Palestinians launch general strike across Jerusalem, Judea, Samaria

Arabs living in eastern Jerusalem and in the Palestinian Authority launch a general strike, shuttering shops and factories, in protest against the Gaza war.

By World Israel News Staff

Shops, factories, schools, and offices across Judea, Samaria, and parts of eastern Jerusalem shut down Monday, as Palestinian Arabs declared a general strike in protest against the ongoing war between Israel and the Hamas terror organization in the Gaza Strip.

Plans for the strike were announced on Sunday by the Palestinian National and Islamic Forces (PNIF), a broad coalition of factions in the Palestinian Authority (PA), including the ruling Fatah party as well as the Hamas terror organization.

Organizers took to social media to urge “international supporters” to strike in solidarity to protest “the genocide and the ongoing massacre of our people.”

The strike spans “all the occupied Palestinian territories, in the refugee camps… and among those who support our cause,” the PNIF said.

Public transportation in some parts of Samaria was also closed down as part of the strike, the PA mouthpiece WAFA reported.

Banks, as well as governmental and PA civil institutions have also been shuttered across Judea and Samaria.

The areas impacted by the strike include the Old City of Jerusalem, with shopkeepers shutting stores throughout the Muslim Quarter.

“We close today because of our families in Gaza, our children in Gaza,” Imad Salman, a 68-year-old souvenir shop owner in the Old City of Jerusalem, told AFP.

“In Jerusalem, in the West Bank, we can’t do anything more than we’re doing here now.”

Some said the strike was directed as much against US President Donald Trump and his Gaza resettlement plan as it was against Israel.

“This strike is in solidarity with Gaza and what is happening there, and the war being waged against the Palestinian people, whether by Trump, Netanyahu, the Israeli government, or the American government,” said a man who identified himself only as Ahmed.

“This war must stop, the killing and destruction must stop, and only peace should prevail — peace, and nothing but peace.”