Testimonies

Ashraf Shalaldeh, 26

I live in Sa'ir with my parents and four brothers. I am a laborer. In the past two years or so, I've barely worked. I worked a bit in agriculture because I have a tractor. I have a magnetic card, but I didn't receive a permit to enter Israel. They said my request was rejected for security reasons.

In the past two weeks, I entered Israel with a few other laborers from Sa'ir. We crossed the fence near a-Zeitun and a-Za'ayem. I managed to work seven days during those two weeks. During the week, I slept at the construction site at the Har Homa settlement [in East Jerusalem]. I had to take the risk[?typo??] because I am almost the only breadwinner in the family. My father, who is fifty-five, also tries from time to time to enter Israel to work and earn some money for the family.

Last Saturday [14 March], around 6:00 P.M., I left Sa'ir with Hassan Shalaldeh, 26, Muhammad Raja Shalaldeh, 19, and his two brothers, Nassim, 23,  and Sanad, 22, Ahmad ‘Eyash [??]Shalaldeh, 23, Samer Samih Shalaldeh, 23, Munir Muhammad Salameh Shalaldeh, 25, ‘Alaa Musa ‘Abdallah, 22, and Mahmud al-Khadur, from Bani Na'im, 31. We drove in a large vehicle to Abu Dis, getting there about 7:30 P.M. We walked and crawled part of the way to the separation fence next to a-Zeitun. It was dark. Two persons held the wire fence, and we crossed under it. We walked to a-Tur [in East Jerusalem], a distance of 300-400 meters.

On the way, suddenly a Border Police jeep appeared, and we ran to Bedouin houses and hid there for about fifteen minutes. The jeep drove off and we continued on our way. We walked another 100 meters, when we saw two border policemen between olive trees. I was last in line. I ran away. Mahmud a-Khadur ran along with me. Both of  us ran about 100 meters, until we got to a small structure used by the army which was next to the road. It was empty and we hid behind it.

After a few minutes, a Border Police jeep came and stopped next to us. Two policemen got out. Without saying a word, they came over to us and beat us. One of them tried to knock me down, and I did what I could to stay on my feet. The other policeman left Mahmud, and the two of them tried to knock me to the ground. They failed. They beat me, punching me hard in the face, stomach, legs, and all over my body. I took a hard punch to the nose, and it began to bleed. They didn't say anything. I tried to avoid their blows. I shouted, “ay,” and asked them to stop. At some point, they told  Mahmud and me to give them our ID cards, and we gave the cards to them. One of the policemen hit me in the leg with his rifle but, and I fell. After I fell, my nose began to bleed worse than before, and the blood got onto my clothes. The policemen beat us for about 10-15 minutes.

Then, they told us to go with them. The policemen drove in the jeep and we walked behind it. Mahmud helped me walk. When we got close to the others, I heard Muhammad's brother Nassim shout at the policeman and ask him why he beat him. We joined our friends, who were sitting on the ground. Muhammad Raja seemed to be suffering. One of them told me a policeman had beaten him.  The two policemen who assaulted us took Muhammad and Nassim in the jeep, and we walked behind the jeep until we got to a-Zeitun checkpoint. At the checkpoint there were four other laborers. We stood in a line, one next to the other, along the road. Muhammad was still in the jeep. They brought Nassim out and made him stand alone, a few meters from us. Not long after that, we saw one of the policemen who had assaulted us lead Nassim into the checkpoint. Five minutes later, he brought him back. Later, the same policeman took Sanad into the checkpoint.

An officer in the Border Police pulled up in a white Toyota. I think he was a senior officer. He spoke with the policeman who had assaulted Nassim and Sanad. Nassim told the officer, in Arabic, that the policemen had beaten him and his brothers. The officer and policeman walked a few meters away from us, spoke for two minutes, and came back to us. I told the officer that the policemen had beaten me as well. He asked me, “Who beat you?” I pointed out the two policemen who had beaten me. They were standing next to us. The officer told one of them to take to into the checkpoint. He took me to a room that had a sink. The officer came with us. I asked the policeman to take me to a doctor, and he replied, “There aren't any doctors.” After I washed away the blood from my face, the policeman and officer took me back outside and released me.

