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Saturday, June 14th, 2003
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5:45 pm - HEBRON: Is this on the Road Map? Dirt roadblocks installed around Hebron
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CPTnet
June 14, 2003
HEBRON: Is this on the Road Map? Dirt roadblocks installed around Hebron
On Thursday night, June 12, the Israeli army dug deep holes in all the streets leading into the El-Manara vegetable market in Hebron and amassed huge piles of rubble to close off all roads into the area.
Roadblocks also were plowed onto heavily-used streets in other sections of Hebron. The Israeli bulldozers erecting the roadblocks severed water pipes and electrical wires in these densely populated areas.
CPTers took photos of the damaged areas on Friday, June 13. Pictures of the road blocks are available under the title "Dirt Roadblocks around Hebron" at http://www.clubphoto.com Login as: guest.49296@MennoLink.org.
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5:27 pm - Hebron Update: May 19 - June 8, 2003
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CPTnet
June 13, 2003
Hebron Update: May 19 - June 8, 2003
Monday May 19
Curfew lifted 9a.m. - 1p.m.
Greg Rollins still in Ramle Prison
On school patrol, Sue Rhodes saw a soldier chasing five small school girls with his gun pointed at them. The girls were very frightened by the time they reached the school gate. The soldier said he had had his gun reversed and that he was shouting because it was curfew. "They must go!" he said and then added "and you go." A settler nearby also shouted "Go!" at Rhodes.
Chris Brown, Mary Lawrence, Diane Janzen and Germana Nijim stood near the school gate, and other pupils passed without difficulty.
Kathie Uhler and Eric Schiller returned from Jabel Johar where they had been staying with the Da'na family. The family was still concerned that their homes were threatened with demolition. Uhler and Schiller went back to the Da'nas, prepared to stay until May 21.
Just before 4 p.m. an Israeli army patrol of six soldiers came up the team's stairs and announced they would search the apartment. They noted the maps, posters and books. The team phoned the lawyer who said items removed had to be signed for.
After about an hour the patrol went to the roof for "an exercise." Rhodes and Lawrence spoke separately with two of the soldiers. They are part of a unit which serves four years, two of which are in community service.
( Read more... )
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| Tuesday, June 10th, 2003
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9:18 pm - HEBRON: Israeli army welds Hebron University gate shut
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CPTnet
June 10, 2003
HEBRON: Israeli army welds Hebron University gate shut
The Israeli military welded shut the main gate of Hebron University at 2:00AM on June 10, resuming the fifth month of a six-month closure, and declared the area a closed military zone. Soldiers turned away the students at the gate in the morning and fired percussion grenades at them. The military then imposed a strict curfew on the surrounding neighborhood.
An official of Hebron University told CPTers that the administration is unaware of what Israeli soldiers may have done inside the gate. He said, "The IDF [Israeli Defence Force] wants to put Hebron University in a hectic psychological position." The educational process will probably restart, he said, in the schools, shops and rooms in which it has been conducted for the past five months of the closure. But, he added, the students do not want to return to this regime, and so the administration remains undecided about what course to take next.
The Israeli military action ended a six-day effort to reclaim the campus that began when students sawed open the previously-welded university gates on the morning of June 4. Students told CPTers who visited the campus that day that they believed the conference on the Road Map to peace that had just begun in Aqaba would show support for their action to regain the right to an education.
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| Sunday, June 8th, 2003
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2:18 am - HEBRON REFLECTION: Greg Rollins writes about his weeks in an Israeli prison
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CPTnet
June 7, 2003
HEBRON REFLECTION: Greg Rollins writes about his weeks in an Israeli prison
The walls of prisons are thick. I believe they are built that way not only to keep the prisoners in, but also to keep prayers out. When I was in prison I prayed a lot, sometimes by myself, sometimes with friends who visited me, sometimes with a group of West African men who were being deported for working in Israel without a permit.
But it was not my own prayers that gave me the strength I needed, it was the prayers and support of the people on the outside that helped. I would go on and name them, but there are too many to list. Besides, I don't even know ninety-five percent of the people who supported me.
All of the men I was in imprisoned with were foreign workers who had overstayed their visas and had little support from outside. Yes, their wives or parents knew of their detentions, but were not in any position to help them other than send money. Other men had expired passports and could not have them renewed because their government would not issue them new passports, or their embassies no longer existed in Israel.
Unlike these men, there are others here who might have support, but not know why they are jailed. Palestinian prisoners often have support outside of prison, but do not know why they are in jail. Under Israeli law, it is legal to detain a Palestinian for up to six months without him knowing why.
Because I was also held without knowing why, for seventeen days, I can relate to how some Palestinians must feel when they are detained.
For me, this feeling was one of absurdity. I found it ridiculous that I was arrested by Israelis for being in a Palestinian city. Israel often claims they want the Palestinian Authority (PA) to be accountable and take care of its own problems within Palestinian areas. If that is the case, then it should be up to the PA, not the Israeli government, to decide whether or not internationals can enter their cities.
In the end, what helped me change my focus from anger at the absurdity of my situation to one of patience was knowing that there were people outside who supported me and CPT in general. Whether this support came through prayer, faxes and phone calls to various embassies and Members of Parliament, or words written to let people know what was happening, I am grateful for all the work done on my and CPT's behalf. As we say in CPT Hebron, I owe you all a lot of chocolate.
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2:14 am - HEBRON: Students re-open gates of Hebron University
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CPTnet
June 5, 2003
HEBRON: Students re-open gates of Hebron University
by Kathy Kamphoefner
Hebron University students re-opened the university gates at 11:00 am on June 4, 2003. The Israeli army had welded the two main gates shut when they closed the university for a six-month period to end on July 11.
"It's a great day that the students opened the gate to the university," said a university spokesperson. During the university's closure, students have been studying in smaller groups in various locations, including homes and in elementary schools. "Library access has been the most important thing they have lacked," the spokesperson reported.
Hebron University hopes to resume normal operation for summer school.
A rumor was an apparent motivation for today's action. Students had heard that the Israeli army was going to impose an additional six months of closure, according to one university professor. The Road Map meetings in Aqaba motivated the timing of their nonviolent action. "This is a peaceful movement, and the students just want to practice their basic human right for education," he said.
CPTers Kathy Kamphoefner, Paul Pierce and Kathie Uhler visited the university and joined with students, staff and faculty to celebrate the opening of the gates later in the day.
In June 1995, CPTers had helped students open the the main gate to the campus, which the Israeli military had kept welded shut for several years--since the time of the first Intifada.
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| Tuesday, June 3rd, 2003
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6:32 pm - HEBRON UPDATE: May 5-18, 2003
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CPTnet
June 3, 2003
HEBRON UPDATE: May 5-18, 2003
Monday, May 5
At 7 am a teacher who lives on Yatta Road called to say that soldiers had entered his home at 5 am. CPTers Mary Lawrence and Germana Nijim went to the house. There were six soldiers on the roof of the house and two soldiers in the teacher's apartment. CPTers asked the soldiers why they were in the house. The soldiers replied that the CPTers would have to ask their commander.
Lawrence and Nijim sat on the landing below the living room to observe because the teacher's wife and his two small children were in the bedroom. The soldiers told Nijim and Lawrence that they could not stay there and should move down. They sat further down the stairs with the teacher, remaining there for six hours. At 2:30 pm Diane Janzen replaced Lawrence. Nijim and Janzen remained in the house until 7 pm when the soldiers left. The soldiers then detained Palestinian young men who were in the street. When the CPTers left the house, the soldiers told them to go back inside, because it was curfew. Janzen and Nijim said they were going back to the CPT apartment. One told the team members they were tourists here and did not belong. After the soldiers detained them briefly, they let them return to the CPT apartment.
Tuesday, May 6
(Israel Independence Day)
The Israeli military imposed a tight curfew on the old city because it was Israel Independence Day. Israelis marked the day with speeches and a fireworks display at the Tomb of the Patriarchs.
Wednesday May 7
While on school patrol Janzen and Lawrence were turned back by the Border Police at the Ibrahimi Mosque checkpoint. They were told they could not pass because they were "tourists." They showed their CPT ID cards and the border policeman said "I know who you are. But you cannot pass." At the Ibrahimi boy's school CPTers were told that they had to obey the curfew and return to their apartment. (Until that time CPTers had been allowed out during curfew.) They returned to the apartment through the "ladder lady's" house, the only way into the old city, because the gate at the Ibrahimi Mosque was closed.
