Land of Israel activists are planning a grand display of defiance for the upcoming visit of US President George W. Bush to Israel, who is hoping to push plans to partition the land.
“We cannot allow the Israeli government to maintain the illusion that it is acting in the interests of the Jewish People,” reads literature promoting the multi-pronged protest. “The Olmert government no longer even feels obligated to safeguard the lives and property of its own Jewish citizens. The population of Sderot and the western Negev remains under constant missile attack, and the Jews expelled from Gush Katif continue to languish in refugee camps.”
On Tuesday, January 8 – the day before the projected date of Bush’s Jerusalem visit – a massive building campaign in Judea and Samaria will be kicked off in Jerusalem’s southeastern Har Homa (Homat Shmuel) neighborhood. There, leaders and activists will declare Israel’s right to build in Jerusalem and in the entire Land of Israel.
From there, activists will leave, with vehicles loaded with building materials, for points throughout Judea and Samaria.
The leaders of the umbrella organization of several extra-parliamentary groups that have taken part in various grassroots activism since the 2005 Disengagement, say they intend to thwart plans to establish a Palestinian Authority state by creating new Jewish communities.
“With George W. Bush's planned visit to Israel in January, in which he will pressure the Olmert government to stop building the Land of Israel and even to divide it, it is essential that we broadcast to the entire world the message of Jewish steadfastness and loyalty to the entire Land of Israel,” they say.
Participants include the Land of Israel Faithful, Youth for Eretz Israel, Women in Green, Homesh First, The Committee to Save the People and the Land, Komemiyut, Maginei Eretz, Mattot Arim, Land of Israel Forum, VeYirashtem Otah, local Action Committees and the Committee for the Expansion of Homat Shmuel (Har Homa).
Supporters the world over are being given the opportunity to purchase cinder blocks, cement, generators, tools, sand, gravel, pipes, chemical toilets, doors, windows, tin roofs, cement mixers and other building materials.
Organizers plan on displaying the names of those who pay for the truckloads of supplies on the side of the vehicles, “emphasizing that the Jews living in Israel's Biblical heartland have the support of friends from all over the world.”
Herzl Yechezkel, of the Committee for the Expansion of Har Homa, spoke with Arutz-7 about the upcoming activity. “The neighborhood continues to grow despite all the talk in the news. We want to remind all of Israel that we are located within the municipal border of Jerusalem and have been an inseparable part of the State of Israel since the neighborhood was established by Yitzchak Rabin. We are taking part in this protest to strengthen the resolve of the Prime Minister and the government in the face of pressure.”
Yechezkel says that Har Homa currently has 20,000 residents, but there are plans to triple that figure in the future.
“Our message to Bush, on Rosh Chodesh Shvat,” said Yechezkel, “is that you don’t mess with Jerusalem. Jerusalem is our heart and if you try to harm our heart that is very serious.”
For more information, call Zahava at 052 484 6034 (011 972 52 484 6034 from outside Israel) or email [email protected]