Tag: Havat Ma’on Settlement

Palestinians protest expansion of Havat Ma’on Outpost

19 July 2011 | Christian Peace Makers Team

At-Tuwani: Palestinians protest expansion of Havat Ma’on Outpost; Israeli Military responds with violence

On 18 July 2011 around 6:35 p.m. three settlers attacked two members of Operation Dove and one member of the Christian Peacemaker Teams (CPT) with clubs and stones in the Meshakha valley outside of At-Tuwani in the South Hebron Hills. The settlers came out of the Havat Ma’on outpost, covering their faces with scarves and then ran with clubs toward two Palestinian shepherds who were grazing their sheep in a valley nearby. 
 The masked settlers could not catch the shepherds who, alerted to the approaching danger, left the vicinity.  The attackers then turned and ran toward the internationals, who had entered the valley to intervene and document the attack.  The settlers then made threats and attempted to strike the internationals as they filmed the settlers’ actions.  When the internationals retreated, the settlers begin throwing stones, narrowly missing their targets.

No Palestinians or internationals were injured in the incident. 
 This incident follows a similar attack of 13 July 2011 where three settler youth attacked Palestinian shepherds.  Five attacks by settlers from the outpost of Havat Ma’on against internationals and Palestinians have occurred within the last 30 days.

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

Additional photos of the incident are available here. (The unmasked men in the photos are the internationals)

Video of the incident is available here.

 

CPT: Palestinians protest expansion of Havat Ma’on Outpost; Israeli Military responds with violence

9 July 2011 | Christian Peacemaker Team – At-Tuwani

Carrying a large banner that read “We want to live in Peace and Dignity,” over one hundred Palestinians, internationals and Israeli activists marched in protest of an extension to the illegal Israeli settlement of Havat Ma’on on the morning of July 9th.

In response to the nonviolent march, Israeli soldiers declared a closed military zone, fired tear gas and threw sound grenades. One Palestinian man suffered minor burns on his legs when a sound bomb landed at his feet.

The extension of the Israeli outpost consists of a tent that settlers built about two months ago. Settlers built the tent on ground that belongs to families in the nearby Palestinian village of At-Tuwani.

The police detained one Palestinian and one international, but released them when activists refused to leave the area without them.

CPT: Rampaging Israeli settlers invade Palestinian village of Tuba

16 May 2011 | Christian Peacemaker Team

(Tuba, South Hebron Hills, West Bank) Late last night, Israeli settlers invaded the village of Tuba, damaged property, and killed and stole several sheep belonging to the Ali Awad family. Palestinians of Tuba reported that they counted seven masked settlers, who entered and left the village on foot, and saw two cars at the outskirts of Tuba, near the chicken barns of Ma’on settlement.

The rampaging settlers stole seven sheep, killed two, and injured others, including one which lost an eye. In addition, the settlers upended three water tanks, which held a total of 4.5 cubic meters of water. They destroyed fences, punctured a storage tent and three large sacks of yogurt, damaged a goat pen and destroyed the ventilation pipe of an outhouse. They also set loose a donkey, which later returned.

Around midnight on Sunday 15 May, internationals from Christian Peacemaker Teams received a call from a Tuba resident to report the settler invasion and request help in urging the Israeli police to come to Tuba. The police refused to go to the village because no one there could speak to them in Hebrew. Two Israeli soldiers arrived in Tuba on Monday morning, but did not speak Arabic and so could not communicate with the villagers.

The Ali Awad family is considering making a complaint to the Israeli police, despite the fact that all their previous complaints about settler attacks, vandalism or harassment have not yet resulted in any indictments or compensation. On 21 March 2011, a masked settler from the illegal outpost of Havat Ma’on stabbed Mahmoud Ibrahim Ali Awad as the Palestinian traveled by donkey from Tuba to the city of Yatta. Mahmoud Ali Awad spent a week in the hospital recovering from stab wounds on his chest and arm.