Thursday May 8
The team, along with members of TIPH (Temporary International Presence in Hebron) was invited to Ma'aref school for graduation ceremonies.
Friday May 9
The team heard that Israeli soldiers had raided the offices of the International Solidarity Movement offices in Beit Sahour. The soldiers removed all the computers and detained four people, including two internationals whom the soldiers later arrested.
Greg Rollins, Harriet Taylor, guest Josh Vander Velde, and Lawrence visited a CSD family in Beit Ummar. While in Beit Ummar, they closed the CPT apartment and office which had been in use since April of 2002.
Monday May 12
The team found that the Israeli military had completed two partial roadblocks at Tariq Ibn Ziyad junction, with large, concrete roadblocks.
Rollins, Mary Lawrence, Diane Janzen, Germana Nijim and a Jewish visitor went to Susia, a village south of Hebron to help a Palestinian family while they worked in their fields below an Israeli outpost. Israeli settlers and soldiers had chased the family off their the last time they worked there. The family were able to accomplish their harvesting in peace.
Two women from Amnesty International visited CPT.
Tuesday May 13
Eric Schiller, Kathie Uhler, Harriet Taylor and a Jewish friend paid a visit to the Da'na family in Jebel Johar. Two of the Da'na homes were issued with demolition orders by the Israeli army in April.
Wednesday May 14
An official visit was made by the British Consul General, Piers Cazalet, to the Beqa'a valley area. Mary Lawrence, Sue Rhodes and the Director of the Hebron Land Defense Committee, accompanied him. Afterwards Lawrence and Rhodes took him to the CPT apartment for tea and a roof-top orientation of the Old City of Hebron.
Thursday May 15
Rollins and Uhler met the American Political Officer, Michael Pascual at Beit Aynoun and took him for a tour of the Beqa'a valley. He noted the increase in settler land appropriation, and the group watched settlers erecting a metal fence on Palestinian agricultural land.
After prolonged search and interrogation a Jewish female visitor permitted to come to the apartment. She had arrived on the settler bus from Jerusalem/Tel Aviv.
Friday May 16
The two Jewish guests led the team worship explaining the ritual and traditions of the service as they did so.
Kathie Uhler and Eric Schiller began a six day stay with the Da'na family in Jabal Johar. This extended family lives right next to the Kiryat Arba settlement. Violent clashes with settlers have occurred nearby and two of the Da'na homes are threatened with demolition.
One of the team's translators invited the team to her birthday party. The gate was locked before the return home so the team climbed over the roof tops in the dark.
Saturday May 17
After an uneventful school patrol, Rollins, Janzen, Nijim and Rhodes met an army patrol of four, led by a young woman, in the Old City. She said that there was curfew and children were not allowed to go to school.
At about 11am, smoke was seen rising from a building across the road from the apartment which faces out on to Shuhada Street. Israeli police, army and eventually a fire truck arrived.
Just after 7 pm a very loud explosion shook the area around the CPT apartment. The team went to the roof and watched smoke rise from the Gross Square area as ambulances, fire trucks, army and police vehicles rushed to the scene. The team later learned that a Palestinian suicide bomber had killed two Israeli settlers, a man and his pregnant wife.
Later in the evening settlers banged loudly on the doors of Palestinian shops and homes along Shuhada Street and continued for most of the night.
Sunday May 18
At 6 am, a Palestinian militant bombed blew himself up on a bus in Jerusalem.
Soldiers would not permit Lawrence, Janzen, Chris Brown, Nijim, Harriet Taylor and Rollins to leave the Old City to do school patrol with the Palestinian children. Rollins, Brown, Lawrence and Janzen reached Bab iZaweyya using the 'tunnel' network. Rollins and Brown stayed to observe the detention of about thirty Palestinian men by Israeli soldiers at the Beit Hadassah check point. They had to hand in their passports and visas to the soldiers and were detained together with a Palestinian observer.
After about three hours Brown and most of the Palestinians were released. Soldiers took Rollins to the police station near Kiryat Arba Israeli settlement where the police put him under arrest. The team alerted the CPT Chicago office, the CPT lawyer and the Canadian Embassy.
Uhler and Schiller continued to stay with the Da'na family at Jabal Johar.
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| Wednesday, May 21st, 2003
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5:44 am - HEBRON: Israel Cracks Down -- CPTer Arrested; Office Searched; Team Restricted
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CPTNet
May 20, 2003
HEBRON: Israel Cracks Down -- CPTer Arrested; Office Searched; Team
Restricted
CPTer Greg Rollins (Surrey, BC) is currently being held in an Israeli prison in Tel Aviv threatened with deportation. Rollins' attorney, Jonathan Kuttab, is seeking an injunction from the Israeli High Court to block deportation.
Rollins was arrested Sunday while he and CPTer Chris Brown (San Francisco, CA) monitored the detention of several Palestinian men by Israeli soldiers in H1 (the area of Hebron under Palestinian control). The soldiers checked the CPTers' IDs, but Rollins only had a photocopy of his passport because the original had been damaged and was at the Canadian Embassy in Tel Aviv for replacement. Soldiers took Rollins into custody but did not charge him with any crime.
In further developments, eight Israeli soldiers entered and searched CPT's apartments (living quarters and office) at 8:20pm on Tuesday, May 20. They examined the passports and visas of the CPTers present, photographed the apartment and individual team members, studied the maps and pictures on the wall, and scrutinized the contents of the filing cabinet.
The soldiers then verbally issued the following orders to the team:
H1 (part of Hebron under Palestinian control)
*CPTers are not allowed in H1 at all. If Israeli troops catch CPTers in H1 they will arrest them and deport them.
*No internationals or Israelis are allowed in H1 except those working for NGOs recognized by the Israeli government.
H2 (part of Hebron controlled by the Israeli military, includes the old city where the CPT apartments and four Israeli settlements are located):
*CPTers are not to go anywhere near an Israeli settlement.
*CPTers are not to accompany school children to school in H2.
*CPTers will not be allowed back into H2 if they leave (e.g. to go to Jerusalem).
This is the second search of the CPT apartment within the past two days. On Monday, the soldiers did not ask for passports and visas and did not pass on any orders to CPT.
International peace workers are an essential part of the reconciliation process. CPT will do everything possible to continue our work of contributing to the road to authentic peace in Israel/Palestine. We ask supporters to remain alert to further developments and possible action requests.
Current CPT Hebron Team members are: Sue Rhodes (Bath, England), Germana Nijim (Cedar Falls, IA), Mary Lawrence (Lunenburg, MA), Eric Schiller (Ottawa, ON), Harriet Taylor (Germantown, MD), Chris Brown (San Francisco, CA), Greg Rollins (Surrey, BC), Kathie Uhler (New York, NY), Diane Janzen (Calgary, AB)
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| Saturday, May 17th, 2003
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11:07 am - HEBRON UPDATE: April 28 -May 4, 2003
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CPTnet
May 16, 2003
HEBRON UPDATE: April 28 -May 4, 2003
Monday, April 28
During school patrol two street cleaners told CPTers Germana Nijim and Eric Schiller that soldiers were detaining a schoolboy. Nijim and Schiller went back to investigate. They found several soldiers holding the boy, who appeared to be eight or nine years old. The soldiers had asked the boy to show the contents of his school bag. As Nijim and Schiller approached, the soldiers let the boy go. The boy then picked up a stone to throw at the soldiers. Two Palestinian adults talked the boy into dropping the stone, and he went on to school. As Nijim and Schiller walked away a car passed them and the settler driving it shouted obscenities at them.
In response to a call from internationals staying in a home that is threatened with a demolition order, Greg Rollins and Ecumenical Accompanier (EA) Theo Von Fellenberg went to the home in Jabal Johar. Two Israeli Defense Force bulldozers were on the scene, and the family was afraid their home was going to be destroyed. However, the bulldozers were continuing to make a road around the Israeli settlement of Kiryat Arba.
The team learned that the appeal to stop the demolition of the houses was denied by the Israeli military court.
