25 December 2009
Is it illegal to go to school? That question has been asked many times in occupied Palestine.
On 20 December 2009, the Israeli military confiscated a Palestinian vehicle used to transport children to and from school in al-Fakheit in the southern tip of the West Bank, as they were returning from school. Israeli soldiers stopped the vehicle, forced the children to walk home, and took the vehicle to a nearby military base across the Green Line in Israel.
It is not new for the Israeli military to harass Palestinian children going to school. The policy of the Israeli government has been to remove the Palestinian people from the South Hebron Hills, and they say, turn the area into a military firing zone. Not only have the Palestinians resisted leaving the area, they are returning to their village homes.
The Israeli military has banned schools in the area, forcing childen who live in the area to live with realitives in nearby cities.
The Israeli military claims there were problems with the registration papers for the vehicle. Local Palestinians claim the Israeli military is trying to ban all Palestinian vehicles from near the Green Line.
The next day, the Palestinians took the children to school with a tractor. The struggle continues.