Police arrest rabbi for 'inciting Palestinians' in East Jerusalem

[bemildred]

Israel Police on Thursday arrested Arik Ascherman, the executive director of Rabbis for Human Rights, for "inciting Palestinians to oppose the police" in East Jerusalem.

Heated tensions between residents of the Silwan village in East Jerusalem and the Israel Police erupted over excavation works that have recently began in the village. The excavations are being carried out by the Israel Antiquities Authority (IAA) and are sponsored by Elad association, which promotes the "Judaization" of East Jerusalem.

Silwan residents say the excavation work is being carried out directly underneath their homes, and have proceeded to set up a demonstration tent on a private lot belonging to one of the village residents. A few confrontations subsequently broke out, and the residents maintained that the police deliberately harassed them. On Wednesday another spat occurred between the local residents and settlers on behalf of Elad, and the police detained Ascherman for questioning.

The police requested that Ascherman promise to stay away from Silwan for 15 days and upon his refusal to oblige, he was arrested and will be brought in front of a judge Friday for his remand to be extended.

http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/964131.html

[Cronus Protagonist]

1. Why would a rabbit do that?

:P

[Scurrilous]

2. Confessions of a provocateur

By: Rabbi Arik Ascherman
Rabbis for Human Rights
15 March 2008

I am not comfortable with the amount of attention around my arrest. Many Silwan residents have been arrested and I am not even the first Israeli to be arrested there. However, I am grateful for all of the support and if the fact that people know me helps to uncover the injustice and discrimination taking place in Silwan, than so be it. As advocate Gabi Laski said in court today, it is `eifa v`eifa`

The reason why I chose to spend a night in jail and not agree to a restraining order keeping me from Silwan is not only because I didn`t do any of what it was said that I did,(The police version changes from minute to minute, but apparently they are saying that I grabbed an ElAd person to prevent him from evacuating the injured driver (I wasn`t even in the area at that time.) and because I told Silwan residents not to listen to the police (The opposite is true).

The reason why I chose to spend a night in jail is because we read in Pirkei Avot, `Where nobody is acting like a decent human being, try to be a decent human being. (2:6) Where the legal and law enforcement systems are not fulfilling their duty to protect the residents of Silwan who with great bravery are leading the struggle to defend their neighborhood, there have to be decent human beings who will do so.

Despite the fact that the excavations ElAd is conducting with totally irresponsibly and unprofessionally have already caused the main street to cave in repeatedly and have caused cracks in houses, the High Court did not issue an order stopping the excavations until they hear the case.

The police burst into homes and arrested at 4:00 am 5 people who just happened to be members of the families who had appealed to the High Court the day before.

Two residents and an Israeli activist that came the police station to lodge complaints about a previous attack were themselves arrested.

This is not the first time in Silwan. For example, a few months ago, by happenstance, the police broke into a home, busted down the doors, and turned the house upside down `looking for drugs,` in a home that ElAd had set its eyes upon.

Shabbat is starting. I have written the full story of what happened in Hebrew, and will send out in English after Shabbat. The short story is that I still received a restraining order in court today. The judge was not interested in listing to arguments and the minutes of the hearing even skipped an exchange in which the chief police interrogator said that nobody from ElAd had restraining orders because no complaints had been lodged against them, Advocate Laski`s reminded him of what happened last time Palestinians lodged complaints. I will have a difficult time deciding what to do if we lose an appeal on Sunday, but my decision will be easier if we have 100 Israelis, including rabbis, standing in Silwan in my stead.

Shabbat Shalom,

Arik

http://www.kibush.co.il/show_file.asp?num=25805