Tuesday, April 29
Team members saw six soldiers climbing over the roofs nearby. They came onto the roof of the Turkish bath next to the CPT apartment. One soldier looked up to where Nijim and Mary Lawrence were watching.
"What's happening?" asked Lawrence. "Nothing is happening," replied the soldier "We're just hanging out." The soldiers made their way across the neighbors' roofs all the way down to the end of the Shuhada Street shops and remained there for about thirty minutes.
Thursday, May 1
CPTers Nijim and Eric Schiller went out to the Beqa'a valley to visit a family that lives across from Hilltop 26, a recently dismantled Israeli outpost. The family told the CPTers that groups of about fifteen to twenty settlers sometimes take walking tours through Palestinian vineyards, which intimidates the Palestinian farmers, who stop working and leave.
At another Palestinian home near Harsina settlement, the CPTers noticed that a barrier of earth and rocks which had previously blocked access onto road 60 had been opened up. Trucks were now able to get from the highway to the Palestinian farm roads. They had heard an earlier report that soldiers had shot out the tires of trucks entering highway 60.
Saturday, May 2
Nijim, Schiller, Diane Janzen and Rollins went with Ta'ayush (an Israeli peace organization) to Twaneh, a Palestinian village in the south Hebron hills. On Shabbat, the Israel settlers from Ma'on, harass the villagers. The CPTers and Ta'ayush members helped Palestinian farmers plow their fields. The farmers had not been able to work on their land for two years because one settler would shoot at them when they came into the fields to work.
After they had been working for two hours Israeli soldiers arrived and told them that the area was a "closed military zone." The group of CPTers and Ta'ayush were ordered back to their cars by the soldiers and then forced to leave.
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| Friday, May 16th, 2003
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8:47 pm - HEBRON URGENT PRAYER REQUEST: Hold Dana family and their homes in prayer
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CPTnet
May 16, 2003
HEBRON URGENT PRAYER REQUEST: Hold Dana family and their homes in prayer
Tonight and tomorrow night CPTers Kathie Uhler (New York, NY) and Eric Schiller (Ottawa, ON) are staying with the extended Dana family in their homes in the neighborhood of Jabal Johar, right next to the Kiryat Arba settlement. The Israeli military gave two homes demolition orders to families living there, but an Israeli lawyer was able to get a stay from the High Court, in part because no violence has ever been attributed to the Dana family members. On the contrary, they have experienced considerable violence from Israeli settlers. These homes, and about fifteen other homes of Palestinian families, stand in the way of Kiryat Arba settlement expansion plans.
In staying the demolition orders, the Israeli High Court gave the military until May 21 to appeal that stay of demolition. Schiller writes, "There are signs that an appeal will be forthcoming. The Dana family homes have been searched regularly by soldiers. Recently settlers have been doing land surveying around their houses and pointing their fingers mockingly at their homes. One night recently they had their homes pelted with stones for about an hour, while the Israeli army watched. This is the kind of harrassment that often precedes a takeover of homes."
The Dana family has asked CPTers to stay with them at least until May 21. Please remember the Dana family in your prayers, pray that no harm will come to them in the coming week. When we told the Dana family that we would be asking for prayers for them, Mohammed Dana said, "Pray that our house is not demolished. We thank God and the people who are helping us. We have no relation with any gunmen. We live in our houses, just our family, for 40 years, never hurting anyone. My home is my life; my children are here and need a home. They can kill me, but just leave the home."
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| Sunday, May 4th, 2003
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11:01 pm - HEBRON UPDATE: April 21-27, 2003
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CPTnet
May 2, 2003
HEBRON UPDATE: April 21-27, 2003
Monday, April 21
Curfew
CPTers Chris Brown, Donna Hicks, Diane Janzen, Mary Lawrence, and Greg Rollins left the old market via the ladder lady's door (See February 27 release, "The Ladder Lady.") Brown and Franzen headed to the Jabal Johar neighborhood near the Israeli settlement Kiryat Arba, because the Israeli military has slated homes there for demolitions. Soldiers stopped them at the end of "worshippers' way." They joined Hicks, Lawrence, and Rollins on school patrol instead.
The team observed Palestinian boys throwing stones at Israeli military near the foot of Tariq ibn Ziad Street. Two border police jeeps arrived and announced over loudspeakers in Arabic and English that there was school. Lawrence and Rollins helped some frightened girls over the machsou (barriers erected by the military) and onto Tariq ibn Ziad Street. Lawrence accompanied them part of the way up the street. Eventually the stone throwing stopped and most of the children got to school.
The team learned that eighteen internationals were staying at the Jabal Johar homes threatened with demolition.
Tuesday, April 22
Curfew lifted 6am-6pm
A Palestinian boy told CPTers that he had gone out after curfew to get feed for his family's livestock near the Abu Sneineh neighborhood. A jeep of soldiers stopped him and shouted at him in Hebrew. When he did not respond because he did not understand Hebrew, the soldiers got out and hit him with their rifles, breaking his arm.
Wednesday, April 23
Curfew lifted 6am-6pm
Lawrence called Ariel prison to check the status of an International Solidarity Movement (ISM) Palestinian activist and an Italian reporter, letting the officials know others were aware of the detentions of activists and journalists.
Hicks, Rollins, and the team's translator visited families in the Beqa'a Valley. All talked about the difficulties of moving produce into the city. They also spoke about the Israeli settlers and how they keep stealing the land. On the way back into Hebron, they visited some of the families in Jabal Johar threatened with home demolitions. They learned about the internationals staying there and that the cases are still in court.
On their way back down the hill, soldiers stopped them many times because it was after curfew.
Thursday, April 24
Curfew 6pm-6am
A friend of the team in Beit Ummar called to report that Israeli settlers had kidnapped two tractor drivers and their vehicles near the Israeli settlement Karme Zur. The settlers released the drivers after three hours but kept the tractors. They said that no Palestinians were allowed to work on their land in that area. Settlers had also forced Palestinians off their land the day before.
Janzen and Ecumenical Accompanier Hallstein Laupsa learned from the Jabal Johar families that soldiers are searching their homes daily.
Friday, April 25
Curfew at 6pm
CPTers Le Anne Clausen, Janzen, and Rollins spent the night with the Jabal Johar families threatened with home demolitions. During the night, soldiers entered the house where they were staying but left quickly when they saw CPTers along with five other internationals in the house.
Saturday, April 26
Curfew lifted 12 noon-4pm
Clausen, Janzen, and Rollins watched Israeli soldiers in Jabal Johar stop a Palestinian van during curfew. They forced the driver to drive the van to the school at the top of the hill, taken over by the army at the beginning of the second Intifada, and leave it there. A Palestinian friend told Rollins that the driver would probably be allowed to pick up his van in several days.
Sunday, April 27
Curfew lifted 6am-6pm
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| Saturday, April 26th, 2003
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1:02 pm - HEBRON UPDATE: April 7-20, 2003
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CPTnet
April 25, 2003
HEBRON UPDATE: April 7-20, 2003
Monday, April 7
At noon,the Palestinian Hebron District Governor's office informed the team that IDF soldiers had entered a Palestinian home on Jabal Johar next to the Israeli settlement Kiryat Arba.
Donna Hicks, Mary Lawrence, and Ecumenical Accompanier (EA) Hallstein Laupsa walked to the Jabal Johar neighborhood, where they were invited into another family's compound to photograph damage from an incursion by the Israeli army on April 6. After viewing the damage and taking photographs, the CPTers climbed up the hill to the home invaded by the army the night before. The army had forced out the family, who spent the night with neighbors. When they returned in the morning, they found the soldiers had occupied the two upper floors of the house and the roof.
Tuesday, April 8
CPTer Chris Brown and EA's Laupsa and Tord Strom paid a return visit to the family whose home settlers and soldiers had attacked on April 6. Israeli soldiers briefly occupied the rooftop of one of the homes and restricted the family of thirteen to the first floor.
Wednesday, April 9
While on school patrol, Israeli soldiers stopped CPTers near the Avraham Avinu settlement and asked to produce identification because "a terrorist stole a CPT car", according to a soldier. The CPTers informed the soldiers that CPT did not have a car.
