Col. (res.) Moshe Givati, appointed by Public Security Minister Uzi Landau Givati to investigate and mediate the ongoing tensions between Hevron police and local Jewish residents, spent the day in Hevron today following what he called yesterday\'s \"grave\" events there. At issue was an incident that began with an arrest warrant for a Jewish youth in Hevron, and that ended doubly bad: Two policemen came \"bursting in to a day camp, with their guns drawn, and dragging the \'suspect\' out, swinging at anything or anyone in their way\" - and a police car drove over a child\'s foot and remained in that position, despite the child\'s screams, until the youth was thrown into the car. (The youth, wanted by the police to deliver testimony, was released a few hours later.) This, in any event, was the residents\' view of the situation. The response of the Public Security Ministry spokesman, as of this afternoon - 28 hours later - was still, \"The incident is under investigation.\"



Hevron spokeswoman Orit Strook told Arutz-7 that she spent several hours with Col. Givati today as he questioned residents, soldiers, and other participants and witnesses to yesterday\'s events. \"One soldier told him he saw the police burst into the children\'s room in an \'exaggerated and unnecessary manner,\'\" Strook recounted, \"and Givati said things like, \'The picture is clear... Grave things were done... There was over-doing...\' I don\'t know what the police told him when he went to speak with them afterwards, but I am quite sure of the picture he received while he was here speaking with the soldiers and the others.\"



Strook insists that the source of the tensions between the police and the residents is the \"special regulations\" that the police use for Hevron residents: \"My impression is that Givati knows that they are discriminatory and that they should be changed. In the past, he has been exposed to and shocked by many stories here that are the outgrowth of these unfair special regulations.\"