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

Provocations and attacks by Israeli settlers obstruct Palestinian nonviolent action in the South Hebron Hills: two Palestinians are arrested

19 March 2011 | Operation Dove

At-Tuwani – Saturday morning, around 9:00 am, during a nonviolent action, the inhabitants of At-Tuwani, accompanied by several international, planted some olive trees in Palestinian-owned Humra valley. In addition, during the action some shepherds of the village decided to graze their flocks in the area.

Immediately, several Israeli army jeep reached the area to monitor the situation. Soon after, settlers from the Havat Ma’on outpost, some of them masked, began to approach and provoke the Palestinians. They walked among their flocks and close to the women who were gathering herbs in the fields. At about 10:30, three young settlers chased a Palestinian man who was returning home with his donkey through Meshaha hill. Luckily, the Palestinian man was just scared by the settlers. The action could still be carried out successfully despite the provocations and the tension due to the presence of about twenty settlers.

The soldiers tried to keep the settlers away, repeatedly asking them to return in the outpost. At around 10:50 an officer of the Border Police brought an evacuation order declaring the zone “closed military area“. The Palestinians, after some protests, went back to At-Tuwani. The settlers returned in the outpost, they splitted in two groups: some of them attacked the Palestinians and their flocks on their way back to the village, while others headed toward At-Tuwani masked and accompanied by dogs, threatening the house closest to the outpost.

The situation deteriorated and some Palestinians replied to the settlers’ attacks defending themselves. The soldiers tried to force the Palestinians back to the village and during the riots they launched two sound bombs. Two young Palestinians were arrested and a third, after being pinned to the ground by several soldiers, felt faint and went by ambulance to the hospital in Yatta. The other inhabitants of At-Tuwani and all the internationals were forced by soldiers to return to the village.

[Note: According to the Fourth Geneva Convention, the Hague Regulations, the International Court of Justice, and several United Nations resolutions, all Israeli settlements and outposts in the Occupied Palestinian Territories are illegal. Most settlement outposts, including Havat Ma’on (Hill 833), are considered illegal also under Israeli law.]

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

CPT: Masked Israeli settlers chase schoolchildren, give directions to Border Police

8 February 2011 | Operation Dove & Christian Peacemaker Team

On the afternoon of 7 February 2011, three Israeli settlers from Havat Ma’on outpost chased a group of 12 Palestinian schoolchildren who were walking home from school. The Israeli military had failed to arrive to escort the schoolchildren, forcing the children to take a longer path without the army’s escort.

Shortly after the schoolchildren and Christian Peacemaker Teams(CPT) volunteers set out on the path towards Tuba and Maghayir al-Abeed villages, Israeli settlers, two of whom were masked, emerged from the grouping of trees which encompasses Havat Ma’on and began moving towards the children. Upon seeing the settlers, the children turned and sprinted to distance themselves from the settlers. Several children began crying and screaming in fear as they ran away from the settlers, one young girl began shaking uncontrollably as soon as she stopped running from the settlers.

The Israeli Border Police, who were located on an adjacent hill for the duration of the incident, arrived at the scene after the Palestinian children had safely distanced themselves from the settlers. The Border Police stopped and spoke with the settlers, two of whom remained masked during the entire conversation with the authorities.

The Border Police then approached the edge of At-Tuwani village where the children, CPT volunteers, and Palestinian adults had gathered. Border Police officers spoke with a CPT volunteer and an At-Tuwani resident, seeking to understand what had happened. After hearing their accounts but refusing to hear the role the settlers had played, the officers suggested that the Palestinian children, internationals, and At-Tuwani villagers were the ones causing problems, rather than the settlers.

Before the children had set out on the longer path without the military escort, CPT volunteers had called the Israeli military four times inquiring as to the whereabouts of the escort. During CPT’s final call to the military – more than 30 minutes after their initial call – the military dispatch office said that they hadn’t yet called the soldiers, who were to provide the escort, because they were too busy and had more important duties to perform.

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

Note: According to the Fourth Geneva Convention, the Hague Regulations, the International Court of Justice, and several United Nations resolutions, all Israeli settlements and outposts in the Occupied Palestinian Territories are illegal. Most settlement outposts, including Havat Ma’on (Hill 833), are considered illegal also under Israeli law.