UPDATED ON:
Friday, December 05, 2008
12:20 Mecca time, 09:20 GMT
 
News Middle East
Israel evicts settlers in Hebron

The settlers were forced to leave the house they named "The house of peace". [AFP]

Grenades and gunfire have been heard in the West Bank city of Hebron after Israeli forces stormed a disputed building to remove Jewish settlers following days of clashes with Palestinians.

Fires are burning across the city and witnesses said the settlers had set three Palestinian homes on fire.

Palestinian medics said three Palestinians were treated in hospital after settlers opened fire on them.

The Israeli army declared the entire Hebron region a "closed military zone" on Thursday evening, barring entry to non-residents.

Up to 20 Israeli settlers and police were injured when Israeli police were dragging settlers out of the building which they have been occupying since March 2007.

The eviction was far less violent than anticipated beforehand.

"Once the Israeli security forces moved in it was all over in less than one hour," Dan Nolan, Al Jazeera's correpondent at the scene.

But soon afterwards, settlers fired live rounds at police and the media.

High tensions

Hundreds of settlers' supporters and activists flocked to the area in the past week in solidarity with the occupants and tensions have been high.

Around 200 people were inside the house at the time of the eviction.

The settlers claim they have lawfully bought the Hebron house from a Palestinian, who denies selling the house.

On November 16, the Israeli High Court of Justice ordered evacuation of the house until ownership is determined.

On Thursday morning, Ehud Barak, the Israeli defence minister, met settler leaders in a failed attempt to work out a compromise deal. 

Barak said that the building, once evacuated, will be guarded by the Israeli army until the courts rule on its ownership.

Damaged gravesites

Palestinians said on Thursday that Jewish settlers had sprayed graffiti on several
mosques in villages surrounding the city of Qalqilya.  Some of the graffiti read "Regards from Hebron" and "Death to Arabs".

The settlers are also accused of damaging Muslim gravesites and stoning Palestinian homes.

On Wednesday, the Israeli army declared the area surrounding the house a closed military zone and hundreds of police and army forces were deployed in Hebron.

Israeli military analysts said they feared the violence in Hebron could spread to other West Bank settlements as part of an organised uprising.

Thirteen settler families were living in the controversial house.

It is located in a key strategic location between the settlement of Kiryat Arba and the Cave of the Patriarchs, a holy site for Jews and Muslims.

 Source: Al Jazeera and agencies
Feedback Number of comments : 1
 
Krapotkin
United States
05/12/2008
Why called Settlers?
Those US jewish Zelots from Brooklyn and other parts of the USA and France, are not settlers, but trespassers and illegal squatters, in other word, criminals!!! Why are they called Settlers in the West, and tolerated, while Palestinian Arabs are terrorists?

 
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