The village of Yanun is located 3.5 km north west of Aqraba village,
which is situated 17 km to the north east of Nablus city. Once home to
25 families every resident has already fled after four years of
worsening attacks by Israeli settlers. The attacks have become
increasingly frequent in recent months. "Our life here is more bitter
than hell," Kamal Sobih said, as he packed his belongings in his little
car heading to the neighboring village of Aqraba.
Groups of masked Jewish settlers have charged into the village, coming
at night with dogs and horses, stealing sheep, hurling stones through
windows and beating the men with fists and rifle butts. The settlers
have poisoned and slaughtered over 150 cattle and uprooted many olive
trees, which are the main sources for survival of the families living in
the once peaceful hillside village of Yanun. Recent attacks have
targeted an electricity generator scorching it with fire, completely
cutting off power to the village. The generator had been recently
installed; it was bought by the EU/UNDP in an effort to ease conditions
for the villagers. Water sources have been contaminated and water tanks
have been tipped over and emptied by the terrorizing settlers.
The Israeli army turns a blind eye to such attacks and sometimes even
joins the settlers in their vandalizing and harassing campaigns.
Displaced villages, homes lost, civilians forced to flee are all too
familiar for the Palestinians who have learned, as a result of 1948 and
1967 attacks, which resulted in so many refugees, to stick around and
endure the pain for they are alone in their plight. "I kept urging the
people not to leave, but they did, one by one," the village chief,
Abdelatif Sobih said, crying. "They left me without a choice. I'm
blaming my people as well (as the settlers) because they left me alone."
Sobih has been attacked seven times before and his wife, Raideh,
threatened to leave him if they did not abandon the place.
The villagers have never been linked to any violence; they live a simple
life and are too friendly and nice for their own good. Ahmad Sobih an
elderly man had told his story: When he was tending sheep on the
hillside when a stranger approached. Sobih, mistaking the man for
someone from a neighboring Arab village, went to shake hands with him
and offer him a cigarette but instead he was beaten with his own walking
stick.
The settlers carry out daily attacks against the Palestinians all
through out the West Bank and Gaza. It is the settlers' goal to drive
them out regardless of the barbaric methods used. The Israeli government
tends to overlook the settlers' actions that are in reality carrying out
the government's dirty work, as they continue to build and expand what
is internationally recognized as illegal settlements. The Yanun
residents hope to return one day and hold the keys to their homes in the
village, but will they pass the key down to the next generation as they
await their return like the rest of the Palestinian refugees displaced
54 years ago?
Published on MIFTAH - Oct. 22, 2002 - http://www.miftah.org
