An Angus man has told how he watched children as young as five walking to school with guns pointed at them.
Alex Holmes was speaking of the violence he has witnessed as his three-month mercy mission in Palestine and Israel draws to a close.
Mr Holmes, 59, from Inverkeilor, has been working as a human rights monitor with the Ecumenical Accompaniment Programme (EAPPI).
Ecumenical Accompaniers (EAs) provide a protective presence to vulnerable Palestinian communities in the West Bank.
He said: “The occupation by Israel of the Palestinian territories will by next year, 2017, have lasted 50 years.
“It is the longest military occupation of modern times.
“And as EAs, we have seen the violence which results from this military occupation.
“I have lived alongside Palestinians in the West Bank for three months.
“I have witnessed children as young as five walking to school with guns pointed at them by Israeli soldiers.
“I have met children who have left their homes in the morning only to find that on reaching their school, it has been demolished, or who have come back from school to find their homes demolished.”
Incidents involving schoolchildren and schools almost tripled in the occupied West Bank, including East Jerusalem, from 2013 to 2014, affecting nearly 25,000 Palestinian children in 2014.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MmcVLxDUJoM
The trip has a personal resonance for Mr Holmes whose father was a young officer with the British Army who was based in Palestine during the Arab Revolt from 1936-39.
Mr Holmes said: “I have heard testimony of a child woken in the night by the sound of heavy machinery at work and emerging from her house to find that the village playground has been reduced to rubble and twisted metal by the Israeli army.
“I have heard testimony of another child awoken in the dark of night terrified by the sound of concrete crashing to the ground outside her house.
“Children all over occupied Palestine face harassment by Israeli soldiers as they walk to school.
“They have guns pointed at them.
“They are taken into the bushes to have their bags searched.
“ They look out of the classroom windows and see armed soldiers in their school grounds.
“As Ecumenical Accompaniers we offer a protective presence to students on their way to and from school.”
All Palestinians living under the Occupation are subject to Israeli military law.
This applies equally to children and adults.
Mr Holmes added: “Israeli settlers living in the West Bank, on the other hand, are subject to civil law.
“At the end of February of this year, 438 Palestinian minors were being held in Israeli prisons.
“A UK government-backed report, Children in Military Custody, concluded that Israel was in breach of six articles of the UNCRC in its treatment of Palestinian children.
“All children everywhere have a Right to a Childhood.
“For Palestinian children living under military occupation, this right is being severely undermined.”
