by Susan Rosenbluth,
Editor, Jewish Voice and Opinion

December 2008

Like Jews too many times throughout history, 100 Jewish residents of a building called Shalom House in Hebron, the Judean city 20 miles south of Jerusalem, have spent weeks waiting for the knock on the door, telling them to leave their home peacefully or face violent eviction at the hands of Israel’s security forces.

The Jewish residents of Shalom House, located on the border linking Hebron and neighboring Kiryat Arba, comprise about 24 families and dozens of children.

Most observers do not expect them to leave voluntarily. Leaders of Israel’s nationalist camp, pointing to the bitter recent history of the expulsion of Jews from Gaza and northern Samaria in the summer of 2005 and the violent expulsion of residents of Amona one year later, have warned the Israeli government they will stand firm against any forces aimed at evicting the Shalom House residents.

These leaders, such as Rabbi Eliezer Waldman of the Nir Yeshiva, have called on supporters to protect Shalom House "with their own bodies" to prevent the government from carrying out its stated intention of emptying the structure.

The government has reason to be cautious. The Jews who were expelled from their homes in Gush Katif, Gaza, greeted the forces sent to destroy their communities with hugs, and the evacuation was bloodless. In Amona, however, there were no tokens of affection from either side. The Jewish protesters were armed with stones, and Israeli police threatened young girls with rape and broke bones, including those of two MKs who had come to give moral support to the mostly young demonstrators. One 15-year-old wound up in Hadassah Hospital on life support after mounted police trampled and beat him.

In Hebron, any confrontation is expected to be much worse than the one in Amona. Some observers said they expect "all-out war" that would make Amona seem like "child’s play."

Michael Ben-Horin, an IDF officer with two sons who serve as commando soldiers, warned that any attempt to expel the Jews will be met with "violence, hatred, polarization, and a weakening of the IDF."

Although the issue over Shalom House has been framed by the government of Prime Minister Ehud Olmert as a simple property dispute in which it seeks nothing more than to impose law and order, the Jewish community of Hebron and their supporters argue that the Kadima-led government, supported by its defense minister, Labor’s Ehud Barak, is using the case as a way to secure left-wing votes in the election scheduled for Feb 10.

"We will not allow a left-wing lame-duck government and its branches in the Supreme Court, media, and police to gain political points for the upcoming elections by persecuting the national camp and destroying Jewish houses. The public outcry must be heard loud and clear: Beit Hashalom is Jewish and we will fight to keep it," said Ruth Matar, leader of the nationalist Women in Green.

Five years ago, the Jewish community of Hebron purchased Shalom House for $700,000 from Ayoub Jabbar, a Palestinian-Arab who had himself recently bought the property from another Palestinian, Faiz Rajbi. Payments for the sale were made between March 2004 and March 2005, after which, a few renovations were ordered. In March 2007, Jews began to move in, even though the apartments were far from finished.

The money to buy the property was donated to the Jewish community by Morris Abraham of Brooklyn, who forfeited his retirement funds in order to secure the building.

Mr. Abraham’s family had lived in Hebron until 1929, when Arabs turned on the Jewish community, murdering 70 Jews, including infants, and maiming scores. After the massacre, the British evacuated what was left of the Jewish community.

One of Mr. Abraham’s goals in donating the money for Shalom House was to link Kiryat Arba with the Tomb of the Patriarchs, the site, according to Jewish tradition, where the Biblical Abraham and Sarah, Isaac and Rebecca, and Jacob and Leah are buried.

As soon as word of the sale became public, Mr. Jabbar fled and Mr. Rajbi was arrested by the Palestinian Authority. Under PA law, selling property to a Jew is a capital offense.

Mr. Rajbi defended himself by denying the validity of the sale. Accusing the Jewish residents of invading his home, he turned to the Israeli courts, demanding that his property be returned. He claimed that all documents presented by the Jews attesting to the legality of the sale had been forged, an argument that was quickly dismissed by a police investigation.

Nevertheless, the Israeli court took the legal challenge seriously, denying the Jewish residents the right to make any further improvements to Shalom House, including adding electricity, before the case was fully adjudicated.

The court even forbade the Jewish residents to install proper windows in the building, prompting the residents, who refused to vacate the property, to use make-shift curtains and sheets to keep out the cold. When some MKs feared for the health of children inside, the court relented and reversed its decision, at least regarding the windows.

At the end of October 2008, the case went before the Israeli Supreme Court. One of the major points of contention revolved around the issue of improvements made to the property. The Jews did not dispute Mr. Rajbi’s argument that he had done some of the repair work; however, they said, they had the bill to show that they had hired and paid him to do the work.

Nevertheless, the judges ruled, because the alleged seller later did some repair work in the building, he was able to retain his claim to the property.

