Barak Letter Supports Permanent Home for Jewish Settlers in Hebron

In a letter released Friday, Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak expressed strong support for Jewish settlers in Hebron and indicated that they should remain permanently in the tense, divided West Bank town.

Palestinians and Israeli peace activists reacted with outrage, insisting that the 450 settlers leave the city of 130,000 Palestinians as part of a final peace treaty. Barak’s critics charged that he has betrayed his pro-peace constituency.

The Jewish settlers in Hebron are considered among the most militant in the West Bank, and there is frequent friction between them and Palestinian residents.

Barak wrote that the right of Jews to live in Hebron, “protected and safe from all harm, is not open to question.” He continued: “I would like to believe that the achievement of peace between us and our Palestinian neighbors in the land of Israel will lead to peace and friendship between the Jewish settlement and its Arab neighbors in Hebron.”

Settlers posted Barak’s letter on their Web site, and the prime minister’s office confirmed its contents. Settler leader Noam Arnon said that in the letter, Barak “recognizes the importance of the renewal of the Jewish settlement in the city of patriarchs.”

Barak sent the letter to mark 32 years since Jews started resettling Hebron by camping out in a hotel. Since then, about 450 Jews have moved to the city, taking over houses that belonged to Jews before the 1929 massacre of dozens of Jewish residents by Arabs.

Because of the need to guard the settlers, Hebron is the only West Bank city divided into Israeli and Palestinian zones. Hundreds of Israeli troops are deployed in downtown Hebron to guard the settlers, whose compounds are fortified by barbed wire and watchtowers.

The burial cave of biblical patriarchs Abraham, Isaac and Jacob is in Hebron. The site, the Tomb of the Patriarchs, is holy to both Jews and Muslims. In 1994, a Jewish settler from nearby Kiryat Arba shot and killed 29 Muslim worshipers at the tomb before being bludgeoned to death by survivors.

Palestinians demand that the settlers be removed as part of a final peace deal.

Such a deal would aim to resolve Israeli-Palestinian feuding over the Palestinian-controlled territories, the fate of disputed Jerusalem and the future of Palestinian refugees.

“There will never be peace in Hebron or in the West Bank unless the settlers leave Hebron and evacuate all the settlements,” Deputy Mayor Awni Isghayer said.

Also on Friday, Israeli police shot and killed a Palestinian man after he ran a roadblock in the West Bank village of Anata, north of Jerusalem, Israel radio reported.

Police said they set up the roadblock after a tip that armed Palestinians were in a house in the village. A car with two Palestinians crashed into two police vehicles. The Palestinians tried to escape, and one of them threw a bag out of the car, the report said.

Police opened fire, wounding one of the Palestinians. He later died, the radio report said.

Police said the bag contained drugs.

They did not release the identity of the Palestinian.