The Gazan winner of Arab Idol, Mohammed Assaf, performed in front of some 40,000 fans in the West Bank town of Ramallah on Monday.
Crowds thronged a square near the tomb of the Palestinian president Yasser Arafat with a heavy security detail present, along with ambulances.
Assaf was greeted with cheers as he came on stage, surrounded by policemen holding back hundreds of fans who wanted a photograph with the singer.
Before beginning his performance, Assaf spoke to the crowds. “I am very pleased to be here with you and with the help of God, I have done you proud,” he said before launching into Raise the Keffiyeh, a Palestinian nationalist song which refers to the traditional chequered headscarf made famous by Arafat.
Assaf arrived in the West Bank, which is governed by president Mahmud Abbas’s Palestinian authority, on Monday afternoon, entering from Jordan over the Allenby Bridge. In Ramallah, Assaf laid a wreath on Arafat’s tomb before meeting Abbas.
The singer is due to visit the other West Bank towns Bethlehem, Hebron and Nablus.
On his return to Gaza on June 25, Assaf called for an end to the “division” with the West Bank, and urged “unity” between Palestinians.
The Israeli legal rights group Gisha stressed that the singer’s arrival was “exceptional not just because Palestinians consider him a national hero, but also because it is an exception to Israel’s consistent policy of blocking access between Gaza and the West Bank”.
“If Assaf had been anything less than a superstar, he would have had little chance of setting foot in the West Bank because of the Israeli policy of restricting the voyage to ‘exceptional humanitarian circumstances’,” Gisha said in a statement.
Born to Palestinian parents in Misurata, Libya, Assaf, 23, grew up in the Khan Yunis refugee camp in southern Gaza before winning the 2013 edition of Arab Idol in Beirut.
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North Pole stats
Distance covered: 160km
Temperature: -40°C
Weight of equipment: 45kg
Altitude (metres above sea level): 0
Terrain: Ice rock
South Pole stats
Distance covered: 130km
Temperature: -50°C
Weight of equipment: 50kg
Altitude (metres above sea level): 3,300
Terrain: Flat ice
UAE currency: the story behind the money in your pockets
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Country-size land deals
US interest in purchasing territory is not as outlandish as it sounds. Here's a look at some big land transactions between nations:
Louisiana Purchase
If Donald Trump is one who aims to broker "a deal of the century", then this was the "deal of the 19th Century". In 1803, the US nearly doubled in size when it bought 2,140,000 square kilometres from France for $15 million.
Florida Purchase Treaty
The US courted Spain for Florida for years. Spain eventually realised its burden in holding on to the territory and in 1819 effectively ceded it to America in a wider border treaty.
Alaska purchase
America's spending spree continued in 1867 when it acquired 1,518,800 km2 of Alaskan land from Russia for $7.2m. Critics panned the government for buying "useless land".
The Philippines
At the end of the Spanish-American War, a provision in the 1898 Treaty of Paris saw Spain surrender the Philippines for a payment of $20 million.
US Virgin Islands
It's not like a US president has never reached a deal with Denmark before. In 1917 the US purchased the Danish West Indies for $25m and renamed them the US Virgin Islands.
Gwadar
The most recent sovereign land purchase was in 1958 when Pakistan bought the southwestern port of Gwadar from Oman for 5.5bn Pakistan rupees.
FORSPOKEN
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Starfield
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Groom and Two Brides
Director: Elie Semaan
Starring: Abdullah Boushehri, Laila Abdallah, Lulwa Almulla
Rating: 3/5