The Jews were given 24 hours to vacate the building.

A few hours before the deadline, the Jewish buyers were able to produce one more piece of evidence: a cassette recording of Mr. Rajbi admitting in a candid conversation with a friend that he had indeed sold the building, of his own volition, to Mr. Jabbar and received payment. On the tape, Mr. Rajbi admitted that he had done the repair work on behalf of Mr. Jabbar, who paid him for that, too. Mr. Rajbi told his friend that because of the venture, he had fallen under intense pressure from the PA Intelligence.

Because of the obvious danger from the PA, the identity of the Palestinian who recorded Mr. Rajbi’s admission was not revealed.

The attorney for the Hebron Jewish community, Nadav HaEtzni, said he left court fairly confident that the cassette had put an end to the argument over whether or not the house was sold and for whom the repairs had been done.

"It showed that the original seller did not intend to retain any rights of ownership by carrying out the repairs," said Mr. HaEtzni.

In fact, the tape caused Mr. Rajbi to change his story. He agreed that he had sold the house, but, he told the court, he annulled the sale back in 2004. This version, however, is disproved by the existence of receipts, issued by him, showing that he was still receiving payments for the property through March 2005.

The Supreme Court, however, was not convinced. The judges ruled that the entire matter of ownership had to be subjected to judiciary review, a process that, in Israel, has been known to take up to a decade or even longer.

In the meantime, the Olmert government’s attorney general, Menachem Mazuz, who has made no secret of either his left-wing sentiments or his distaste for the entire Hebron Jewish enterprise, petitioned the court for the right to evict the Jewish residents of Shalom House.

Permission to expel the Jews was granted at the beginning of November on the grounds that because there were "doubts" regarding the occupants’ acquisition of the property—namely, Mr. Rajbi’s claim that he did not sell it—the property could revert to its initial status while the situation is resolved in civil court.

Adding insult to injury, the court ruled that Hebron’s Jews were required to pay court costs of almost $3,800 and an equal amount to Mr. Rajbi.

The outcry over the court’s decision was immediate and fierce, and the complaints came from quarters far removed from right-wing settlements.

According to retired District Court Judge Uri Struzman, the justice who wrote the Court’s decision, Ayala Procaccia, based herself on a case adjudicated by him known as Mishmar Ayalon, At a conference last month, Mr. Struzman accused Ms. Procaccia of "twisting the original meaning" of his ruling. In fact, he said, if the court really had been guided by his precedent, it would have reached the opposite conclusion and allowed the Jews to remain in Shalom House until the case was settled.

"There’s no surprise in the settlers’ forceful protests that it wasn’t a fair trial that guided the High Court’s considerations, but, rather, a political perspective," he said.

Residents and supporters of Hebron are convinced that, by ignoring their documents as well as the cassette, the Supreme Court and the government are, in effect, "stealing" their property. The fact that the ruling coincided with Torah portions dealing with Sodom and Abraham’s purchase of property in Hebron did not seem coincidental.

Hebron spokeswoman, Orit Strook, compared the Israeli Supreme Court to the corrupt judiciary in Biblical Sodom.

"In Sodom, too, there were courts, in which the judges enlisted all their wisdom in order to legalize injustice. The same has happened here: the laws and the precedents were all distorted unrecognizably for the purpose of legalizing the expulsion of the Jewish buyers from their property. To this end, the Court contradicted itself in every possible way. Both the judges and the Attorney General stood fast and did not allow the facts to confuse them," she said.

She likened the Jewish community to Abraham the Patriarch, who, according to the Bible, also bought property in Hebron and paid for it in full.

"We know that justice is on our side. We presented all the evidence, but were met with impervious callousness and unwillingness to hold a fair judicial proceeding," she said.

Writing in Ha’aretz, commentator Nadav Shragai suggested the problem between the Jews of Hebron and the government is a conflict of vision. "Hebron in the eyes of the state prosecutors and the High Court of Justice is an Arab city where a few hundred Jews reside until ‘the final status agreement’ is struck. Hebron in the eyes of the settlers is the city of our forefathers in which Jewish settlement has existed ‘from time immemorial’ and will exist ‘forever,’" he said.

In fact only Jerusalem commands more Jewish historical and religious attachment than Hebron. Next to the Temple Mount in Jerusalem, the Cave of the Patriarchs is Judaism’s holiest site.

For centuries, the Muslim rulers of the Holy Land appropriated the site as a mosque and forbade Jewish worship inside the structure. Jews were limited to the building’s seventh step.

After the Arab riots of 1929, a few Jews returned to the city, but another such riot in 1936, rendered Hebron judenrein until the 1967 Six-Day War, when Hebron once again came under Jewish sovereignty.

