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‘My children still wake up at night crying’: Palestinian man tells of trauma after George Floyd-like incident

Yousef Adi, 36, shows his injuries at his apartment in the West Bank city of Ramallah, on September 11, 2022. (Photo by AP)

A Palestinian man, who appeared in a viral video while an Israeli policeman was kneeling on his neck, says he and his family are still suffering from the pain and trauma caused by the George Floyd-like incident.

Video footage circulating online shows Yousef Adi laid face down as an Israeli policeman kneels on his neck. The man is seen bleeding from his nose as police officers put handcuffs on him.

The policemen later dragged Adi who appeared to be unconscious.

The 36-year-old man said he was attacked on Thursday while heading to prayers at al-Aqsa Mosque in occupied al-Quds with all the necessary Israeli permits to enter the city.

Adi, who works as a technician at Palestine TV, said officers arbitrarily detained him, dragged him against a wall, and started beating him.

“I did nothing except shout at them to leave me alone and stay away from me,” The Associated Press quoted Adi as saying on Sunday.

“But then more policemen came and began hitting me everywhere on my body,” he added.

Adi said the Thursday the attack left him with a broken nose and an injury on his forehead that required four stitches.

The incident is the latest in a series of violent acts by Israeli forces against Palestinians. Israeli police claimed that they had used “reasonable force” because of “his violent behavior.”

Some social media users compared the incident to that of Floyd, an African American, who died in May 2020 after a white police officer kneeled on his neck for more than nine minutes during an arrest. The unarmed man’s death in police custody triggered mass protests, not only in the US but around the world.

Adi said the following day he was fined 500 shekels (about $150) and temporarily prohibited from entering al-Quds.

“I’m still suffering from the pain,” he said. “My children, after seeing the video, wake up at night crying ... I need surgery on my nose. Who will pay for it?”

The Israeli regime occupied the West Bank, including East al-Quds, in a Western-backed war in 1967. Since then, Israel has been dotting the territory with hundreds of illegal settlements that house thousands of settlers.

More than 600,000 Israelis live in over 230 settlements built since the Israeli occupation of the West Bank and East al-Quds.

All Israeli settlements are illegal under international law. The UN Security Council has condemned Israel’s settlement activities in the occupied territories in several resolutions.

Earlier on Sunday, a young Palestinian man succumbed to injuries he suffered during an Israeli attack, earlier this month, on a neighborhood in the city of Jenin in the northern part of the occupied West Bank.

The Israeli regime’s military has stepped up its deadly raids on the local population in and around the flashpoint West Bank town of Jenin.

Israeli forces continue their near-daily raid-and-arrest operations in various parts of the West Bank, wounding or killing Palestinians. Such raids are carried out while Israeli settlers also conduct acts of violence against Palestinians and their properties.

More than 70 Palestinians, including 37 Palestinian children, have been killed so far this year, many as a result of the use of lethal force by the Israeli authorities in a manner described by the UN Human Rights Office in the Occupied Territories as a violation of international human rights law.


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