A journalist friend of the team called in the morning requesting assistance. Kristin Anderson and Brown met the friend and another journalist on Shalala Street and accompanied them to the Beit Hadassah checkpoint. The friend explained that soldiers had accused him of taking a picture of a military position, but the screen on the digital camera showed two men being detained with their backs to the camera. The soldiers refused to look at the screen. Five other journalists arrived. The soldiers threatened to arrest them also.
The friend stood up from sitting against the wall, unbuttoned his shirts, took them off, and placed his camera around his body. He started yelling at the soldiers, "Look at me! I have no bombs, no guns, nothing - only a camera! I have nothing, yet you are still ready to kill me! Yesterday, you killed three of us in Iraq [three journalists had been killed the day before]! What today? I am a human! I am a peacemaker!" He became physically ill. The other journalists repeatedly told the soldiers he had a heart condition and needed medical attention. The soldiers said he could not go. The journalists called an ambulance. The medical workers had to negotiate with the soldiers before they were allowed to care for him.
Before the ambulance arrived an Israeli medic had hooked up an IV to the journalist. As Brown held the friend's head and upper body, Anderson asked the soldier standing next to her, "Is it worth it?" The soldier replied, "Yes." "So his life means nothing to you?" Anderson continued. The soldier responded with a smile. The journalist was not released for medical care and transportation to the hospital until the soldier confiscated his digital camera disc. He was treated at the hospital and released.
Thursday, April 10
Soldiers stopped Brown, Hicks, Lawrence, Germana Nijim, William Payne, and Greg Rollins on Shuhada Street just before the Avraham Avinu settlement. They were told the street was closed to CPT. "Orders," the soldier said. The CPTers walked through the Muslim cemetery to get to the schools. Hicks, Lawrence, and Nijim returned to the CPT apartment via Shuhada Street. Brown, Payne, and Rollins returned via the gate at the Ibrahimi Mosque end of the old market.
CPTer Brown and EA Laupsa met two soldiers in the old market who demanded to see their ID's. Both said they did not have to show their ID's, but the soldiers insisted. Brown asked why. The soldier said, "We are trying to protect the people." Brown asked, "Which people?" She replied, "The commander and other soldiers." Brown asked, "Why do you need protection if you have guns? Isn't that what guns are for?" The soldier cut the conversation off and told them they could pass.
The team spent the rest of the day posting signs and banners proclaiming "This is racism" in Arabic, English, French, and Hebrew at roadblocks around the Hebron district. On the way to the roadblocks, at the Bab iZaweyya, the team observed a demonstration by Palestinians shopkeepers objecting to the continued closure of their shops. (See reflection April 15 release, 'Planned by God.')
Saturday, April 12
Art Arbour, Brown, Payne, and Rollins, along with Israeli and Palestinian peace activists from Ta'ayush met with families in the South Hebron Hills community of Toani. The children are forced to walk five to six kilometers out of their way to school to avoid attacks from settlers. Settlement security and an IDF jeep told the visitors the area was a closed military zone, but the Israeli activists engaged the soldiers in a long conversation, the result of which was that the soldiers agreed to escort the children each day past the settlement.
Sunday, April 13
Anderson and Payne responded to a call from a family at Jabal Johar against whose home the Israeli army was laying a razor wire fence. The army informed the CPTers that they could not document the laying of the fence and bulldozing of the land, that they could not leave, yet were not allowed there or in Hebron. In the end the CPTers were not stopped from leaving.
Monday, April 14
CPTer Greg Rollins and Ecumenical Accompanier Tord Strom went to the Jabal Johar area below the Israeli settlement Kiryat Arba, which has been subjected to Israeli settler and soldier harassment. They were told that seven Germans visiting the families had had their film confiscated by soldiers for photographing military outposts. The Germans complained but did not get their film back.
Tuesday, April 15
CPTers Donna Hicks, Mary Lawrence, and Ecumenical Accompanier Hallstein aupsa visited the families on Jabal Johar who have suffered from Israelisettler and military harassment. A representative from the
Palestinian human rights organization Al Haq was there to document the
families' plight.
Hicks, Lawrence, and Laupsa moved up the road to a family whose roof and top
floors had been taken over by the Israeli military. The soldiers did not
stop the CPTers from visiting even though the group of Germans the day
before had difficulties with the army. They learned that the children are
able to get to school but no longer play outside for more than five minutes
without adult supervision.
Wednesday, April 16
A visitor returning to the Galilee tried to take the Israeli settler bus
into Jerusalem. Soldiers at the Ibrahimi Mosque/Cave of the Patriarchs
suggested he catch it at Kiryat Arba. A soldier at Kiryat Arba would not
let him wait there. "Go get help from your Arab friends," he said. The
visitor returned to Hebron and took a Palestinian service taxi.
The office of the Palestinian governor of Hebron informed the team that
soldiers had served orders for the demolition of two houses on Jabal Johar
on family members. They told the family they had three days to remove their
belongings.
An Israeli officer stopped CPTers at the Beit Romano checkpoint. He told
them if the team were out during curfew, team members would be stopped,
detained, and maybe deported.
Thursday, April 17
Curfew all day
The team received a phone call around 10:00pm to say that Israeli settlers
had thrown stones at a Palestinian house and that Israeli police had
responded to the vandalism by locking the family in their house.
Friday, April 18
Curfew lifted 6am-1pm in H2 and
6am-6pm in H1
The team investigated the phone call from the previous night and learned
that settlers had indeed thrown stones at a house but that the soldiers had
not locked the family in. CPTers Kristin Anderson and Rollins attempted to
visit the family but were stopped by Israeli soldiers.
Saturday, April 19
Curfew lifted from noon to 4pm
The headmaster of Ibrahimi School told CPTers that soldiers had taken him
and some neighbors to Kiryat Arba and held for six hours the night before
for breaking curfew near their homes, close to the Israeli settlements of
Kiryat
Arba and Harsina.
Around 9 pm the team received a call saying that a third household in Jabal
Johar had received a demolition order.
Sunday, April 20
Curfew
Hicks, Diane Janzen, and Lawrence went on school patrol. Israeli soldiers
were patrolling the streets in larger numbers and stationed at many of the
intersections in addition to the usual checkpoints. A soldier called to
Lawrence, "Hey CPT! Please get the children to go back home. There is no
school. They must go inside now. There will be a big crowd of Jewish
people visiting here today, so it is best if the children are not in the
street. It is for them, I'm telling you." He continued, "There is nothing
I can do about this, you know. These are orders."
At the Ibrahimi School junction, soldiers told Hicks and Janzen that the
Palestinian boys could go to school but that they must walk towards the
school on Tariq ibn Ziad Street. The girls were gathered outside their
school, which was locked. Two military jeeps with sirens blaring came down
the street announcing curfew and school closure. The girls gathered in the
schoolyard, explaining there were soldiers at the foot of the street who
would not let them pass to go up the hill towards their homes. Lawrence
explained to the border police who assured her the soldiers would let the
girls pass. When the girls, accompanied by the CPTers, reached the
intersection, they found boys on the other side of the machsom (barrier of
rubble) throwing stones at the soldiers. The girls managed to cross the
machsom in between bouts of stone throwing. Two soldiers grabbed a boy who
was throwing stones and hauled him up the street to a waiting jeep. Janzen
observed some of the girls crying when they saw the boy hauled off.
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| Wednesday, April 23rd, 2003
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5:52 pm - HEBRON REFLECTION: Passing Over
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CPTnet
April 23, 2003
HEBRON REFLECTION: Passing Over
by Diane Janzen
The Jewish religious celebration of Passover (Pesach) is a yearly reminder of God's deliverance of the Israelites from their oppression in Egypt.
"And when your children ask you, 'What do you mean by this observance?' you shall say, 'It is the Passover sacrifice to the Lord, for he passed over the houses of the Israelites in Egypt, when he struck down the Egyptians but spared our houses.'" (Exodus 12:26-27)
The Da'na families in the Jabel Johar area of Hebron have been living in tense and uncertain times. The three houses of the extended family are part way down the hill from the large Israeli settlement of Kiryat Arba. The family has experienced harassment from settlers in the past, but the recent events come after a Palestinian gunman allegedly used the area to fire upon Kiryat Arba.
