A man came to our house, asking, "Where is Nasser?  Is Nasser here?"

I didn't quite know how to respond, because Nasser is in jail.  He's not in jail because he did anything wrong.  He's in jail because he's Palestinian, and because he's living in the South Hebron hills in Area C, an area under full Israeli control.  He's in jail because the mission of the Israeli military and police is to protect settlers, whatever the behavior of those settlers may be.  Nasser was arrested because he tried to build a house, a house the settlers didn't want him to build, and thus, the military and police didn't want him to build. 

During July 2009, Palestinians from the village of At-Tuwani and the surrounding villages continued their nonviolent resistance against the Israeli occupation, including organizing a demonstration in response to Israeli settlement and outpost expansion, exercising their right to build on their land in defiance of stop work orders, organizing a children's march from At-Tuwani to Tuba, and regularly accessing their land, despite Israeli military and settler harassment and violence.

An Israeli soldier chased and assaulted a thirteen-year-old Palestinian youth by the Ibrahimi Mosque Gate on Saturday, 8 August, leaving red welts on his shoulder and back.  CPTers Paulette Schroeder and Claire Evans saw the soldier chase the boy and heard the boy's cries, after they passed through the Mosque Gate shortly after 5:00 p.m.  As the CPTers rounded the bend, they saw the boy crouched by the cement barrier wall, crying out.  The soldier's colleagues had by that time separated the angry soldier from the boy.

Today there was a nonviolent training in the South Hebron hills village of At-Tuwani.  There were workshops for women and for men.  People came from Mfaqqara, Rakiis, Juwayya, and of course, At-Tuwani.

This goes out to all the doubters.

General Situation
Regular military patrols, detentions at checkpoints, sporadic soldier and Border Police harassment, and attacks on Palestinians continued through the month of July.  The Israeli military replaced plastic barriers with more solid barriers in the Israeli-controlled H2 area of Al-Khaliil, further restricting movements of local Palestinians and separating walking routes for Palestinians and settlers.  A solid cement wall has replaced heavy stacked barrels in one barrier on Shuhada Street.

During July, CPT hosted at 26-30 international groups of various sizes, which were interested in CPT work and in better knowing the situation of the conflict in Palestine.  For two weeks of this month, John Harris led a delegation of his friends from Pentecostals for Peace and Justice.

SOUTH HEBRON HILLS, PALESTINE At noon on 5 August 2009 between the villages of Mfaggara and Jinba, Israeli soldiers dug up the road with a military bulldozer, creating three earth mounds that made using the road impossible.

The entire village of Kallet Adbea now lies between two of the earth mounds, which also affect villages south of Kallet Adbea.  Approximately 700 Palestinians living in the area now do not have access to the nearby village of At-Tuwani or to the city of Yatta, north of At-Tuwani

Hebron/Palestine  On Monday, 3 August, CPTers Lorin Peters, Paulette Schroeder, and Aida Hayes walked to Tel Rumeida in the evening to meet a member of the CPT Advisory Council.  They used the street leading to the Council members’ house, which passed the Israeli settlement of Tel Rumeida, and tried unsuccessfully to find a way past Tel Rumeida settlement to the house.  Palestinian and Jewish houses in the area are completely separated; metal walls, barbed wire, and a locked gate surrounded the Palestinian home they wished to visit.