[h=1]Israelis Terrorists Hit Mosque After Govt Vows Action[/h]
Earlier this week, the groups vandalized an army facility and pelted Palestinians' cars with stones, sparking a national debate in Israel over whether the radicals should be officially classified as terrorists and subject to legal procedures used against Palestinian militants.
Thursday's vandalism came hours after the army dismantled unauthorized structures at an outpost settlement several miles away, Mitzpeh Yitzhar.
The army said Thursday it had promoted a general who was one of the first high-ranking officials to call the vigilante campaign "Jewish terror" and call for a crackdown, a move likely to deepen the tension between the some settlers and the army. He was promoted to chief of the army's Central Command, which is responsible for the West Bank.
On Thursday evening, incidents of rock-throwing by settlers prompted the army to close several West Bank roads to Palestinian traffic.
In the harshest Palestinian response yet to the violence, the spokesman for President Mahmoud Abbas described the mosque torching "an act of war" by the settlers and said Israel's government was responsible. The spokesman, Nabil Abu Rudeineh, called on the international community to intervene to stop the attacks.
Israeli security authorities have been worried that the campaign by the vigilantes, who have often scrawled the words "Price Tag" at the scenes, could serve as the spark for a new protracted uprising, or intifada, among the Palestinians.
In a meeting with prominent settler leaders on Thursday, Israeli President Shimon Peres said the attacks on Palestinians were immoral and "add fuel to the fire" against Israel at a time of popular unrest across the Middle East.
The attacks this week cast a spotlight on a defiant vanguard of settlers who subscribe to a religiously driven ideology that sanctions attacks on non-Jews and encourages active resistance against Israeli government concessions in the West Bank, said experts.
Known as the Hilltop Youth for setting up tiny settlement outposts on West Bank mountains, the radicals are part of a younger generation made more religious and politically extreme by the disillusionment with Israel's 2005 evacuation from settlements in Gaza Strip. That crisis drove many youths to break with the views of their parents, who saw themselves as emissaries of the state in claiming the West Bank for Israel. Instead, many in the younger generation were drawn to religious authorities who portrayed Israel's leaders and the government as a hostile entity which must be resisted.
These youths came to see settlement evacuation as "a war crime, a crime against humanity," which they took to justify any actions against it as legal, said Rabbi Yuval Sherlow, the head of a military-affiliated yeshiva the Tel Aviv suburb of Petach Tivkah. He said the group has developed an us-against-them discourse, in which they stand against "the army, the police, the Supreme Court and especially the media."
The radicals have come under criticism by many settlers. Gershon Mesika, the head of the Shomron regional settlers council, issued a statement late Wednesday denouncing settler attacks on the army that occurred earlier this week.
But another settler leader, Rabbi Eliezer Melamed, accused the army of intentionally exaggerating the reports of the attack as part of a campaign against the settlers, according a statement released by the same regional council.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Wednesday approved a plan authorizing administrative detention and military courts for vigilante attack in the West Bank. Used commonly against Palestinians, the measures would enable officials to detain vandals for longer periods of timeup to eight days, compared with 24 hours for a civil proceedingbefore going to a court hearing. He also called for more restraining orders against radical Jewish activists.
However, Mr. Netanyahu rejected recommendations to term the marauding attackers as "terrorists," likening them instead to left-wing Israeli protesters who participate in demonstrations with Palestinians against settlements and the Israeli army.
Newspaper commentators were skeptical that the harsher measures would change the situation on the ground. According to United Nations monitors, settler attacks against Palestinains have nearly tripled in two years.
"The rule of law is imposed selectively in the occupied territories. Violence has become commonplace, and now it has evolved into a contagious disease," wrote Boaz Okun in the Yediot Ahronot daily. "And hence the attempt to return to some form of human dignity ends in failure."
