Palestinians protest for fifth day in West Bank after death of activist

Demonstrations continue over treatment of Nizar Banat, a vocal critic of President Mahmoud Abbas

Bethan McKernan and Sufian Taha in East Jerusalem
Mon 28 Jun 2021 17.18 BST

Demonstrations against the Palestinian Authority (PA) are growing across the West Bank after the death in custody of one of President Mahmoud Abbas’s biggest critics.

Several hundred people took to the streets of Ramallah, Hebron and Bethlehem for the fifth consecutive day on Monday to protest against the treatment of Nizar Banat, a social and political activist, who died during an arrest by the authority’s forces in Hebron on 24 June.

Crowds waving Palestinian flags, pictures of Banat and calling for an end to Abbas’s 16-year rule, have been met with brutal force from both Palestinian security forces and men in plain clothes loyal to Abbas’s Fatah party. Clubs, metal rods, teargas and the sexual assault of female protesters have been used to break up the demonstrations and stop reporters from documenting the events, according to the Palestinian journalists’ union.

On Sunday, the left-wing Palestinian People’s Party withdrew from the Fatah-led PA due to “its lack of respect for laws and public freedoms”, the party said, which in effect meant the resignation of the PA’s labour minister, Nasri Abu Jaish.

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