The IDF celebrated Jewish return to the city by destroying the hated arch marking the "seventh step." Then the military promptly forbade any Jewish entry into the city.

During Passover 1968, Rabbi Moshe Levinger and a group of like-minded religious Jews decided it was time to re-establish the Jewish community of Hebron. But the government didn’t make it easy. Then-Defense Minister Moshe Dayan gave the group a choice: Be forcibly removed or agree to stay in the nearby military compound.

The Jews lived in that compound for two years, waiting for the first neighborhood of Kiryat Arba, the new Jewish community adjacent to the ancient city of Hebron, to be completed.

In 1979, a group of ten women and their 40 children stole in the dark of night into the basement of the old Hadassah clinic in the heart of Hebron. When their presence in Beit Hadassah was discovered the next day, then-Prime Minister Menachem begin did not try to force them out, but neither would he allow any supplies to come in. He relented when Rabbi Levinger reminded him that even enemy Egyptian soldiers were given food and water.

For two months, the women and children remained holed up in the building. They won permission to come and go only when one of the children, suffering from a toothache, went out to see a dentist and then had trouble getting back inside to his mother.

Each Friday night, the men from Kiryat Arba gathered outside Beit Hadassah to make kiddush for the women and to welcome the Sabbath. On a Friday night in May 1980, terrorists attacked, killing six and wounding 20. The Israeli government relented and gave permission for Jewish resettlement in Hebron.

Former Defense Minister Moshe Arens pointed out that when an agreement is eventually reached between Israel, the PA, and/or Jordan, Jews will still probably continue living in Kiryat Arba, making Shalom House, located on the road leading to the Cave of the Patriarchs, important, if Jews are still to have access to the holy site.

Without Shalom House, he said, "the impression is created that the defense minister and presumably the government in general have no interest in assuring this access. On the contrary, it seems they would like the settlers to leave the area, and are reconciled to Jews in the future being denied access to the Cave of the Patriarchs and the city of Hebron in general."

Mr. Shragai characterized Hebron, where the Biblical King David established his kingdom before the conquest of Jerusalem, as "the fault line" that divides political secular Zionists and religious Zionists. The former, he said, see "the future of our sons as more important than the graves of our forefathers," while the latter argue that "there is no future for our sons in a place that is without the graves of our forefathers."

To Mr. Shragai, Jews were not the Supreme Court’s only losers. He argued that one of the most egregious decisions of the Court in this case was simply to accept the death sentence which the PA hands down to anyone who "commits the crime" of selling land to Jews.

"In any properly functioning state, the government, its attorney general, and its Supreme Court would cry out to the heavens against such a punishment, which more or less constitutes a license to murder. But this law is accepted with near indifference, perhaps because the champions of human rights, who were supposed to rise up in protest are themselves of the mind that a Palestinian who sells land to a Jew is a criminal," he wrote.

The case did not mark the first time the Jews of Hebron found themselves at odds with Mr. Olmert’s government, and especially Mr. Mazuz.

For several years, the Jews of Hebron sought to rent and renovate the formerly Jewish-owned buildings in the city’s market place. Each time they applied to the government, they were met with opposition.

In 2006, after a terrorist, very close to the market, shot and killed a Jewish baby, the Jews of Hebron realized their security depended on establishing a presence in the old market. Without securing IDF permission, they invested tens of thousands of dollars converting the former fruit and vegetable stands into small, but livable apartments.

They named the new neighborhood Mitzpe Shalhevet, after the murdered infant, established a Torah study hall, and Jews began moving in.

But as soon as they did, an Arab demand was made to reclaim the market place. Mr. Mazuz’s office filed papers with the Supreme Court denying the Arabs’ legal right to the market, but also insisting that the Jewish "trespassers" be evicted.

The Supreme Court issued no ruling in the case, but Mr. Mazuz ordered the eviction anyway. The Jews appealed, and, this time, the court ruled that although the land did belong to private Jewish organizations, the buildings were under the legal jurisdiction of the Israeli government.

The court recommended that the structures be leased to the Hebron Jewish community, but Mr. Mazuz refused, saying, "The criminals must not be rewarded." The Jewish community’s "crime" was that they had moved in without first securing IDF permission.

Mr. Mazuz’s next task was to pressure then-Defense Minister Shaul Mofaz to remove the families. Once again, hundreds of protesters gathered in Hebron to lend their support.

A violent crisis seemed imminent until Israeli army officials and the Hebron Jews reached a compromise: the Jews would leave Mitzpe Shalhevet voluntarily and the IDF would expedite Jewish acquisition of the buildings so that the residents would be allowed to reoccupy the neighborhood legally in about two months.

