As part of the many measures being taken lately against residents in the Samaria (Shomron) Jewish community of Yitzhar, the police and the military have adopted a new policy: arresting residents who come home after midnight.
One of them is Elchanan Gruner, a resident of Yitzhar and a member of the Honenu legal aid association.
“We came on Monday at 12:15am,” Gruner told Arutz Sheva’s Hebrew website on Wednesday. A Border Police jeep stood at the entrance to the community, stopped us and asked us for identity cards. We asked why, they said that there are all kinds of suspicions related to ‘price tag’ operations. This reality of continued harassment has been ongoing for six months.”
Yitzhar, which has long been the victim of zealous police and IDF attention, has been especially targeted by the Israeli security forces in recent months. Some of its residents have been driven away from the community by restraining orders, and two residents were recently arrested for allegedly torching Arab cars. They were released and then summoned again for questioning.
Gruner told Arutz Sheva that on Monday night, after twenty minutes all the people who had been detained were released except for him.
“They let everyone go but me,” he recalled. “I asked what was happening and they claimed that I am banned from Judea and Samaria. I told them it was a mistake, and they took me to the Tapuach intersection and searched me. Then a cop from Ariel arrived, and I told him I was not banned from Judea and Samaria. He checked and said that an administrative order was put out against me. Then he checked again and suddenly told me that I was not banned and am free to go.”
Gruner said the poiceman told him there had been an error and that one month ago, a restraining order was issued against Gruner when he was suspected of torching a vehicle belonging to a police commander after the violent eviction of the Aley Ayin outpost near Shilo.
“Someone likely made a mistake in that restraining order and wrote that I was expelled from Judea and Samaria,” said Gruner, who didn’t come home until 2 o’clock in the morning because of the incident.
He told Arutz Sheva that he intends to file a complaint against the army and police for abuse.
“They released me without even apologizing,” he said. “Instead they told me to thank them for not arresting me. As far as I’m concerned, it was directed harassment and I intend to sue them. They apparently decided that it’s okay to bother us at night rather than deal with the Arabs from nearby villages.”
Yitzhar residents have a litany of raids, arrests and accusations, but also attempted Arab and anarchist raids on the community and attempts to frame the residents for harming Arab olive groves, proven later to be done by the Arabs themselves. A year ago, the Od Yoseph Chai Yeshiva in YItzhar was raided by police in the middle of the night. The IDF Civil Administration claimed in 2010 that the then 11 year-old yeshiva building, built with government authorization and funding, was built illegaly and set a date for its demolition, which was not carried out.