Map Position 4. Attack in Wadi
Yanoun
I interviewed Sameh abu Hani at the family house and yard one afternoon with his sister-in-law translating. She had studied English in secondary school and was quite good. She formed a friendship with an American woman, Emilie, who was in Yanoun last winter for two months with a Canadian man, Lucas Carpenter. She still gets phone calls from Emillie. Ghassan showed me the bullet wound scar in his leg when I visited him in Lower Yanoun. There is more detail on this attack in the David Nir article under map postion 8.
On May 10, 2000, Sameh (then 20), his brother Rami (then 14), Ghassan (about 35), and two men from Aqraba, were hand-cutting wheat in Wadi Yanoun (Yanoun Valley on the map). Twenty-five settlers from Itamar approached them firing their guns into the ground. The settlers took the five Palestinians captive and herded them to Abu Azeitah, a nearby hill, where they were forced to lie on the ground. Two settlers worked on each of the captives, beating them with sticks and keeping a gun pointed at their heads. All five were then forced to remove their shoes and walk around on the thorns.
At this point Avri Ran, the big man of Itamar, and known for his sadism, arrived and they had to lie down again. The settlers took a photo of each, and got their names. They picked out Ghassan and threatened to bash him with a big rock, but he rolled over and ran away. As he ran, the shot him in the leg, from which he still has a scar. He managed to escape and run for Aqraba, a few kilometers away.
They asked Sameh if Ghassan is his brother. No. They then beat Sameh with a stick again and told him to go get Ghassan within 10 minutes, or they would kill his brother Rami. Sameh left for Aqraba to try to find Ghassan
The Army came at this point, but the settlers hid the three remaining Palestinians in a grove of trees, so the Army left without investigating.
Sameh and Ghassan found a car in Aqraba to go to the hospital in Nablus, which at that time was only 15 kilometers, since the settlers and the Army had not yet closed the road. By Wadi Yanoun they picked up the other three and all five went to the hospital. The car was held up at a checkpoint for two hours. Sameh and Rami stayed for three days in the hospital and were released.
Only Sameh has long-term effects. His beatings injured his back and side and he is in pain, and cannot do any heavy work. Every three months he goes to the hospital in Aqraba for an injection.