Video has surfaced of a brutal attack on a transgender woman and her two male friends that transpired in the Palestinian Authority on Monday.
The attack happened near the Palestinian city of Ramallah in the West Bank. The woman, identified only as “Sammy,” drove through the area on her way to a doctor’s appointment in the nearby village of Kafr ‘Aqab. Sammy and her two friends stopped to do some shopping after her appointment, at which point three men from a nearby refugee camp began filming Sammy inside the store. The group then attacked her male friend who waited outside near their vehicle.
Related: Wait, So Palestine Is Gay-Friendlier Than Israel Now?
The group of men began assaulting Sammy’s male companion, holding him against the hood of a car while repeatedly punching him in the face and kicking him. According to Miriam, a friend of Sammy’s, Sammy and her friend heard their friend screaming and ran outside to intervene. “When they came out of the store to see what was going on,” Miriam says, “the group of men assaulted them as well. They stole 52,000 shekels [about $15,000] from Sammy, took her and her friends’ phones, and then told them to run away.” The group also had their car vandalized and seriously damaged.
Two gay Palestinian youth were spotted in Ramallah and brutally attacked by people while police stood by idle.
There are no laws to protect LGBT people under the Palestinian Authority, where homosexuality is a punishable crime.@BuzzFeedLGBT pic.twitter.com/fSDPpSjlJa
— Mark Halawa – ???? ????? (@HalawaMark) December 2, 2019
Ultimately Sammy & her friends managed to escape. They returned to Israel where they had their injuries treated by medical professionals.
Mark Halawa, the man who reposted the video of the attack, condemned the local police for inaction. “Two gay Palestinian youth were spotted in Ramallah and brutally attacked by people while police stood by idle,” Halawa wrote on Monday. “There are no laws to protect [queer] people under the Palestinian Authority, where homosexuality is a punishable crime.” Indeed, earlier this year, Palestinian police threatened to “crack down” on LGBTQ events. Homosexuality remains a crime under Palestinian law.
???? pic.twitter.com/44MMRFYt73
— dudi d?lev (@dudid2428) December 2, 2019
maleficent
it’s all about the money…. much more here than being reported….classic queerty
Rock-N-RollHS
Umm, anti-gay religious hate has nothing to do with money, honey.
maleficent
rocks off …did you read the article?
Den
Did you?
Police don’t “stand idly by” in the case of robbery. However, with a governing body that criminalizes homosexuality and despises transgender people they are quite likely to look the other way for a hate crime.
There is a good reason why so many Christian and LGBT Palestinians live in Israel. Despite ongoing discrimination, it is safer.
Just because the thugs added robbery to assault does not mean that robbery was the motive.
ShiningSex
maleinefficient is a Trumptard. She’s on here to spread her awful hate towards our community. BAN HER!!!
Cam
The right wing troll will ALWAYS defend attacks on LGBT people.
Milton
Why do “tough” guys always attack in packs and always attack a weaker target? Gutless pathetic thugs thats all they are, a pack of cowardly animals.
ShiningSex
This kind of hate exists here too. It’s vile.
Nosso Crankee
Yes, it certainly does. I moved back to the Midwest from California some years ago. There’s an ingrained local yokum mentality prevalent here on the Prairie – and the public at large REVEL in their DNA deficient ignorance, broadcasting their fetid moral compasses with an obscene and boastful sense of entitlement and pride.
It has gone from very bad to AWFUL since the trumpkunt took office. His presence has emboldened every Hills Have Eyes mutant to slither out from their dank hidey-holes and malinger about, just waiting for an opportunity to bash and savage the community.
Cam
That takes guts to be openly trans in an area that criminalizes LGBT activities.
PLAYS WELL WITH OTHERS
Is that how those smcubag pukes practice their “religion of peace”???
Polaro
Yes, Islam sucks. Sorry. Not that Christianity is much better.
Hussain-TheCanadian
This is disgusting, the thugs and cowards are caught on video assaulting and robbing sammy and her friends, this needs to be taken directly to court and threaten the Palestinian authority with international press if the cowards are not caught and brought forward.
Is it not enough that the palestians are under israeli occupation and brutality, now it is allowed for roaming wolves to add to the trauma of innocent gay men for just being, this is unacceptable.
inbama
What? Hasn’t anyone told the Palestinians about “Intersectionality?”