The endless settler soap opera
HEBRON, West Bank (AP) — Israeli security forces armed with sledge hammers, chain saws and power clippers smashed through the fortified doors of a building in the holy city of Hebron on Tuesday to evict two Jewish settler families and hundreds of supporters.
The military operation was meant to reduce conflict between settlers and Palestinians in the volatile West Bank town, but it also highlighted the growing schism between some religious soldiers and an army command that orders them to carry out evacuations they deplore.
Settlers spit and hurled stones, water and oil as police, backed by soldiers, broke through the reinforced doors and dragged the squatters out one by one. Three settlers had sealed themselves inside a concrete bunker, and it took three hours to drill through a wall to get them out.
Danny Poleg, a police spokesman, said four soldiers, 14 police officers and 12 settlers were injured during the evacuation. Eleven settlers were briefly detained and two arrested.
The scenes were reminiscent of the forced evacuations of thousands of settlers from Gaza and parts of the West Bank two years ago. Many of those settlers also resisted leaving and had to be dragged screaming and crying from their homes.
A spectacle, you bet.
But most importantly they are actually worse than the iOf, their sick, twisted, and violent behavior, that is.
are full of people saying that some day the majority of the army will be mafdal (national-religious) or hardal (ultra-orthodox-national-religious)