A Palestinian from the West Bank village of Bilin claimed Wednesday that Israel Defense Forces soldiers beat him and threatened to treat him like another activist who was shot during an anti-fence rally.
Soldiers attending to the incident were confronted by foreign left-wing activists who documented the occurrence.
Mohammad Khatib, a member of the Bilin Popular Committee Against the Wall, told Ynet he was awakened at 2 am by his friend's wife, who said soldiers had burst into her home. She said they were conducting a violent search in the presence of her children and damaging her property.
"I arrived at the home and there were soldiers there who didn't tell me anything," he said. "At the entrance a soldier who saw me asked what I was doing there, and when I said I had come to speak with the officer he grabbed me by the shirt and threw me into the apartment."
Khatib claims a soldier then hit him from behind with the butt of his rifle. "Then the nightmare began," he said. "All of the soldiers in the apartment began to beat me with everything possible – hands, rifles, feet. They kicked me in the head, the face, the stomach."
Meanwhile soldiers outside were exchanging harsh words with foreign activists who reside in the building. Two of them demanded entrance, as the video shows, but were denied it by the soldiers.
Khatib claims that he attempted to leave the building but was confronted by soldiers who continued to beat him. He says the incident lasted 20 minutes, during which the woman who had summoned him attempted to intervene.
"I lifted my face and saw someone who had interrogated me in the past. I told him: 'Why did you do this to me? I only wanted to speak to the officer'. He said: 'If you don't call your friend and bring him here we will do what we did to Abu-Rahma' (an anti-fence activist shot dead during a rally)."
Meanwhile, Khatib says, an officer began to answer incoming calls to his cellular phone, demanding of everyone who called to turn in Abdullah, the resident of the apartment.
"We know they do this because they don't like and don't know how to handle our national struggle which has become a symbol all over the world," Khatib said.
The IDF had no comment and said it would release a statement on the matter.
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