ISRAELI SECURITY forces clashed with militant West Bank settlers yesterday after troops destroyed buildings, including a makeshift synagogue, erected on an illegal hilltop outpost.
The wooden buildings had been constructed in defiance of the government’s 10-month freeze on building settlements.
Settlers slashed the tires of a military jeep, threw stones at border policemen and set fire to Palestinian fields close to the Mitzpe Avihai outpost after six buildings were demolished in an early morning raid by troops enforcing the ban on settlement construction, now in its ninth month.
Six people were hurt during clashes when the security forces tried to disperse protesters. Six settlers were arrested on suspicion of throwing stones at the security forces. The illegal outpost of Mizpe Avihai, close to the city of Hebron, was home to five families and some 15 youths. The hilltop community has already been destroyed by the Israeli authorities a number of times only to be rebuilt quickly by settlers. Within hours after yesterday’s operation the settlers were back at the site erecting new homes to replace those destroyed.
A leading settler activist, Itamar Ben-Gvir, who took part in the protest, accused prime minister Binyamin Netanyahu and defence minister Ehud Barak of inflaming the situation. “A synagogue was demolished. They wouldn’t dare destroy a mosque,” he said. “I wouldn’t be surprised if someone attempts to damage mosques because of what happened here.”
Last year radical settlers, dubbed the “hilltop youth”, instituted a “price tag” policy, vowing to attack Palestinian residents or property in response to every action by the Israeli authorities to remove illegal settler buildings. Most of these revenge attacks have gone unpunished.
The militant settlers are invariably young, religious and dwell on the dozens of illegal outposts erected across the West Bank. They are usually children of veteran West Bank settlers who live on the 121 established settlements, also considered illegal by the international community but built with the permission of consecutive Israeli governments.
The hilltop youth do not recognise the leadership of the mainstream settler movement and act independently, often clashing with the Israeli security forces. They never accepted the building freeze and have vowed to use any means to thwart a territorial compromise that would require Israel to relinquish any part of the West Bank, which they believe was granted by God to the Jewish people.