CPTnet
11 December 2006

HEBRON UPDATE: 19 November -2 December 2006

On team during this period were Donna Hicks, Kathie Uhler, Jerry Levin, John
Lynes, Sally Britton and Laurie Hadden, and Cathy McLean.

Monday 20 November 2006

In the morning, John Lynes, Sally Britton, Laurie Hadden and his wife,
Marilyn, went to the farming village of Beit Ummar for a day of olive
picking. Neither the Israeli authorities nor Israeli setters interfered.

Tuesday 21 November 2006

In the morning, Hadden and Lynes led a tour group of German Mennonite Peace
Committee. When they attempted to walk to Tel Rumeida via Shuhada Street,
Israeli soldiers stopped them. Taking a longer, unpatrolled route, they
reached their destination.

Wednesday 22 November 2006

During morning school patrol, Donna Hicks, Jerry Levin, Kathie Uhler and
John Lynes encountered an Israeli army patrol stopping foot traffic in the
market. A soldier stopped two young schoolgirls and searched their
backpacks. At the Beit Romano checkpoint, they found a group of
Palestinians whom Israeli soldiers had prevented from entering the Old City.

Meanwhile Lynes and Hadden, also on school patrol, entered Shuhada Street
via Gates 4/5 and headed for the checkpoint across the street from the
Gutnick Center in the Ibrahimi Mosque security zone. Soldiers stopped them
at a guard post recently established midway between gates 4/5 and the
Gutnick Center checkpoint. The soldiers told them that if they wanted to
proceed they would have to retrace their steps, go back into the Old City
through Gates 4/5 and enter the mosque security zone via the Ibrahimi Mosque
gate. Lynes and Hadden elected to stay where they were and conduct their
surveillance of schoolchildren walking from that spot. Levin and Uhler
joined them at the end of patrol. Only then did the soldiers allow Hadden
and Lynes to head back to the CPT apartment along with Levin and Uhler via
the mosque security zone and the mosque gate.

Hicks took some visitors from Holy Land Trust, some of whom were
Palestinian, on a tour of the area. Soldiers would not allow the
Palestinians to walk on Shuhada Street.

Thursday 23 November 2006

The team went to Bethlehem for Thanksgiving dinner at Jerry and Sis Levin's
house. Britton, Hadden, Hicks, Lynes and McLean visited the Olivewood
Factory just below the Milk Grotto Church. One of the owners told them the
Israeli authorities have denied his family access to most of their olive
trees located on the other side of the wall separating Bethlehem from
Jerusalem. He said his family was able to harvest only enough olives to
produce about twenty liters of olive oil this year. In earlier years, they
were able to produce about 2000 liters each year. In the past, they could
sell the surplus. Now they have to buy olive oil when what they make for
their own use runs out.

Hicks, McLean, and Uhler spent the night in Bethlehem with a Palestinian
family that operates a hostel. They told the CPTers about the previous
Monday evening when the Israeli army invaded Bethlehem in pursuit of alleged
militants. Some soldiers forced their way into the house as two guests were
leaving. The soldiers began firing their guns from the house. The couple
said they spent most of the several hours the soldiers were firing from the
house under their beds. One of the sons showed the CPTers a plastic bag of
spent shells he picked up after the soldiers left.

Friday 24 November 2006

The Levins attended the latest session in the trial of nuclear whistle
blower Mordechai Vanunu. The Israeli government has accused him of
violating restrictions placed on him at the time of his release from prison
in 2004 that forbid him from giving interviews to foreign journalists. The
defense examined General Yair Neve, who signed the orders stipulating these
restrictions. In response to questioning by Vann's attorney, the general
confirmed that the order was based on information supplied by the Israeli
secret service, but that some of the information was so secret that he was
not allowed to see it. Then he revealed that he delegated the
responsibility and the authority to enforce the restrictions to the Israeli
police and secret service. The judge did not set a date for the next trial,
but said he hoped it could wrap up in January.

Saturday 25 November 2006

The latest CPT delegation arrived in Hebron for a four-day stay in the area.

Sunday 26 November 2006

The team lost telephone and internet service early in the day.

Monday 27 November 2006

At mid-morning, Sally Britton, and Kathie Uhler joined two women from
Machsoum (checkpoint or roadblock) Watch and a driver/translator to the home
of a farmer in the Baqa'a Valley on whose recently confiscated land the
Israeli authorities are building a new road. They also visited the home of
another Palestinian who told them the Israeli authorities had encircled his
land with a barbed wire fence and two roadblocks.

Telephone and internet service was still out all day. CPT learned that
other customers had heard that their service would be out for two or three
more days. Someone had allegedly cut a main cable.

Tuesday 28 November 2006

On morning school patrol, Jerry Levin and John Lynes found a Palestinian man
whom Border Policemen were detaining at the checkpoint across the street
from the Gutnick Center. When they returned about thirty minutes later the
Palestinian, along with four others, was still there. Levin asked the two
Border policemen on duty why they were holding the young man so long. One
of the soldiers sneered and said, "I don't speak English." Levin said,
"You're speaking English now, and very good English. So tell me, why are
you holding him so long?" The soldier shrugged. Lynes called out,
"Congratulations on your English." Then right after the soldiers heard
Levin calling TIPH (Temporary International Presence Hebron), the soldiers
suddenly handed out the ID cards of all the detainees.

John Lynes attended a meeting with two representatives of the PLO's
negotiating unit at the Hebron Land Defense Committee office. Committee
members, along with representatives from local governmental units, spoke of
the inadequacy of PLO efforts to deal with effectively with the occupation,
i.e. and its advocacy work overseas and the effects of expanding Israeli
settlements. One of the PLO conferees