The Israeli occupation navy on Wednesday night kidnapped four Palestinian fishermen after opening fire at them and wounded another off the southern coast of the Gaza Strip.
Chief of the fishermen committees Zakariya Baker said on his Facebook page that Israeli gunboats chased Palestinian fishermen as they were working off the shores of Khan Younis and Rafah and opened machinegun fire at their boats.
Baker added that one fishing boat sustained damage after several bullets penetrated its hull and a fisherman called Abdullah Abu Salima was injured after an Israeli gunboat ran over his boat off the coast of Rafah.
According to the official, the Israeli naval forces confiscated the boat of fisherman Khader al-Sa’eidi and rounded him up along with another fisherman from the same family.
Meanwhile, two fishermen were also wounded and kidnapped and their boat was seized after naval forces chased them and intensively opened fire at them off the shores of Khan Younis.
Israeli gunboats are around Gaza fishermen almost every day, harassing them, shooting at them, damaging their boats, and making arrests. Sometimes fishermen are injured or killed during gunfire attacks.
Under the 1993 Oslo accords, Palestinian fishermen are permitted to fish up to 20 nautical miles off the coast of Gaza, but since then Israel has kept reducing the fishing area gradually to a limit of three nautical miles as part of its blockade on Gaza.
Fishermen and human rights groups also say that, since the 2008-09 war in Gaza, the Israeli army has been regularly enforcing a limit even closer to the shore.
Shortlink for this post: https://daysofpalestine.ps/?p=4585
