<html>
<body>
<font size=3><br>
Destroying history<br>
by Ahmad Sub Laban <br><br>
ON AUGUST 9, Israeli bulldozers sank their jaws into three buildings
<br>
in the old city of Hebron. The demolitions, to make way for a <br>
settler-only road to connect the Kiryat Arba settlement with the <br>
Ibrahimi Mosque, caused an outrage. <br><br>
The three buildings were ancient, dating back some 500 years to the
<br>
Mamluk period. The alleys in the Jaber and Salaymeh quarters where <br>
the houses were situated and the stone arches above them used to <br>
form the southern entrance to the old city. <br><br>
"These three buildings were part of the structural fabric of <br>
Hebron's old city and part of the historical environment surrounding
<br>
the Ibrahimi Mosque," said Imad Hamdan, public relations director
<br>
for the Hebron Reconstruction Committee, in an interview with the <br>
Palestine Report. "It seems the occupation forces ignored this fact.
<br>
They tore down these historical buildings in order to build a <br>
settler road which they are calling `Worshippers Road.'"<br><br>
The demolitions were denounced by the highest official circles. <br>
Prime Minister Ahmad Qrei', in a statement released by his <br>
government on August 10, called it a "true crime by the occupation
<br>
against the Palestinian people." Israel, he said, demolished these
<br>
historical sites with no regard to humanity or civilization. <br><br>
Hamdan believes Israel is waging a war on the heritage of Hebron's <br>
old city, pointing to the fact that there are tens of other houses <br>
slated for demolition, some of which date back to the Mamluk and <br>
Ottoman eras and others that were built during the British Mandate.
<br>
It is a clear indication to Hamdan of an Israeli attempt to Judaize
<br>
the old city and the area around the Ibrahimi Mosque. <br><br>
"This new settler road will pass through the Wadi Nasara, Jabaer and
<br>
Salaymeh quarters and the neighborhoods east of the Ibrahimi <br>
Mosque," explained Hamdan, but pointed to an existing road, also
off-<br>
limits to Palestinian motorists, which runs a similar route and is <br>
only 150 meters longer. "The difference is only 15 seconds in any
<br>
car," he said. "Their `security concerns' are already being
<br>
addressed by the existing road." <br><br>
A loss of centuries<br>
"These violations are aimed at imposing facts on the ground through
<br>
settlement expansion at the expense of the property of residents in
<br>
the old city and its surroundings," said Areef Jabari, Hebron <br>
governor. "What happened is a disaster that can never be rectified.
<br>
We can never bring back the ancient houses that were torn down. With
<br>
them, almost six centuries have been lost." <br><br>
According to international law, an occupying power is responsible <br>
for preserving the cultural property of those under occupation. <br>
Indeed, the Hague Convention, which Israel ratified in 1957, <br>
specifically calls on an occupying power to refrain from any <br>
hostility directed against such property and from any use of such <br>
property or its surroundings for military purposes.<br><br>
Since the end of 2000, an as yet uncounted number of Palestinian <br>
heritage sites, from Rafah in the south to Jenin in the north, have
<br>
been damaged or destroyed during Israeli military operations. Most <br>
famously, the siege of the Church of Nativity in Bethlehem in 2002 <br>
saw one of the most important sites in Christianity damaged by <br>
Israeli gunfire. The damage there, however, pales in comparison to <br>
that in Nablus, which has been one of the hardest hit Palestinian <br>
cities during the Aqsa Intifada. <br><br>
The old city of Nablus dates back to Canaanite times. It was <br>
described as Shechem in the Tel El Amarna letters 1,400 BC. Some <br>
2,600 buildings in the old city can be dated back to Ottoman times,
<br>
and some go as far back as the Mamluk and even Byzantine eras.<br><br>
Over a period of three weeks in December 2003 to January 2004, <br>
repeated Israeli incursions into the old city of Nablus left several
<br>
historic houses and buildings as well as archaeological sites <br>
destroyed or damaged. Most notable was the damage to the Abdel Hadi
<br>
Palace and the Kakhn, Sadeq and Shabi homes in the Qaryoun <br>
neighborhood. Israeli forces also destroyed the eastern wall of the
<br>
Salah Mosque, which was previously a Byzantine church, and the <br>
Khadra' Mosque, previously a Crusader church.<br><br>
"The destruction in Nablus has been concentrated mostly on buildings
<br>
in the old city," Naseer Arafat, president of the Association to
<br>
Protect Nablus Old Town, told PR. He said the destruction included <br>
shops and homes inside the old city, which were either partially or
<br>
fully destroyed. "Nearly 60 buildings were completely destroyed and
<br>
an additional 250 were partially demolished. This is in addition to
<br>
the massive damage done to the old city's infrastructure. That is <br>
our identity they are destroying. Our cultural heritage is our <br>
identity."<br><br>
The Abdel Hadi Palace dates back some 250 years. It covers an area <br>
of over 3,000 square meters and belongs to the well-established <br>
Abdel Hadi clan. During the invasion, the Israeli army claimed <br>
resistance fighters were hiding inside the houses or in the tunnels
<br>
that run under the old city, and went house-to-house in search of <br>
them.<br><br>
Their claim was dismissed by Ali Touqan, director of the Nablus <br>
library, who said the targeting of the Abdel Hadi Palace was <br>
intentional and direct. "They put holes in the walls, a meter thick.
