http://www3.haaretz.co.il/eng/scripts/article.asp?id=27629&mador=4&datee=9/6/98
Ha'aretz, September 6, 1998
Between Juwarish and Yitzhar
By Gideon Levy
Have the settlers gone too far? Have they gone
even too far to merit acceptance and forgiveness
from a right-wing government?Indications in recent
days suggest that the number of right-wingers who
are heartily sick of some settlers and their
off-the-wall behavior has grown slightly. And,
though less important, even voices on the left
have been more courageous in condemning the
settlers, particularly after the murders at
Yitzhar and Tel Rumeida. And what had previously
been whispered is now being voiced publicly; that,
yes, there are settlers who are in no small
measure to blame for the murderous violence that
has been aimed at them and, yes, there is a
difference between an attack on a peaceful Jew in
Tel Aviv and an attack on a provocative settler at
Tel Rumeida or Yitzhar.
From the perspective of the Arab village of Burin,
located below Yitzhar, the presence of thugs who
threaten village farmers with weapons and curses
to prevent them from getting to their olive groves
is understandably the target of violent outbursts.
But it is not only the Palestinians who are
targeted by the Yitzhar settlers. Two weeks ago, I
saw them threaten to shoot officers of the IDF and
the Border Police - who as usual did nothing. You
had to see the haplessness of the sector's brigade
commander, Col. Shuki, to understand that his
hands are tied.
Since then, however, in a sort of delayed reaction
as more events have occurred, it suddenly appears
that the authorities - meaning the judicial and
security authorities - have partly shaken off
their apathy and begun trying to change the rules
of the game being played out in these lawless,
anarchic territories. Still, all the intentions
that have been trumpeted over the past few days
have to pass the test of concrete action and
government backing.
The attorney general issued a set of guidelines
for authorities who must deal with lawless
settlers. The settlers screamed and yelled, but
Elyakim Rubinstein stuck to his guns - the same
Elyakim Rubinstein who petitioned the High Court
of Justice last week to block the early release
from prison of Yisrael Lederman, who in 1996 threw
scalding tea into the face of Labor MK Yael Dayan.
The head of Central Command, Major General Moshe
Yaalon, has explicitly ordered his forces to
assist Palestinians to travel safely to their
plots of land, in spite of settler threats.
According to reports, he has also ordered the IDF
to "act firmly" against any settlers in Hebron who
disturb the public order. The police announced
that in the last 10 days of August about 15 files
were opened against Israelis for attacking
Palestinian property in Hebron, and the chief of
the Shin Bet security service, Ami Ayalon, held a
meeting with settler leaders.
It is not by chance that the killers of some 135
Palestinians in the past 10 years have come from
the settlements. Groups and individuals have
caused property damage and they have uprooted,
smashed, shattered, shot and beaten.
This is a group in which the conditions that bring
about the establishment of murderous phalanges are
rife: a feeling of isolation, a sense of messianic
mission, an enemy-neighbor that is perceived
through a demonic prism, mistrust of the existing
legal and governmental systems, arms caches,
combat experience, and a lenient attitude from the
ruling authorities.
Labor governments were afraid of this group, Likud
governments identified with it. These are groups
with a record of violence unrivaled by any other
community in the state of Israel, with the
possible exception of the village of Juwarish,
outside the city of Ramle. There, too, rifles
speak louder than words, and the police are,
again, afraid to intervene.
Juwarish? Bewailing the new regulations introduced
by the attorney general, one settler leader said
bitterly that "even in Juwarish there are no
special procedures for enforcing the law." In
Juwarish, we should remember, the only solution
was the exile of one of the combatant sides from
the village. The day will yet come when it will
become clear that in the area between Yitzhar and
Tel Rumeida, that same solution is the only viable
one.
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