As Hebron Festers, Fighting Goes On

Palestinian rioters threw Molotov cocktails, rocks and other projectiles at Israeli troops here Tuesday, injuring two soldiers, one seriously, when a hurled pipe bomb exploded at their feet.

Medics at a makeshift field hospital on the Palestinian side of the confrontation line treated about 30 young men and boys for injuries, mostly minor, from rubber-coated steel bullets. One youth was hit in the head.

A few hundred yards up Shaleleh Street, past the rocks and hard, cylindrical bullets that littered the road, other Hebron residents did their shopping, carefully inspecting tomatoes, melons and crates of fresh fish. Few flinched at the sound of periodic gunfire.

It was another day in Hebron, a divided city that simmers these days with a feeling more akin to expectation than foreboding. With no one talking peace, an escalation is on the way, say the youths who dart in and out of the city’s alleyways, taking aim at the Israeli soldiers guarding Jewish settler enclaves.

And that’s good, they say.

“We feel that something is coming,” said Sharif Abdel Bast, 19, who added proudly that he has been injured three times by the Israelis, most recently last week. “The Israelis are intensifying their actions, and we have to carry on the battle.”

As he spoke, a rubber bullet, fired by one of the soldiers on a nearby rooftop, struck a 12-year-old. Mohammed Daadreh, grimacing and blinking back tears, displayed an instant welt on his right shoulder.

The two Israelis were hurt when a pipe bomb was thrown from a rooftop onto troops in an alley below. Both men were hit in the legs by shrapnel, with one suffering severe injuries.

Palestinian police, who earlier in the day kept a peaceful demonstration away from the Jewish enclaves, were nowhere in sight as the rocks and bombs were thrown.

The Israeli military commander in Hebron, known only as Col. Gadi, said on an inspection tour that the incident represented “an escalation in the devices and the methods” used by the Palestinian youths, who have recently begun throwing gasoline-filled bottles and homemade bombs.

The commander also said the Palestinian security forces were not cooperating sufficiently with their Israeli counterparts to prevent violence. “We have coordination but no cooperation,” he said.

The clashes came one day after the Israeli media reported that Israel and the Palestinians had agreed to resume their security cooperation, which deteriorated in March amid Palestinian anger over Israel’s decision to launch construction of a new Jewish neighborhood in East Jerusalem. Peace talks have been frozen since.

But Palestinian officials, while confirming that security chiefs for the two sides met last week, said the session did not indicate any immediate renewal of the comprehensive security coordination that existed three months ago.

“Coordination has never stopped, but it won’t be like it was before until the construction stops at Jabal Abu Ghneim,” said Nabil Amr, an advisor to Palestinian Authority President Yasser Arafat, who used the Arabic name for the hill that is the site of the new housing project. Israel has said it has no plans to halt the project.

The spark for Tuesday’s violence, as for lower-level clashes in recent days, was an inflammatory leaflet that was found plastered on Arab shops last weekend near Hebron’s Jewish enclaves. The drawing depicted the prophet Muhammad as a pig. Pigs are regarded as unclean by Muslims and Jews alike.

Israeli police have arrested a 25-year-old Israeli woman in connection with the drawing, and Israeli officials, including Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and President Ezer Weizman, have sought to defuse tensions by issuing public condemnations. A Hebron settler leader also met Tuesday with several Palestinian residents to express his regret over the incident.

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But the anger has yet to dissipate. In Cairo, a leading Muslim cleric said the person who drew the leaflet should be killed. In Hebron, a deeply conservative city that is a stronghold of the militant Islamic Hamas movement, residents said they were offended and saddened. And they called again for the removal of Hebron’s Jewish settlers, who number about 450.

“This was a personal insult for all Muslims,” said Asad Arafeh, 53, the owner of a shoe store. “These apologies are not enough. The answer is to get the settlers out of Hebron. There will never be peace as long as they are here.”