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Religious boys watch burning tires on a Jerusalem street. Police uncovered more than 700 tires before they could be burned. (AP)
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| By israelinsider staff and partners May 16, 2005 |
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| Demonstrators block a motorized cop on a Jerusalem street. (AP) |
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Despite public announcements about the time of the demonstrations -- 5 pm rush hour Monday -- Israeli police forces failed to stop the closure of main roads and junctions to protesters claiming that there was no business as usual as long as forced expulsion of 10,000 Jews from Gaza and Samaria remained the government's plan. 300 arrests were made, Channel One reported.
Opponents of the pullout tied up large numbers of police Monday with their road blocking operation, a dry run for diversionary tactics to divert police and soldiers from implementing the removal of 21 Jewish settlements from Gaza and four from the West Bank.
In preparation for the mass demonstrations, Israel Police had raised the national alert level Monday morning to Level 3 -- just one stage below a general state of emergency -- and deployed large forces along major highways across the country.
Security agencies insisted they are ready with contingency plans to handle the diversions, even charting detours through cities to avoid the burning tires. Monday they failed miserably.
In Jerusalem, police pulled flaming tires off a key road with crowbars, and in other places, they hauled the protesters themselves off the roads.
At the northern entrance to Jerusalem, two tires burned in the middle of the road, forcing motorists to slow to a crawl and drive on the sidewalks to pass the tires and the billowing black smoke.
Protester Shlomo Sternberg, waving a flag, believed the pullout would be canceled. "I am sure that we will not see that dark, evil day the prime minister and government are planning," he told Channel Two TV.
Irate motorists shouted at the demonstrators, and a TV station showed one man punching a protester blocking the highway.
Anti-disengagement activists called the day's events an "overwhelming success." Activists protested and burned tires all along the main Tel Aviv-Haifa Highway, far outnumbering the dozens of police officers summoned to the area. "This is a war of attrition," one officer said. Yesterday, the police appeared to be losing.
In Jerusalem dozens of demonstrators blocked numberous key junctions. Hundreds of activists gathered at the city's entrance and succeeded in blocking it, despite scores of police officers, many on horseback. The Yesha settlers' Council said in a statement that it was not linked to the road-blockings, but added Prime Minister Ariel Sharon was at fault for pursuing a "destructive policy." The Yesha Rabbinical Council expressed "support" for "the thousands of demonstrators and detainees in their non-violent struggle against the banishment and destruction decree."
Protest organizers appeared successful in their attempts to recruit the ultra-Orthodox community to join in the disobedience and disruption campaign. Notices posted in religious Jerusalem neighborhoods called for the community to join public protests, something the ultra-Orthodox had refrained from doing. Until today.
Police officials report that troops on Jerusalem's Bar Ilan Street tonight used a stun grenade against protesters, claiming that some in the crowd were throwing stones.
Police said they intended to "seek justice" and in the coming days planned to file indictments against the hundreds who were arrested. As one senior officer said at the blocked entrance to Jerusalem: "Let them block the roads -- in the end we will arrest them and they will spend a long time in jail."
But many protesters welcomed the prospects of filling the country's jails. Some wore T-shirts proclaiming that getting arrested for a just cause was their goal and the key to victory in their non-violent civil disobedience campaign.
Israeli media reported that the next tactic of the protesters will be more selective: blocking the streets, homes and vehicles of pro-expulsion politicians.
The AP contributed to this report.
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