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Occupation magazine - Life under occupation

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The isolation of the residents of Hebron – a tactic to break their spirit

By Yehudith Harel
Occupation Magazine
22 May 2005

Hebrew version: http://www.kibush.co.il/show_file.asp?num=3323

Yesterday (Saturday 21 May 2005) there was a report in the media that the attempt of Israeli peace activists to carry out a solidarity visit to residents of the Old City of Hebron, at the invitation of the latter, encountered energetic and violent opposition from the army. In the face of the nevertheless steadfast effort of the peace activists to enter the city of Hebron and to visit the Palestinian residents to hear what they had to say, many activists were arrested and many others were forced to slip away like thieves in the night. Needless to say, if they had been settlers from Beit Hadassah or Tel Rumeida or Beit Romano, or their friends and relatives, they would have gone in without any trouble, and on the main road, and even maybe accompanied by a (dubious) `honorary guard` from the army, sent to defend them from any harm.

Only the indigenous residents of Hebron, those who have lived there for generations, are forbidden to invite their friends. Only they are forbidden to live normal lives, to open their shops, to make business in the old market, to walk around the beautiful alleys of this market and just go in and out of the many alleys of the Old City to their hearts’ content, without passing military checkpoints and inspection stations and revolving iron “carousels” as the frightening barrels of rifles are pointed at them through slits in military positions set up at the entrances to the alleys.

My vocabulary does not contain words of adequate condemnation to describe the terrible reality that this miserable population has been living every day and night. Young people, women, old people and children are being constantly terrorized for about a decade. In fact, the situation has become immeasurably worse since the “Hebron Accord”, signed in 1996, divided the city and left the Old City under Israeli security control. Even the heading “Sodom and Gomorrah” would not be an exaggeration.

Anyone who visits the place can see the atrocity: blocked alleys, people cannot get to their homes so they have to climb the roofs, the passageways in the market are covered with mesh in order to stop the cinderblocks, bricks, iron bars and various kinds of garbage that the settlers take care to throw at their neighbours; everyone can see the abandoned and shuttered houses because there is no way to get to them after entire passageways were blocked for the convenience of the settlers. Everyone can see the closed shops the racist slogans scrawled on the locked iron doors. Everyone can hear from the mouths or the residents about their daily nightmare, about the fear that their children cannot peacefully go to and from school, their endless stories about blows sustained by youth, old people and children, usually with the army looking on. One can hear the recurring stories about pointless detentions by the army, about opening fire on unarmed people upon the slightest suspicion, thus causing injuries and even deaths among the residents. Lately the settlers have taken to a new method of terrifying the population: they are banging on Palestinians’ doors in the middle of the night, accompanied by terrifying and barking attack dogs, all with the goal of imposing fear and terror of themselves among the Palestinian residents.

And the above `stories` are only a few of the daily “experiences” of the Palestinian residents of the Old City and Tel Rumeida. Life in the neighbourhoods bordering the settlements (Avraham Avinu, Beit Romano, Beit Hadassa and Ramat Yishai) has become unbearable for the Palestinian residents who suffer in isolation from the outside world.

The timing of yesterday’s attempted visit was not coincidental, and it was carried out in response to the desperate appeal of local Palestinian residents who cannot bear the isolation imposed on them by the army as they become prisoners in their homes and absorb daily abuse by the violent settlers who live in their neighbourhood.

The question must be asked, why was it so important for the military authorities to prevent a visit of Israelis to the place? Why does the army take such an active hand in isolating the Palestinian residents of Hebron? Why does it bother the military authorities so much that a group of Israeli peace activists carries out a visit to Palestinian families who invited them to go there? It is not reasonable to assume that the army hopes thereby to prevent information on what is being done in Hebron from leaking out – after all, these days, thanks to the Internet, it is impossible to keep the situation “secret.” I can’t come up with any other explanation than that the authorities are working hand in hand together with the settlers to embitter the lives of the Palestinian residents. Thus I am of the view that the forbidding of a solidarity visit by Israeli peace activists constitutes another
ignominious step in the attempt to isolate the residents of Hebron and to abuse them with a clear goal: to make them despair and cause them to leave their homes and to clear the place out for the expansion - thirsty settlers.


To read more about the situation in Hebron – please go to:

Maia Carter: The Threat of solidarity (about the same visit)
http://www.kibush.co.il/show_file.asp?num=3317

Jerry Levine: While you were gone: Closure, confiscation, connivance and cupidity Part 1 -
http://www.kibush.co.il/show_file.asp?num=3123

Jerry Levine: Closure, confiscation, connivance and cupidity Part 2 -
http://www.kibush.co.il/show_file.asp?num=3301

Settlers attack and wound 3 women, one 11 years old child and a 70 years old woman
http://www.kibush.co.il/show_file.asp?num=3208

Palestinian Families from Tel Rumeida ask Israelis for urgent solidarity visit
http://www.kibush.co.il/show_file.asp?num=3014

Hebron: Palestinian Families in Crisis - settlers escalate violence
http://www.kibush.co.il/show_file.asp?num=2901

Btselem: Settler chidren stone old Palestinian Woman
http://www.kibush.co.il/show_file.asp?num=2853

Anna Buren; Hebron - terror in the shadow of Peace
http://www.kibush.co.il/show_file.asp?num=2241

You are also invited to visit our site:
http://www.kibush.co.il/show_file.asp?num=3014
and look up the word Hebron in the search engine.

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