Left: Khalil Sakakini's home in 1934 Jerusalem; which he put everything he had into building.
Zionist Haganah militants took his home in 1948.
Right: #Israel gave the house to the Women's International Zionist Org.
Sakakini became a penniless refugee & died of a broken heart🧵
2\ In 1934, Khalil Sakakini sent a jubilant letter to his son Sari, who was studying in the US, telling him that they finally have a place to call home. He described his relief that he can retire peacefully & his wife's excitement of not having to move between rented places...
3\Khalil Sakakini (1878 – 1953), who was one of the most influential Palestinian intellectuals, named each room in his house after an Arab capital: Cairo, Damascus, Sanaa, Baghdad
His home had a rich library & was a meeting place for artists, poets & leaders from the MENA region
4\ In 1948, the Zionist Palmach militia wreaked havoc on Sakakini's neighborhood "Qatamon" in #Jerusalem; forced its people to flee & looted their homes.
2 days later, Sakakini found himself a refugee in Cairo listening to the radio telling him that his home was taken over!
5\ After #Israel's founding in 1948, Sakakini's home was given to an Israeli family. His library was looted & taken to the Jewish National Library at the Hebrew University. The house is adorned with Israeli flags obfuscating its history.
Sakakini was never allowed to return!
6\ In 2014, a journalist visited Sakakini's house & met its resident, Rafael, a Jewish Israeli from Kurdistan. Next door is a Jewish woman from the US who thinks Rafael is "primitive."
At the house' entrance is a picture of "Rabbi Ovadia Yosef" who called Arabs "rats and snakes"
7\ Ironically, Sakakini who was imprisoned in 1917 for giving refuge to an illegal Jewish migrant in Palestine (poet Alter Levine) was made a refugee himself by Israel
#Israeli law allows ONLY Jewish Israelis to reclaim properties they once owned before 1948, even if compensated
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1st thing Palestinians in #Jericho woke up to was dozens of #Israeli soldiers in armored vehicles & bulldozers raiding the Aqabat Jabr refugee camp & wreaking havoc!
14 Palestinians wounded; multiple homes & cars damaged; multiple young Palestinians kidnapped without charge...
2\ Eyewitnesses say #Israeli soldiers bombed a Palestinian civilian's house with a rocket then bulldozed parts of it around 7:00AM in #Jericho's Aqabat Jabr refugee camp.
Jericho has been under blockade for 8 days.
3\ The neighbor living next to the targeted house said he woke up to #Israeli bombs & shootings around 5:30AM, then bulldozing started at 7:00AM
They weren't allowed to flee. "If you dare look out of a window, you'd get shot"
He smuggled his kids to safety out of a back window
A🧵debunking #Israel's "Pay for Slay" myth:
The Palestinian Authority NEVER pays for killing Jewish Israelis!
The PA's "Martyr Fund" provides modest stipends to families of ANYONE killed, injured or imprisoned by Israel
Israel's gov has a SIMILAR fund called "Prisoners of Zion"
2\ #Israel's "Prisoners of Zion and Families of Martyrs" fund provides a number of benefits, including financial stipends, to individuals (& their families) who have been imprisoned or killed for "putative Zionist activity" abroad or in mandate Palestine.
Pay for slay?!?
3\ #Israeli kangaroo courts' conviction rate of Palestinians is over 99%. So prisoner ≠ terrorist.
The Palestinian martyr fund pays Palestinian prisoners in #Israel (including those imprisoned for non-political crimes) about $327. It goes to the Israeli prisons' canteen.
🧵#Israeli public streets & monuments named after convicted terrorists who are now deemed "National Heroes & Martyrs."
The Mordechai Alkahi street in #Jerusalem: named in honor of a member of the terrorist Irgun militia who was sentenced to death by the British.
2\ Shlomo Ben-Yosef street in #Jerusalem - Israel: named after a convicted terrorist member of the Irgun who attacked a bus full of civilians & was sentenced to death.
#Israel erected a monument honoring his bravery in Safed with the line "To die or conquer the mountain."
3\ Yehiel Dresner street in Tel-Aviv: named after a convicted terrorist member of the Irgun militia who took part in attacking the Lydda railway station, where 4 Palestinian civilians & 2 British security personnel were killed & several buildings were blown up.
When #Israeli terrorist Baruch Goldstein massacred 29 Palestinians & injured 125 at a mosque, his grave became a shrine & pilgrimage site visited by 10,000 Israelis by 2000
Rabbi Dov Lior called him "holier than all the martyrs of the Holocaust"
His fans now set in Israel's Gov
2\ Mass murderer Goldstein's grave reads:
"The revered Dr. Baruch Goldstein... Son of #Israel.
He gave his soul for the sake of the people of Israel, the Torah & the Land. His hands are CLEAN & his heart good."
The gravesite was renovated in 2020.
Stones = "Thank u" by visitors
3\ "The greatest Jew alive, not in one way, but in every way," a Jerusalem college faculty, Samuel Hacohen, declared mass murderer Goldstein. "the only one who could do it, the only one who was 100% perfect"
Israel's current Security Minister hung a portrait of Goldstein at home