| THE HANDSTAND | LATE AUTUMN2008 |
'Tossed
Out Like a Dog'
By Gideon Levy
22/08/08 "Haaretz"
- -- In the lawless South Hebron Hills, things are
wild as usual: The settlers continue to attack shepherd
children with clubs and stones, to steal their sheep and
to make their lives miserable, while the Israel Police
continue to abuse anyone who tries to file a complaint
against the settlers.
Mahmoud Abu Kabaita, whose children and flocks were the
targets of settlers from Beit Yatir and Susia, was left
outside the Kiryat Arba police station in the burning sun
for four hours, until they even allowed him to enter. The
members of the Abu Awad family, some of whose children
suffer from a serious skin disease, have already been
victims of a cruel pogrom by the settlers of Asael, as
described here three weeks ago. Relatives waited outside
the police station for two hours, and left without filing
a complaint, after being attacked once again last Shabbat.
That is how the Israel Police enforces the law here.
After writing in this column about the Abu Awads, all of
whose meager property was destroyed and looted by the
rioters from Asael, some readers offered to help the
penniless family. One prominent figure, who is well known
in the political establishment and not necessarily from
the left, and who wanted to remain anonymous, gave the
family a personal financial contribution which is
considered huge by local standards. There was great joy
in the miserable encampment, but it was short-lived: Last
Shabbat the children and their sheep were attacked once
again by the Asael people. A wonderful way to welcome the
"Sabbath bride," as is customary every week.
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The Abu Kabaitas, whom Israel decreed would have to live
outside the separation fence, along with and adjacent to
Beit Yatir, were not very fortunate either. They were
also attacked by rioters from the neighboring settlement.
They were also abused by the Israel Police, which are
supposed to protect them.
Thus there exists, with a distance of an hour and a half
from Tel Aviv, a region with its own rules: The settlers
rampage as much as they please, and the police don't lift
a finger and even treat the victims of the violence
rudely when they want to complain. In the past weeks, as
everyone knows, the rioting has mounted, for some reason,
but for the police it's business as usual.
Opposite the new checkpoint and among antennas and wind
turbines, lives the Abu Kabaita family. There is a mother,
a father, 13 children and two grandmothers, one of them
97 years old, and of course the sheep and goats. They
have been here since 1948 - Palestinians who live in a
poor, but relatively well-kept compound of lean-tos,
tents and stone structures, some of which have been
demolished by Israel.
In the shade of a date tree are several plastic chairs;
one of the children is picking dates and serving them
together with small cups of sage tea. The father Mahmoud
is relating the story of his tribulations. He is 40 years
old, born here on the private lands registered to his
family since the days of Turkish rule. He does not keep
the official documents in the compound; he already knows
that the settlers and perhaps even the police and the
army are liable to confiscate them. Wearing a baseball
cap backward on his head, speaking fluent Hebrew, he
looks like an Israeli. A new Ferguson tractor is parked
within the compound, but he has to leave his private car,
an old Subaru, on the other side of the separation fence
and the checkpoint on the slope, several hundred meters
from his home. He is forbidden to bring it any closer to
his house. Israel built the fence in such a way that Beit
Yatir will remain in Israeli territory, along with some
of its Palestinian neighbors.
It may be good for the settlers, but for the Abu Kabaitas
the new checkpoint has only heralded more troubles: The
children must pass through it every day on their way to
school, as does Mahmoud on his way to buy feed for the
sheep or to sell one of his herd, to bring a gas canister
or other goods. Sometimes the soldiers allow him to pass,
sometimes they don't. When he wants to take sheep to sell
in neighboring Yata, the soldiers allow him to take out
only two at a time. That's just how it is. Every crossing
by he and his children depends on the good will of the
checkpoint soldier: If he so desires, he'll let them pass;
if not, he won't.
Abu Kabaita: "I drive with the tractor to Yata to
bring water. If the soldiers are nice they let me pass.
If not, I have to travel three hours in the fields on a
route that bypasses the checkpoint. It all depends on the
type of soldier at the checkpoint." He adds that his
sister and other relatives who live on the opposite side
are not allowed to visit him at all.
The path to the Abu Kabaitas' private pasture land is
also an obstacle course: It passes within the border of
Beit Yatir. This is also the source of constant friction;
the children of the settlers sometimes throw stones at
the shepherd's children when they traverse the settlement.