When Mr. Mazuz heard about the agreement, he denied its validity. "The state has not made any obligation to repopulate the concerned structures," he said.

When the Hebron Jews protested that they had "an agreement in our hands," Mr. Mazuz claimed the Israeli Army had no jurisdiction to strike such a deal.

Since then, Mr. Olmert’s government has forcibly expelled Jews several times from buildings in and around Hebron. When the structures in question have amounted to little more than tents or trailers, it usually takes no more than a few hours for the Jews to re-establish the camp or "illegal outpost" after the soldiers have gone.

In the case of Shalom House, Hebron’s Jews and their supporters seem determined not to allow another eviction. To that end, the Jewish residents have waged a two-pronged battle: convincing Israeli and Diaspora supporters to join in their struggle and asking for prayer.

Their campaign may be meeting with some success. Shortly after the government received permission to expel the Jews, 50 MKs—nearly half the Knesset, including several members of Mr. Olmert’s Kadima party—signed a letter asking Mr. Mazuz to reinvestigate the sale of the building, especially in light of the cassette, and, in the meantime, to refrain from ordering the expulsion of the Jews living there.

In their letter, the MKs told Mr. Mazuz that evicting the Jews under these circumstances, would not only "be an outrageous injustice" but would also seriously undermine public trust in Israel’s judicial system.

Calling the ruling "clear discrimination" against the Hebron-Jewish community and "nefarious indifference to the evidence showing that the building is, in fact, theirs," MK Uri Ariel, head of the National Union faction, said, "The judges and Mazuz and the police should thus not wonder why the public trust in them has dropped to the abyss—for they have earned it."

Shas MK Eli Yishai, who serves as Minister of Industry and Trade, called the Supreme Court’s action "scandalous" and accused the judges of behaving like "servants of political groups."

"It can’t be that the High Court, without even determining who the owner of the property is, chases people out. With a decision like this, the court stopped being for everyone and turned into something loathsome," he said.

In the US, such expressions are fully protected speech. But in Israel, media commentators were quick to cry "incitement" when, in addition to Mrs. Strook’s comparison to the courts of Sodom, the High Court was ridiculed as a "High Brothel." Some members of the Israeli media compared such comments to the name-calling that took place before Prime Minister Yitzchak Rabin was murdered.

In fact, however, recent surveys indicate that, because of accusations of prejudice, bias, and corruption, Israelis’ respect for the courts and the political system in general has been dwindling.

The same is true for the mainstream media. But that did not stop Voice of Israel government news anchorwoman Estie Peres, who has previously faced complaints that she demonstrates an anti-religious and anti-nationalist bias, from calling Shalom House "House of Conflict."

Not only Israeli Jews answered the call to help their brethren in Shalom House. Thousands of Diaspora Jews telephoned, faxed, emailed, and text-messaged their local Israeli consulates and embassies. Some got through to Mr. Olmert himself.

Typical was "Sharon from Manalapan," who told the Consulate in New York that she was "outraged" by the government’s threat to expel Jews from Peace House in Hebron.

"I promise that if the government forces the Jews out of Beit Hashalom, my friends and I will see this as a crime against the Jewish people. We will consequently do whatever we can to prevent any representative of this Israeli government, including the military, from appearing in our synagogue or in any of the organizations with which we are affiliated. If you want to lose the only friends you have left in America, then, by all means, expel the Jews from Beit Hashalom. We’ll see how far your government can operate without US support.

"I love Israel," she continued, "but your actions and anti-Jewish policy are a threat to the Jewish people in their homeland. On the eve of national elections in Israel, I realize we must do everything to bring down those of you who are giving a hand to the Arab enemy by uprooting Jews from the Land of Israel.

"I repeat: Do not touch the Jews in Beit Hashalom. Instead, send the IDF to fight the Arabs who daily attack the Jews living in the Negev, Sderot, and Ashkelon," she concluded.

Throughout November, whenever there was an inkling that the eviction was imminent, hundreds of supporters of the Hebron residents flocked to Shalom House, making it clear to the government that the expulsion forces would have to face far more than 100 men, women, and children.

On the Sabbath of Nov 21-22, close to 25,000 Jews came to Hebron to hear the Torah portion that recounts the purchase of the Patriarchs’ Cave in Hebron by Abraham, who bought the site as a grave for his wife, Sarah.

These supporters included yeshiva students and rabbis, businessmen and professionals, entertainers and MKs. Some of them helped residents of Shalom House build barricades, affixing steel bars to doors to make entry difficult for the police.

On Dec.1, Jeff Daube, director of the Zionist Organization of America’s Israel Office, announced that ZOA would open a Hebron branch office in Shalom House.

Mr. Daube said he planned to devote as much time as possible to the new office "in order to demonstrate to the Hebron Jewish community and the Israeli government that ZOA’s tens of thousands of members and leadership stand behind and with Shalom House’s Jewish residents."

