Israeli troops detain terrified Palestinian kids for picking vegetables

Israeli forces have detained Palestinian children, who went foraging for wild vegetables in the occupied West Bank, triggering widespread condemnation.

The incident was filmed by Nasr Nawajaa, a field researcher with Israeli human rights group B’Tselem, in the Masafer Yatta area of the southern al-Khalil hills on Wednesday.

According to Press TV, the video, which was circulated widely on social media, shows dozens of Israeli soldiers in combat gear grabbing five terrified boys, ages 7 to 11, and pushing them towards military vehicles. 

Several Palestinian bystanders can be seen attempting to intervene, but to no avail.

At one point, an older Palestinian boy tries to rescue one of the minors, but he is grabbed by another Israeli soldier and dragged along with the group. 

“The children were screaming and crying, pleading with the soldiers to call their parents and wait until their family arrived before taking them away,” Nawajaa told the Middle East Eye (MEE) news portal.

“The soldiers were treating the children like some hardened criminals, as if they had committed some huge crime,” he said, adding that the Israeli forces were “extremely aggressive” and “took the children by force.”

The children were taken to the nearby Israeli settlement of Kiryat Arba, where they were held inside the military vehicles and interrogated for several hours, before being released to their families.

“These are just harmless children, what kind of threat could they possibly pose to justify this treatment?” Nawajaa said.

ME