Sometimes the settlers also try to steal the sheep or run
them over, as happened on August 1.
The family has 200 head of sheep; they are now sprawled
in their pen, resting in the summer heat. When Beit Yatir
was established, in the late 1980s, the war over the land
began. Abu Kabaita did not give in, embarked on an
exhausting legal battle and remained on his land. Beit
Yatir was forced to expand in a different direction, not
into his lands, which are adjacent to the fence that
surrounds the settlement, which is also of dubious
legality, because it passes through his property. He and
his children cross through an opening in the fence to the
grazing area. The tin roof of the family home is strewn
with small stones that the children of the settlers
sometimes throw at it.
"We are not spoiled," explains Abu Kabaita.
"We were born in caves and we're used to a hard life.
We have no problem, we became used to it already from our
parents and I also force my children to become accustomed
to our hard life. Only the settlers disrupt our lives -
they are destroying our lives. We grew up with this. We
liked this situation, we like to be with nature in
difficult conditions, except for the settlers who have
inhabited our lands. They have disrupted things. All we
want is to continue our lives. That's all. And we hope
that the settlers will stop causing us problems. They're
interrupting our lives."
Now Abu Kabaita removes from his pocket a folded packet
of documents, confirmation of the complaints that he has
managed to file with the police against his neighbors'
attacks. "When I come to the police station they see
me and close the gate. I waste my entire day there; if I
go to file a complaint, I need to spend an entire day in
the sun. That's what happened the last time. I stood
there, tossed outside like a dog. I push the buttons,
speak on the intercom; they tell me I'll be admitted
right away, and nothing happens."
The last time he tried to file a complaint, on August 4,
after baking in the heat for hours, representatives of
the Temporary International Presence in Hebron, came and
complained that they were not letting Abu Kabaita in.
That didn't help either, and he remained outside. "At
2 P.M. they allowed me to enter," he says. "I
had arrived there at 10 A.M., and it took me until 5:30 P.M.
before I could file the complaint. Even when I had
already done so, I felt that the policemen were not
receiving me properly and the investigator was not
writing down what I said."
The complaint number that time was 309765/2008. Among the
large number of documents showing evidence of complaints,
about which nothing has been done, he also has a
photograph that he once took clandestinely, in which one
sees a settler from Beit Yatir, who, according to Abu
Kabaita, is the violent one - dressed in white, a large
white skullcap on his head, with a long beard, covering
his face with his hands so that he won't be identified as
he is fleeing.
Danny Poleg, spokesman and assistant commander for the
Judea and Samaria Police District writes: "1. Mr.
Mahmoud Abu Kabaita did register a complaint on 4.8 at
the Hebron station. An investigation is under way. 2.
With regard to the amount of time he waited, there is no
factual evidence to substantiate his claims. It should be
noted that the Hebron police conduct ongoing, careful
surveillance of the gates at the station, also by closed-circuit
TV, to determine whether there are complainants or others
in need of their services. 3. At the entry gate where
Palestinians are received, there is a telephone with
relevant extensions listed and signs. 4. Despite all this,
and in response to your request, the commander of the
Hebron district has ordered a clarification of this
subject among the staff. 5. The policy of the Hebron
district is to provide professional, high-quality and
especially prompt service to the area population.
It was August 1, at twilight, and his two sons, Bilal, 11
and Sagr, 8, were on their way home with the sheep from
the grazing land beyond Beit Yatir. A group of settler
children was there, playing paintball. They teased the
shepherd children and threw the balls of paint at them.
That is how Mahmoud Abu Kabaita describes it. It was a
group of young people from Susia, he explains, and some
others from Beit Yatir. "They began to shoot those
paint bombs at our children and our children got scared
and fled," says Abu Kabaita.
Bilal remained at a distance to watch over the sheep and
Sagr ran home. Their father was in the family olive grove
at the time. He dropped everything and rushed toward the
flock and another shepherd boy who had remained behind.
When he arrived he saw about 10 young people, who were
holding onto several sheep. A white car was parked
alongside the group. Five goats and sheep were already
tied to trees in the woods.
"I wanted to approach, to ask them: Why are you
stealing our sheep? But they are very fanatic people and
they told me to leave the place immediately. I didn't see
Bilal or the sheep. Where was Bilal? Where were the sheep?
