Nazareth holds children’s event that honors killer of Israelis
Human reading-chain gathering is modeled after initiative by Baha Alyan, terrorist in Jerusalem bus attack last year in which three people were killed
Nazareth, the largest Arab-Israeli city, recently held a pro-reading and anti-violence event for children in honor of a Palestinian terrorist who murdered Israelis in Jerusalem last year.
On December 10, the city, in conjunction with Inma’a Association for Democracy and Capacity Building, held its “Nazareth reads” event, which saw hundreds of children sit and read in a line that stretched from the plaza of the Spring Square within Nazareth’s old city until the Church of the Annunciation, according to Palestinian Media Watch, which first reported the event in English.
The event honored Palestinian terrorist Baha Alyan, one of two men that attacked a bus in Jerusalem’s Armon Hanatziv neighborhood on October 13, 2015, shooting and stabbing passengers. Three people were killed as a result of the attack. Police who arrived at the scene shot and killed Alyan. The other attacker, Bilal Abu Ghanem, was shot and injured and taken into police custody.
In March 2014, Aylan had organized a human-reading chain event around the walls of the Old City of Jerusalem, which was attended by thousands of people, the Palestinian News Agency Ma’an reported.
Saeb Masawrah, the local Nazarene who came up with the idea for the human reading chain in his city, told the Arab-Israeli news site Arab48, “We saw fit to establish the largest and longest chain of readers in the city of Nazareth as a completion of the message of Martyr Baha Alyan who came out of Jerusalem. We are gathering here in order to emphasize our unity as Arabs everywhere, and we will complete the message in all of the Arab cities and villages,” according to a translation by Palestinian Media Watch.
Palestinian students in Birzeit University near Ramallah held a similar human reading-chain event in February in honor of Aylan.
Aylan has already been honored in Palestinian schools and by the Palestinian scouts.
Micah Lakin Avni, son of Richard Lakin who was killed Aylan’s attack, has campaigned against Palestinians glorying his father’s murderer.
