Epal European Palestinian Media Center Bulletin, Issue No. 2532, Date: Friday, August 21, 2026

1. After nearly three years under the rubble, Gaza buries the remains of 50 victims

Palestinians in Gaza City held a funeral for the remains of 50 people killed, whose bodies were recovered by Civil Defense teams from beneath the rubble of destroyed homes after remaining buried for nearly three years since their homes were targeted during the first months of the war. The recovery operation took place amid a severe shortage of heavy equipment and difficulties accessing large areas that remain under the control of the Israeli occupation forces, while Palestinian families continue to wait for the remains of their relatives who are still buried beneath the rubble of destroyed homes.

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**2. Human rights center: Systematic Israeli targeting of police in Gaza exacerbates chaos**

The Palestinian Centre for Human Rights strongly condemned the targeting by Israeli occupation forces of a temporary municipal police headquarters in central Gaza City. The attack resulted in the killing of eight police officers, including two female officers, as well as a child who was inside a nearby municipal park, and injured 18 civilians, some of whom sustained injuries described as extremely serious. The attack came hours after a police officer and a security employee were detained in the southern Gaza Strip.

The center said the attack is part of a recurring pattern of targeting police and security personnel working to maintain public order in the Gaza Strip, while civilians, displaced people’s tents, markets, and civilian gatherings continue to be targeted in various parts of the Strip.

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**3. Five injured in settler attack on vehicle northeast of Ramallah**

Five Palestinians were injured in an attack carried out by settlers on a Palestinian vehicle in the Marj Si’a plain area, located between the villages of al-Mughayyir and Abu Falah, northeast of Ramallah.

Local sources reported that a group of settlers infiltrated the area and intercepted a vehicle carrying several Palestinians before attacking it, causing it to overturn. Members of the group then assaulted the passengers.

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**4. Settlers besiege Qusra for the 12th day; raids in the Jordan Valley and homes set ablaze**

For the 12th consecutive day, settlers continued to besiege three homes in the town of Qusra, south of Nablus, under the protection of Israeli occupation forces, in an attempt to seize them and impose a new fait accompli in the area.

Qusra Municipal Council Chairman Abdul Azim Wadi said that Israeli occupation forces and a number of settlers continue to besiege three homes in the Ras al-Ain area, preventing the families from entering or leaving them. One of the homes has been turned into a military barracks and taken over, while the area has simultaneously been declared a closed military zone.

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**5. Euro-Med: Israeli investigations into the killing of 35 Palestinians in Gaza reproduce a pattern of denial**

The Euro-Mediterranean Human Rights Monitor said that the Israeli occupation army acknowledged the facts surrounding five incidents that resulted in the deaths of 35 people in the Gaza Strip, but shielded those responsible from accountability after announcing, belatedly, that it had opened two investigations and closed three other cases.

The organization said the findings of the Israeli investigations reproduce a pattern of denial and misleading the public, while providing legal cover that protects military commanders from accountability. It noted that the five incidents included the targeting of employees of World Central Kitchen, Hind Rajab, and medical and UN personnel.

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**6. Israeli occupation authorities demolish two homes and uproot trees in Abda village in the Naqab**

Israeli occupation authorities demolished two homes in the village of Abda in the occupied Naqab desert and cut down around 10 trees in the village.

The Arab 48 website quoted a local activist as saying that “two inspectors from the so-called Israel Land Authority raided the village this morning in two four-wheel-drive vehicles, tied the two homes to the vehicles and pulled them, causing them to be demolished and destroyed immediately.”

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**7. Israeli occupation converts school building in Shu’afat camp into an Israeli-run school**

Israeli occupation authorities have converted the former school building of the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees (UNRWA) in Shu’afat refugee camp in occupied Jerusalem into a school affiliated with the Israeli Ministry of Education and the Jerusalem municipality.

Israeli Jerusalem Deputy Mayor Arieh King said the move aims to “erase any trace or memory of UNRWA” and remove it permanently from the city of Jerusalem.

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**8. #Video: Israeli occupation gunfire pursues Palestinians in Gaza**

**#Watch:** Under a barrage of gunfire, a displaced Palestinian young man in the Gaza Strip documents the moment he and others survived Israeli occupation sniper fire while attempting to move through the Shuja’iyya neighborhood, near the Yellow Line.

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# European

**9. Protests in Italy against Atalanta–Hapoel Tel Aviv match**

The Bergamo Network for Palestine called for a mass protest in northern Italy today, Thursday, to denounce the match between Italian club Atalanta and Israeli side Hapoel Tel Aviv in the UEFA Conference League, and to demand an end to what it described as Zionist colonialism in international sport.

