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Israeli forces evict jewish settlers in hebron { April 2006 } Original Source Link: (May no longer be active)
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Associated Press
Update 9: Israeli Forces Evict Jewish Settlers
By NASSER SHIYOUKHI , 05.07.2006, 06:40 AM
Israeli police armed with batons evicted dozens of Jewish squatters from a Palestinian home in West Bank city of Hebron on Sunday, in an important test for Israel's new government and its plans to uproot tens of thousands of settlers.
The clearing of the three-story building was over in about less than 3 hours and encountered no serious resistance - a marked contrast to the violent evacuation of part of a tiny West Bank settlement in February, when more than 200 police and teenage protesters were injured.
Prime Minister Ehud Olmert was widely criticized for his handling of that operation while heading caretaker government. Olmert told his Cabinet at its first meeting on Sunday that he would tolerate no illegal West Bank settlement outposts.
Police sawed through a barricaded metal door in the occupied building. Inside, they appealed to the settlers - some with toddlers and babies - to leave peacefully, and some agreed. But others had to be dragged out, including a woman whose bawling infant was carried out by officers.
Jewish settlers outside the building tried to force their way in after police sawed off the door. But police dragged the struggling protesters away, sometimes slapping them to stop their thrashing.
Three squatter families and 27 young sympathizers from the Hebron area were removed from the building, police spokesman Mickey Rosenfeld said.
Hours before police stormed in, settlers hurled firebombs, stones and bottles at security forces. Nineteen security forces were injured, and 17 settlers were arrested, Rosenfeld said. Neither he nor rescue services could say how many settlers were wounded, but Israel's Army Radio said seven were slightly injured.
Hebron, a city holy to Jews and Muslims, is home to about 160,000 Palestinians and some 500 ultranationalist Jewish settlers who live in heavily fortified enclaves.
Three settler couples and their eight children moved into the abandoned home near the settler enclave of Avraham Avinu about a month ago, presenting documents allegedly showing they had rented the property from its Palestinian owner. Israeli authorities later determined the documents were forged, and the Supreme Court ordered the squatters removed.
"It is our house, bought with our money, and the court wronged us," Rabbi Israel Shlussel told Israel Radio before police stormed in. "Justice was not done."
About 700 police, reinforced by 1,000 soldiers, were mobilized for the operation. Rosenfeld said border police would increase the number of patrols in the Hebron area over the next few days to maintain public order.
In the first meeting of his Cabinet on Sunday, Olmert took a hard line against unauthorized settler activity.
"In every case where the law is violated, we will respond without compromise, and we won't reconcile ourselves to illegal facts on the ground," his office quoted him as saying.
A government-commissioned report issued last year says settlers have established 105 unauthorized outposts in the past decade. The outposts are designed to break up Palestinian areas and try to prevent establishment of a Palestinian state.
Israel promised the U.S. it would dismantle about two dozen outposts set up since 2001, but little action has been taken.
Olmert ordered the evacuation of unauthorized buildings in the West Bank outpost of Amona in February, an operation that critics said used excessive force.
But Olmert plans go further, hoping to pull settlers out of much of the West Bank by 2010 while fortifying Israel's three major settlement blocs. He contends the plan is necessary to improve Israel's security and guarantee its future as a democracy with a Jewish majority.
But many West Bank settlers are observant Jews and believe that God promised the land, which the Palestinians claim as part of a future state, to the Jewish people. They have promised fiercer resistance than Gaza settlers showed when they were uprooted over the summer.
In other violence, Palestinian hospital officials said a 55-year-old Palestinian civilian was killed Sunday in Israeli shelling of northern Gaza. But the Israeli army denied firing at Beit Lahia, the area where the man was killed.
Israel has been shelling the area in recent weeks to try to curb Palestinian rocket attacks on southern Israel. The artillery fire has killed civilians in the past, including a 60-year-old farmer on Saturday.
Copyright 2006 Associated Press.
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