Privatizing of protest
By Uzi Benziman
Haaretz, March 5, 2004
Last week, about 200 residents of Mevasseret Zion signed a petition calling on the authorities to reconsider the route of the separation fence that is due to separate them from the neighboring village of Beit Suriq. Not a big number, considering the town's overall population of 32,000. About 30 of them also joined a petition to the High Court filed by Beit Suriq residents against the route of the fence.
Two days from now, the High Court is due to rule on whether the petitioners from Mevasseret Zion have standing in the petition submitted by their neighbors from Beit Suriq. These figures are important in terms of understanding what is happening in Mevasseret Zion: To what extent does the opposition movement to the fence's route really represent the community, or is it rather another manifestation of activism on the part of a marginal left-wing group.
The media furor this group has stirred up is quite impressive. Dozens of its members joined the demonstrations by Beit Furiq residents against the route of the fence. A few also showed up, albeit belatedly, at the violent confrontation that occurred two weeks ago between the security forces and residents of Bidu, which ended with the deaths of two Palestinian protesters. One member of the group appeared on television proclaiming that the route of the fence should be transferred from the Beit Suriq ridge to the Mevasseret Zion ridge in order to prevent a terrible injustice to the Palestinian villagers. This is a new phenomenon: The voices being heard here and there in Israel against the route of the fence are undergoing a process of privatization - from general and principled opposition to a readiness to pay a personal price.
When you peel away the layers of the protest activity in Mevasseret Zion, a familiar picture emerges: a small group of people, identified with the left, running around and improvising initiatives to fight the route of the fence, with disagreements already arising among them. This is not an organized public campaign; it is a spontaneous outpouring by people full of good will. The media impact of their efforts stands in stark contrast to their actual power and their pretensions reflecting the will of the residents of their community.
It all started about two weeks ago, when people who live in the northern neighborhoods of Mevasseret Zion heard the sounds of gunfire and noticed a crowd of people and an ambulance gathering next to Beit Suriq. This was the result of a confrontation between Border Police officers and Beit Suriq villagers who were demonstrating against the route of the fence. It ended with injuries and arrests. This is how local residents became aware that the construction of the fence near them was fast approaching.
A week before that, there was a lethal demonstration near Bidu, across from Har Adar, but Mevasseret Zion residents learned of that one primarily from media reports. Several dozen Mevasseret Zion residents joined the Beit Suriq protests and are trying to wage an organized public battle against the route of the fence.
In fact, the efforts of this small group of left-wing activists are having more of an effect in the media than in the field. They put together a moderate-sounding petition that calls for the route of the fence to be changed so it will not divide Beit Suriq residents from their lands, but were unable to get more than 200 people to sign it. By comparison, when Mevasseret Zion residents objected to former Jerusalem mayor Ehud Olmert's attempt to annex them to the capital's municipality, the protest encompassed nearly the entire community and became an issue discussed in every home.
Also, when a group of Mevasseret Zion residents expressed solidarity with the "Four Mothers" movement that pushed for a withdrawal from Lebanon, its activity reverberated very widely. For now, opposition to the route of the fence seems like the hobby of a few who are pulling in different directions, but still stirring a good deal of media interest.
The activity in Mevasseret Zion is worth nothing because it exemplifies the ethical dilemma facing Jewish citizens of Israel who live within the Green Line, whose interest in the construction of the fence ostensibly clashes with the distress caused to their close Palestinian neighbors, whom they know personally.
Peeking out of the shell
Shai Dror, 58, a gardener by profession, says he was moved to protest the wrongs being done to his neighbors from Beit Suriq when he saw that the route of the fence, as proposed, would eventually close them into a ghetto. He is left- leaning in his political views and has participated in several Peace Now demonstrations, but would not define himself as a political activist. In the past, he has been involved in public activity relating to Mevasseret Zion issues.
He wrote a letter to fellow Mevasseret Zion residents, in which he warned that 37 years of good neighborly relations with the people of Beit Suriq were about to go down the drain because of the route of the fence. He gave the letter out to passersby and says his effort was overwhelmingly well-received, apart from one person who cursed him and called him an "Arab-lover." Dror arranged for a gathering of public figures in Mevasseret Zion, including local council head Carmi Gillon, to be held in his home.
Most participants in the meeting agreed that the route of the fence as proposed by the Defense Ministry should be fought, but there were some who differed: Those more associated with the right (Gillon's deputy mayor, Aryeh Shamam, and Akram Barzani) argued that security considerations should supercede the inclination to take the hardships of Beit Suriq residents into consideration.
Gillon explained that he was coming to this meeting as a private citizen, since the local council has no standing in determining the town's security arrangements, but that he had "done his homework." He had taken a tour with the Border Police commander in charge of the area and learned from him that the fence can only be moved on the ridge and therefore would have to stick close to Beit Suriq.
One of the people at the meeting asked: Why not move the fence to the Mevasseret ridge? - the same question that local resident Sara Bartel asked on television.
This week, Dror was asking himself how representative his own view of the issue is compared to that of all the local residents. He was agitated and spoke like someone who suspected that the Golem he created was already out of control. He was referring to the uproar generated by the protest, which has led to a (temporary) halt to construction work on the fence (as per a High Court injunction).
Dror is certain that the route stipulated by the Defense Ministry will cause real hardship to Beit Suriq residents and endanger Mevasseret Zion's security because it will tempt the frustrated Palestinians to direct their anger toward them. He sounds like he either hopes or fears that his initiative, and the other scattered protest actions that have popped up in Mevasseret Zion in the last two weeks, are just the first signs of the Israeli public emerging from the shell in which it has curled up for the past three and a half years so as avoid seeing the consequences of the military operations and initiatives against the Palestinians. "This is my struggle, as a Mevasseret resident, against the injustice happening before my eyes," he said the other day.
But Dror and the other activists protesting the route of the fence are apparently a small minority in Mevasseret Zion. There is no large chorus of people joining in the call to move the fence to the Mevasseret ridge. There aren't many people who are ready to give up a piece of their territory, or alternatively, to have the fence run right next to their community's municipal boundaries, so that it won't impinge on Beit Suriq's lands.
This week, Carmi Gillon told Naftali Raz, a reporter for the local newspaper Zman Mevasseret, that there will be a gate in the fence to enable Beit Suriq residents to come and go from their fields. He also pointed out that there have been 11 attempted terror attacks from the direction of Beit Suriq and that Palestinians from other areas of the West Bank have recently moved into the village to take advantage of the easy access from it into Israel. Gillon, Mevasseret Zion's leader, is therefore not joining the campaign against the fence. The same goes for the local council, which decided that it will not get involved in the dispute over the route of the fence.
In the coming days, it will become apparent whether the pangs of conscience that have begun to affect a few residents of Mevasseret Zion will grow into a protest movement of significant public magnitude, or whether the energy it produced has already run its course with a few television appearances and a sparse demonstration.
The activists are pinning their hopes on the High Court: Maybe it will recognize their right to be a party to the Beit Suriq residents' petition; maybe it will extend the injunction that has frozen work on the fence for now. Some wonder whether it would be better to submit a separate petition to the High Court. Others are looking to defense professionals to buttress their feeling that the route of the fence could be changed in a way that would reduce the hardship caused to Beit Suriq residents.
The left in Mevasseret Zion has set itself a test: Will it make do with voicing modest demands against harming the neighbors in Beit Suriq, or will it stand at the head of a determined and hands- on campaign to actually reduce the damage?