First, the Israeli military bulldozed 600 trees and the gardens belonging to the families to make a demilitarized zone. Then a long pyramid of six coils of razor wire was placed between the houses and the Kiryat Arba settlement (as close as four feet from the backs of the houses). And then came the demolition orders for two of the three houses.
The CPT team was informed the evening of Holy Saturday that the Israeli
military had given the Da'nas twenty four hours to retrieve belongings from
their homes and then leave. One step closer in the process of house
demolitions.
As I thought and prayed about this situation before going to sleep I was reminded again of the instruction by God for the people in Egypt to slaughter a lamb and use its blood to mark the doorposts of their houses. This was a sign for the angel of death to pass over that house and leave the firstborn son alive. And so I prayed that God would put a mark on the Da'na houses and that they would be 'passed over' by the Israeli military and not be demolished.
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| Saturday, April 19th, 2003
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1:01 pm - HEBRON UPDATE: March 31-April 6, 2003
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CPTnet
April 19, 2003
HEBRON UPDATE: March 31-April 6, 2003
Monday, March 31
A Palestinian shopkeeper whose shop the Israeli army had welded shut for over a month reported that the Israeli army had unwelded his shop and he was able to remove some of his inventory.
CPTers Kristin Anderson, William Payne, and Greg Rollins met with staff of Hebron University, which the Israeli authorities closed in January. Some classes are meeting in elementary schools throughout Hebron. Administrators and teachers told the CPTers that they are without access to their offices and computers, which impedes their ability to run the university. The staff fears the closure will extend beyond July without significant international pressure.
Tuesday, April 1
Curfew
Chris Brown, Donna Hicks, and Rollins visited families in Wadi Rousse where three days earlier the IDF had bulldozed dozens of the families' trees.
[See April 7 release, Trees.]
Wednesday, April 2
A friend of the team in Beit Ummar called Rollins to report that at 2am the night before, about 200 Israeli settlers attempted to attack the village. The settlers got two blocks into the town before Israeli soldiers came and forced the settlers to leave.
Friday, April 4
Art Arbour and Hicks showed visitors from the Sabeel conference around Hebron. Israeli settler boys threw stones at Hicks and one of the visitors as they walked up Shuhada Street, open only to Israeli traffic. An Israeli soldier came out of the military post and stopped the boys from throwing more stones.
Saturday, April 5
Israeli soldiers at the checkpoint across from the old wholesale vegetable market told CPTers Arbour and Hicks and Ecumenical Accompaniers Hallstein Laupsa and Tord Strom that the military had called a curfew for everyone in the area, except for students. Shortly after arriving at the junction near the Ibrahimi Boys' School, CPTers Arbour and Hicks observed four soldiers in an Army jeep chase a group of students across the parking lot below the Ibrahimi Mosque. The headmistress of El Fahya Girls' School was forced to close the school and send the children home. While the soldiers concentrated on the girls' school, students of the Ibrahimi School were able to get into their schoolyard unobserved. One of the soldiers noticed the boys heading to school and attempted to stop others from passing the junction. Another jeep arrived with an officer who ordered the headmaster to close the Ibrahimi School. The headmaster was able to convince the officer to let the school remain open.
Later in the morning, the headmaster of Ma'aref School called to request accompaniment for his students as they left school. He reported there were soldiers surrounding the school and one videotaping. The Ibrahimi headmaster had also requested a CPT presence at dismissal time. Hicks, Laupsa, and Strom responded to the Ma'aref request. They observed an Israeli soldier videotaping the students as they left school. As an army jeep parked at the Tariq ibn Ziad junction sped up the street, some boys tossed stones. The Ibrahimi students were able to leave school for their homes without incident.
At 4:30pm, while passing through the Bethlehem checkpoint, Brown, Le Anne Clausen, and Mary Lawrence observed an ambulance with lights flashing waiting in line while other cars were allowed to pass through the checkpoint. The crew asked for assistance from the CPTers. The ambulance was carrying four cancer patients headed for treatment in Jerusalem. When the ambulance reached the checkpoint, soldiers thoroughly searched it and collected the ID cards from the passengers and crew and put them on a desk where they lay for fifteen minutes. When the CPTers inquired about the delay, one soldier called in the ID numbers while two others searched the ambulance a second time. CPTers pointed out that under international law, ambulances are not to be delayed even in times of armed conflict. "There is no such law," replied one soldier. When Clausen went over to the ambulance to get more information from the crew, a soldier grabbed her by the elbow and forcefully escorted her away. The ambulance had been waiting in line for a half hour before it was able to transfer the patients to another ambulance waiting on the other side.
Sunday, April 6
Curfew
At 1:30am, CPTers received a call that settlers and soldiers were attacking a Palestinian home in the Jabal Johar neighborhood below the Israeli settlement Kiryat Arba. (Palestinian gunmen had infiltrated the settlement earlier in the evening.) Rollins and Strom walked to Jabal Johar where a white jeep from the District Command Office (DCO) pulled up and a soldier asked them to leave, threatening them with arrest if they moved forward. A police jeep escorted them away. Rollins phoned the family to update them and to say they would follow up in the morning.
Brown, Hicks, Rollins, and Strom visited the family on Jabal Johar whose homes settlers had attacked the night before. CPTers observed broken windows and shards of glass on the floors of two houses, and bulldozed land and trees. One family member was injured by a rock in the course of the attack and a young boy was shot in the leg after soldiers opened fire. His grandfather applied a splint and tourniqet and then called for an ambulance. Because soldiers held the ambulance up at checkpoints, it took three hours for the boy to get to a hospital in Hebron.
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| Tuesday, April 15th, 2003
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5:40 pm - HEBRON: Planned by God
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CPTnet
April 15, 2003
HEBRON: Planned by God
By Greg Rollins
In Hebron, one rarely sees Palestinians form any sort of large nonviolent protest against the Israeli army's orders. Many are overwhelmed by the possibilities of violent--even deadly--responses, while others do not have faith in their ability to bring change. So if Israeli soldiers declare a curfew, Palestinian shop owners complain and close. If the Israelis want to see a Palestinian's ID card, the Palestinian quickly hands it over.
Recently, the team decided to challenge the acts of the Israeli army by making several large banners in English, Hebrew, Arabic and French that read, "This is Racism." We decided to place these banners in the dirt roadblocks that the Israeli army has erected around Hebron, where both Palestinians and Israelis would see them.
On the day we set out to put up our banners, we came across a group of Palestinian shop owners in the center of the city. An Israeli army officer had told them that they could open their shops, but a few hours later, other soldiers had ordered them closed. People had gathered to protest the closure. When they saw us they asked us to join them, and without hesitation, we set up our signs.
Our signs and banners spread through the crowd quickly. Shop owners and schoolboys held them with broad smiles on their faces. It did not take long for the shop owners to approach the soldiers and demand permission to re-open their shops. They refused to leave the checkpoint until they spoke to the commander who originally told them they could open their shops. After twenty minutes they were given permission to open. As the shops opened, we asked one shop owner who was in charge of the protest. "No one," he said. "We have no leader." "This action was planned by God," one of our translators added.
The fact that the shop owners stood together and were able to open their shops without anyone being hurt says a lot for the power of nonviolence here. If Palestinians all over the West Bank and Gaza were to carry out protests like this on a daily basis, the violence between both sides would taper off quickly. Peace would stand a greater chance. We in CPT loved what the shop owners did. It spoke of a commitment to nonviolence that we would like to see explored more. We were even more excited that we were able to partake in two actions that day: the Palestinian one in the city center, and our own later that day.
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| Wednesday, April 9th, 2003
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8:19 pm - HEBRON UPDATE: March 18-30, 2003
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CPTnet
April 9, 2003
HEBRON UPDATE: March 18-30, 2003
Tuesday, March 18
Day 124 of curfew, H-1and H-2 (whole city)
CPTers Kristin Anderson, Art Arbour, William Payne, and Ecumenical Accompaniers (EA's) Rebecca Johnson and Tord Strom went on school patrol. Anderson and Arbour observed Israeli soldiers and teachers at the Ibrahimi Boys' School sending children home. As Anderson and Arbour followed the soldiers down the street, they observed two Israeli jeeps with a soldier announcing closure of the schools. Payne, Strom, and Johnson observed two border patrol jeeps speeding through the Tariq ibn Ziad junction, where they stopped and began shooting. The clashes between soldiers and students continued for forty minutes as children threw stones and soldiers shot plastic-coated bullets and percussion grenades. Payne and Johnson shouted at the soldiers to stop shooting over the course of the clashes. Johnson stepped in front of a soldier pointing his gun towards the children. The soldiers justified their shooting by saying someone had thrown a stone at them. On the way back to the apartment, an Israeli settler called Payne names and tried to hit his hat. An Israeli soldier intervened.
