CPTnet
December 26, 2003
HEBRON UPDATE: December 13-16, 2003

Saturday, December 13
No curfew

Maxine Nash and Diane Janzen went to Tel Rumeida where Israeli soldiers
had threatened to destroy a new fence that belongs to three Palestinian
families. The families live along Duboyya, a street used by Israeli
settlers from the Tel Rumeida settlement. As the settlers and soldier pass,
they often throw rocks and garbage at Palestinians and the houses. The
Palestinian governor's office in Hebron built the fence to keep settlers
from throwing things at the homes. The army said the families had to remove
the fence for security reasons and that if the families did not take it
down by 6:00 PM, the army would do it. The families had informed the
governor's office, who in turn was in dialogue with the Israelis asking
them not to destroy the fence.

Sunday, December 14
No curfew

Janzen and Greg Rollins returned to Tel Rumeida to see if the Israeli army
had destroyed the new fence belonging to the three Palestinian families.
The fence was still there and the families said they had not heard anything
from the army.

On their way home from Tel Rumeida, Janzen and Rollins met two observers
from Temporary International Presence in Hebron (TIPH.) TIPH said they had
just witnessed a group of settler women and children attacking Palestinian
workers from the Hebron Rehabilitation Program who were rebuilding
Palestinian homes on Tarek Ibn Zayed St. not far from the Tomb of the
Patriarchs and Matriarchs. The settlers poured out all the workers' cement
bags and knocked things over. The Israeli army had been present but did
little to stop the settlers.

Monday, December 15
No curfew

The team met with three members of the Italian organization Operation Dove,
who are looking to set up a team in West Bank.

Tuesday, December 16
No curfew

Nash and Jerry Levin, on morning school patrol were stopped by a
Palestinian working for the Hebron Rehabilitation Committee on old homes
lining the northern-most block of Tarek Ibn Zayed Street. He said that for
the past two days just after dark set in (approximately 5:00 PM) ten
settler women and about twenty five settler kids rampaged up and down the
street throwing stones at the houses, pounding at doors, uprooting a tree,
and screaming obscenities and threats. The man said that Israeli police
with the help of some soldiers, restored order.

Mid-morning, David Cockburn and Levin joined a group of six internationals
led by Hebron Rehabilitation Committee guides to the Wadi al-Ghroos, the
Palestinian farming area, lying between the north end of Kiryat Arba and
the southern edge of Harsina. (See previous CPTnet release, "Creeping
annexation Continues in Wadi Al-Ghroos.)"

At Wadi al-Ghroos they met local journalists and farming families from the
area, including several children. Everyone pitched in, especially the
children, to prepare some signs protesting the digging of new settler roads,
which will put another fifty or so dunams under settler control (four
dumans equals one acre.)

A number of the families had protested the road building to the Israeli
Civil Administration and were waiting to hear whether the Israelis would
pay any attention to their complaints.

The settlers who had been preventing the farmers from tilling their fields
and planting new crops where they have been building the new roads had been
restrained by a court order until a decision by the Israeli court. The
CPTers were shown grape arbors, with over-ripe grapes hanging from the
yellowing vines because the farmers were prevented from harvesting them.

The group went to the edge of the Palestinian land lying just beneath the
bluff on which Kiryat Arba sits and that the settlers are in the process of
stealing. A security guard drove close to the fence separating the
settlement from the field and asked why the internationals were there. The
internationals said they were "just visiting."

On the way back, the group was stopped by a police Jeep and the security
guard in his truck. The Palestinian children were still carrying the signs.
One sign said "Walls Kill Hope." The guard asked what it meant. One of the
internationals asked the guard, "How can these walls you've built be signs
of hope for the Palestinians." He replied with a snicker, "You mean fence?"

Then the guard asked about the signs. The group told him they were part of
the peaceful protest in the Wadi. The Policeman replied that the people
needed a license to have a demonstration.

The security guard asked why the internationals and Palestinians had "put
the black bag in the field." None of the internationals and Palestinians
knew what he was talking about, so he dropped the subject. The police jeep
and security guard truck shadowed the group as it left the area. At one
point, the police and security stopped and asked to see the IDs of Cockburn
and one of the Hebron Relief Committee guides. Police returned the IDs
quickly, but told the guide to report to the Police Station.

At about 4:30 in the afternoon, Levin, Cockburn, and Janzen came back to
the street where the settler women and children had been harassing workers
from the Hebron Rehabilitation Committee and patrolled it until shortly
before 6:00 PM. All remained quiet.

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