Witnesses say Palestinian youths used slingshots to hold back settlers
An Israeli court on Wednesday released four suspects in the attack on Washington Post photojournalist Heidi Levine and placed them under house arrest because the evidence was insufficient to keep them in custody. The ruling concerned Friday’s attack on Levine during an olive harvest in Abu Falah, north of Ramallah.
Israeli police said they had arrested 10 suspects after the Abu Falah assault and a separate Saturday attack aimed at European diplomats near Taybeh. U.S. Ambassador to Israel Mike Huckabee called the attack on Levine a “despicable act of terror” and demanded prosecutions.
Levine, 64, a photojournalist who has covered multiple wars and had just returned from an assignment in Ukraine before Friday’s attack, was discharged Wednesday from a hospital in Petah Tikva after sustaining four fractured vertebrae, two broken ribs and four puncture wounds.
The olive harvest began peacefully, Levine said, as Palestinian villagers harvested olives with journalists and human rights activists. A group of young masked settlers appeared on a nearby hilltop and watched the villagers, journalists and human rights activists, she said. Levine said the attack began only after the Israeli army arrived. Some farmers then began gathering their tarps and bags of the olives they had picked, she said. Levine said she started running after hearing a machine gun and seeing tear gas in the distance, then saw about a dozen people charge at her.
Levine said she kept her face to the ground but did not know whether she had adopted that position before the initial blow or in response to it. She said her whole face otherwise would have been broken and that she could have suffered brain damage or lost an eye. Levine said attackers kicked and beat her with sticks and estimated that they did so probably more than 100 times. She said she tried playing dead, but the beating continued.
It remained unclear whether knives or other weapons caused Levine’s four puncture wounds. Levine said a witness to her attack had seen nails sticking out of some of the wooden clubs wielded by her attackers. She said she would most likely have been killed had she not been wearing protective body armor and a helmet. “I probably would have been dead, because for sure it doesn’t take much to kill a person with blows to the head,” she said.
Witnesses said the beating only ceased when young Palestinian men used slingshots to aim stones at the settlers, forcing them back and allowing another American journalist, Jasper Nathaniel, to reach Levine and, with other reporters, help her to safety. Levine said: “The shabab [Palestinian youth] put themselves in front and were trying to keep them [the settlers] away, keep a protective shield, which was amazing. It was like a biblical battle.”
Nathaniel wrote: “Had the shabab not stepped up to protect her, she might well be dead. It is no exaggeration to say that young Palestinians armed only with stones risked their lives to save Heidi Levine’s.” Nathaniel said the army pursued the young Palestinians after the incident rather than the settlers. The Guardian reported that Palestinians risk being shot by settlers or soldiers if they try to resist attacks and can face long periods in detention without charge.
Levine pointed out that the Palestinians harvesting olives did not have the protective body armor and helmet she had worn. She said more than 20 Palestinians had been killed in settler attacks so far this year. The Guardian reported that the attacks were occurring in the course of “an escalating campaign of aggression” across the West Bank, “aimed at driving Palestinians from their land.” The Guardian also reported that Israeli security leaders described the campaign as “terrorism.” “Every single journalist who looked at [the attack on me] are thinking they and I have gone to so many funerals of Palestinians killed by settlers,” Levine said.
Levine, who has lived in Israel for four decades, said she would return to reporting in the West Bank as soon as she recovered. “My work is important,” she said. “They have bruised me, broken some bones, but they haven’t cracked my spirit.”
Since the attack, Levine received letters from Israelis expressing regret and an apologetic phone call from Israeli President Isaac Herzog. Levine said Herzog kept saying, “I just want to give you a big hug.” She said he told her the attackers did not represent the country, called them “a dark stain” and called them “thugs.” She also said, “He was a teddy bear on the phone.”
The office of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu posted a statement on X, however, seeking to cast doubt on witness and video accounts of what he called an “alleged attack.” Levine said she was particularly angered by Netanyahu’s claim that some video footage “appears to show Levine knocked down and immediately helped to her feet by the same unidentified individual.”
Levine disputed that account. She said the attackers helped her up because they could not get her belongings off of her. “They helped me up because they couldn’t get my things off of me. That’s why,” she said. She said they robbed her of everything she had: “a pouch with my documents, my American passport, credit card, camera disk and a small camera bag with two other lenses.” Everything was gone, she said. After standing her up, the attackers threw her back down and continued to kick and hit her, Levine said.
Asked whether she expected her attackers to be brought to justice, Levine said her level of confidence was “two out of 10.” “I am not very hopeful,” she said. Levine said the government could act against the teenage suspects if it decided to do so, but said the response needed to go beyond arresting them to their leaders, the rabbis and how they were organised.
MSI previously reported the arrests of 10 suspects and the initial detention ruling for six men. Since then, an Israeli court has released four suspects in the attack on Levine under house arrest because the evidence was insufficient to keep them in custody.