How one Palestinian with a camera rattled Israelis
Ever since he taped the incident in which an IDF soldier shot an already injured Palestinian attacker in Hebron, Imad Abu Shamsiya has been receiving death threats from extreme-right activists.
B’Tselem Director Hagai El-Ad has appealed to the Israeli army and the police to demand protection for Imad Abu Shamsiya, the Palestinian who filmed the March 24 shooting death of assailant Abdel Fatah al-Sharif by an Israeli soldier in Hebron. Since the video became public, and especially since the soldier’s arrest, Jewish settlers in Hebron have been threatening Abu Shamsiya’s life and throwing stones at his home in the Tel Rumeida neighborhood. They even uploaded his photo onto right-wing websites with a call to execute him. Abu Shamsiya has lodged a complaint with the police, but so far no suspects have been arrested. He said neither the Israel Police nor the Israel Defense Forces are in any rush to act against the violent Hebron settlers.
In a conversation with Al-Monitor, Abu Shamsiya talked about life in the shadow of fear since the video went public, and about his work as a cameraman for Israeli human rights organization B’Tselem, which tries to make public the complex life of Palestinians under threat by Hebron’s most radical Jewish settlers. Six settler families live in Tel Rumeida, one of which is the family of radical right-wing activist Baruch Marzel.
