Set for Battle With Israelis : Palestinian Street Teams Well-Drilled for Combat

Only a fierce downpour kept the war from coming to Sheik Mussalem Street on Saturday.

For a while, as an Israeli army patrol snaked its way through the narrow, twisting streets of the casbah, the old quarter of Nablus, a confrontation seemed inevitable. Tension had been running high in Nablus since soldiers shot and killed two Palestinian youths in a battle with rock- and bottle-throwing protesters the day before. Now, as an army patrol entered their neighborhood, the people of the casbah appeared ready, even eager, to do battle once again.

Informed of the patrol’s presence by lookouts posted on rooftops and on street corners, the people along Sheik Mussalem Street quickly grouped into organized teams, went to their designated positions and began to get ready, each performing his or her pre-assigned task.

Some youths picked up small boulders the size of watermelons and hurled them to the ground, breaking off baseball-sized chunks to throw at the soldiers. Others built bonfires and barricades from rocks, scrap metal and other stockpiled debris while still others, the bravest and fastest among them, limbered up their throwing arms for the coming battle by hurling rocks down the now deserted street.

“They are the offensive team,” said Jamal, a young Palestinian neighborhood leader who, while supervising the preparations, explained the protesters’ tactics to a small group of visiting reporters.

“Each area has a team led by a team leader,” said Jamal, “and each team has an offensive and a defensive wing.”

Jamal would not give his last name or divulge other personal information for security reasons. However, his importance in the casbah is such that he supervises several of the other team leaders.

“When a patrol comes, the youths assigned to offense hurl stones at them,” Jamal explained. When the youths are forced to disperse by the soldiers, who fire back with both rubber bullets and live ammunition, those assigned to defense cover their retreat by throwing more stones, he added.

“Everybody knows where to go. Everybody is assigned a specific area and task,” he continued. “Those on offense have to be the most courageous and the quickest. . . . The people on defense have slingshots for greater range. . . . The role of the women is to break up stones, give first aid and shout encouragement to the men.”

When the latest round of unrest began in the West Bank and the Gaza Strip more than two months ago, many analysts, Arab and Israeli, viewed the protests as a spontaneous outburst of anger and frustration--a volcano of despair finally erupting after 20 years of increasingly harsh Israeli rule. Even the Palestine Liberation Organization, which claims to speak for the 1.5 million Palestinians living in the occupied territories, seemed surprised and unprepared for the turn of events.

But according to Jamal and other young activists in Nablus and other parts of the West Bank, the PLO has since reasserted its control and is now providing the organizational tactics necessary to prolong the uprising, in which at least 54 Palestinians have been killed.

Organized Response

“In the beginning, when it started, it was spontaneous. But by the second week or so, supporters of the PLO took over all the organizational activity,” Jamal said. “Now, all the activity, everything you see here, is organized by the Unified Command of the Uprising.”

The Unified National Leadership for the Uprising in the Occupied Territories is the name of a coalition of PLO groups and their supporters, who pass information and instructions chiefly by word of mouth. The command called for a commercial strike in Nablus on Saturday and, apart from a few street corner fruit vendors, the largest city on the West Bank was shut tight. The command has also called for a widening of the strike today, when Arab-owned shops and services throughout the territories are expected to be closed.

The speed and alacrity with which the people of Sheik Mussalem Street and its adjacent streets and alleyways prepared to greet the soldiers certainly suggested a high degree of organization, at least on the neighborhood level.

Angry Crowd

When four Western reporters arrived Saturday morning to interview some of the local residents at random, they were quickly surrounded by a crowd of angry men and giggling small children, all trying to talk at once.

“We are striking because two people were killed here yesterday. As long as Israel keeps provoking us, we are not going to quit,” one elderly man said. “We don’t want to destroy Israel. We are willing to live alongside Israelis, but they must recognize our right to self-determination too,” said someone else.

“Israelis should remember what Hitler did to them and not treat us the same way,” shouted another voice from within the now sizable crowd.

Attracted by the commotion, Jamal was soon at the center of the crowd to take the reporters in hand. He was answering their questions and explaining his tactics when suddenly the alarm was sounded. The women and children began breaking up stones as the men and the older boys ran to their positions. Within minutes, the crowded street was deserted.

Rooftop Perch

The reporters were shown to the roof of a house by a woman who begged them to keep out of sight. She said the army retaliates against Palestinians who talk to journalists by breaking into their homes and smashing the furniture after the reporters have gone.

Most of the rooftops were crowded with women and small children, darting back and forth under the lines of flapping laundry, while in the streets below, Jamal shouted orders and positioned his troops. The army patrol was expected to turn onto Sheik Mussalem Street from the right, so Jamal called up his left-handed throwers. They could throw, turn and run more easily than right-handed men, given the side of the narrow street down which the patrol was expected to come.

Hushed Expectancy

It was 11:59 a.m. The battle lines were drawn and manned and a hushed expectancy fell on everyone on the roof. The soldiers would be here at any moment.

Then, two things happened to change the course of events.

Israeli soldiers positioned on another rooftop several hundred yards away spotted the reporters. Moments later, a tear-gas canister arched across the sky from another direction and landed a few feet away on the roof of the adjacent building. Another canister followed, this time missing the side of the roof by only a foot and falling into the street below.

Although they could not be sure, the reporters strongly suspected the soldiers knew of their presence and were trying to chase them off the roof before moving in. While the other rooftops also had people on them, the tear gas clearly was being aimed only at the one where the reporters were stationed.

Drenching Downpour

Then, while the soldiers waited for them to leave, it started to rain--a drizzle at first and then a heavy, drenching downpour. The rain extinguished the fire the boys had started on the street below and sent everyone scattering for cover.

Although the lookouts remained at their posts, both sides seemed to sense that the confrontation, for now at least, was over--called on account of rain.

And so, in the end, the soldiers did not come down the street, the Palestinians went back into their homes and the reporters went elsewhere in search of a story as, slowly, life began to return to normal on Sheik Mussalem Street.