Wednesday, March 19
Day 125 curfew H1 and H2
CPTer Greg Rollins and EA's Tord Strom and Hallstein Laupsa reported that at 7:30am six Israeli soldiers had occupied an apartment on the top floor of a building at the Tariq ibn Ziad junction. William Payne joined them and they stayed in the vicinity until the soldiers left shortly after 9:00am.
Thursday, March 20
Day 126 curfew H1 and H2
Friday, March 21
Day 127 curfew H1 and H2
As the team was returning to the apartment after dinner, Israeli soldiers at the checkpoint into the old market demanded that CPTers produce identification. Afterwards, Payne noticed he had lost 200 shekels. He returned to the checkpoint to look for it. One of the soldiers said he had found the money and gave it to Payne.
Saturday, March 22
Day 128 curfew
Sunday, March 23
Day 129 curfew
Anderson, Arbour, and Laupsa observed Israeli soldiers stopping Palestinian drivers, confiscating their keys and forcing them to leave their vehicles on the street. A tank sometimes trained its gun on the drivers. It left when Anderson began taking photographs.
Monday, March 24
Day 130 curfew
Israeli soldiers told Greg Rollings and Chris Brown that the gates into the old city at the Ibrahimi Mosque were closed. They were able to go through, but a Palestinian woman was not allowed to pass. The soldier said the woman could not pass "because there is a war on."
On their way to the Bab iZaweyya Arbour and Rollins were stopped by soldiers and told they could not proceed because it was a closed military zone. They argued with the soldiers and refused to go another way. After a while, Rollins said, "I think we got off to a bad start. My name is Greg." He and the soldier shook hands and chatted. The soldier said the street was closed--"those were his orders." Rollins said he didn't mind waiting. The soldier then let the CPTers pass.
Tuesday, March 25
Curfew lifted
CPTers Arbour and Janzen and Israeli soldiers helped a Palestinian shopkeeper near Beit Hadassah remove debris from the roof of his shop and deal with a leak from a pool of water on the roof.
CPTers Brown, Christine Caton, and Mary Lawrence heard machinery outside the CPT apartment. They observed a bulldozer moving large cement blocks on the other side of the gate blocking old market access to Shuhada Street, a major thoroughfare no longer open to Palestinians.
Wednesday, March 26
Brown, after repeated calls, was able to talk with a person in the DCO to determine if Palestinian shops whose doors had been welded shut could be reopened for merchants to retrieve their inventory. The DCO representative informed Brown that the shopkeepers would have to contact the DCO directly. Brown passed this information on to the shopkeepers.
Thursday, March 27
A friend of the team in Beit Ummar reported that the night before, Israeli soldiers had cut down olive trees.
Friday, March 28
On a visit to the Beqa'a Valley, CPTers Janzen and Payne observed two
Israeli settlers attempt to fill a ditch with a tractor-load of dirt. The
ditch prevented access to a settlement outpost dismantled by the IDF earlier
in the week. The Israeli soldiers denied CPT access to the area as well.
Saturday, March 29
During school patrol, an Israeli soldier told Payne, "You shouldn't judge Israel when you have had peaceful childhoods in safe places, and haven't had to live with the dangers we live with." He continued, "I don't believe in turning the other cheek."
Payne and Rollins visited a family on Abu Sneineh, part of whose home has been occupied by Israeli soldiers for over seven months. The father said some of the soldiers are good and others are very, very bad. In winter, they tracked in lots of mud and used lots of water and electricity. The night before fourteen or fifteen soldiers were in the apartment.
As Payne and Rollins were returning to the CPT apartment, Israeli settler children threw some large stones at them. Israeli soldiers from Beit Hadassah, Beit Romano, and the military post came running out to stop the children from throwing stones.
Sunday, March 30
Brown and Rollins visited a family who live along the "worshippers' way", the path by which Israeli settlers from Kiryat Arba come to the Cave of the Patriarchs to worship. Soldiers have harassed the family for fifteen years, and have occupied the roof for a month. The soldiers have put a piece of sheet metal in the staircase so they will hear anyone approaching. The noise from the soldiers stepping on it keeps the family awake at night.
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| Monday, April 7th, 2003
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5:57 pm - HEBRON REFLECTION: Trees
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CPTnet
April 7, 2003
HEBRON REFLECTION: Trees
by Donna Hicks
Last December, an ice storm hit my hometown. The morning after, I walked out my front door to see an obstacle course of limbs and branches from three seventy-year-old willow oaks in front of me. I went back inside and upstairs to a front window from which I could look to see if the newspaper were there. No.
Later that day, the neighborhood began its clean-up operation. I got the smaller pieces picked up, cut up, and down to the curb over the course of several days. A neighbor came over with a chainsaw and cut up the limbs too big to handle. I hired professionals to come in and cut up the rest of the debris and prune the damaged trees. It wasn't until early March that all the debris had been cleared and stacked at the curb so the contractors hired by the city could haul it all away. Daffodils, jonquils, and hyacinths, snowdrops and narcissus were blooming. The fig tree survived last year's drought and the ice storm and was leafing out when I left.
On April 1 we visited Palestinian families who live below the Israeli military base and between the Israeli settlements of Harsina and Kiryat Arba. We learned that Israeli bulldozers had plowed through their land to prepare it for a road to connect the two settlements. Oak and other trees had been uprooted. If the Palestinian landowners plant crops on this land, the Israelis will come and uproot the crops, too. Under Israeli law if the land remains uncultivated for a certain period of time, it can be confiscated because it was not continuously cultivated. Their homes are in danger of being demolished because they are too close to the military base and to the settler road-to-be. The men spoke of beatings by Israeli soldiers, the women of midnight break-ins and of tanks rumbling up and down their roads.
My yard and home were damaged and scarred by a natural disaster. I cleaned up, had the debris hauled away, and repaired the damage to my home. The governing authorities will not stop me from making repairs or tell me I can't plant new trees and plants. These Palestinian families live in the shadow of an Israeli military base and Israeli settlements on land they have cultivated perhaps for generations. They cannot replant their trees or plant crops or repair the damage made by the bulldozer treads. They can only remain steadfast in the hope that some day their lands will not be occupied and they will live in their own independent state.
Inshallah (God willing).
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| Friday, March 28th, 2003
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4:37 pm - HEBRON: The Shopkeeper
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CPTnet
March 27, 2003
HEBRON: The Shopkeeper
By Chris Brown
My friend's shop is in the old city. Because there is curfew everyday (131 days), he has been unable to get there. Recently, his shop, along with nineteen others, was welded shut by the Israeli Army. I have been to the District Command Office (DCO), to speak to someone who might be able to get the shops un-welded. They gave me a phone number of someone to call who might be of assistance. Everyday for the last month I have been trying to reach someone on the phone. No luck. Then today, something magical happened, someone answered!
"Hello?"
"Yes, sir. My name is Chris and I'm with Christian Peacemaker Teams."
"Yes."
"I am calling on behalf of some shop owners in the Kasbah whose shops are welded shut. I was wondering if we might be able to get the shops open in order that the owners could remove their merchandise?"
There was silence. I heard muffled sounds in the background. Someone got on the line again (a different person this time) and told me that the only person he would talk to about this situation was the shopkeeper himself. I asked if this process could go through me, but he said no.
I walked to my friend's house. He opened the door and greeted me warmly. As always, he invited me in for coffee. I told him that I had finally reached someone on the phone at the DCO. "Do you think this person will help us?" he asked. I shrugged my shoulders. I didn't know what to say to him.
I just sat there, not saying anything. I just listened. "I don't have any money. I had only ten shekels this morning. I gave it to my children to get to school." He said. "I have many bills to pay. Where am I going to get the money to pay for the electricity? I have nothing."
