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An anti-expulsion protester at a prayer rally in Netivot. (AP)
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PM Ariel Sharon surrounded by at least 12 bodyguards as he enters the Knesset, Israel's parliament. (AP)
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| By israelinsider staff and partners July 18, 2005 |
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| A crowd of anti-pullout protesters. (AP) |
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Not since Biblical times has there been in this land such a massive night march of men, women, and children to stand up for their fellow citizens under siege in Gaza.
Billed as "the greatest protest in Israeli history," the well-planed "engagement" event (a rhyming contrast in Hebrew to "disengagement") had to overcome a last-minute declaration by Police Chief Moshe Karadi, supported by the Sharon regime and the country's judicial apparatus, to refuse a permit for the three-day march because settler leaders would not comply with police demands to promise not to enter Gush Katif, thus rendering the demonstration and march illegal.
Karadi had said Monday that unauthorized entry into Gaza, which had been declared a closed military zone last Wednesday, would be regarded as criminal offense, with the police empowered to take "all necessary steps." PM Ariel Sharon said security forces were authorized to use "all force necessary" to prevent interference in the government's "disengagement" plan. The Yesha Council, however, refused to scrub its plan for the march to conclude at Gush Katif even after it was declared illegal.
In what police smugly called a "surprise," bus drivers taking demonstrators had their driver licenses revoked, with passengers forced to disembark and find alternative transport. A police spokesman said that from the moment the rally in the western Negev town to Netivot was defined as illegal, anyone assisting participant to attend was guilty of breaking the law. Legal commentators interviewed on the media could not recall a previous invocation of the legal statute or the prevention of busses from going to a rally.
Arutz Sheva reported that nearly 400 buses were stopped by police.
Yet tens of thousands of Israelis protesting the planned expulsion of Jews from Gaza managed to overcome police resistance to rally in Sderot -- some arriving by foot, hitchhiking and private cars.
After a tense late-night standoff that took more than two hours, security forces finally agreed to allow some 30,000 to 40,000 anti-disengagement demonstrators -- men, women and children -- to arrive at their planned resting place in the village of Kfar Maimon for the evening. The agreement was reached through negotiations between Public Security Minister Gideon Ezra, Karadi and heads of the Yesha council, which represents the settlers.
Ezra and Karadi had previously expressed confidence that settlement leaders would capitulate under the pressure and go home, but in the end it was the security chiefs who gave in to the determined marchers.
The only concession the settlers reportedly made was not to "surprise" the police and army by continuing without warning toward Gaza this evening. But the marchers and their organizers made no secret of the fact that, as planned, the Kissufim entrance to the Gush Katif settlement bloc was their destination, even though some 15,000 police and soldiers are arrayed to prevent them from doing so.
Before the agreement was reached, police sources had said that under no circumstances would marchers be allowed to reach Kfar Maimon. The breakthrough was achieved when 150 intrepid young people crawled through the nearby fields to the village.
An anti-disengagement activist among those who broke through the police barrier told The Jerusalem Post that the police acted with restraint. He said the atmosphere was charged and emotional. "Helicopters are hovering in the sky. There are whistles everywhere," he said.
"There's a feeling here that we've lost all faith in the judicial system, in the government," he added. "We understand the soldiers and the police. They're doing what they're told. They're also under a lot of pressure here."
Channel One reported instances of army jeeps passing by and shouting to Gaza residents: "We won't evacuate you." There continued to be reports of "insubordination" as IDF soldiers refused to participate in the police actions. Several actually fled their units and took refuge inside Gaza.
March organizers considered splitting up the marchers into many small groups to bypass police roadblocks. Yesha council leaders instructed the heads of the small groups not to act violently or to resist arrest. Soldiers were instructed not to open fire even if the settlers break through the checkpoint.
Yesha council member Elyakim Haetzni said that when prisons are filled with thousands of demonstrators, the victory of the disengagement opponents will be official, and the plan will fall.
Former chief rabbi Mordechai Eliyahu called at the rally on Prime Minister Ariel Sharon to "disengage from the disengagement." The Attorney-General responded by threatening to reopen a police file against the Rabbi for allegedly encouraging soldiers to refused orders.
Apparently fearing lawsuits and civil actions resulting from the unprecedent prevention of buses to proceed to the rally in Netivot, police finally gave permission for some drivers previously prevented from taking passengers to the large anti-disengagement rally in Netivot to be allowed passage. Earlier Monday, the Association of Civil Rights in Israel -- typically a defender of left-wing causes -- filed a complaint with Police Chief Moshe Karadi, demanding that police allow all demonstrators to arrive at the rally. The Attorney General admitted that his office was behind the unprecedent restriction on the right of peacable assembly.
"We used our authority within the framework of the law and we could not allow an illegal protest to take place here in this area," Karadi told reporters at a news briefing at an IDF base near Netivot in late afternoon. But in the end, the sheer numbers of demonstrators and their determination to carry out the march forced the police and Attorney General to back down from their plans to prevent the rally or subsequent march.
The Yesha Council called on demonstrators to make their way by all possible means,"by car, by train and by foot."
MK Effi Eitam (Religious Zionism) said that preventing buses from reaching Netivot was a "tragic mistake that would escalate the situation and create more violence."
The Yesha Council was also infuriated by the move that they called a "tyrranical behavior of the Sharon clan." According to the council "a red line has been crossed whereby the prime minister does not allow the holding of a wide public protest against all the rules of democracy."
Marchers may stay a while
Earlier on Monday, Pinchas Wallerstein, a leader of the Yesha Council, told Israel Radio that even if marchers are blocked by security forces, they would remain at the site until they are allowed to enter the Gaza Strip, however long that my take. "We will stand there and demand to be allowed to enter Gush Katif, a day, two days, a week if necessary," he said.
Speaking on Israel Radio immediately after Wallerstein, Justice Minister Tzipi Livni said that statements by anti-expulsion protesters they will enter the Gaza Strip to help its Jewish residents stay on permanently are "violent by definition" and seek to prevent the disengagement, a legal government decision, from taking place.
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