http://www3.haaretz.co.il/eng/scripts/article.asp?mador=4&datee=03/12/00&id=71520
The Territorial Dybbuk and the Cave Dwellers
By Gideon Levy, Ha'aretz, 03/12/2000
The paratroopers raided at dawn: less than two weeks ago the soldiers in
their vaunted red berets, young men from an elite unit, swooped down on
Khirbet Jinba in the land of the caves in the area of southern Mount
Hebron. Bursting into the caves, they removed the possessions of the 17
families - of the hundreds of residents who were expelled from them
about four months ago - that had returned to them, loaded everything on
a truck and without further ado left the site. After traveling for about half
an hour, the truck pulled up at the village of Tawana; the paratroopers'
mission flawlessly accomplished, they dumped everything along the side
of the road and went on their way. The Civil Administration did the
planning, the paratroopers obeyed orders and the operation went off
without a hitch. During the night, soldiers were posted at the caves and
prevented neighbors from supplying the cave dwellers with food and
water.By the side of the road the meager heap of belongings lay exposed
to the elements: a pile of rags that were perhaps children's clothes,
scrawny mattresses, a few basic food products, even some pitas that had
been baked at dawn. Israeli eye-witnesses who arrived at the site
encountered a heart-rending site: an elderly blind man crawling among
the objects looking for the remnants of his clothes. A few children who
arrived broke out in tears when they saw what the soldiers had done to
their things. Four months earlier, in the first eviction operation, they saw
how the soldiers treated them and their parents. But their parents did not
give in: they are in the caves now, with the few belongings that they hide
during the daylight hours for fear of the Red Berets.
This is what is done to people who have the effrontery to return to their
homes, this is how Israel behaves in its dark backyard. In its front yard,
Israel dispatches rescue teams to every stricken place on the planet -
medicine to Mozambique, a new village with a clinic and a shopping
center for Turkey - but here it takes the possessions of a few hundred
people and dumps them by the roadside, leaving themdestitute.
No one took any interest in this raid by the paratroopers two weeks ago,
just as few people are showing any interest in the fact that for the past
four months these people, who were brutally ejected from their
cave-homes near Hebron, continue to be homeless. It took two months
after the expulsion before the Meretz ministers raised the issue in the
cabinet; Deputy Defense Minister Ephraim Sneh was appointed to
investigate - and he too reached the conclusion that the expulsion is
absolutely fair, justified and necessary. Seven important writers signed a
petition, the defense establishment quickly arranged a meeting with them
- and went on behaving as it had. The peace government is far more
perturbed by the fate of Deputy Education Minister Meshulam Nahari.
All along the number of the cave dwellers who were expelled was put at
300, but the Civil Administration claimed that was an exaggeration. Last
week the B'Tselem human rights organization issued a new report stating
that the true number is 730. Now it is possible to talk about a disaster
area.
The story has its beginnings last October-November, when Israel
expelled all the residents of the caves in the area of the settlement of
Havat Maon. The official reason: the caves were located in an active IDF
firing area. This is easily refuted; the B'Tselem report gives the real
reasons. At the time, the media reported that the evacuation was part of
the deal that was made by the government with the Yesha Council of
Jewish settlements: the evacuation of Havat Maon, where a handful of
settlers had been living illegally for two and a half years, in return for the
expulsion of the hundreds of Palestinians who had been living in the area
for decades.
Now, though, a bigger cat has been let out of the bag: the B'Tselem report
discloses that the head of Central Command, Maj. Gen. Moshe Ya'alon,
explicitly told the writers who met with him about the issue that Israel,
which is about to start the final-status talks with the Palestinians, has an
interest in leaving the area under its control. A few weeks ago, Ha'aretz
also reported that the defense establishment has recommended that the
area remain under Israeli sovereignty.
So, it turns out that this is not a firing range and that the issue has nothing
to do with the arrangement between the government and the settlers.
Israel is cleansing the area - there is no other word - of its Palestinian
residents in order to facilitate its annexation when the time comes. It's
one more caprice of territorial avariciousness at the expense of hundreds
of residents who have done no harm to Israel and want only to be allowed
to tend to their flocks of sheep and lead their meager lives in the land of
the caves, which is their land. Where is there another state that expels
people from caves?
About two months ago I saw them in their temporary shelters: here a
tent, there the house of relatives who took pity on them. Soon they will
have to ask them to leave. And what will happen to them? No one is going
to offer alternative housing or financial compensation to these 700 people
who have been scattered to the four winds, wandering as far as the Jiftlik
in the Jordan Rift Valley in search of a roof over their heads. The caves
were their homes: children and elderly people, helpless shepherds whom
Israel has abused citing all manner of reasons, but now it turns out that it
is once again the territorial dybbuk that has seized the authorities.
If Deputy Minister Sneh or Gen. Ya'alon had seen the cowed look of the
girl Rasha and her baby brother Suheib as they stood in their temporary
hovel after their expulsion, they would understand what they have
wrought. But they of course will not take the trouble to actually look at
their victims. What is the fate of 700 Palestinians to them? They, after all,
are entrusted with the security of Israel.
