Yesterday, I went to Hevron with a program through T’ruah (the rabbinic call for human rights) for rabbinical students in Israel for the year (and a couple rabbi tag alongs like me). The program was guided by Breaking the Silence and we also met with a local Palestinian activist from a group called Youth Against Settlements, a non-violent activist group. This post is part 1 on hevron as I am also going to hevron with a trip with Pardes in two weeks that is organized by a teacher who is a religious settler and I imagine will show us a more mainstream Israeli religious approach to settlement and historical sites.

Hevron is intense and tough for many reasons. On the Jewish side, it is where most of the patriarchs lived and one of the four cities that have had continuous Jewish settlement from ancient times (until the riot in 1929 when 69 Jews were killed and most of the Jews left with a few trying to come back and stay until the 1930s when they were forced to leave. Also, during these riots in 1929, many Jews were saved by their Arab neighbors). It is a location with a long history of Jewish pilgrimage and living.

Hevron is also the only Palestinian city with Jewish settlement in the middle of it and settled by very hard core, right wing, religious settlers. Jews tried to move back as soon as the 6 day war was over in 1967 and Israel took over Hevron and were denied and then a number of Jews booked staying in a hotel in 1970 and never left even though they didn’t have permission to move in. Much of the settlement in Hevron has happened by similar tactics of settlers creating facts on the ground through putting up tents, or moving into abandoned buildings (sometimes in the middle of the night) and then fighting for the legal right to remain or appealing to popular sentiment to be able to stay. There is a constant legal battle about the status of some of the outposts that are in Hevron. There are now about five of them that are not connected to each other and right in the middle of the city. Hevron also is governed by its own set of regulations called the Hevron agreements that divides the city into two areas with different rules between the areas and checkpoints between and within the areas.

In the name of the security of the settlers (not always clear that what is called needed for security is needed for security and there have been many changes made to security arrangements over the years), the movement of Palestinians is greatly limited and controlled and their is constant activity by the Israeli army to demonstrate their power and being in charge. There are approx 600 Jewish settlers living in Hevron proper (with thousands more in the nearby settlement of Kiryat arba) and about 600 soldiers stationed at all times in Hevron to guard these settlers. There are a number of streets where Palestinians can’t drive their cars (even if they live on those streets or have their businesses there) and some streets where they have additional restrictions of not being allowed to open their stores and other streets where they are further forbidden from walking (which means residents whose front door opens on to that street, can’t enter or leave their house through their front door)I. The downtown area’s main thoroughfare that previously had been an active market with open stores all along it and markets, is now all abandoned with no people and stores all shuttered close – some from not being allowed to open and some from there being no business at all. You see an abandoned city core.

There is lots one can write about hevron but here are a couple quick things from our day there:

  • we got off the bus and were being filmed by a settler who followed us and watched us – not quite clear why though the thought was likely to just be a burden and make it be known we are being watched. I understand this settler frequently does this and sometimes interrupts tours and causes havoc and has a reputation of being violent towards Palestinians
  • there are over 20 checkpoints in the city and Palestinian residents have to go through them to get from one part of town to another
  • we were supposed to walk one way to meet our Palestinian host and the trip had been cleared ahead of time with the army and policy, and when we arrived, the army decided it was a closed military zone and we couldn’t pass with no explanation given, though we did get there through by means of a back way and walking across a field. My understanding is that intimidation and road blocks like this are common
  • the tension and hatred between the settlers and palestinians is extraordinary intense and then you also have the tension between the army and the palestinians and a complicated relationship between the army and the settlers. The army is there to protect the settlers but by law can’t touch or arrest them (only the police can do that) which makes it hard for them to stop violent settlers and there is often tension between the army and the settlers.

My heart went out to the soldiers who don’t get to pick whether they are stationed in Hevron or not. And know that they are serving in a dangerous place where soldiers have been killed and are frequently the target. They also are sent on missions of intimidation – such as entering palestinian homes at night, and forcing all the residents in one room, so they can map the house and draw it – explained to us as a power move. Or might be sent into a Palestinian house and go onto its roof to use it as a lookout and sniper location, despite the protests of the home owner.

Hevron is a city where people take the law into their own hands and challenge legal rulings. It is a city where everyone is sure they are right and the others are wrong.