Settlers' sit-down protest begins
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Yaakov Katz, THE JERUSALEM POST Jan. 2, 2005--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Despite the frosty weather and the steady rainfall Monday, settlers and right-wing activists turned up by the hundreds to launch one of their biggest anti-pullout initiatives yet – a mass, open-ended, sit-down demonstration opposite the Knesset.
Activists - many of them schoolchildren and yeshiva students - gathered throughout the morning gearing up for the protest, which they have pledged will last until Prime Minister Ariel Sharon agrees to hold a national referendum over the disengagement plan.
Along the street in front of the government building, hundreds of people, sporting the characteristic orange T-shirts bearing the slogan "We have love and it will win," were busy erecting tents.
The tents, as well as portable rest rooms and running water, are being installed in the area to serve the protesters' needs, as they say they are committed to staying put for a long time.
National Union MK Uri Ariel showed up at one of the tents Monday morning, declaring that he will stay until Sharon gives in to a national referendum or goes to new elections. Ariel said he is ready to spend several nights in front of the Knesset, sleeping inside his tent, and he "will not budge."Binyamin Regional Council head Pinhas Wallerstein, who was the first to call on the populace to be ready to sit in jail fighting against Ariel Sharon's voluntary disengagement plan, showed off his waterproof tent. My sleeping bag is in the car, he said, and it will get me through the cold nights.
"If Sharon gives in I will be able to go home and won't have to spend the cold nights outside," Wallerstein added. "Sharon, however, will most probably not do that because his model these days is Stalin."
Tzvika Bar-Chai, head of the Hebron Regional Council said that the massive sit-down protest is the settlers' attempt to circumvent imminent clashes with IDF forces if evacuation goes through. "We don't want to reach a stage where tens of thousands of us are fighting with the IDF," said Bar-Chai.
In the tents, large groups of students sat around tables studying Jewish texts. One group of students from the Noam School in Jerusalem perused works of Maimonides, while another group who traveled north to the capital from a yeshiva in Sderot said they were here to "strengthen the residents of Gaza and make our voice heard."
Koby Shteiner from the settlement of Dolev sat in a tent with his three children, the oldest of which is 10-years-old, and helped them with their homework. "I pulled my kids out of school and took the day off of work to participate in this protest and demonstrate unity with the Gaza Strip." Shteiner brought markers and coloring books to entertain his children during the long day.
Every day, a different region from the West Bank and the Gaza Strip is to take part in the demonstration. On Monday, officials said, some 60 buses from the Binyamin region and the center of the country are bringing activists to the capital.
Although large police forces were surveying the activity, the mood was quite calm and there had been no outbreaks or clashes.
Settler leaders expressed hope that the protest would grow into a demonstration on the scale of those in Kiev - in which tens of thousands flocked to the city's historic Independence Square, vowing not to move until the presidential election results were reversed.
As part of their crusade against disengagement, opponents of the plan have added new tactics in their campaign to promote the refusal of military orders to clear out settlements when Israel pulls out of the Gaza Strip. The right-wing activists are publicizing a tape of Ariel Sharon recorded nine years ago in an interview with Channel 7, in which he expresses empathy for the refusal of orders if it conflicts with one's conscience. "As someone who served in the IDF for many years, I say that a soldier must carry out his orders. And if that soldiers feels that an order he is given conflicts with his conscience, he must personally approach his officer and explain this to him, and be prepared to bear the consequences," Army Radio quoted the tape.
Sharon made the comments after the attempt nine years ago to clear the Givat Dagan neighborhood in the West Bank settlement of Efrat.
Sunday night settler leaders met with Chief of General Staff Lt.-Gen. Moshe Ya'alon. They warned of the growing lawlessness among anti-disengagement activists and the threat of a mass refusal of evacuation orders by IDF troops.
Ya'alon, distressed over increasing concern of an eruption of refusal in the ranks, blasted the settler leaders for shirking their responsibility and treading on red lines. He called on them to assist in stopping the phenomenon of soldiers refusing orders.
The settlers, warning of a refusal by the thousands, responded: "We can't. It's too late."