AT-TUWANI – The past two weeks have seen a marked rise in settler activity outside the illegal settlements* of Ma’on and the Havat Ma’on (Hill 833) outpost. This has varied from settlers crossing Palestinian grazing land, to grazing their sheep while shooting rocks from slingshots at nearby Palestinian shepherds, to abducting young Palestinian shepherds with the aid of the Israeli military and police.

On Friday afternoon, 19 February, 2010, Israeli settlers, soldiers and
police detained a 12-year-old boy from the Palestinian village of Saadet
Tha’lah, located near the Israeli settlement of Carmel in the South Hebron Hills. The boy had been grazing his family’s flock alone in their regular grazing area, just above Umm Zeitouna Valley, on the south side of the large Israeli dairy facility belonging to the Ma’on Settlement.

When CPTers** arrived, Israeli occupation authorities were also holding
two of the boy’s goats, which especially worried him because one goat was pregnant and could miscarry. Another shepherd from the nearby village of Tuba told the CPTers that he had been in the area and heard the boy’s shouts of panic as the Israelis grabbed him.

The boy reporting seeing two Israeli settlers outside the dairy barns, who summoned and directed the soldiers to go after him. The soldiers walked downhill from the dairy barns, grabbed his two goats, and told him, “If you want your goats back, you better come here.” The boy complied. The other shepherd then reported seeing both a settler and a soldier together grab the boy and physically restrain him. The boy also said he had been struck violently.

Israeli police held the boy and his two goats for about two hours, telling CPT that he had criminally trespassed on Ma’on Settlement land. The boy reported having no idea the land was not open to everyone. The police refused to produce a map defining which land was private, and eventually released him and his goats.

On the same afternoon, about 2 km west, according to area residents, a larger group of settlers crossed the Israeli highway 317 and attacked two shepherds, ages 13 and 21, from Jawayya Village, located about 1km north of At-Tuwani. The settlers killed one ewe and took it away. Although their means were unclear, blood was found at the site. Israeli police arrived and took the boys to their headquarters inside the Qiryat Arba Settlement, near Hebron, in order to file a complaint against the settlers. The boys’ father arrived as the police were leaving, asked if he could speak with his sons, and was told “no.”

CPT and Operation Dove are further investigating the details of both
incidents.

*According to the Geneva Conventions, the International Court of Justice in the Hague, and numerous United Nations resolutions, all Israeli settlements in the Occupied Palestinian Territories are illegal. Most settlement outposts are also considered illegal under Israeli law.

At Tuwani – On the morning of Thursday 7 January, 2010, Israeli soldiers attacked and injured Palestinian shepherds from the Musa Raba’i family, as they grazed their sheep in Humra valley, near the village of At-Tuwani in the South Hebron Hills. The soldiers also attacked the internationals accompanying the shepherds and broke a video camera. Before leaving the area the soldiers arrested one of the shepherds, Musab Musa Raba’i.

At around 10:30am Palestinian shepherds were grazing their sheep on privately owned Palestinian land when they saw Israeli settlers observing them from the outpost of Havat Ma’on. A short time later an Israeli army jeep came to the area. After stopping to speak with one of the settlers, three Israeli soldiers approached the shepherds and ordered them to leave the area. The shepherds explained that it was their land, but agreed to move further down into the valley. The soldiers followed them and grabbed at one of the shepherds, so they all tried to quickly leave the area with their sheep. A second army jeep came to the area and a further three soldiers joined in the attack escalating the violence. Soldiers hit the shepherds with their rifle butts, pushed them and while some soldiers forcibly held them to the ground others kicked them.

Other members of the family came to the area, and the women tried to intervene, hoping to deescalate the situation. However, the women were also forcefully pushed to the ground. Internationals trying to video tape the violent attack were roughly pushed and a soldier grabbed at and broke one of the video cameras.

Other villagers came to the area and tried to calm the situation by talking with the soldiers, but the soldiers ignored all pleas for calm and instead fired percussion grenades and tear gas into the small group of women and children gathered nearby on the hillside.

Israeli police reported to the scene after receiving numerous calls from internationals, but arrived as the soldiers were leaving the area. The police told CPTers that there would be a military investigation into the actions of the soldiers.

During the incident a spokeperson from an Israeli Human Right Organization called the local Israeli Army Brigade Operations Room and the Israeli Army Coordination Office to find out what was happening. She told CPT “I called several time and they had no information and no idea that something was going on in At Tuwani.”

