Three Knesset Members refused to visit the destroyed Shomron Jewish community of Homesh Monday because the army did not allow reporters to accompany them.
The IDF had granted members of the newly-formed Homesh Knesset Forum - MKs Aryeh Eldad, Uri Ariel (both of the National Union party) and Yuli Edelstein (Likud) - special permission to visit Homesh, one of the four Shomron towns destroyed two years ago in then-Prime Minister Ariel Sharon's Disengagement plan. The visit did not go through, however - because the MKs refused to accept certain restrictions.
Over the past several months, the "Homesh First" organization has arisen with the goal of rebuilding the community, and Jews have in fact been there nearly every day and night for the past two months. Border Guard policemen and army forces have arrived periodically to throw them out, however.
MKs Ariel, Edelstein and Eldad, and their aides, were on their way to Homesh this morning (Monday), but stopped at nearby Shavei Shomron to demand that reporters be allowed to come as well. "We ourselves have been there before," MK Ariel told Arutz-7. "We want the whole country to see it as well, through the cameras and pens of the reporters. We met with the local Deputy Brigade Commander, who refused to allow them in, so we turned right back to Jerusalem."
"To say that there are security warnings is just a bluff," Ariel said. "If there are threats, how is it that we and our aides are allowed in?"
The army similarly claimed last week, on the first night of the Rosh HaShanah holiday, that there were terror threats, requiring the desecration of the holiday in order to forcibly remove the Jews who had arrived there.
Asked if he did not believe these claims, MK Ariel said, "I'm not saying that. I'm saying that the army is using the security situation improperly. If there was just a terror threat on the holiday, then why did they have to take the people to the police station? What criminal activity was involved? They could have taken them straight to [the religious community of] Shavei Shomron - as they ultimately did, involving extra and unnecessary holiday desecration."
The Knesset Homesh Forum
MK Edelstein (Likud), speaking with Arutz-7's Chizki Ezra on the way to Homesh, said, "This forum's goal is to help the Homesh First core-group to re-settle Homesh, and this visit is part of that plan. We want to show solidarity with these pioneers, and in general to help pave the way for more people to come in the future... It is clear that the very fact that we are being allowed to come shows the weakness of the claims of terrorist threats in the area..."
"MKs are certainly allowed to come here," Edelstein said, "and even civilians are not necessarily banned, according to a recent District Court ruling... I am certain that more and more MKs and civilians will yet come here to visit and then to settle in Homesh."