At 2.30 on the 21^st January our neighbour, Zleikha Muhtaseb, rushed into our CPT base to tell us that Israeli settlers were forcibly trying to break into two Palestinian homes near Abed’s shop just down from the Ibrahimi mosque in Hebron. We grabbed our things and followed her. The mosque checkpoint was shut down so we had to detour through tunnels to Zleikha’s brother’s home which was situated right between the two houses under attack. On this journey we travelled through intense tear gas and struggled to open our steaming red eyes to see where we were going, but this was nothing compared to the situation in which we found the Muhtaseb family when we arrived at their home.

The women and children in the home took us to the upper floor window to look out on to the street. There were about 80 Israeli settlers milling around, going in and out of the houses on either side of us. They were moving in with large pieces of luggage, domestic equipment, grocery supplies and even huge packs of toilet paper. Standing around with guns and protecting them were nearly as many Israeli soldiers and Border Police. Armoured personnel carriers and police jeeps served as further protection.  Did they think that the family in the Muhtaseb home in the middle of these homes were going to resist and attack them with wooden spoons - all 3 women and 5 small children?  There were no other Palestinians in the immediate area as checkpoints had been shut down all around the homes.

The only Palestinians in the vicinity were on the roofs of other homes about 200 metres behind the homes that were being forcibly occupied. Their defence of these two Palestinian homes was to throw stones, a crime that can result in 20 years of imprisonment, and to wave a Palestinian flag which is also illegal in the old city of Hebron. The Israeli response was to tear gas them and to aim loaded guns at them.


Read the full article here.

 

He asked   -      “Where do you live?”
We replied -     “The old city.”
He asked -        “I mean, where are you from?
We replied -     “The U.S.” and “Ireland”.
 
He was small, with a tiny face and deep brown eyes that twinkled in the street lights at the checkpoint.
 
He asked -        “What do you think of the situation here?”
I replied  -        “Will you arrest me if I tell you honestly?”
He replied  -     “No, I won’t arrest you.”
I replied -         “Your presence here with checkpoints is humiliating the Palestinians.”
 
His body language intimated that I had a point, and as his partner attempted to try to defend or to justify the occupation with its checkpoints, he gently cut him off and said – 
 
“From their perspective, she has a point.”
 
After some more conversation about the occupation and Gaza and Hamas and rockets coming from Gaza into Israel and Israeli settlers in the West Bank and the breaching of international law we said good-bye and continued our journey home.
 
We reflected on the conversation as we walked through the tunnels of this ancient beautiful city of Hebron and we both thought about how, if things were different, it would have been nice to sit down over coffee and have a conversation with this young twinkly eyed Israeli soldier.  And we wondered what would be the reaction of his comrades if he recounted the conversation we had back in military barracks that night?  From reading testimonials from ex Israeli soldiers in the Israeli organisation called Breaking the Silence here , our guess was that the conversation would be shut down very quickly. These testimonials are given to Breaking the Silence by ex soldiers who want to talk about the brutality of the Israeli occupation in the West Bank and the Israeli military siege and wars on Gaza.
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And we wondered what would be the reaction of his comrades if he recounted the conversation we had back in military barracks that night?  From reading testimonials from ex Israeli soldiers in the Israeli organisation called Breaking the Silence here  , our guess was that the conversation would be shut down very quickly. These testimonials are given to Breaking the Silence by ex soldiers who want to talk about the brutality of the Israeli occupation in the West Bank and the Israeli military siege and wars on Gaza.
 
Could it be possible that this soldier could be a new recruit for Breaking the Silence in a couple of years time? 

SCHOOL REPORT
SEPT 2015-JAN 2016

 

“The daily walk to and from school exposes many Palestinian children in these areas to harassment and violence from Israeli settlers and security forces... The access regime applied in the restricted areas for the last decade has turned the daily trip of students and teachers to and from school into a long, dangerous and unpredictable journey. This has had a negative impact not only on the psychological well-being of those affected, but also on the educational achievements of children." read more here.

Settler Aggression on Prayer Road.
(Photo here for illustration purposes only)

At the request of a family who has been frequently harassed by settlers from the Israeli Jewish settlement called Kiryat Arba,   CPTers Chris and Gerry were patrolling the Prayer Road and the Palestinian neighborhood adjacent to Kiryat Arba. At around 11 p.m. a group of 12-15 young male settlers began walking down the Prayer Road singing loudly. One of the settlers walked out in front of the group and began following us, just a a half and arm’s length behind us. When we turned around to calmly, respectfully engage him in conversation he stopped and stared ahead silently. He had his jacket hood over his head and his face was covered with a scarf from just below his nose down to his jacket top. No matter how we tried to engage him he just stared ahead, poker faced. No emotion was displayed by him, nothing. It was a little disconcerting to say the least. His colleagues were continuing their journey down the hill after us, still singing loudly, and gaining ground on us.
 
At the military post where the Prayer Road diverges we went left and the settler went right. As he moved to about 3 metres from us he shouted to us: "F**k Jesus! I want to kill all of you."
 
When we were about 50 meters down the road the larger group, having reunited with the young man that had accosted us, began to come in our direction again, at which point a police truck that had been following steadily from a distance pulled up alongside the group.  CPTer Chris began to film this scene. The young settler who had accosted the CPTers saw Chris filming and began running towards us yelling - "No pictures! No pictures!" He demanded to see the pictures Chris had taken and to have them deleted, but Chris had taken a video, so, as requested by the settler, he was able to show him that no photos had been taken!  At this stage, the Israeli police truck pulled right up to us. CPTers Chris and Gerry explained that the settler had threatened them and the police verbally intervened, telling the CPTers that they could continue on and that the police would keep an eye on the settler. They then escorted him down the hill by driving the jeep beside him. The CPTers then continued on their patrol without further incident. As CPTers we need to think about what it means to be ‘protected’ by Israeli forces?