|
|
November 29, 2002
Jews must remain in Hebron
What sort of threat do 70 families really pose to the Arab community?
YEHOSHUA HALEVI SPECIAL TO THE JEWISH BULLETIN
Why are there still Jews in Hebron? This question is again being
asked, as if the very presence of Jews there provokes the kind of
wanton murder perpetrated by terrorists two weeks ago. Hebron now
holds the distinction of being the only Palestinian-controlled city
where Jews continue to live and visit regularly. As one of Israel's
four holy cities and the burial site of the patriarchs and three
of the matriarchs, Hebron attracts a constant stream of visitors,
as well as locals, who pray at the Cave of the Machpela, where their
ancestors are entombed.
A more compelling question we should be asking, however, is why
can't a few hundred Jews live peaceably in Hebron among 130,000
Arabs? What kind of threat do 70 families – 450 people, and
many of those young children – pose to the Arab community?
One could ask the same question about the entire Middle East, namely,
why a quarter of a billion Arabs can't tolerate the presence of
six million Jews living in Israel? The answer, I believe, is that
the enemies of Israel understand that cutting off the Jewish people
from their heritage is the surest path to the destruction of Israel.
Bus bombings and suicide missions will kill a few and scare off
a few others but, ultimately, Israelis are not going anywhere. The
only way to win the war is to sever Jewish ties to the land. Thus,
barring Jews from Hebron is one step toward the terrorists' explicitly
stated goal of destroying the Jewish state.
This strategy has produced several successes during the past two
years of conflict. At the very outset of the fighting, Israeli forces
fought and lost a battle in defence of Joseph's tomb in Shechem.
Shortly after troops abandoned the site, the tomb was ransacked,
burned and converted to a mosque. Likewise, an ancient synagogue
and yeshivah in Jericho, left to the stewardship of the Palestinian
Authority, was raided and burned at the onset of the current intifada.
And there have been numerous attempts to overrun Rachel's Tomb in
Bethlehem.
In Jerusalem, the Temple Mount, the holiest place to Jews (the Western
Wall is only referred to as such by default since the Temple Mount
is largely off limits to Jews), has been closed to Jews for the
past two years. And prior to that, Jews who were allowed access
who so much as mouthed what looked like words of prayer, were quickly
led away.
This is not a new strategy. From 1948 to 1967, when Jordanian forces
occupied Jerusalem's old city, they destroyed all of the 27 synagogues
located within the city's ancient walls. And still more recently,
Yasser Arafat claimed at Camp David and elsewhere that there never
was a Jewish Temple in Jerusalem. It's all part of an attempt to
deny the Jewish claim to the land of Israel. If we lose our foothold
in Hebron, history tells us, there will be nothing Jewish left in
no time at all. Lucky for us, though, those recalcitrant residents
of Hebron, the ones peddling T-shirts emblazoned with the slogan
"Hebron: from now until forever," aren't buying any of
this. Their courage and deep ideological convictions are keeping
the door open for Jews around the world who want to visit and pray
at one of Judaism's most important holy places.
There has been a continual Jewish presence in Hebron from the biblical
period until today, except for the years 1929-1967. When nationwide
riots erupted in Palestine in 1929, 67 members of the Hebron Jewish
community were murdered and the rest ordered to leave by British
officials. In 1968, a group of 10 families received permission to
hold a Passover seder in a Hebron hotel. They arrived but never
left and soon after founded the adjacent township of Kiryat Arba,
now home to some 5,000 people. The Israeli government eventually
acquiesced to the move to resettle Hebron. In 1970, David Ben-Gurion,
Israel's first prime minister, spoke of the importance of re-establishing
a Jewish presence there.
"We will be making a tremendous and terrible mistake if we
do not settle Hebron – the neighbor and predecessor of Jerusalem
– with a large and growing community of Jews, in the shortest
possible time," he said.
Interestingly, his remarks followed a short discourse on the historical
importance of Hebron to the Jewish people, not only as the site
of the Machpela, but also as the city where David was anointed King
of Israel.
"Hebron, then, is the site of the establishment of the greatest
kingdom that the nation of Israel has ever known," Ben-Gurion
said.
Immediately after the Nov. 15 massacre, in which 12 Israelis were
murdered, several government ministers spoke of plans to expand
settlement in Hebron. Housing Minister Natan Sharansky said that
the government is considering expropriating land and paying reparations
to some 15-20 Arab homeowners in order to construct a new Jewish
neighborhood of hundreds of units. Other plans call for a secure
walkway to connect the Machpelah to Kiryat Arba.
So why, then, must Jews remain in Hebron?
Today, it is illegal for Israelis to visit Ramallah or Bethlehem
or Jenin, for fear that the army might have to place its troops
at risk rescuing a wayward tourist. Jews are not permitted to set
foot on the Temple Mount. But Hebron, for the simple reason that
Jews remain as permanent residents there, remains open to anyone
wishing to visit.
The bullets and grenades launched at a crowd of Sabbath observers
earlier this month are part of the heavy price we continue to pay
to maintain a link with our past. The extensive and costly security
measures, which, sadly, sometimes fail us, not only protect those
who venture to Hebron today, but safeguard our Jewish future as
well. A people cut off from its past has no chance of building a
future.
Yehoshua Halevi is a Jerusalem-based photojournalist and
writer.
^TOP
|
|
