Mick Hartley

More on that Oxford Union cancellation (yesterday).

The red hands, in Palestinian iconography, celebrate the Ramallah lynching in October 2000, when two Israeli reservists strayed by mistake into Palestinian territory:

According to accounts, rumors spread that Israeli undercover agents were being detained at the police station, prompting a crowd of over 1,000 to gather calling for their deaths. While Israeli intelligence got word that the reservists were being detained and a crowd was gathering, the IDF allegedly decided against a rescue operation due to the presence of PA security forces in the area. Haaretz and Maariv, The Jerusalem Post’s sister publication, also reported that 13 Palestinian policemen were injured trying to prevent the mob from storming the station and conducting the lynching. 

The IDF reservists were murdered by the crowd via beatings and stabbings, with one Italian news outlet later capturing the infamous photo Aziz Salha raising his blood-soaked hands to the cheering crowd. The reservists’ bodies were then thrown out the window, mutilated and set on fire. The bodies were then dragged to Al-Manara Square in the city center. PA security forces, aware of the seriousness, attempted to confiscate film showing the events.