TEL AVIV/GAZA, 6 September — Marwan Barghouti, the top Palestinian activist to be tried by Israel since the beginning of the intifada, yesterday rejected Israel’s right to try him on terrorism charges in an uproarious court session, as two Israeli soldiers and a Palestinian activist were killed in the Gaza Strip.
A disastrous bomb attack on the eve of the Jewish New Year was also narrowly averted in the morning when the Israeli police discovered a car allegedly loaded with hundreds of kilograms of explosives, while Palestinian militants succeeded in blowing up an Israeli tank in the Gaza Strip.
Barghouti, the West Bank leader of Palestinian President Yasser Arafat’s Fatah movement refused to recognize the jurisdiction of the Tel Aviv district court on the grounds he is an elected member of Parliament and rejected the indictment read to him.
“I am a freedom fighter, I am a member of Parliament,” said the 43-year-old Barghouti, who has become a hero of the intifada for Palestinians and was once tapped as a successor to Arafat. “I don’t recognize this court. This is a court of the occupation,” Barghouti told the three-judge panel.
But he was interrupted by the father of one of the people killed in an attack Barghouti allegedly commanded who shouted from the auditorium: “Freedom fighters are supposed to attack soldiers, but you murdered my son.”
Barghouti, whom Israel accuses of heading the deadly Al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigades, a Fatah offshoot, sought to turn the table on his captors. His lawyers did not attend the court session, arguing they “did not want to be partners in Israel’s game against the Palestinian people” but adding they would be by Barghouti’s side for the next hearing on Oct. 3 “to put the occupation on trial”.
Meanwhile, an Israeli soldier was killed and three others wounded when their tank ran over a powerful explosive charge in the southern Gaza Strip, the army said in a statement.
Also yesterday, a member of the Al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigades was killed in the northern Gaza Strip, Palestinian medical sources said. He was gunned down after shooting and injuring two Israeli soldiers near the northern Jewish settlement of Nitzanit. One of the soldiers later died of his injuries.
Israeli tanks also staged two incursions in the Gaza Strip, moving into autonomous territory in Deir Al-Balah while the army destroyed four houses in the southern town of Rafah and arrested three Palestinians there. Violence also flared in the West Bank, occupied by Israel for 10 weeks.
