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Israeli Troops Face Protests as They Dismantle Settlement

(New York Times) Hundreds of Israeli security force members wrestled Thursday with Jewish settlers trying to prevent the dismantling of the first populated settlement targeted under a Mideast peace plan, on a day when a Palestinian suicide bomber killed an Israeli shop owner in a farming community, 25 miles to the north. At the outpost of Mitzpeh Yitzhar, less than a mile from the Jewish village of Yitzhar, the young, bearded settlers set up large rock barricades, lit hillside brush fires, and threw themselves in front of army vehicles to prevent soldiers and police from taking down the tents and a cinder-block hut. The settlers tossed buckets of purple and orange paint on the windshields of army vehicles. After blocking earth movers with their bodies and forcing them to stop, the settlers sat inside the jaws and remained for hours. Every time the unarmed soldiers and police moved toward the outpost, clusters of settlers jumped in their path. One protester, Yossi, encountered his brother, Moshe, a soldier, Israel Radio reported, without giving their last name. "We greeted each other and embraced, and continued with our business," Yossi said. "We know many soldiers in the area, and they know us. We cry, and they cry with us, and we are all equally pained."
2003-06-20 00:00:00
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