The New York Times · 16 May 1968

CP-1968-016

HEBRON SETTLERS MAY STAY IN TOWN

An Israeli Decision Reported, Allowing Jews to Remain

By JAMES FERON

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HEBRON, Israeli-occupied Jordan, May 15 — The Israeli Government is reported to have decided to accept the presence of a group of Jewish settlers who have been living for a month in this occupied town on the west bank of the Jordan River.

The settlers, a group of about 80 ultra-Orthodox Jews, moved into the Park Hotel on the northern outskirts of Hebron last month ostensibly to celebrate the Passover holiday but then announced that they had come to stay.

They said that Hebron, which is holy to both Jews and Moslems, had been a Jewish city a thousand years ago and that its capture in the June war last year was part of the redemption of the land of Israel. Their presence created a split in the Cabinet. Ministers who favor retention of the occupied West-Bank area of Jordan applauded the move.

Others regretted it as an obstacle to peace talks. The Government was forced to decide whether to order the removal of the settlers or accept their presence and, by doing so, extend Israeli protection to them.

Reliable sources said tonight that the decision had been made in the form of an authorization to the Israeli military governor in Hebron to “attend to the defense and housing needs” of the settlers.

It is likely to infuriate Arab leaders, who have been pleading with the Israeli authorities for weeks to remove the settlers before their presence touched off incidents.

The Mayor, Sheik Mohammed Ali Jaabari, said earlier today in an interview that took place before the Israeli decision was known that the Israelis should not be allowed to settle in Hebron before the status of the west bank was decided. He said that the people of Hebron did not want Jews settling there.

Hebron was the site of a massacre of several dozen Jews in 1929 and nearby Kfar Etzion, one of four Israeli settlements, was the scene of a similar massacre in the 1948 war between Israel and the Arabs.

The Hebron settlement, which will expand considerably in the fall if its leaders’ plans are fulfilled, would represent the first purely civilian Israeli settlement in the occupied areas. It would also represent the first Jewish settlement in an Arab urban center.

There are 50,000 Arabs in this town, the vast majority Moslem, and no Jews except for the Park Hotel group and the occupation soldiers. Israel has established about 10 nahal, or paramilitary border settlements in the occupied areas, mostly in the Golan heights, captured from Syria. One of the most controversial cases was the return of settlers to the Etzion area.

Although technically a nahal, the new Etzion settlement is occupied by religious Israelis some of whom share the background and training of the Park Hotel group. Eliezer Waldmann, spokesman for the new Hebron settlers, said today that “God has shown us the way to redeem the Jewish nation.” He said that Hebron was the first city of the Kingdom of David.

“He lived here for seven years before going to Jerusalem,” Mr. Waldmann said as he spoke of the holiness of Hebron for Jews. It contains the Tomb of the Patriarchs, a site that is second only to the Western (wailing) Wall of Jerusalem in its sacredness to religious Jews. The same structure is called the Haram al Khalil by Moslems, and is equally holy to them.

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