To that end, he said, he intends to work with the leadership of the Jewish community in Hebron to facilitate visits by very concerned Israelis and tourists to express support and solidarity with Shalom House’s Jewish residents.

Like Mr. Arens, he questioned whether Israel could guarantee access to Hebron’s Jewish holy place without a strategic spot, such as Shalom House, leading to the Cave of the Patriarchs.

Simple agreements with the PA to maintain free access to holy sites do not work, said Mr. Daube. Although the PA promised access to Joseph’s Tomb in Shechem and the Shalom Al Yisrael Synagogue in Jericho, since those cities have fallen under PA rule, Jews who want to visit these places must secure difficult-to-receive military permission and heavy military escorts.

"I believe Hebron, much like Jerusalem, is a Jewish and Zionist treasure, held in sacred trust by the Jewish State for the entire Jewish nation. As the Israel representative of the ZOA and an Israeli citizen, I feel a special obligation to express my membership’s concern for and identification with the Jewish community of Hebron. I encourage everyone to join me at Beit Hashalom so that we can let the government know, with one unified voice, that it should remain an integral part of Jewish Hebron, now and forever," he said.

Among the Israelis speaking out for the Jews of Hebron was Rabbi Nahman Holtzberg, the father of Rabbi Gavriel Holtzberg, z"l, who was murdered in the Chabad center in Mumbai.

Just after his son’s and daughter-in-law’s funerals, Rabbi Holtzberg sent a letter to Mr. Olmert asking him not to order the eviction, at least not while the families of those who had been murdered were sitting shiva.

"We implore you not to commit any act that will polarize and create a schism within the people, at a time when all the people of Israel are mourning so great a tragedy," he wrote.

Many Hebron supporters asked Messrs Barak and Olmert to postpone any eviction plans until after the new government takes office.

Throughout November, there were several false alarms. In the middle of the month, Daniella Weiss, the former mayor of Kedumim, announced, "The moment is now. If many people come, the government may back down and cancel its plans."

While it is unclear if the government did call off a planned action against Shalom House, the fact is, supporters showed up and the police did not.

Nevertheless, on Nov. 20, Public Security Minister Avi Dichter, a Kadima MK, vowed that, within 30 days, "Shalom House will be empty."

Calling the implementation of the eviction order "a test for the rule of law in Israel," he expressed hope that the expulsion would proceed without violence.

"There are some who understand that the High Court’s order is binding, and I hope there will be dialogue and no need to use force," he said, adding that Israeli troops would be prepared to use force if necessary.

Mr. Barak made similar statements. "The ruling is not a recommendation, and we will implement it exactly as written," he said.

Their implication that the Court had ordered the expulsion outraged the Hebron residents, who pointed out that the judges did no such thing, but rather had merely deferred to the government.

"The decision is in the government’s hands," said Mrs. Weiss. "They are lighting the flames of a conflagration and recklessly leading to a provocation, out of political motives."

Former Supreme Court Justice Yaakov Turkel criticized Messrs Barak and Dichter, as well as the media for "misleading" the public into thinking that the Supreme Court had ordered the evacuation.

"The ruling does not obligate the State to act to evacuate the Jews, but, rather, gives the government the freedom to decide whether to do so or not," he said. "This misunderstanding has caused the great rift in the religious and right-wing’s trust in the Supreme Court."

In fact, even if the Court had ruled for eviction, the government is in a position to postpone or even cancel the order by arguing that the move would seriously endanger public safety. Israel’s security forces have often used this reasoning to oppose actions which, in other circumstances, would be permissible.

For example, even though the right-wing Temple Mount Faithful has won the court’s permission to march in the Old City of Jerusalem, the police invariably cancel the event, fearing it would lead to Palestinian rioting. When the organization has petitioned against the police position, the courts invariably side with the police.

But this is not always the case. Just recently, the police opposed a request by a right-wing activist to hold a march in an Israeli-Arab town. The police said it would lead to violence, but when the activist appealed, the court ordered the police to find a way to permit the march to take place.

"However, Barack is reportedly determined to carry out the eviction without prompting from anyone," said Jerusalem Post journalist Dan Izenberg, adding that eviction is "what the state wanted in the first place."

Asked how he would have ruled in this case, Mr. Turkel said he would have passed the matter down to the district court which would then rule on the claims of forgery.

"The District Court would then review the evidence and decide if an evacuation order should be issued before a final ruling," he said.

In fact, this is in keeping with a long-standing practice that the Supreme Court does not rule on matters pertaining to civil disputes between individuals.

The fact that so many Israeli jurisprudence experts agreed with the Hebron Jews was reflected in the speeches and signs at rallies held to support them.

