NBC News Team Reports Being Attacked By Settlers In The West Bank

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An NBC News team reported being attacked and injured Saturdday along with a Palestinian woman in the Israeli-occupied West Bank.

Video posted to NBCNews.com showed a gray car backing up to a white SUV as two men wearing masks jumped out and began slamming what appeared to be wooden planks into the vehicle’s windshield and side window.

A man could be heard shouting, “Woah! Woah!” as a woman screamed.

“Four members of an NBC team were interviewing Aida Ahmed Abdullah and her family in the Palestinian town of Jalud, near Nablus,” NBC News reported. “Abdullah said they had been driven out of their home by Israeli settlers, and the team was walking down the hill toward the house.”

That’s when the report said, “A gray car with Israeli license plates then drove in reverse up the hill toward them, and attacked “Abdullah and the crew with sticks,” as well as with rocks.

“They jumped out, beat us, then jumped back in the car,” said NBC News international correspondent Matt Bradley.

Bradley was treated at a nearby clinic for injuries he sustained.

Abdullah, 51, was taken by the Red Crescent for medical care, the report said. She remained hospitalized Saturday night.

“Three additional members of the NBC News team — a cameraman, producer and driver — were also injured and were treated following the attack,” the report said.

NBC News producer Lawahez Jabari said camera equipment and one of the crew’s vehicles were damaged during the attack. She also said she “saw a gun” but the masked attackers “didn’t use the gun.”

Photojournalist Khaldoon Eid, who lives in the West Bank, said the attack was a surprise.

“We didn’t expect that — that they would come to attack,” he said. “We were in the middle of a Palestinian area next to Palestinian houses.”

Israeli security forces told NBC News that “Israeli rioters had arrived in the area and that violent clashes had occurred, including stone-hurling toward Palestinians and additional civilians.”

In a statement, the security forces said, “Upon their arrival, the security forces identified dozens of rioters who had barricaded themselves inside a Palestinian home while Palestinian residents were inside.”

“The security forces who arrived at the scene initially operated to remove the rioters from the home and separate the groups, in order to protect the residents inside the house,” according to the statement. “In addition, the security forces confiscated vehicles belonging to the Israeli rioters that were suspected of having been used to reach the area.”

“IDF soldiers and Israel Border Police forces continue to operate in the areas of Qusra and Jalud to prevent further disturbances and restore order in the area,” the statement added added.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said he condemned the “criminal acts of violence committed in the villages of Kosra and Jalud by a handful of rioters who violate the law, cause enormous injustice to the law-abiding settler public, hinder the IDF in fulfilling its missions and harm Israel’s standing in the world.”

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