The mobilization is taking place ahead of the match under the slogans “Get Zionism out of sport” and “Show Hapoel the red card,” amid growing popular and international calls to exclude all Israeli occupation clubs and entities from continental and international competitions.

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**10. Teacher suspended from teaching in Hesse over solidarity with Palestine**

German mathematics and computer science teacher Julian Hund announced that education authorities in the German state of Hesse had arbitrarily decided to suspend him from teaching because he had posted political views supporting the Palestinian cause and opposing the occupation on his personal social media accounts.

The measure, according to the report, exposes the growing use of administrative sanctions and professional intimidation by German security and education authorities to silence educators, even outside their official work and teaching duties in schools.

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**11. British courts prosecute five Palestine Action activists**

The activists had been arrested and prosecuted on charges of “criminal damage” after breaking the windows of a bank and spraying it with red paint in protest against its military support for the occupation. However, the judge moved to invoke terrorism legislation against them at the final stages without informing the defendants or the jury during the trial.

This judicial approach, according to the report, reveals a blatant violation and systematic double standard within the British legal system aimed at suppressing the boycott movement.

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**12. Hind Rajab Foundation rejects Israeli announcement of investigations into massacres in Gaza**

The Hind Rajab Foundation (HRF), based in Brussels, Belgium, announced that it does not trust the decision by the Israeli occupation army to open criminal investigations into the killing of Hind Rajab, her family, and Palestinian Red Crescent paramedics in January 2024.

The foundation said the move is an attempt to circumvent mounting international scrutiny and pressure and to conceal the ongoing genocidal war.

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**13. Australian solidarity group leader: The term “genocide” is not used to insult anyone but describes the scale of what is happening in Gaza**

Waverley Library in the Bondi Junction area of Sydney removed the book *How to Sell a Genocide: The Complicity of the Media in the Destruction of Gaza* by American author Adam Johnson from its shelves, following pressure from a survivor of the attack targeting a Hanukkah celebration event at Bondi Beach in December 2025.

According to the Jewish newspaper J-Wire, the individual had expressed distress at seeing the book displayed on the library’s “New Releases / Most Requested” shelf. The library is located within the same local council that oversees Bondi Beach.

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**14. Australia: Israel closing investigation into deaths of Gaza aid workers is an insult to us**

Australia summoned the Israeli ambassador in protest against the Israeli occupation army’s decision not to pursue criminal proceedings over the killing of Australian aid worker Zomi Frankcom and six of her colleagues in a strike targeting them in the Gaza Strip in April 2024.

The Australian government described the Israeli decision as a “profound insult” to Frankcom’s family and humanitarian workers and said it fell short of the accountability required over the deaths of aid personnel.

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# International

**15. City University of New York ordered to disclose investments in companies serving the occupation**

The City University of New York (CUNY) officially agreed to a legal settlement requiring it to comprehensively disclose records of its investments and financial contracts with 30 major companies linked to the Israeli entity and complicit in its aggression.

The decision ends a years-long legal dispute initiated by law student Sarah Southie in 2024, when she filed a request under the Freedom of Information Law (FOIL). Under the settlement, the university administration has committed to providing all records of its stocks and bonds retroactively to January 2020, within a maximum period of 15 days.

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**16. Academic sues Northwestern University and federal officials over dismissal following Gaza advocacy**

Stephen Thrasher, a former associate professor at Northwestern University’s Medill School of Journalism, filed a federal lawsuit against the university administration and government officials after being arbitrarily punished and dismissed over his public opposition to the genocidal war on the Gaza Strip.

The lawsuit came after the university suspended Thrasher from teaching, brought criminal allegations and disciplinary investigations against him, then denied him tenure and ultimately dismissed him, overriding a faculty committee decision that had cleared him and affirmed that the university had violated his academic freedom.

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**17. Palestine movement in Hungary secures legal decision allowing protest in Budapest**

The Palestinian community in Hungary obtained official recognition from the Budapest Metropolitan Police leadership that there was no legal basis for banning its planned demonstration on Friday, which is intended to express solidarity with Palestinian prisoners held in Israeli occupation prisons and support Dr. Hussam Abu Safiya.

Hungarian police officially confirmed that they had acknowledged the notification submitted regarding the gathering and its legal and constitutional standing, despite campaigns of incitement and intense pressure from Jewish organizations seeking to link the solidarity event to “support for terrorism.”

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**18. Human rights report refutes Israeli occupation investigations into Gaza**

The Euro-Mediterranean Human Rights Monitor said the findings announced by the Israeli occupation army concerning five incidents in which 35 people were killed, including children and humanitarian and medical workers, do not meet the standards of independent and effective criminal investigations.

The organization said the findings reproduce a pattern based on delaying investigations, denying the facts or presenting changing accounts of events, and then limiting responsibility to operational errors while closing cases without genuine criminal accountability.