Palestinians protest, clash with Israeli troops

BETHLEHEM (WEST BANK), AUG 24: Cooped up and boiling over, Palestinians protesting Israel's three-week blockade of this biblical city threw...

BETHLEHEM (WEST BANK), AUG 24: Cooped up and boiling over, Palestinians protesting Israel’s three-week blockade of this biblical city threw stones and bottles at Israeli troops, who responded with tear gas and rubber bullets.

In Hebron on Saturday, hundreds of armed, masked Palestinians marched some firing bullets into the air to protest the Israeli border closure that is crippling their economy.

Israel has gradually lifted some of the restrictions it imposed on the West Bank and Gaza Strip after a July 30 suicide bombing in Jerusalem that killed 16 people. But the 60,000 residents of Bethlehem are still barred from leaving their town.

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Israel reportedly suspects that the masterminds of the blast, leading figures in the Islamic militant group Hamas, are hiding in Bethlehem, five miles (eight kilometers) South of Jerusalem.

About 300 Palestinians marched from the center of town Torachel’s Tomb, an Israeli enclave guarded by Israeli troops. About 150 people threw stones and empty bottles at the soldiers, and some burned an Israeli flag.

“The Israeli Government should know that we as a nation will never be humiliated,” said a 19-year-old stone thrower, his face masked by a white T-shirt. “They will lift the closure or we will burn the ground underneath their feet.”