<br>
They just wanted to destroy it." <br><br>
Touqan said Israeli claims of underground tunnels used by resistance
<br>
fighters were also completely baseless. The tunnels are there, they
<br>
have been around since the Byzantine era when they were used as <br>
water canals, but "under no circumstances could they be used by
<br>
resistance fighters. These tunnels are a cultural legacy that the <br>
occupation has destroyed."<br><br>
Targeting identity<br>
"The main goal behind these assaults," Hamdan Taha, director
general <br>
of the antiquities department of the Ministry of Tourism and <br>
Antiquities told PR, "is to cause political harm to Palestinians'
<br>
cultural identity. This has always been a source of intimidation for
<br>
the Zionist movement and the Israeli occupation. And the intentional
<br>
targeting of historical sites over the years is also designed to <br>
destroy a component of future cultural, economic development and <br>
tourism."<br><br>
Taha believes the demolitions in Hebron are just one link in a chain
<br>
of a deliberate campaign to target symbols of Palestinian cultural <br>
heritage. He pointed to over 450 villages that have been destroyed <br>
and erased from existence in an attempt to change the historical <br>
character of certain places with historical and archeological <br>
significance. <br><br>
If Israel continues this "path of destruction," said <br>
Taha, "Palestinians will have no other choice then to teach future
<br>
generations about their heritage through pictures and books." In
<br>
fact, he continued, his department is preparing for the eventuality.
<br>
The antiquities department is documenting the damages incurred by <br>
these archeological sites, he said, "in order to ensure that this
<br>
precious legacy is passed down even if Israel succeeds in wiping it
<br>
from existence." <br><br>
Direct damage incurred during military operations is only part of <br>
the story, however. According to a March 2004 study released by the
<br>
Palestinian Institute for Cultural Landscape Studies and prepared by
<br>
researchers Jamal Barghouth and Mohammed Jaradat, the separation <br>
wall being erected by Israel in the West Bank is set to undermine <br>
the cultural link between archeological sites in the West Bank and <br>
surrounding archeological areas. <br><br>
The West Bank is one of the richest areas in the world from an <br>
archeological perspective. From Canaanite times up, the ancient <br>
Greek, Mesopotamian, Persian, Roman, Byzantine and Arab Islamic <br>
civilizations have all left traces in the ground. <br><br>
According to the First Hague Convention, of which Israel is <br>
signatory, cultural property includes archaeological finds. But no <br>
specific mention is made of archaeological excavations by an <br>
occupying power. That was rectified in 1999 in the Second Protocol <br>
to the Hague Convention, which specified that an occupying power <br>
must act to prevent archaeological excavation in occupied territory.
<br>
The second protocol entered into effect on March 9, 2004, but has <br>
not yet been ratified by Israel.<br><br>
Barghouth and Jaradat's study finds that Jewish settlements in the <br>
West Bank have directly annexed over 924 archeological sites either
<br>
now or through future expansion plans. This number will rise, <br>
however, to 4,264 sites and archeological landmarks, 466 of them <br>
major archeological sites, once the wall is completed. This figure <br>
equals 47 percent of all known major sites in the West Bank <br>
including East Jerusalem, from a total of 1,084 sites according to <br>
1944 British maps that surveyed archeological sites in the West <br>
Bank. <br><br>
The ideological and historical premise behind plotting the course of
<br>
the barrier in such a way, said both Barghouth and Jaradat, is that
<br>
the West Bank is considered the historical and geographical site on
<br>
which the Israelite tribes settled during the Iron Age around 1000 <br>
BC and thus where Judea and Samaria was created. <br><br>
Between 1967 and 2000, the two researchers said, the northern and <br>
central areas and even the Jerusalem area were exhaustively <br>
surveyed, enabling Israel to determine the exact sites Jewish <br>
tradition deemed important and that should remain under Israeli <br>
rule. Thus, added the researchers, it is unsurprising that one of <br>
the standards used to define the course of the wall would be <br>
archeological sites. <br><br>
"The wall constitutes a disaster to Palestinian cultural
heritage," <br>
said Taha. "In addition to the fact that it will isolate <br>
approximately 50 percent of archeological sites from Palestinian <br>
territories, it will affect religious tourist activity for which <br>
Palestine is famous. The main religious tourist sites are already <br>
isolated. Look at Jerusalem and Bethlehem. Travel between these two
<br>
cities, which for thousands of years has been unhindered, has now <br>
become almost impossible for Palestinians." -Published September 01,
<br>
2004©Palestine Report <br><br>
<br>
<br>
</font><x-sigsep><p></x-sigsep>
<font size=3 color="#FF0000">The Freedom Archives<br>
522 Valencia Street<br>
San Francisco, CA 94110<br>
(415) 863-9977<br>
</font><font size=3><a href="http://www.freedomarchives.org/" eudora="autourl">www.freedomarchives.org</a></font></body>
</html>