I walked about 300 meters  along a street in Abu Dis. All the shops were closed. I waited for my friends. Within half an hour or so, all of them came and joined me.

Despite the pain and everything else we had experienced, we decided to try and enter Israel again. We walked 500 meters, until we got to  Za'ayem, where we saw Border Police jeeps. I think it was around 11:00 P.M., maybe later. We decided to go to a-‘Issawiyya and tried to cross into Israel from there, but there was also a Border Police jeep. We decided to go back to a-Za'ayem. From a distance, we looked at the place where people cross the fence. Nassim called somebody who had crossed there before us, and he said it was a good idea to cross there. We wanted to climb the fence with rope that was there. The fence is  5-6 meters high. Nassim climbed it and after him, Jabril Ahmad Shalaldeh, 32, another laborer who had joined us, climbed it. Then Sanad, and then ‘Alaa. When '‘Alaa began to climb it, he saw policemen grab Sanad, and he came back. I heard Sanad cry out from the other side, and I realized he was being beaten. I called Nassim, who had gotten over the fence, and he said he saw border policemen take Sanad in a jeep.

Five minutes later, Sanad called his brother Muhammad, who was with me, and told him that the Border Police had left him close to a-Zeitun checkpoint. He said they had beaten him. I stood close to my brother and I heard him groaning on the cell phone. I called Nassim and asked him to come back and help his brother. A few minutes later, we walked to Sanad. I think it was already after 11:30 P.M. He was lying on the ground, shaking, and his face was swollen from being hit. Nassim decided to take him to the checkpoint and file a complaint about the beating. We all went with him to the checkpoint. In the meantime, we summoned an ambulance from Abu Dis to come and take Sanad to hospital.

Five minutes later, a Border Police jeep pulled up. A little while after that, a few more policemen came from the checkpoint. I asked one of them to summon the police, but he refused. Then a fracas broke out between Nassim and Muhammad and the policemen. I tried to separate them. During the fracas, Nassim knocked off the badge of a border policeman. He took Nassim and Muhammad into the checkpoint.

When the ambulance arrived, about twenty-five minutes after we summoned it, Nassim and Muhammad came back from the checkpoint. We saw that they had been beaten. I wanted to go in the ambulance to the hospital, but the paramedic saw Nassim and Muhammad and decided to take them and Sanad to hospital. The paramedics said they could only take three people in the ambulance, and apologized for not being able to take me. Nassim called me later and told me they had been taken to hospital in Bethlehem.

We were now a group of five laborers. We walked for about an hour, until we got to the apartment of students from Sa'ir whom one of us knew. The students welcomed us to spend the night there. We shared mattresses and blankets. At 8:00 A.M., we left the apartment and returned to Sa'ir.

I got home around 9:30 A.M. I told my family what happened. Then I went to the clinic of Dr. Nabil Haliqah in a-Shuyukh, an ear, nose, and throat specialist. He told me I'd need surgery, that my nose was broken. He did the surgery, giving me a local anesthetic, and told me to come back in three days. In addition to the injury to my nose, I have pains in my stomach, leg, and right side of my body. I am in bed and have trouble moving. The treatment cost me 600 shekels. The doctor charged me less because the Border Police had injured me.

My father was injured two years ago when he tried to enter Israel. Police chased him and he fell off the fence and broke his leg. He was treated at Hadassah Hospital. He never got completely better, but he still takes the risk and enters Israel so he can put bread on the table.

Ashraf Fadi Mahmud Shalaldeh,26, is a laborer and a resident of Sair in Hebron District. His testimony was given to Musa Abu Hashhash at the witness's house on 17 March 2009.