I was afraid. I phoned the emergency number, 100. They
didn't answer. It started to get dark. We're in the dark
alone, they're cursing and shouting, and I'm worried
about my son and the sheep."
He called the offices of the UN Office for the
Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs in Hebron. They
referred him to the B'Tselem human rights organization. B'Tselem's
research coordinator, Najib Abu Rakia, together with the
organization's district fieldworker, Musa Abu Hashhash,
called the Israel Defense Forces and the police to come
to the site. The IDF came, the police did not.
When the IDF jeep arrived the settlers fled, leaving
behind the flock. The soldiers did not say a word to Abu
Kabaita, however, and left the scene. He and Bilal untied
the goats and sheep, and returned home with the flock
late in the evening, tired but mainly frightened.
Bilal and Sagr have refused since then to go out by
themselves to the grazing land beyond Beit Yatir, and
their father must accompany them daily, in the hope that
they will return home safely. He is now very concerned
about the fate of his children and his flock. He also
feels there has recently been an intensification in the
violence on the part of the settlers.
Abu Kabaita: "I got the children used to not being
afraid, and I hope that it won't happen again. I don't
want to say that all of Beit Yatir is like that. Not
everyone in the settlement is a thief and wicked. It's
important to say that. Only a few, and especially the one
in the picture. In recent months it's become worse and
they've started to make a lot of trouble for us. I feel
it. They try to steal sheep, they try to run over sheep,
they throw stones at night and scare my children."
Fortunately for him, the wind turbine built by the
settlers almost on top of his house is often broken. The
noise it makes at night when it is working prevents them
from sleeping. "Every time it revolves - boom. It's
like an explosion at night."
A turbine above their heads, one settlement spilling over
into their pasture land, another on a nearby slope, and
the threat of violence around them - that's the safe and
pleasant life enjoyed these days by the Abu Kabaitas.
© Copyright 2008 Haaretz. All rights reserved
The odds against Tzipi Livni
Can Tzipi Livni deliver a peace with the Palestinians?
She has on occasion expressed more sympathy toward the Palestinians than other Israeli leaders and has led Israel's negotiating team since the Annapolis conference. Her Palestinian counterparts have welcomed her victory.
If Livni can cobble together a cabinet, she is likely to continue the peace process. But Israeli-Palestinian peace is more elusive today than at any time since the first Oslo agreement was signed in 1993.
Here are three reasons why:
The first, and most important is that Israeli political and military leaders can no longer control the settlement movement they launched and supported soon after Israel occupied the Palestinian territories of the West Bank, East Jerusalem and Gaza in 1967.
The Israeli establishment's plans have been nothing if not consistent. They have colonized the territories in a way that swallows up the best land and water and maintains sovereignty over East Jerusalem. The peace talks since 1993 have tinkered around the edges of the borders Israel wants - and that it has tried to cement through its separation wall - as it has sought a Palestinian leadership weak enough to accept such a deal.
The right-wing leaders of the Israeli settlement movement are too strong to budge. To prove it, the settlers have been escalating their attacks on Palestinians - and even on Israeli soldiers - unchallenged by Israel's politicians, military or courts.
The second reason why a peace deal is not possible at this time is that Israel has indeed weakened the Palestinian leadership. Though Israeli and American leaders have embraced Mahmoud Abbas as a moderate, Israel has not eased its occupation.
After Abbas was elected as president of the Palestinian Authority in 2005, and before the electoral victory of Hamas in 2006, there was no freedom of movement and goods, no freeze on settlements and no meaningful release of Palestinian prisoners. Indeed, the pitiful number of prisoners released - a few hundred at a time when around 10,000 remain in Israeli jails and dozens more are arrested each day - only undermines Palestinian leaders and underscores their powerlessness.
Many Palestinians believe another uprising against the Israeli occupation is at hand, though there is little clarity on what shape it might take. And more Palestinians are questioning the two-state solution and speaking of alternatives - including a struggle for equal rights in the whole land of Israel/Palestine.
Arafat was the only Palestinian leader who could have arrayed the majority of Palestinians behind a deal that would have recovered most of the occupied territories while, at the same time, pushing them tocompromise on their right of return. The present leadership has no such power.
