A Palestinian activist reported that “colonists” burned, at dawn on Thursday, a mosque and wrote racist slogans on its walls, northwest of Salfit in the central West Bank.
The Palestinian News and Information Agency (Wafa) quoted settlement resistance activist Nazmi Al-Salman as saying, “The people were surprised at dawn today by the colonialists burning the Hajja Hamida Mosque, located between the towns of Derastia and Kafil Haris, northwest of Salfit.”
He added, “The colonialists poured flammable materials at the entrance, but the intervention of the people prevented the fire from spreading to the entire mosque,” noting that “the colonialists also wrote racist slogans hostile to Arabs and Muslims on the walls of the mosque.”
For his part, US Secretary of State Marco Rubio expressed concern yesterday that the impact of the latest waves of violence carried out by Israeli settlers in the West Bank would extend to undermine the ceasefire efforts supported by the United States in Gaza.
He told reporters in response to a question about whether the events in the West Bank could jeopardize the ceasefire in Gaza: “I hope that does not happen… We do not expect that. “We will do everything we can to make sure this does not happen.”
