Peloni: This is a very important briefing with Gen. Avivi. He explains the situation on the Jordanian border as well as the importance of Israel maintaining the Philadelphia Corridor. Avivi also addresses the recent murder of hostages by Hamas, explaining that Hamas wants to see Israeli society unraveling. He reminds us that this is not a political debate, but a national security debate, one which must be focused upon achieving the established goals of the war, and all that is needed to be determined is what strategy should be pursued following the murder of the hostages: should Israel surrender to Hamas or should Israel make Hamas pay a price for their continued murder of innocents. Surely, the answer must be to have Hamas and their Iranian masters pay the ultimate price. Hunt them down and kill them all!
This is a genuine, not a rhetorical question. Does anyone who writes or comments for Israpundit know what the background is of the alleged attack on an Arab village bt 100 oe more “settlers” about a week ago, people who covered their faces with masks?
Since this was a highly unusual event in Judea and Samaria, I am left puzzled by it. It was obviously terrible publicity for Israel, and playrd right into the hands of Mahmoud Abbas & co., lending some plausibility to their longstanding claims that the Jewish ‘settlers” in Judea-Smaria are terrorists. It played right into the hands of Blinken and the pro-Iranian, pro-PLO, pro-Hamas etc. crowd in the U.S. State department, for the same reason.
But what was the context of this unusual incident. Why were the “settlers” from the Jewish village of Yitzhar so angry at the nearby Arab village of Jit? Was is the context?
The “settlers” were said to come from the “settlement” of Yitzhar, which as a population of only about 2,000 people or less. The “settlers” are said to have burned down many houses in the Arab village, which I think is named Jit or something like that, often with many people still inside the buildings when they were burned down. However, all of these people were evacuated safely from the burning buildings. The “settlers” are also alleged to have shot and killed one Arab resident and wounding several others before lleaving the village and returning to their own homes nearby.
The IDF and the border police arrived within minutes of the alleged attack, rescued all of the people who were trapped in burning buildings, and broke up the riot, forcing the Jewish alleged rioters to return to their nearby village. However, they were criticized for not making any arrests.
Following these criticisms, the border police did identify four Israeli individuals from Yitzhar as suspected rioters and arrested them. They are allegedly being held at a police station somewhere without access to legal counsel. The Honenu organization, a pro-settler human rights organization, that provides legal counsel to Israelis accused of committing terrorist acts, has been denied access to these prisoners,
To recapitulate, can anyone give us the back storry to this unusual event?