By Ulrike Putz While diplomats and leaders seek to find a path to Middle East peace, Jewish 'settlers' in the heart of the West Bank's second biggest city insist that they are going nowhere. Indeed, their thirst for settlement construction is far from sated.
The centre of the city, the second largest in the West Bank, is no longer the lively place it once was. Now, a Jewish 'settlement' dominates the heart of the city. Ninety families have settled here -- a right-wing, ideologically motivated group interested in "taking back" Hebron from the Palestinians.
The result is nothing short of a ghost town guarded by hundreds of Israeli soldiers. For the benefit of 800 Jews living in Hebron, a city of 170,000 people, Palestinian life in the city centre has come to a standstill.
Indeed, a visit to Hebron can destroy any hopes that the recently started Middle East peace talks might find success. It is here in Hebron that the Israeli occupation of the West Bank shows its ugliest face.
The city centre is divided into sectors. There are streets that are open to settler traffic but which may only be used by Palestinian pedestrians. Some streets are closed to Palestinians altogether. Along Shuhada Street, once a main arterial through the Hebron market, all Palestinian shops are shuttered. The Israeli military ordered them closed "due to security concerns". More than 1,800 Arab families lost their livelihoods as a result.
Peace, even conciliation, seems extremely remote in Hebron. In Kiryat Arba, a separate ‘settlement’ at the edge of town, the settlers have erected a monument to Baruch Goldstein. A Jewish doctor, Goldstein stormed the Ibrahimi Mosque -- known to Jews as the Tomb of the Patriarchs -- in Hebron in 1994 and killed 29 praying Muslims.
There are both religious and political reasons for why the settlers have sought out Hebron. On the one hand, the Tomb of the Patriarchs is revered as the burial site of Abraham and Sarah, Isaac and Rebecca, and Jacob and Leah. Its religious importance for the Jewish people is second only to Jerusalem. On the other hand, however, the settlements are seen as recompense for the 1929 massacre of Jewish residents of Hebron at the hands of Palestinians.
"They [the Palestinians] will have to understand that they can't stay here," says David Wilder, spokesman for the Hebron 'settlers'.
MORE AT: http://www.spiegel.de/international/world/0,1518,719203,00.html
Picture by Rina Castelnuovo
The centre of the city, the second largest in the West Bank, is no longer the lively place it once was. Now, a Jewish 'settlement' dominates the heart of the city. Ninety families have settled here -- a right-wing, ideologically motivated group interested in "taking back" Hebron from the Palestinians.
The result is nothing short of a ghost town guarded by hundreds of Israeli soldiers. For the benefit of 800 Jews living in Hebron, a city of 170,000 people, Palestinian life in the city centre has come to a standstill.
Indeed, a visit to Hebron can destroy any hopes that the recently started Middle East peace talks might find success. It is here in Hebron that the Israeli occupation of the West Bank shows its ugliest face.
The city centre is divided into sectors. There are streets that are open to settler traffic but which may only be used by Palestinian pedestrians. Some streets are closed to Palestinians altogether. Along Shuhada Street, once a main arterial through the Hebron market, all Palestinian shops are shuttered. The Israeli military ordered them closed "due to security concerns". More than 1,800 Arab families lost their livelihoods as a result.
Peace, even conciliation, seems extremely remote in Hebron. In Kiryat Arba, a separate ‘settlement’ at the edge of town, the settlers have erected a monument to Baruch Goldstein. A Jewish doctor, Goldstein stormed the Ibrahimi Mosque -- known to Jews as the Tomb of the Patriarchs -- in Hebron in 1994 and killed 29 praying Muslims.
There are both religious and political reasons for why the settlers have sought out Hebron. On the one hand, the Tomb of the Patriarchs is revered as the burial site of Abraham and Sarah, Isaac and Rebecca, and Jacob and Leah. Its religious importance for the Jewish people is second only to Jerusalem. On the other hand, however, the settlements are seen as recompense for the 1929 massacre of Jewish residents of Hebron at the hands of Palestinians.
"They [the Palestinians] will have to understand that they can't stay here," says David Wilder, spokesman for the Hebron 'settlers'.
MORE AT: http://www.spiegel.de/international/world/0,1518,719203,00.html
Picture by Rina Castelnuovo
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