At a rally in Kiryat Arba, the mayor, Zvi Katzover said the intention of the government to expel the Jews from Shalom House "has nothing to do with the law."

Mrs. Matar agreed. "If this government really cared about the law, then thousands of illegal Arab buildings, houses, and fields would not exist. The government would have prevented them from being built. Arabs build illegally all over Judea and Samaria, the Negev and the Galilee, and this government does nothing to stop them. On the other hand, Jews who legally purchased a house are meant to be expelled. This has nothing to do with the rule of the law. This has to do with the fact that we have an extreme left, anti-Zionist Kadima government who hates the proud Jewish pioneers in Judea and Samaria and will do all they can to crush and persecute them in the hope that this will give them some votes in the upcoming elections," she said.

Like Mrs. Weiss, she called for supporters to be "on standby" 24 hours a day so they might rush to the area if forces were seen approaching the building.

"We don’t know when the police will come, but they are too afraid to appear when there are many supporters," said one of the speakers.

One supporter from Givatayim, just east of Tel Aviv, demonstrated how to use a gas mask "in case the police decide to stage a chemical attack."

"I’m not kidding," he told the crowd. "These people—the police—hate us and I believe they want to kill you."

Mr. Ariel did not go that far, but, he said, "If they come to evacuate us, we will be there. We will defend ourselves against anyone who attacks us. This is a house of peace. Here there is peace, and we will continue to buy houses," presumably from the Arabs.

Kadima MK Otniel Shneller told the crowd that he had joined the party because it officially backs a Jewish presence in Hebron.

Many residents and supporters of Hebron argued that while the government seems eager to follow court orders designed to harass the national camp, it routinely ignores directives that have been in their favor. At the rally, Mr. Ben-Horin, the IDF officer, said he would personally escort the Shalom House residents from the building if the government would agree to uphold the High Court rulings that Jews be permitted to pray on the Temple Mount in Jerusalem.

A similar rally was also held in Tel Aviv opposite Mr. Barak’s home. The protesters focused not only on Mr. Barak’s position regarding Shalom House, but also on a raid Mr. Barak authorized just this past October against an alleged "illegal outpost" between Hebron and Kiryat Arba.

The property, a farm belonging to the Federman family, was attacked by approximately 100 soldiers and police at 1:30am on a Sunday morning, destroying virtually all the property owned by Noah Federman, a well-known activist; his wife, Elisheva; and their nine children.

According to Mrs. Federman, when they heard noises, her husband went outside to investigate and, within seconds, was arrested. The troops then broke the windows and climbed into the house, waking the children and throwing them out of the house, still in their pajamas. Some of the children were thrown through the windows.

"The house was filled with screaming and yelling. The children began to get hysterical and ran to my room. I asked the police to let me talk to them and calm them down. They didn’t let me, and just yelled, ‘Get out, get out, get out,’" she said.

The police, she said, systematically broke furniture, ripped books and clothing, and smashed dishes. The family was not allowed to take any of their belongings.

Afterwards, she said, the police began beating her and the children, breaking several of their 16-year-old daughter’s fingers. When they were finally taken away in police cars, Mrs. Federman and her infant were separated, an illegal action in Israel.

Once everyone was out of the house, a bulldozer ploughed the structure to the ground.

At 4am, when she was released from the police station, Mrs. Federman returned to the site where her home once stood. "I tried to rummage through the destruction to find clothes and coats and other things for the children. Eighteen years of marriage are buried in the ruins," she said.

Kiryat Arba Mayor Katzover said the destruction was "unbelievable." "It looks just like Gush Katif," he told reporters.

Rabbi Dov Lior of Kiryat Arba said the demolition reminded him of the pain he suffered as a little boy in Poland after Germany invaded in 1939.

By the next day, a call was put out to supporters and between them and the residents of Kiryat Arba and Hebron, the rebuilding began. Groups such as Women in Green collected clothes and other basic items for the family. Money was also donated.

During the destruction, several residents of Kiryat Arba were alerted. While most of them expressed quiet rage, one man reportedly told the soldiers that he hoped they would either fall in battle or be kidnapped like Gilad Shalit.

It seemed to be just what Mr. Barak was waiting for. Announcing he intended to seek punishment for anyone who expressed himself in that fashion, he may have been hoping to refocus attention away from the violence that had occurred at the outpost.

Some long-time activists wondered if the person who made the remarks had been an agent provocateur, sent to Kiryat Arba for the purpose of making incendiary comments that would then allow the government to take action against the entire community.

