Israeli soldiers brutally attack Jerusalemite mother with rifle butts then place blame on stone-throwers

Occupied Jerusalem (QNN)- A Palestinian mother from occupied Jerusalem has been brutally hit by Israeli border police with rifle butts, and when she tried to file a complaint to the Israeli Justice Ministry, they tried to convince her that she was struck by a rock, reported Israeli daily Haaretz.

Rina Darbas (36 years old) said the incident took place six weeks ago, when she tried to protect her son and keep him from being arrested by the police in Isawiyah neighborhood.

The Israeli police held her 14-year-old son, demanding to check his shirt and shoes to see if they matched the description of a person suspected of throwing rocks at them, despite an officer was heard saying that the child was not the young man they were looking for. The police had put the child in their patrol car anyway.

According to Darbas, she tried to pull her son, to no avail, and when she tried to speak to one of the officers in the patrol car, he forcefully hit her with the butt end of his rifle, making her lose consciousness.

Darbas consequently underwent a complicated surgery to implant a metal plate in her skull, and will likely need plastic surgery as well.

“Every time she looks in the mirror, she starts to cry,” said her husband, Karim Darbas.

“Every time she looks in the mirror, she starts to cry,” said her husband, Karim Darbas.

Israeli police claimed that firebombs and rocks were hurled at the officers in Isawiyah, and that Darbas fell victim to one of the stray stones.

Darbas’ son, suspected of throwing rocks, was released after four days in detention. No formal charges have been submitted against him.

When her husband tried to file a complaint they told him that only she can do that. And when she went to file a complaint after being released from the hospital, she was treated dismissively at the Justice Ministry’s police investigations department.

“The interrogator made it hard for me to explain what happened,” according to her deposition. “He asked for details about the soldier and asked me to draw a picture of the weapon. How would I know to do such a thing? He tried to put words in my mouth, to get me to say that I was hit by a rock, and he even tried to convince me that the soldier had hit me by accident when he raised his arm with the rifle to protect me from a rock that was thrown at me. I told him there was no rock-throwing going on there.”

Haaretz was told that ‘the case is still under investigation’, before knowing from another source that a case had not yet been opened.

The Border Police commented that “It emerges that during the weekend in question, 24 firebombs as well as fireworks and rocks were thrown at police forces at the scene in question, which is apparently how the local resident was hurt.”