[h=3]TEL AVIVIsraeli vandals torched part of a mosque in the West Bank early Thursday, defying government ministers' pledges to crack down on vigilante settlers who have stepped up attacks this week on Palestinian and army targets alike.[/h]Israelis terrorists burned prayer carpets and scrawled the Hebrew word for "war" at the Al-Noor mosque in the village of Burqa. The second mosque attack in as many days, it was part of a wave of vigilantism attributed to a group of young settlers who oppose Israeli concessions in the West Bank, including the evacuation of settlements, and who believe in retaliating against both Palestinians and Israeli security forces.Earlier this week, the groups vandalized an army facility and pelted Palestinians' cars with stones, sparking a national debate in Israel over whether the radicals should be officially classified as terrorists and subject to legal procedures used against Palestinian militants.
Thursday's vandalism came hours after the army dismantled unauthorized structures at an outpost settlement several miles away, Mitzpeh Yitzhar.
The army said Thursday it had promoted a general who was one of the first high-ranking officials to call the vigilante campaign "Jewish terror" and call for a crackdown, a move likely to deepen the tension between the some settlers and the army. He was promoted to chief of the army's Central Command, which is responsible for the West Bank.
On Thursday evening, incidents of rock-throwing by settlers prompted the army to close several West Bank roads to Palestinian traffic.
In the harshest Palestinian response yet to the violence, the spokesman for President Mahmoud Abbas described the mosque torching "an act of war" by the settlers and said Israel's government was responsible. The spokesman, Nabil Abu Rudeineh, called on the international community to intervene to stop the attacks.
Israeli security authorities have been worried that the campaign by the vigilantes, who have often scrawled the words "Price Tag" at the scenes, could serve as the spark for a new protracted uprising, or intifada, among the Palestinians.
In a meeting with prominent settler leaders on Thursday, Israeli President Shimon Peres said the attacks on Palestinians were immoral and "add fuel to the fire" against Israel at a time of popular unrest across the Middle East.
The attacks this week cast a spotlight on a defiant vanguard of settlers who subscribe to a religiously driven ideology that sanctions attacks on non-Jews and encourages active resistance against Israeli government concessions in the West Bank, said experts.
Known as the Hilltop Youth for setting up tiny settlement outposts on West Bank mountains, the radicals are part of a younger generation made more religious and politically extreme by the disillusionment with Israel's 2005 evacuation from settlements in Gaza Strip. That crisis drove many youths to break with the views of their parents, who saw themselves as emissaries of the state in claiming the West Bank for Israel. Instead, many in the younger generation were drawn to religious authorities who portrayed Israel's leaders and the government as a hostile entity which must be resisted.
These youths came to see settlement evacuation as "a war crime, a crime against humanity," which they took to justify any actions against it as legal, said Rabbi Yuval Sherlow, the head of a military-affiliated yeshiva the Tel Aviv suburb of Petach Tivkah. He said the group has developed an us-against-them discourse, in which they stand against "the army, the police, the Supreme Court and especially the media."
The radicals have come under criticism by many settlers. Gershon Mesika, the head of the Shomron regional settlers council, issued a statement late Wednesday denouncing settler attacks on the army that occurred earlier this week.
But another settler leader, Rabbi Eliezer Melamed, accused the army of intentionally exaggerating the reports of the attack as part of a campaign against the settlers, according a statement released by the same regional council.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Wednesday approved a plan authorizing administrative detention and military courts for vigilante attack in the West Bank. Used commonly against Palestinians, the measures would enable officials to detain vandals for longer periods of timeup to eight days, compared with 24 hours for a civil proceedingbefore going to a court hearing. He also called for more restraining orders against radical Jewish activists.
However, Mr. Netanyahu rejected recommendations to term the marauding attackers as "terrorists," likening them instead to left-wing Israeli protesters who participate in demonstrations with Palestinians against settlements and the Israeli army.
Newspaper commentators were skeptical that the harsher measures would change the situation on the ground. According to United Nations monitors, settler attacks against Palestinains have nearly tripled in two years.
"The rule of law is imposed selectively in the occupied territories. Violence has become commonplace, and now it has evolved into a contagious disease," wrote Boaz Okun in the Yediot Ahronot daily. "And hence the attempt to return to some form of human dignity ends in failure."
