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77 injured in Kfar Darom clash, evacuation completed
Seventy-seven people were injured, two moderately, during clashes on the rooftop of the Kfar Darom synagogue, which was overcome on Thursday night. Sixty-six soldiers and police officers and 11 right right wing activists were taken to Soroka Medical Center in Beersheba. The majority of them were released from hospital after receiving a brief treatment. Police said that about 120 demonstrators were arrested in Kfar Darom. OC Southern Command Maj.-Gen. Dan Harel accused the protesters of using acid in an attempt to deter the forces from reaching the rooftop. Police Inspector General Moshe Karadi was furious after the violent clash, which left some of his subordinates with light injuries sustained from acid. "We will prosecute each and every one of them," he vowed. Karadi said the security forces' patience had worn thin after the display of violence at Kfar Darom. After two days of gentle persuasion, "from the moment when the dialogue ended, restraint also ended." National Religious Party MK Shaul Yahalom slammed the behavior of the youth saying that it "shamed religious Zionism and the kippot on their heads." Yahalom said that the NRP distanced itself from this action, and that these youth were "wild weeds" on the fringes of the national religious camp and do not represent it and only cause it harm. On the Synagogue's roof, Col. (res) Moshe Leshem told The Jerusalem Post that "we're learning our lessons on how to fight this struggle and you can be certain to see them in Netzarim, [West Bank settlements] Sanur and Homesh. The activists seemed to anticipate every police tactic. Some of them stole motor oil from the Kfar Darom military base to cause police and soldiers scaling ladders to slip. They prepared Y-shaped pikes to shove away the steel cages and used doors hauled up to the rooftop as shields against water canon. By late Thursday night all Kfar Darom's residents had either been loaded onto buses or reached arrangements with the IDF to leave with their belongings. Residents and activists spent much of the day haranguing soldiers, beseeching them to disobey their orders. After four failed tries a force of Israel's Swat Team both scaled the roof in ladders and landed in steel shipping containers fashioned into portable cages. Kfar Darom's Rabbi Gabi Shreiber ruled that there was to be no violence. And after the Swat Team stormed the rooftop, the activists resisted only passively. The unarmed Swat members elbowed their way into the thick of the crowd, as activists sprayed them with insulating foam. They wrestled in the 2-inch deep muck that accumulated on the roof â a combination of blue water, motor oil, acid and mashed onions. It took the police several hours to convince, shove, and tug the 150 people on the roof â women among them â to depart on cages that shuttled up and down the building. For the better part of the afternoon, activists pelted police and army forces with eggs, paint bombs, even watermelon and potatoes they had stored on the roof. The military fought back, as a Psy-Op unit reiterated that all was lost and that even Neveh Dekalim had succumbed to one of Israel's largest military operations. More gut wrenching for the evacuating troops was the removal of settlers from their homes. "Just rape us," screamed Orly Manovich into the face of a soldier standing guard near her sister-in-law's house, "I am sure if you got an order to do that you would do it too." Soldiers all over the community huddled to cry together or marched off, hat concealing their face for a private sob more at the link. what is shameful and outrageous is that most of these actions come from west bankers who moved in for the action Posted by: leader of the pack 2005-08-18 |
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