Testimonies

Shadiyeh 'Odeh, victim

At four o'clock this morning (24 Feb. 2002), I awoke with pain and realized that I was in labor. I woke my husband and told him that I was in labor and had to go to the hospital. He woke our two children and took them to their grandparents, who live in another apartment in our building.

We got into the car at 4:30 A.M. to make the twelve-kilometer trip to Rafidiyeh Hospital in Nablus. About fifty meters before the checkpoint, which is just before the entrance to the city and is next to an Israeli army base, soldiers stopped us and ordered my husband to get out of the car and go over to them. They asked him where he was going, and he said that he was on his way to Nablus because I was in labor. I was sitting in the back seat of the car. A soldier came over and looked at me. A soldier told my husband to take his jacket off, and another soldier thoroughly searched the car. Then they let us continue to Nablus.

We drove about four hundred meters and came across a ditch that ran the full width of the road. My husband moved some rocks from the road so that we could pass. We drove for another thirty meters, moving very slowly. Then we heard gunshots from behind us. I felt a pain in my left shoulder. I told my husband that I had been hit. He stopped the car and asked me where I had been struck. He put his hand on my shoulder and when he removed it, it was full of blood. He realized that I had indeed been wounded, and he began to scream.

Israeli soldiers rushed to the car. I don't know how many there were. They asked him why he was screaming. He said, "You wounded my wife, why did you shoot her? The guards at the checkpoint let us cross because my wife is in labor." One of the soldiers told him, "You are lying. Your wife has not been wounded." My husband replied, "Take a look for yourself." The soldier said, "I am going to summon an army doctor, and if you are lying, you'll pay the price."

The soldiers called for an army doctor, who arrived very quickly. He examined me and told the soldiers that I was in a dangerous condition because one of the bullets had hit me in the back of the shoulder and exited my chest, near my heart. He said that I had to be taken to a hospital in Israel. I heard him say, "Beilinson or Tel Hashomer."

The doctor summoned an army ambulance and treated me. He bandaged the wound to stop the bleeding and hooked me up to infusion. The soldiers asked my husband's permission to take me in an armored personnel carrier to the checkpoint that we had previously crossed. My husband consented, provided that he could come with me. At first, the soldiers refused to let him in the army vehicle, but after a brief argument, they agreed.

At the checkpoint, the soldiers contacted the [Israeli] DCO [District Coordinating Office], and an officer from the DCO arrived at the scene. He told my husband that it was possible to take me by ambulance to Nablus, which was closest. The officer summoned an ambulance from Bita, which is about three kilometers from the checkpoint. After about ten minutes, a Red Crescent ambulance arrived, and it took my husband and me to Rafidiyeh Hospital in Nablus.

I reached the hospital at 6:00 A.M. The doctors examined me and said that the bullet had entered my left shoulder and exited the upper part of my chest. They estimated that the bullet had been fired from a distance of about ten meters.

I am still [11:00 A.M.] in intensive care. The doctors told me that they will deliver my baby in four hours by Caesarian section because my condition does not allow a regular delivery.

Shadiyeh Fahmi Khaled 'Odeh , age 28, is a housewife. She is married with two children, and is a resident of Hawareh, Nablus District. The testimony was given to 'Ali Daragmeh at Rafidiyeh Hospital in Nablus, 24 February 2002