We sat in silence. Then, he turned to me and said, "You are a good friend Chris. Thank you for helping me. You are always welcome in my house." I smiled. "Maybe, God willing, I can welcome you in my shop again."
I'd like that.
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| Monday, March 24th, 2003
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4:56 pm - HEBRON UPDATE: MARCH 11- 17, 2003
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CPTnet
March 24, 2003
HEBRON UPDATE: MARCH 11- 17, 2003
Tuesday, March 11
Day 117 of curfew
Wednesday, March 12
Day 118 of curfew
Thursday, March 13
Day 119 of curfew
The curfew was lifted from 8:00 am until 2:00 pm.
At 9:30 pm Kristin Anderson and Greg Rollins were called out to escort a Palestinian woman to an ambulance because she was having a heart attack. On their way to the woman's house with paramedics, a patrol of Israeli soldiers stopped them, but allowed the CPTers and paramedics to continue when they heard about the sick woman.
Thursday, March 14
Day 120 of curfew
Friday, March 15
Day 121 of curfew
The curfew was lifted from 11:00 am to 3:00 pm.
The team attended a Palestinian woman's march against the war in Iraq. The march drew approximately 200 women who carried signs against the war and chanted for an end to the violence.
Sunday, March 16
Day 122 of curfew
William Payne and Rollins watched Palestinian school children climb down a ladder from a house at the edge of the old city. Because all the entrances in and out of the old city are blocked during curfew, the children are forced to go through people's homes to find a way to their schools outside the old city. The two CPTers intervened when Israeli border police (who are a branch of the Israeli military) yelled at the children to return home. When one of the police pulled the ladder away from the house Rollins pulled it out of the policeman's hands and put it back against the wall. The border police left when Payne began to videotape their actions.
At the Ibrahimi boys school a block away, Israeli soldiers told the principal there was a curfew and the school had to be closed. CPTer Art Arbour told the soldier that it was against the Geneva Convention to stop children from going to school in a war zone.
"This is not a war zone," the soldier replied.
"Then why are you here carrying a gun?" Arbour asked.
"This is not a war zone and neither is Tel Aviv," the soldier said.
"But children are allowed to go to school in Tel Aviv," Arbour said. "Plus, if the children here are in school, they will not throw rocks at you."
The soldier made a call on his radio, then told the principal the school
could remain open.
In the evening, Le Anne Clausen joined a candlelight vigil in Bethlehem against the war in Iraq. 250-300 Palestinians and a dozen internationals from various organizations processed through the streets of the old city from the Lutheran church to the church of the Nativity.
News of International Solidarity Movement (ISM) activist Rachel Corrie's being killed by an Israeli bulldozer reached the internationals while they were taking part in the vigil. (See March 18 release, "U.S. Peace Activist Crushed to Death by Israeli Military Bulldozer in Gaza.") After returning to Jerusalem, Clausen gave a number of interviews to the international press about the killing and its impact on international peace workers in Israel and Palestine.
Monday, March 17
Day 123 of curfew
Israeli settlers outside the settlement Beit Hadassah attacked two European members of the Temporary International Presence in Hebron (TIPH) who were escorting Palestinian children home from school. The settlers also attacked an Israeli military officer who was talking to the two TIPHers. None of the men were badly hurt.
Arbour, Payne, and two members of the World Council of Churches Ecumenical Accompaniment (EA) Hallstein Laupsa and Tord Strom, visited Palestinian families in the Beqa'a valley. One of the families told the CPTers and EAers that settlers had come to their house at 1:00 am on March 15 and smashed some of the windows in the house. The settlers also set fire to both the family's cars. The family called the firefighters to put the flames out, but the Israeli army would not allow the fire truck to come to the house. The father of the family identified the settlers who vandalized his property, but Israeli police responded by saying, "What can we do?"
Clausen represented several international human rights accompaniment organizations with field workers in Palestine at a press conference in Jerusalem. She joined a panel of Israeli and Palestinian organizations who are forming an emergency coalition to document and try to prevent an anticipated mass 'transfer' of Palestinians from areas in the West Bank and Gaza Strip by the Israeli military and settlers while the US pursues its war on Iraq.
CPTers Chris Brown and Clausen traveled to Gaza to offer condolences and provide trauma support to the ISM team in Rafah. While there, they took part in a memorial walk to leave flowers at the place where Corrie was killed. An Israeli tank approached the peaceful procession, which included about eighty Palestinians, and tear-gassed participants while they laid the flowers. The dozen internationals stood between the tank and the Palestinians, then processed towards the Egyptian border to lay flowers and an ISM banner along the wall. The tank followed them and attempted to bulldoze the banner and flowers. The ISM activists and several Palestinians responded by placing flowers and pictures of Corrie on the tank while appealing to the tank to allow them to mourn in peace. Two more tanks and the bulldozer that killed Corrie also drove past the group, firing shots and tear-gassing as they passed. At one point, several Palestinian boys entered the no-man's land near the Egyptian border. Brown and an ISM coordinator tried to prevent the boys from getting near the heavy machinery. A Palestinian doctor whose house was saved from demolition when Corrie was killed gathered the boys and young men present to sit together on the sand while the machinery passed. While sitting, the Palestinians and internationals were tear-gassed again. Due to the rising tension among the group, the Palestinians and internationals left the area.
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| Saturday, March 22nd, 2003
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1:56 pm - HEBRON UPDATE: February 28-March 10, 2003
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CPTnet
March 22, 2003
HEBRON UPDATE: February 28-March 10, 2003
Friday, February 28
Day 106 of curfew
Walking back to their apartment, CPTers Kristin Anderson and Chris Brown heard gunfire, and then saw Palestinians running towards them. Anderson and Brown approached a nearby Israeli military checkpoint where they encountered twelve soldiers playing 'war games.' When one pointed his gun from behind a concrete block his commander yelled, "Don't shoot!" Later that evening CPTers witnessed tanks, jeeps, and police moving into a neighbourhood adjacent to the CPT apartment.
One of the team's Arabic translators came to the CPT apartment to assist the team in planning for an upcoming delegation of North Americans to Hebron. Regarding the present very difficult situation she commented, "Somehow we get used to (the months and months of curfew.) Even getting beaten by soldiers seems bad at the time, but [you] can recover from it. The worst thing is soldiers entering your house and going through personal things."
She said that twelve families had been forced to stand outside at night during a heavy rainstorm while soldiers searched their homes. On a happier note, she said she was pleased to see soldiers and police throwing snow and playing with Palestinian children.
Saturday, March 1
Day 107 of curfew
CPTers on school patrol--the daily accompaniment of thousands of school children who attend the nine schools near their apartment--had to deal with jumpy soldiers who asked for ID at every checkpoint. A large new group of very young soldiers had recently arrived in Hebron.
A Palestinian man asked soldiers for permission for his wife to go see a doctor. Soldiers told him that nobody may leave their house in the Abu Sneineh neighborhood, near the CPT apartment. CPTer Sue Rhodes intervened, and the soldiers said that maybe the woman could go later in the morning.
CPTers Art Arbour and Bob Holmes traveled to the South Hebron Hills, ten kilometers south of the city. They met with Palestinian farmers and other human rights organizations concerning ongoing attacks by Israeli settlers against the Palestinian farmers. Members of Ta'yush (a joint Palestinian-Israeli anti occupation organization), the International Solidarity Movement, a French human rights organization and CPT, all agreed to participate in a rotation of human rights accompaniment for the farmers as needed.
Sunday, March 2
Day 108 of curfew
A delegation of nine people from Canada and United States arrived in Hebron to join the team for one week. They came from several church denominations, and included two people retired from the U.S. military.
During the delegation's opening time of prayer, six soldiers entered the CPT apartment to investigate the new group of foreigners. CPTers Anne Montgomery and Holmes told the soldiers that CPT would not comply with the military's curfew, so the commander called the police. When the police arrived, the CPTers agreed to inform the soldier on the rooftop across from the apartment when people were leaving the apartment.
Tuesday, March 4
Day 110 of curfew
On his way home, Brown was stopped at a checkpoint adjacent to the Israeli settlement of Beit Romano, a short distance from the CPT apartment. He was told he could not go into the Old City. When he told the soldiers he lives there, they replied, "That's not our problem." Brown took a detour away from the soldiers.