The third reason a peace agreement is not on the horizon is the position of the U.S. administration. It insists on remaining the primary broker in this conflict and limiting the role that might be played by the Europeans or Russians. But it does not do what it takes to push peace.
Abbas is scheduled to visit President George W. Bush yet again this month, while Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice makes periodic visits to the region. These pleasantries are no substitute for real diplomacy. At the same time, both Barack Obama and John McCain have vociferously supported U.S. aid to Israel and sent the same signals to the settlers' enterprise.
A Livni cabinet might usher in a different tone in dealing with the Palestinians. But Israel's 40-year colonization of the West Bank has gone unchallenged by so many for so long that it will take much more than that to deliver peace.
Nadia Hijab is a senior fellow at the Institute for Palestine Studies in Washington.
bil'in and jayyous
"The settlement of Mattityahu East along with Israel's
wall, which was built mostly inside the occupied West
Bank to grab land for settlements, seizes 50% of the
village of Bil'in's land, including olive groves that its
residents have relied on for centuries. Leviev's Zufim
settlement, again along with Israel's Wall, seizes as
much as two-thirds of the village of Jayyous'
agricultural land and six wells, effectively annexing one
of the West Bank's most fertile agricultural zones. Since
2002, residents of Bil'in and Jayyous have held more than
250 nonviolent
protests, with the support of Israeli and
international activists, in an effort to save their lands.
The Israeli army meets
the protesters with clubs, teargas, bullets, curfews,
arrests and stink sprays."
**************************
Palestinian prisoner 'jumped to escape
torture' Associated Press
A Palestinian prisoner says he jumped from
a second floor window to escape torture at the hands of
his Palestinian jailers. Prison officials say he fell.
The prisoner is 34-year-old Mohammed Abdel Karim. He's
being treated in an east Jerusalem hospital for back
injuries from his plunge. The Palestinian human rights group Al-Haq says
the case is an example of widespread abuse of prisoners
in the West Bank and the Gaza Strip.
Abdel Karim plunged from the second-story window 15 days after he was arrested by Palestinian security and taken to a prison in the West Bank city of Nablus. He said every day he was tied up in painful positions every day. In an interview with The Associated Press at his hospital bed, he said, "I began to prefer death."
The farmers of Atuf
The small farming village of Atuf is in the north east of
Palestine, right next to the Jordan Valley. The land is
fertile but nothing grows without water, of course, and
what rainfall there is comes during the winter season.
Fortunately, however, there is an abundance of artesian
water to fill the village wells.
Or so it would seem. The Israeli army of occupation has
forbidden the people of Atuf to draw more than a minimal
amount of water from the village wells, scarcely enough
to satisfy their domestic needs. No-one is allowed to use
water for the purpose of agriculture. So, what limited
crops are grown, are dependant on the scanty winter rains.
If they had unrestricted access to their wells the
farmers of Atuf could truly "make the desert bloom".
Much of the village land has already been lost to the
voracious appetites of the Israeli settlements of Hamra
and Beqa'ot. Seen from a distance (and the Palestinians
cannot approach within a kilometre - on their own lands -
for fear of being shot) the settlements are an oasis of
green in the brown, arid landscape. Here there is no
restriction on the amount of water which can be pumped up
from underground and crops are grown all the year round.
The Jordan Valley is the eastern-most part of Palestine,
running from north to south along the length of the
Jordan River and borders the state of Jordan. It is a
desolate, mostly barren and weirdly beautiful landscape,
in stark contrast to the more intimate hills and valleys
of the West Bank. Most of the indigenous inhabitants have
been expelled from their villages and farms and, in their
place, is an almost contiguous line of Jewish settlements,
cutting off Palestine from its border with Jordan. Partly,
this is due to demographic reasons, the desire to create
"facts on the ground" if ever a Palestinian
state came to be negotiated. Just as importantly, though,
are the enormous water acquifers which lie below, making
it a potential agricultural heaven.
The farmers of Atuf, and the farmers of the other
Palestinian villages which still remain, cling to a bare
existence and can only gaze with envy at the green fields
of the Jewish settlements which surround them. One day,
if the western world's leaders continue to look on and
approve this grand experiment in ethnic cleansing, they
too will be gone.
THROUGH AUSTRALIAN EYES