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Hundreds of activists of Gush Shalom, Taayush, The Committee Against House Demolition and others demonstrated on the last day of 2004 against the uprooting of the olive trees of Jayush village and the building of a large new settlement there. This is being done under the guise of enlarging an existing settlement (Tsufin). The land is situated between the Green Line and the fence, and the Sharon government is engaged now in a frantic effort to fill this territory with new settlements, in order to annex it de facto to Israel. This exposes the lie that the fence is being built for security reasons only. It must by now be clear to everybody that the wall/fence has only one real purpose: to annex more territory. In fact, Sharon’s “disengagement plan” is but a diversion, designed to draw the attention of the Israeli public and the world away from this big operation. The army and police tried to stop the demonstrators when they crossed the Green Line, but they left their buses and covered on foot the distance to the affected area, crossing the muddy fields. Once there, a senior police officer warned them by megaphon that the planting of saplings at this place is a violation of the law. However, the police did not interfere when the demonstrators planted dozens of saplings in the holes left open after the uprooting of the big trees – which, by the way, are being sold to rich yuppie house-owners in Israel. From there, the activists continued their march to the fence. A hundred yards from it, they were stopped by a chain of soldiers and policemen. A stormy demonstration took place, with the activists shouting “No fence, no transfer – we don’t want to rule over another people!” After negotiations, a delegation of four demonstrators was allowed to approach the gate in the fence, were they met the villagers of Jayuss who came from the other side of the wall. |
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