Montgomery left for Bethlehem to help facilitate a non-violence workshop for Palestinian young people there.
Wednesday, March 5
Day 111 of curfew
Arbour, Rhodes and Brown went on school patrol. Soldiers were not stopping children from attending school that day.
CPTers Dianne Roe, Kristin Anderson and Greg Rollins left for Jenin, a Palestinian city in the northern part of the West Bank. They planned to investigate the possibility of establishing a new team there (CPT may establish an additional team in Occupied Palestine and is considering several locations.)
Thursday, March 6
Day 112 of curfew
On the way back from 'school patrol William Payne encountered six soldiers using barbed wire to reinforce the fence that blocks the road next to the apartment door. A soldier told Payne, "We hate doing house searches in the middle of the night and have children frightened of us. Children usually love me!"
Another said he agreed with the CPT analysis that violence is only causing more violence, but did not see a way out. The second soldier asked Payne, "What is the solution? Should we be right or should we be smart?"
Friday, March 7
Day 113 of curfew
Rhodes reported that shopkeepers in H1 (the part of Hebron legally under Palestinian authority according to the Oslo Accords) were angry because four soldiers forced them to close at 9:30 a.m.
In a related incident, a shopkeeper from an Old City location near the CPT apartment reported that he had been unsuccessful in getting the Israeli military to open his shop so he could remove his merchandise. A week ago, the CPT team had learned that Israeli soldiers had welded shut twenty shops adjacent to an Israeli settlement. CPT had met with David Glass, an officer with the Israeli military who had said that the shops were welded shut to protect the shop owners' merchandise, and that it would be no problem to arrange for the removal of the merchandise.
Walking back to the CPT apartment in the early evening, Arbour and Payne heard gunfire. The team learned later that two Palestinians killed two settlers and injured eight others at the Kiriat Arba settlement located on the edge of Hebron, about 1.5 kilometers from the CPT apartment. The armed wing of Hamas claimed responsibility for the killings. The two Palestinians were also killed in the exchange of gunfire.
Roe, Anderson and Rollins reported that Israeli soldiers were preventing all entry into the Jenin district, where the CPTers were headed. Soldiers said they might permit CPTers entry in three days. The CPTers decided to return to Hebron and reschedule the exploratory trip. Over the past year, the Israeli military has imposed a strict curfew on Jenin, a city of 200,000 people.
Saturday, March 8
Day 114 of curfew
On the way to school patrol Brown and Payne encountered four soldiers who positioned themselves at a crucial intersection and prevented children from passing through to school. Dozens of children made several attempts at walking through the area. Brown and Payne witnessed a soldier grab a very small child and shout at him. The CPTers asked the soldier not to yell at children.
As the CPTers passed Israeli settlers on route to the synagogue located at the Tomb of the Patriarchs and Matriarchs, Brown and Payne expressed their condolences for the deaths of settlers the previous night. The settlers nodded in response.
Sunday, March 9
Day 115 of curfew
During school patrol a teacher informed Arbour and Payne that Israeli soldiers had demolished a house near Hebron University, in retaliation for the killings of settlers two days earlier. It was the home of the family of one of the Palestinians who killed the settlers.
The team's translator called to say that settlers were bulldozing on the perimeter of Kiriat Arba, and that a Palestinian family was worried that their house was in danger of being demolished. Payne, Rhodes, and Brown went to investigate. Two Caterpillar bulldozers were clearing a section of land adjacent to Kiryat Arba on the southeast side. As Payne began filming the destruction, an angry settler threatened to shoot at him.
The Palestinian family lost over five dunams (1/4 acre) of land with six hundred trees, including almonds, olives, and grapevines. The settlers had also destroyed a building used for farm animals. A settler told Payne that he would like to demolish the Palestinian homes but did not have permission yet from the Israeli government. Another settler threw rocks at Payne and members of the Temporary International Presence in Hebron (TIPH), and also tried to push the TIPH observer off a rock ledge.
The CPTers learned that soldiers forced one Palestinian family of seventeen people to stand outside the previous night for two and a half hours, and then to stay in one room of their own home for another three and a half hours. CPTers asked what the soldiers were doing. "They were just relaxing in our house," the family said.
As the funeral of the murdered settlers was beginning, Rhodes, Brown and Payne accompanied two Palestinian children through the settler controlled area of Hebron. The children were afraid to go home because Israeli settlers often attack random Palestinians after settlers have been killed.
In violation of international law, the Israeli Army demolished three Palestinian homes in Hebron in retaliation for three recent attacks against Israeli civilians.
Monday, March 10
Day 116 of curfew
Rhodes, Arbour, and Brown went out on school patrol. A tank stationed itself to prevent students from passing. Other soldiers stationed by the Ibrahimiyye School ordered the headmaster to dismiss his students and close the school. When Rhodes was trying to get children past the tank a soldier commented, "I guess you are just doing your job." Rhodes replied, "Well I guess you are just doing your job too, but who is doing the more sensible job?"
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| Tuesday, March 18th, 2003
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7:09 pm - HEBRON: U.S. peace activist crushed to death by Israeli military bulldozer
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CPTnet
March 18, 2003
On Sunday, March 16, 2003, an Israeli military bulldozer crushed peace activist Rachel Corrie as she was trying to prevent a Palestinian civilian home from being demolished. Corrie was a volunteer with the International Solidarity Movement (ISM), an organization with close ties to the Christian Peacemaker Team in Hebron. In January of this year, Corrie took part in a training CPTers led in conjunction with Palestinian and international ISM coordinators.
CPT deplores the actions of the Israeli military that caused this death, as we deplore all the senseless deaths -- Palestinian and Israeli -- connected to the occupation of Palestine by Israeli forces.
Corrie (23), from Olympia, Washington, was part of an ISM team in Rafa (Gaza Strip) for the past two months. According to her teammates, early Sunday afternoon they went to a neighbourhood where two Israeli military bulldozers and a tank were demolishing several Palestinian houses. The eight volunteers stood in front of the houses and used megaphones to call on the bulldozer drivers to stop. The military initially left the area, but returned at about 5p.m., heading for a Palestinian doctor's home. Corrie was standing between the bulldozer and the house.
Although witnesses saw Corrie and the driver in verbal contact with one another while the bulldozer was approaching her, the Israeli military is claiming that the soldier driving the bulldozer never saw her. Photos taken by her teammates show Corrie standing several meters in front of the bulldozer as it approached, clothed in a florescent orange jacket and speaking through a megaphone. As the bulldozer approached, she stepped backwards and stumbled. The bulldozer buried her in sand and rubble before driving over her. She was dragged 10-15 meters before the bulldozer stopped and reversed, rolling over her a second time. Her teammates dug her out of the sand. She was still breathing, though the bulldozer had crushed her skull and chest. A Palestinian ambulance crew transported her to hospital where she died. Israeli soldiers on the scene did not attempt to stop the bulldozer, nor did they offer medical care after the incident.
The Israeli military has demolished thousands of Palestinian homes in recent years, usually citing lack of a building permit or security considerations as the reasons. Meanwhile, Israel has routinely refused to issue building permits to Palestinians since occupying the West Bank and Gaza in 1967. In an attempt to challenge these immoral and inhuman acts, ISM, CPT and Israeli peace groups have engaged in similar interventions on many occasions in the past. Israeli soldiers have arrested and sometimes physically assaulted those who have intervened, but this is the first time the Israeli military has killed an international involved in opposing a home demolition.
Corrie's death is not an isolated incident. In several recent incidents, reckless actions by the Israeli military and by Israeli settlers have threatened the lives of international peace workers from ISM and CPT. Other international organizations also report an increase in threats and attacks on foreigners by Israeli soldiers and settlers in occupied Palestine.
ISM is a Palestinian-led movement that invites international volunteers to accompany Palestinians in nonviolent resistance to the military occupation. The group is committed to using nonviolent methods to push for the resolution of the Palestinian-Israeli conflict as outlined by existing UN resolutions and the Geneva Conventions. CPT has provided nonviolence training and assistance in organizational development to ISM since its inception in 2001.
Photos of Corrie and an ISM press release are available via their website
http://www.palsolidarity.org
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