Hebron spokesman David Wilder suggested the remarks may have been the result of personal and communal trauma. "There is a saying in Hebrew that a person should not be held responsible for his words when his loved ones are still lying dead in front of him. The expulsions from Gush Katif and Northern Shomron are still too fresh and the fate of those expelled still hurting much too much. It is no secret that this administration has plans to implement further expulsions. There is a feeling in the air—a sensation reminiscent of the Rabin-Peres days following the signing of the cursed Oslo Accords, when ‘settlers’ were unofficially declared ‘enemies of the state’ and treated as such," he said.

One month later, an Israeli judge ruled that the destruction of the Federmans’ home was illegal.

"The eviction was not balanced, not reasonable, not right, and not appropriate," said Jerusalem District Court Judge Moshe Drori, rejecting a petition by the state prosecution and the police to ban Mr. Federman from Judea and Samaria.

Earlier, Jerusalem Magistrate Shulamit Dotan had rejected the same petition.

Mr. Drori also rejected the state’s petition to fine Mr. Federman.

Obviously outraged, Mr. Barak ordered the state prosecution to appeal the case to the Supreme Court, but as of the beginning of December, papers still had not been filed.

The rulings by Judges Drori and Dotan prompted demonstrators at the Tel Aviv rally to hold signs proclaiming: "Barak, you made a mistake with Federman—don’t repeat it with the Peace House."

At the rally, former Herut MK Michael Kleiner accused Mr. Barak of personally targeting Shalom House in an attempt to rally support for the Labor Party which is falling is the polls.

"Does Barak want to appeal to the High Court against Federman and destroy a legal building in Hebron? He should pay for it himself. Let the Labor Party pay for the appeal against Federman. Why should we taxpayers pay for Barak’s election campaign?" he said.

One of the demonstrators, Chaim Rabinovich of Ramat Gan, suggested that if elections were not scheduled for Feb, "those Jews would not be expelled."

After the rally, Shas MK Zev Nissim moved into Shalom House. His show of support for the residents prompted Peace Now leader Yariv Oppenheimer to demand that legal proceedings be brought against him "for breaking the law."

While Mr. Nissim was not arrested, Mr. Barak told IDF Radio that he still intended to evict the Jews. However he declined to call them "enemies."

"These are Israelis, citizens of the state," he said. "It’s clear that representatives of the security forces will meet with them and examine the matter."

If Messrs Dichter and Barak were hoping the Council of Jewish Communities in Judea and Samaria (Yesha Council) would take the same role it did in helping the expulsion from Gaza go smoothly, the residents of Shalom House disappointed them. Although leaders of the council asked the residents and their supporters to allow them to participate in plans to resist the eviction, their offer was rejected. Even the council’s offer of financial assistance was turned down.

Most of the activists still blame the council for cooperating with the Sharon government to expel the Jews from Gaza during the Disengagement.

"The Yesha Council’s mission ended with the failure in Gush Katif. It has no more place in any position whatsoever, in any matter. Its mission is over, and it must step down," said Mrs. Weiss.

Although the residents and their supporters insist that they will not initiate any violence against anyone, their activities to stave off eviction were frequently interrupted last month by accusations that they were engaging in illegal actions against neighboring Arabs and Israeli security forces.

At one point, IDF officials said a soldier had been "very lightly wounded" when activists from Hebron threw turpentine on his face. The IDF also accused the nationalists of throwing rocks and firecrackers at a house belonging to an Arab and then assaulting and cursing soldiers who came to stop the attack.

Mrs. Weiss called the entire accusation "a lie," reminiscent of the stories about acid attacks on soldiers during the expulsion from Gush Katif.

"There was no acid, there was no turpentine, there were no attacks on soldiers," she said, accusing the government of "slandering" nationalist Jews because it failed to defeat them legally in court.

"We’re acting as Jews should, as the rightful owners of this place. Apparently, the sight of Jews walking freely in the City of the Patriarchs, carefree and secure, is a thorn in the eye of the Arabs and Olmert’s leftist government, and for that that reason, they resort to slander," she said.

On Nov 29, dozens of Arabs began throwing rocks at Jews walking to Shalom House, prompting some Jewish young people to retaliate. The Jewish young men threw rocks at Arab homes and damaged an Arab-owned car. Three Jews punctured the tire of a Border Police jeep, and one of them was arrested.

Mr. Wilder said he believed the Arab attack was prompted by the Israeli government’s determination to evict the Jews. Further, he said, it was clear the attack was planned and that journalists had been alerted in advance.

By Tuesday, Dec 2, the clashes had expanded to involve hundreds of Jews and Arabs, leading to injuries, smashed windows, and burnt vehicles.

Two Jewish young men were arrested and the IDF deployed to prevent a Arab terror attack on the Jewish Hebron.

