(en) Israel MEDIA, View from the hills: Anarchists spoiling Shabbat By JOSH HASTEN03/12/2013 22:20

[Note: Half the truth is the best lie... The formal "state-owned lands" are the Jordanian
state lands occupied in 1967. They became Jordanian state lands as the to be Israel state
and the Jordanian kingdom (still dominated by UK at the time) divided between them the 
lands allocated to the Palestinian state by 1947 UN distribution plan. They were really 
community lands progressively encroached by settler - formal and non formal projects. Ed.
I.S.] ---- Regardless of one?s level of religious observance, Shabbat in the Jewish State
of Israel is a nationwide day of rest. ---- Sussiya Photo: REUTERS Regardless of one?s 
level of religious observance, Shabbat in the Jewish State of Israel is a nationwide day 
of rest. Whether your custom is to spend time visiting with family and friends, lying on 
the beach, taking in a game of football, or attending services and eating the traditional
festive meals, there is no doubt that Shabbat is a much needed day in this country for our 
populace to recharge their batteries.

But for the 16 proud Zionistic pioneer families living in the southern Hebron Hills 
community of Mitzpe Yair, just two kilometers east of Sussiya, over the past several 
months instead of being a day of rest, Shabbat has become a day of angst, tension and 
confrontation.

According to local residents, dozens of Arabs from the surrounding villages, with the 
encouragement, support and coordination of extreme left-wing Israeli groups, along with 
college-age Europeans ? have been hosting vociferous demonstrations on the outskirts of 
the community, demanding that the residents be evacuated and their land turned over to 
Arab control.

?Every Shabbat they start up with us, getting closer and closer to our homes,? says 
Mordechai Doitch who along with his wife Michal and their eight children have lived in the 
community since 2000. ?They shout out nasty threats, saying things like ?go back to 
Poland? and ?you were already evicted by the Romans, what are you doing back here.?? 
Doitch says that while the IDF is quick to respond, on a weekly basis, to prevent the mob
from infiltrating this fence-less community and to back away the demonstrators, community
members are forced to leave the synagogue, many times in the middle of Shabbat morning 
prayers, to stand up and defend their mere presence.

?Firstly,? he says, ?we are afraid for our lives and the lives of our families [when the 
mob shows up]. And if we don?t show ourselves, and stand up for our right to be here, 
there would be a vacuum, and no doubt, the Arabs would claim this area as theirs.?

According to Doitch, who along with Michal are organic vegetable farmers who moved to 
Mitzpe Yair from Gush Katif, the community was established in 1998, and is built on 100 
percent state-owned land.

Originally known as the ?Magen David Farm,? the community was renamed in 2001 in memory of 
local shepherd Yair Har-Sinai, 51, father of nine children, who was murdered by Arab 
terrorists with ties to Hamas, while tending to his flock in a nearby field.

Standing on the lush green hills outside his home, Doitch scans the horizon and notices an 
Arab?s flock of sheep on a hill just several valleys over. ?Look at that brown hill where
the sheep are? he points out. ?The Arabs are creating a desert, while everywhere the Jews
live here, the land in green.?

Doitch says that the local Arabs are in actuality using sheep to get closer and closer and 
attempt to enclose his community.

?Those sheep are not really grazing there, it?s all brown. Not only is what they?re doing
bad for the land but it is not healthy for the flock which is clearly overpopulated and 
isn?t being cared for properly.?

In the foreground, on the hillside just a few meters from where we?re standing are the 
Doitch family greenhouses.

He says he grows organic celery, parsley, broccoli, fennel, lettuce and a wide variety of
other vegetables and sells them to his wide customer base, mostly in the Jerusalem area.

While Doitch is adamant that Mitzpe Yair is built totally on state land, he says the 
authorities ?don?t want to officially authorize the community, since they are against 
building in this area.? He?s hopeful that the recent publication of the Levy Report, 
calling on the state to recognize unauthorized communities as legal, will assist in 
upgrading his area?s status.

Seated in the Doitch family dining room with some of the most spectacular views in all of
Israel pouring through their floor-to-ceiling porch doors and windows, Michal gives 
further details about the identities of the weekly protestors.

?These are not just regular leftists,? she says, ?these people are anarchists.? Michal 
says that because of the Israelis themselves the group is extremely organized, using the 
Internet and social media outlets to coordinate their activities.

She also cites a conversation with one of the European college students who took part in a 
recent Shabbat confrontation, who she says admitted to her that ?he didn?t even really 
know too much about the conflict.?

According to Michal, the student said he came to Israel after being offered a free 
sight-seeing trip by one of the Israeli leftist organizations. Only once in the country 
was the group told by their hosts that in addition to seeing the sites they would be given 
the opportunity to do some important work ?in the name of peace? and were thus brought in
to protest.

Michal, who discloses that two of her sons are currently proudly serving in IDF combat 
units, with one of them already a commander, says what is most disturbing and frightening
about the demonstrations is the fact that the demonstrators know her family by name.

?When they come out on Shabbat and scream at us by name, the fact that they make it 
personal makes it feel like it?s a danger where you don?t know what?s going to happen.?

Avidan Ophir, who serves as one of the community?s administrative officials, says the army 
should take a harder stance and not put up with the weekly provocations.

?It?s all an act, like a play,? he says. ?The demonstrators come on Shabbat and the army 
shows up week after week with 10 jeeps and 80 soldiers and forms a wall, but instead of 
solving the issue, they let this provocation continue, which just pushes off the problem.

There needs to be solution once and for all.?

Both Ophir and the Doitchs say that sometimes when the army is diverted and forced to 
focus its attention on Mitzpe Yair, the protestors then seize the opportunity to disturb 
life at other communities in the area, including Avigail, a community just to the North, 
as well as several other area farms.

Stepping out on Doitchs? porch one can clearly see the city of Arad to the southeast, the
Jordanian mountains to the east, and Jordan Valley just beyond the Judean desert below. 
While from a security perspective is it no mystery why this community and their neighbors
in the area are of utmost importance to the wellbeing of the entire country, for Michal 
living in Mitzpe Yair is so much more.

?There are no words to describe this place,? she says.

??Love? isn?t a strong enough word to describe how special we find that it is to be living 
here. We came here so that we could have a larger living space, and where we could farm. 
We have a neighbor who is a bee farmer, another who is running a winery and a third who is 
starting a dairy farm; it is such a special community.?

Despite the protestors, the intentions of some of her Arab neighbors, and issues Mitzpe 
Yair has with the High Court over full legalization of the community and disputes with 
regard to surrounding agricultural areas, Michal says that she is not worried about the 
future of her home. The key, though, she says, ?is that the Jews have to start believing 
that this is our land.?

The writer is a media expert, freelance journalist, and host of Reality Bytes Radio, on 
www.israelnationalradio.com.