue and care about the people there. He was there speaking for us and this is what happened to him. I think this talks to us in a way that we really need to re-evaluate what we’re doing here. This is as shocking as the bullets that go into Palestinian children on a regular basis, and that is why he was there.

I have an email here that he sent the night of the star of the Iraq war and he describes some of what he was going through and I think it’s important to hear his words, there’s not much out there that he has written, and he was speaking about how the death of Rachel (Corrie) has been a real blow to everyone here, we were all at the same training -- she was a really sweet person. He’s speaking about the soldiers, he said, the psychology that these kids use is really a sight to be seen -- and I do mean kids; half of them are conscripts thrown into the wild Palestinian yonder at no more than 18. They have no clue to the great politics of this thing and the few that do are incredibly cynical and sadistic about it. All of them are terrified, though -- they clutch their machine guns like teddy bears as though every Palestinian is about to tear out their hearts and eat them and treat everyone like nothing. The tanks and APC’s are rolling around night and day and they love to come into the camps and the city late at night and start destroying houses in the process. If not, just occupying it and holding the family hostage until they’re off to the home of the next supposed terrorist. I tell you, this place is really s**t a lot of the time, the only thing that makes it worth it is these Palestinians; their generosity is a true display of incredible hospitality -- enough to make you laugh and cry.

AMY GOODMAN: And that was a letter from Brian Avery?

DANNY MULLER: Yeah, he wrote that the night of the start of the Gulf War, he said,

“I imagine the Iraqis are much the same, my heart goes out to them tonight.”

AMY GOODMAN: Danny Muller, as you’ve gone to Iraq and you listen to what happened to your friend in Jenin, what are your final thoughts?

DANNY MULLER: Well, I can only say -- my own intentions, which are to go down to the Israeli embassy today, down to the federal building, to go down to Boeing -- probably where this bullet was made, and I’m just not going to leave. That’s the least I can do for my friend, I think that’s the least a lot of us can do right now; not taking ‘no’ for an answer and getting an explanation and an investigation and getting reparations for people here in Chicago and New Mexico and Palestine and in all these places affected by all these bullets that shouldn’t be flying through the air that we’re paying for. Tax Day is coming up next Tuesday and I think a lot of us are resisting our taxes for exactly this reason and redirecting them to Palestine and places like Iraq and exactly for the reasons that Brian is there for and exactly for the reason that Brian is in the hospital right now.

AMY GOODMAN: As a member of Voices in the Wilderness, any word from Kathy Kelly in Baghdad, the co-founder of Voices in the Wilderness.

DANNY MULLER: Yes, we received word from her 13 people there over the weekend, which was the first word we had received that they were safe. They have continued every day to go to bomb sites and to go to the hospitals. The sites are as horrifying in their description- the destruction of peoples’ bodies with weaponry that’s designed to go through tanks and buildings. We have had a very hard time with communication, but we’re just glad to know they’re safe and we’ll continue to listen to their reports which can be read at the www.IraqPeaceTeam.org and at www.electonicarock.net.

AMY GOODMAN: I want to thank you, Danny Muller, for being with us.

DANNY MULLER: Thanks, Amy.


| Home | Background | Not All Jews | Sabra & Shatila | Nablus & Jenin | | Articles | Pictures