A few Jewish youngsters were wounded, one, a 16 year old from Kiryat seriously when a rock thrown from among the Arab mob hit him in the head. IDF soldiers, guards, and riot police responded to the situation with gas and stun guns, eventually halting the clash.

But shortly afterwards, a 15-year-old boy was lightly wounded in the hand and chest by a stun grenade launched by the troops. The Border Police also began using tear gas.

Fear that Israel’s security forces might use the riot as a pretext to evict the Jews from Shalom House sent hundreds of Hebron supporters to the area.

Other Jews began protesting. Forty Jews blocked traffic along Highway 1, while a lone activist blocked the Mitzpe Jericho Junction.

Hundreds blocked access roads to Hebron as well as main thoroughfares throughout Judea and Samaria. In clashes with police and the IDF, three people were reported injured and 30 activists were arrested.

Brig-Gen Noam Tivon, commander of the Hebron brigade, declared the Shalom House area "a closed military zone," which restricted civilian activity in the area.

The determination of the Hebron Jews and their supporters seemed to affect even adversaries such as President Shimon Peres. On a trip to Britain last month, he told Members of Parliament as well as students and faculty at Oxford University that while the Israeli government was prepared to relinquish most of Judea and Samaria to the PA, it would be difficult for Israel to dismantle Jewish towns in the area without causing "a civil war."

He explained that more than 250,000 Jews live in the area the government would like to give away, but forcibly evicting them without causing a war would be "an art."

According to Ma’ariv, IDF leaders also realize the difficulty their troops will be facing in any proposed evacuation. The paper reported that the military is concerned that soldiers whose families live in Judea and Samaria, or simply support those who do, will refuse to carry out eviction orders.

The IDF has already tried lying to the soldiers. While the Federman farm was being destroyed, senior security officers told soldiers, including a group of yeshiva students in the Givati Brigade, that their job was to keep Jewish residents away from the site. The soldiers were told that they were participating in a mission to help catch a terrorist, which was why, they were told, Jewish civilians had to be kept away.

Many of the Jews with whom the soldiers spoke believed them, but others did not, resulting in a few scuffles.

The soldiers did their job, but, according to reports, regretted it the next day.

According to Ma’ariv, the IDF feared that if the soldiers knew the action was not military, but rather the destruction of a Jewish home, they would refuse to take part.

"This creates mistrust between echelons in the military framework, and is liable to cost human life. In the next security incident, the residents won’t believe the security forces, and the soldiers won’t believe their commanders," said a member of Hebron’s emergency alert team. "It’s sad that for the purpose of destroying a Jewish home, they cause such harm to the delicate security relations here."

Border Guard officials confirmed that the soldiers had been tricked. "The sensitivity of the incident required us to maintain high security," a Border Guard source told Ma’ariv.

One of the hesder yeshiva soldiers told Ma’ariv that, a day after the operation, he was still stunned.

"I can’t believe that I had a part in this eviction. I am a soldier in the IDF, not a policeman, and there is no reason that they should take me on missions that have nothing to do with protecting Jews. I almost cried when I found out," he said.

This type of reaction prompted a group of soldiers’ parents to send a letter to IDF Chief of Staff Gabi Ashkenazi demanding that the commanders who lied to soldiers about their role in the mission to destroy the Federman family’s home be fired.

"Until you do so, we will call upon our sons and daughters not to take an example from the top command of the IDF, in order that they be able to continue to serve with a sense of responsibility to the nation, land, and state that stems from our education—and not from the example they receive from you," the parents wrote.

The tense situation pitting Jews against each other has caused some military sources to speak out against the "unnecessary" order to expel the Hebron residents.

In an interview with Voice of Israel radio, former IDF Ground Commander Yiftah Ron-Tal, who had participated in the Disengagement from Gaza, said that if he were the commander in the field, he would urge Mr. Barak to withdraw the expulsion order.

Denying that the IDF has "lost control," Mr. Ron-Tal said, "The army has fallen into a complicated situation. We are not talking about an enemy. There is no need to expel families. We are talking about children and mothers. What is the hurry?"

Noting once again that the High Court did not order the expulsion, but merely allowed it, he said he wished the Supreme Court had denied the government permission to expel the residents until after a civil court could decide who in fact owns the property.

"We have to prevent the army from getting into this situation. We have been in this movie before," he said.

According to some reports, IDF Chief of Staff Gabi Ashkenazi is correctly worried.

"Right or wrong, Ashkenazi knows the last ‘disengagement’ worked, but that there are many, many Israelis who now regret that they stood aside and let it happen," said columnist Leonie Ben-Simon

"No matter what he does—whether by passing the buck to the Border Police to do the job or by scrounging around to find a few leftists in the army who believe that the country belongs to the Arabs and will be happy to evict people—there will be blood this time," she said.

S.L.R.

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