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Journalism of Courage
NABLUS, West Bank, NOV 25: Crying "death to Barak," around 10,000 angry Palestinians joined the funeral procession in the West Bank town of Nablus for two brothers killed in an Israeli shelling of a nearby village the day before.
Tensions remained high across the territories, with sporadic clashes reported between Palestinians and Israeli troops. In Nablus, the crowds shouted "Death to Barak" and "Death to Sharon," referring to Prime Minister Ehud Barak and Israel’s hawkish Opposition leader Ariel Sharon as they carried the bodies of Samir and Nahed Adel Amr through the streets.
Masked armed men mingled with the mourners, who brandished Palestinian and Islamic flags and photographs of the victims they said were members of the militia wing of Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat’s Fatah faction.
In the Gaza Strip, some 3,000 people marched through the town of Rafah near the border with Egypt during the funeral for Ziad Khalil Abu Jazar, 22, who was killed by Israeli troops on Friday. A total of seven people were killed in Friday’s bloodletting, including an Israeli Army officer and a civilian Army employee, and another two Palestinians died of wounds suffered in previous clashes.
A total of 278 people have been killed in the wave of unrest unleashed eight weeks ago by Sharon’s controversial visit to the al-Aqsa mosque compound in occupied East Jerusalem, a site holy to both Jews and Muslims.
Funerals have often been the trigger for angry demonstrations and clashes with Israeli troops. At the Karni crossing point between the Gaza Strip and Israel, minor skirmishes flared between Palestinian demonstrators and Israeli troops but there were no immediate reports of injuries.
