Teens locked arms on the lawn of the Bar Lev home in the Netiv Haavot outpost and sang Israel’s national anthem to protest Tuesday’s evacuation of 15 unauthorized homes in the Netiv Haavot outpost.
Security forces, made up mostly of Border Police, entered the small hilltop community at 6:30 a.m. to carry out a High Court of Justice order that the homes must be demolished.
By 4:15 p.m. the Bar Lev home, one of the first to be built in the Netiv Haavot outpost, became the site of the activists’ last stand.
One by one officers evacuated teens from the Bar Lev home, as others on the roof chanted, “officer, police, refuse your orders.
One young man chanted that slogan as four policemen held him aloft by the arms and legs as they carried him up a dirt path away from the house.
Other teens argued with officers on the lawn, “what will tell your children about the day that you harmed Jews?” one curly haired teen asked the officers.
She refused to be intimidated or pushed back when the officers asked her to leave.
“If you are strong enough to evacuate, you are certainly strong enough to hear what I have to say,” she said.
Earlier in the day the teens received strict orders from home owners to engage only in passive resistance.
“If you have a burning desire to burn tires, don’t do it here,” one tall gray haired man told them.
Girls and boys crowded into living rooms and bedrooms of many of the 15 homes.
In homes where it was too crowded to enter through the door, they climbed in the windows and sang religious songs, such as “we won’t abandoned this land” while they waited.
In some of the homes supporters gave musical concerts with keyboards, guitars and violins to help ease the families.
Many of the families hung large signs from their homes protesting the demolition.
“Don’t use justice to create injustice,” stated the red black and white sign on the two story stone structure that belonged to the Yehzkeli family.
Before leaving his home, Matan Yehazkeli removed the mezuza from the door frame and locked the door. He stood outside with his family and promised that they would rebuild on the same lot.
The homes are part of the larger outpost which is in the process of receiving authorization to become a legal neighborhood of the settlement.
But these homes, originally thought to be on state land, cannot be authorized and the High Court of Justice has ruled that they must be taken down. It did so in response to a petition from the Left-wing group Peace Now.
No physical demolitions had taken place by the afternoon. The families plan to relocate to a new authorized site of already constructed modular homes, located a short distance away from their outpost.
Live Twitter Coverage from Tovah Lazaroff and Marc Israel Sellem
Article source: http://www.jpost.com/Breaking-News/Turkey-to-continue-measures-in-Syrias-Afrin-until-threats-eliminated-549361
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