NABLUS, West Bank, November 27 -- Raed Faour and Jihad Natour, lifelong friends, were walking through the dark, narrow street and alleys of Nablus' New Asker refugee camp early today, banging their tambourine-like drums and singing a song to wake up the Muslim faithful and announce the approaching sunrise. The drummers, as the pair and others like them are known, are a fixture in Muslim neighborhoods during the holy month of Ramadan, when families arise before daybreak to eat a meal because their religion requires them to fast from sunup to sundown.
Just before 3 a.m., as they were singing a song praising the Prophet Mohammed -- "Oh, the god of Mohammad," it went, "Take the worry from us!" -- several Israeli soldiers emerged from a dark hiding spot behind a taxi, aimed their guns at them and shouted in Arabic, "Stop! Stop!" Faour said in an interview. "They immediately started shooting," he said, and Natour hit the ground, shouting: "My brother Raed, I've been shot!"
Palestinians here said that Natour, 22, an unemployed carpenter, died in the street after Israeli soldiers refused to allow an ambulance to pass through an Army checkpoint to take him to a hospital. Local residents were outraged that such a drummer, who plays an important role in the Islamic culture, was killed while fulfilling a ritual that has been a part of Ramadan observances for generations.
"This is the height of brutality because they are attacking our culture, our customs," said a local librarian, Naama Ajouri, 37. "The drummer is the most beautiful thing we have in Ramadan. He does marvelous work, and the children all listen for his voice and wake up to have a meal so they're not hungry all day long. I'd never heard such a nice voice as Jaihad had."
An Israeli Army spokeswoman said that soldiers spotted the pair "and they were suspected because there was a curfew, and they were violating the curfew. The forces shouted at them to stop and fired a warning shot in the air, and when they refused to stop, they shot one of the suspects and he was killed."
"I don't think the soldiers knew who he was," the spokeswoman said. "It's not regular for people to walk in the street at that time of the night, and it raised questions. Two mistakes can be made. You can either shoot when you're not supposed to or not shoot when you should, and that's a judgment. It's a very violent city. We've arrested seven [would-be] suicide bombers in the city in the last two weeks."
Faour, 28, an unemployed construction worker who has been a drummer during Ramadan for four years, said it was unlikely anyone could have mistaken them for anything else. Typically, since their duty is to wake people up, drummers make so much noise that they can be heard for several blocks in all directions, and Faour said his drum was loud enough "to wake people in the next village."
"Is the musaher [the name for the drummer] also a terrorist?" said Said Natour, 37, the older brother of Jihad. "They are creating terror when they kill a person like him. Where is the peace they are talking about? My brother was an innocent person. He never harmed anyone and was never arrested. They knew he was not armed. After all, they could hear him going around with a drum."
Fasting during the month of Ramadan is one of the five pillars of Islam, along with other obligations such as praying five times a day and making the hajj to Mecca. During the fasting period from dawn to dusk Muslims are not allowed to eat, drink or smoke, so families typically wake up before sunrise to eat a meal, then have a special dinner at night.
In more traditional neighborhoods, drummers walk through the streets announcing the coming fast and add to the spirit of the season. While the job is voluntary, residents often tip the drummers with food or cash after Ramadan is over.
Early today, while banging their drums, Faour said the pair sang their usual song: "Oh, listeners of my voice: Pray for the Prophet Mohammed! Oh Mustafah," it went, using another name for the Prophet, "because of your love, I can't sleep at night. He is lucky who goes to visit you!"
The shooting occurred as the drummers walked down Biliardo Street near the center of the camp, a neighborhood of about 1,000 families in the eastern area of Nablus in the West Bank. Faour said that when the shots rang out and Natour fell, he darted about 30 feet down an alley and pressed himself as flat as he could in a shallow doorway. Soon, an Israeli soldier appeared at the top of the alley, sited his gun with a laser on Faour's forehead and ordered him to come out. When the soldier promised not to shoot, Faour said, he complied.
Faour said that he and Natour had not run after being told to halt, and that the firing had begun "immediately" after the soldiers had shouted to stop. "If I had not gone inside the alley, they would have shot me too," he said.
Faour said that soldiers ordered him to lift his shirt to check that he was not wired with an explosive belt, and when they saw he was unarmed, they threw him against a wall, knocking him out for about five minutes. When he came to, Faour said, he asked to see Natour and was hit in the head with gun and knocked unconscious again for about five more minutes. When he awoke, he said, he was taken to another part of the city in handcuffs. It was too dark to see if Natour was bleeding, he said, but his friend clearly was still alive.
Faour said he was detained until about 4:30 a.m. After his release, he returned to the street where his friend had been shot, he said, and found him in an alley, dead.
Amjad Rifai, 31, president of the camp council, said Israeli solders refused to allow an ambulance to assist Natour. He said an ambulance arrived at about 5:30 a.m. "This is an indication of how cheap our blood is to them," he said.
Faour said that today, the 22nd day of Ramadan, was the first time they had encountered soldiers during their rounds, and it would be his last day as a drummer.
NABLUS, West Bank, Nov. 25 -- Israeli troops shot and killed an 8-year-old Palestinian boy in Nablus today as hundreds of youths on their way home from school ignored a curfew and threw stones at soldiers, witnesses and hospital officials said.
The children gathered in the center of the city and threw stones at an army jeep, witnesses said. The soldiers opened fire, killing the boy, Jihad Faqeh, hospital officials said. Seven Palestinians were wounded, including two adults who were in serious condition.
The Israeli army said troops fired to disperse stone-throwers and that two explosive devices were thrown toward soldiers.
In Bethlehem, meanwhile, Israeli troops scaled back their presence after arresting dozens of alleged Palestinian militants but told residents reemerging from their homes to go back inside because a curfew was still in effect, witnesses said.
The Israeli military clamped down further on Palestinian cities in the West Bank last week after a resurgence of suicide bombings and ambush shootings by Palestinians waging a two-year-old uprising for independence.
Tens of thousands of people demonstrated Friday across the Middle East in a day of solidarity with Palestinians, with marchers calling for trying Prime Minister Ariel Sharon as a war criminal and punishing the United States for its support of Israel. Friday is the anniversary of the United Nations vote in 1947 that enabled the creation of the Israeli state.
Iranian President Muhammad Khatami joined the estimated 10,000 people who converged on Teheran's Enqelab Square in the annual protest for Jerusalem Day. Accompanied by a squad of bodyguards, Khatami walked with the crowd to the nearby Teheran University where he took part in Friday prayers. "Sharon is a war criminal and must be punished!" the demonstrators shouted.
Protests also were held Friday in Cairo, Damascus, and Nabatiyeh in southern Lebanon to mark Al-Quds Day - Al-Quds, meaning "the holy," is the Arabic name for Jerusalem. Held on the last Friday of the Islamic holy month of Ramadan, the protest day was declared by the late Iranian leader Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini to celebrate Jerusalem as an Islamic city.
In Teheran, former Iranian president Hashemi Rafsanjani delivered the Friday prayers sermon, saying the West remained indifferent to the suffering of Palestinians in the ongoing fighting with Israel, "despite pictures and [TV] films showing Israeli brutality." In a warning to Israel, he said: "Don't think the war will be over if you expel Palestinians from their homes in the Gaza Strip and the West Bank."
"We saw an example of that in Kenya on Thursday," Rafsanjani said, referring to the suicide bomb attack outside Mombasa that killed 12 people at an Israeli-owned hotel.
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