CPTnet
August 27, 2003
HEBRON UPDATE: August 14-August 24, 2003

Thursday August 14, 2003
No curfew

Jerry Levin and Diane Janzen went to the Palestine Polytechnic University,
Wadi Hariyya campus. Shortly after they got there, they learned that earlier
in the morning a graduate and former student leader, Mohammed Sidar, was
assassinated by the Israeli Army because he was a local Islamic Jihad
leader. The students spent the entire morning eulogizing him.

Friday August 15, 2003
No curfew

Greg Rollins, Kristin Anderson, and Levin went to the ruins of the building
where Mohammed Sidar died the day before. The owner, who lived next door,
said Israeli soldiers surrounded the building, destroyed it with rockets,
and then forced him to go in to see if anyone was inside. Later, Mohammad
Sidar's body was found behind the building.

Saturday August 16, 2003
No curfew

Sunday August 17, 2003
Kathy Kamphoefner, Paul Pierce, Rollins, and Anderson went to the wake for
Mazen Dana, a Reuters News Agency cameraman from Hebron. He was killed by a
U.S. soldier while on assignment in Iraq. He had planned to return home on
Monday, August 18.

Monday August 18, 2003
No curfew

A visiting delegation and several CPTers took part in a procession of
journalists from Hebron and elsewhere in the West Bank that traveled through
the streets of the city to protest the killing of Mazen Dana. Then the
group, about 200 in all, proceeded on foot to the TIPH (Temporary
International Presence Hebron) compound. Participants presented TIPH with
letters of protest because Denmark, a TIPH member, sent troops to Iraq.

Tuesday August 19 2003
No curfew

While a group toured the Ibrahimi Mosque, Kamphoefner intervened with border
police who had barred two Palestinians from walking down the short street
leading from the Old City past the mosque. The Israeli military has closed
the street to Palestinians for several weeks, even when there is no curfew.
In time,the border police let the Palestinians pass.

Anderson and Kamphoefner went to the Hart iSheik neighborhood and visited
the Juneidi family whose land (40 dunams/or 10 acres) the Israeli Army
confiscated to build a new base and observation tower. The land, however, is
not in H2--the area of Hebron left under Israeli security control as part of
Oslo II. The Israeli military confiscated it from H1 --the area of Hebron
that was turned over to the Palestinian Authority until the Israeli military
reoccupied it in June 2002. (See August 21 release, "New Israeli military
camps go up Sunday night in H-1." )

Wednesday August 20 2003
Curfew imposed in H1 and H2 at 5:30 pm

The team heard an explosion at about 3:37 pm, followed by about five minutes
of gunfire. At 5:30, the Israeli military imposed curfew possibly as part of
a massive West Bank crack down in reaction to a suicide bombing in Jerusalem
the night before.

Earlier in the day, Rollins, stuck at Beit 'Einun just as curfew was imposed
there, walked from that distant checkpoint to Hebron. In Hebron, he met
Pierce, and the two attended the funeral and internment of Mazen Dana in a
small cemetery, set aside in H1 for the burial of Palestinian "martyrs"
(Generally any Palestinian who dies as a result of fighting between Israelis
and Palestinians.)

Thursday August 21, 2003
No curfew

At 7 in the morning CPTers heard the sound of a home being blown up. They
found out later that it was the home of Tuesday's Jerusalem suicide bomber.
At 9:30 they heard another explosion they couldn't identify.

Rollins and Levin, on their way through Bab iZaweyya, came across soldiers
closing shops and ordering people away from the intersection. TIPH showed up
and reported that soldiers had just beaten a Palestinian man at the Duboyya
checkpoint. When when a soldier hit him with the butt of his gun, he
suffered an epileptic seizure. At Beit Romano checkpoint, Rollins asked a
soldier why he was involved in racist actions such as curfews. The soldier
did not answer the question, but he lectured the CPTers about not being out
during curfew.

Friday August 22, 2003
Curfew in H1 and H2

At midnight Rollins went out in response to several apparently nearby
explosions. He encountered Israeli Army jeeps with sirens blaring. A
percussion grenade went off in the Old City. He saw flares streaming in the
night sky above the Old City.

In the morning Rollins went to Bab iZaweyya. There were few people around,
but four soldiers were patrolling the area. The soldiers said they did not
have permission to answer Rollins's question as to why there was curfew. The
soldiers moved down the street. One started roughing up a little boy.
When they saw Rollins watching, they stopped the harassment and moved on.

Meanwhile, Joanne Lingle learned from an Israeli soldier stationed on a roof
across the street from the CPT apartment the reason for the noise early that
morning. The soldier claimed that a Palestinian, shooting a gun in the
marketplace, had been subdued and arrested. The soldier said no one was
hurt.

Later, five soldiers went up to the CPT apartment building's roof and
conducted what appeared to be a drill.

Saturday August 23, 2003
Curfew in H2

Rich Meyer, Janzen, Rollins, and Anderson went to a Palestinian home located
a few meters from an entrance to Kiryat Arba. The woman of the house
complained that settlers have thrown rocks at her home and the family's
store beneath it constantly. As a result they suffered a series of medical
problems, including a miscarriage due to physical
complications connected with a settler attack. Because the family is
forbidden to use the street in front of their house, which is reserved for
Israelis only, they can't open their store and must exit their second story
house via a ladder at the side of the house.

Sunday August 24, 2003
 Curfew in H