Israeli Squatters Evacuated From Homesh
Pastor Dale Morgan
Israeli Squatters Evacuated From Homesh*
The Associated Press
Saturday, April 28, 2007; 1:04 AM
JERUSALEM -- Army and police forces evacuated a small group of squatters
who had entered the abandoned West Bank Jewish settlement of Homesh on
Friday, the military and police said.
Police spokesman Moshe Pinchi said between 70 to 100 people attempted to
return to the former settlement, which was evacuated along with three
others in the northern West Bank as part of Israel's 2005
"disengagement" plan.
Seven were arrested and held for questioning, Pinchi said.
Friday's clash marked the second such confrontation this week.
Pro-settlement groups staged a similar march on Tuesday, Israel's
Independence Day, to oppose the 2005 pullout. The military closed off
the area, but an army spokesman said after sundown that more than 1,000
people had gathered at the site.
At the end of March, hundreds walked to the tiny, destroyed settlement,
and dozens spent the night. The army evacuated them with little resistance.
Homesh, a hilltop village of 80 people in the northern West Bank, was
reduced to rubble by Israeli bulldozers shortly after the forcible
evacuation in 2005.
It was one of four West Bank settlements evacuated in September 2005,
part of the Israeli government's "disengagement" that included removing
Israel's 21 settlements from the Gaza Strip and leaving that seaside
territory.