Note to Editors: At the time of writing Moussab Mussa Raba’i is still detained at Kiryat Arba police station. One elderly woman, Umm Juma’ Raba’i, and a young woman, Umm Ribhi Raba’i, who is 2 months pregnant, had to be taken to hospital, suffering from the effects of tear gas inhalation. Three of the shepherds, Kamaal Raba’i, Majde Raba’i and Juma’ Raba’i were hospitalized for their injuries, and a young boy, Ramze Jamaal Raba’i, had his tooth broken.

Christian Peacemaker Teams and Operation Dove have maintained an international presence in At-Tuwani since 2004.

Some 100 Israeli activists left Tel Aviv and Jerusalem today to bring water to several isolated villages in the South Hebron Mount. These villages suffer more than anywhere else from Israel’s racist water policy, as they lack connection to water pipes, and suffer from army attacks on what few water wells and deposits they have. Busses where harassed several times on the way, and stopped completely near the Carmel illegal settlement, where soldiers claimed the area was a closed military zone, though no warrant was shown. Activists got off the busses and started marching, passing the bewildered soldiers and policemen and moving on towards their destination. Attempts to stop the spontaneous march failed, and the hostile forces left the area.
Meeting with Palestinian partners, activists mounted water trucks and tractors and traveled the dessert until they reached a physical block on the road, put there by the army to make Palestinians’ lives harder. A mass direct action, backed by a bulldozer hired for the cause, broke the road open and allowed water trucks to pass. At this point four soldiers appeared and tried to arrest the driver for the bulldozer, or at least stop it from moving. And so the activists split, leaving a small group to safe guard the bulldozer and allowing the majority to move on to the final destination.

It took the small group that stayed back two hours to convince the soldiers to leave and to secure the safe return of the bulldozer and its owner to their home. Meanwhile, the main group reached the destined villages and transferred eight trucks full of water to local residents. Four army vehicles showed up too late to stop the action, and though declaring the area a closed military zone (this time with a warrant) – could not really do anything to the activists. With the road open, the water at its rightful place and with no arrests or wounded – the action was declared a success.

At a time when the international community is calling for a freeze on new building in settlements and the disbanding of settlement outposts, the settler community of the South Hebron Hills is continuing its expansion unabated.

Israeli settlers from the illegal settlement on Ma’on, in the South Hebron Hills area, are constructing at least five new caravans on the south-west side of the settlement. Internationals based in the nearby Palestinian village of At Tuwani first observed building preparatory work in Ma’on a few days ago. Today, as the new caravans were being built, settlers began preparatory work on a nearby hilltop for further settlement expansion.

Over the past three months, internationals have also observed settlers constructing numerous new buildings in the nearby illegal Israeli outposts of Havat Ma’on (Hill 833) and Avigail.

Since its establishment in 1981, Ma’on settlement has been a source of violence towards local Palestinians. The agricultural orchards of Ma’on are cultivated on private land belonging to a family from the nearby Palestinian village of At Tuwani. By 1997, ongoing settler violence forced the Palestinian inhabitants of three nearby villages (Sarura, Humra and Kharoubeh) to abandon their homes.

The original outpost of Havat Ma’on was established in July 1999, but was dismantled in September of that year by the Israeli military. The following year, the outpost was re-established on a nearby hilltop, Hill 833, and has remained and grown since then. Avigail outpost was established in 2001.

Settlers from Ma’on and Havat Ma’on attack and harass Palestinian children from Tuba and Maghayir al Abeed traveling to and from school in At Tuwani. In 2004, following two attacks on internationals accompanying the children, the Israeli Knesset Committee for Children’s Rights affirmed the need for a military escort for the school children. The escort continues five years later. Settlers from Avigail and Havat Ma’on outposts also regularly attack Palestinian shepherds grazing their sheep.

At noon on 5 August between the villages of Mfaggara and Jinba located in the South Hebron Hills an Israeli military bulldozer and a hummer with five soldiers created three earth mounds, blocking the road. In addition, the military damaged the road by digging it up to create the earth mounds.

The entire village of Kallet Adbea is now closed between the two of the earth mounds. In addition, the mounds affect villages south of Kallet Adbea. It is estimated that approximately 700 Palestinians living in villages in the area are affected by the mounds as they do not have access to the nearby village of At-Tuwani or north to the city of Yatta.

The earth mounds represent a serious problem to health needs of the local Palestinian population, because now the access to health services from the city of Yatta is not accessible by ambulance or car. Now, in the dry season, it is impossible for vehicles to deliver food and water to villages in the area, and for villagers to take products to the market to sell.

The Israeli military told international volunteers that the earth mounds are an attempt to close the border between Occupied Palestinian Territories and Israel approximately 5 km south of the earth mounds to
“stop terrorists.” This road south to Jinba is one that is often used by Palestinian men traveling to work as migrant laborers in Israel.