Hebron, Sansana (Meitar Crossing), South Hebron Hills

The last laborers collect around some Israeli cars.  The parking areas on both sides of the checkpoint are very crowded.  On the way we passed Sham’a.  An area is being prepared for a new neighborhood (35 dwelling units) which will flow down the hill and adjoin the Palestinian homes.

The lovely, sunny day has brought Palestine’s sheep out to graze.  They cover many grazing lands.

At the entrance to Hebron-Kiryat Arba, right above Ja’abri’s home, flies a huge Israeli flag.  Beyond, at Giv’at Avihai, a new shed has popped up [Do we smell elections?  Or has the spring energized the settlers to carry out a series of provocations?  Maybe this time they’ll succeed…].

Farther on we pass Hazon David, a synagogue erected without permission which has recently been transformed from a tent into a large, wide white shed.  Beyond, on the Cave of the Patriarchs route, we see an expanded military presence.

We meet with ‘Abed the day after he, his son and his shop opposite the entrance to our Cave of the Patriarchs and their Ibrahim Mosque were victimized.  He was hit in the head, the hand and the leg with an iron bar.  ‘Abed told us that Baruch Marzel, Itamar Ben Gvir and twenty others attacked him and his son, who was hit in the face, and conducted a pogrom in his shop.  An officer who saw the attack later instructed Marzel and the others what to tell the police in order not to incriminate themselves.  They, of course, went home for now; nothing happened to them.  ‘Abed was angry and humiliated and thinks Marzel wants to “show the flag” before the elections in which he’s a candidate.  That’s how he operates.  Later we meet Hanna and Shlomit from Jerusalem who came to see for themselves and also try, on behalf of Yesh Din, to offer legal assistance to the father and son.  Michal Tzadik told me later that she already spoke to Gaby Lasky about ‘Abed.

And on the deserted Shuhada Street we talk to a group of ecumenicals, to soldiers, to a settler, to a local Red Magen David staffer who told us to “evaporate”…because it’s because of us, the “left,” that there’s terror.  We, we leftists, encouraged them to be terrorists.  It’s unbelievable, but he remembers “how wonderful and peaceful it was here and in Gaza before the days of Rabin and the left.”