West Bank stone-throwing leaves 2 wounded

A Jerusalem court on Sunday freed on bail 23 right-wing activists arrested Saturday on charges of throwing stones at Palestinian vehicles on Route 60 near the fledgling Ramat Migron outpost.

According to the Jerusalem Magistrates Court, 22 out of the 23 were minors. The court issued injunctions mandating that the activists stay away from Ramat Migron for 60 days, unless they could prove it was their place of residence.

The activists were also charged with entering a closed military zone. They were freed on bail of NIS 500 to NIS 5,000.

According to the court, a Palestinian was injured by the stone-throwing. A police officer was injured during the arrests.

According to the Border Police, officers found stonethrowing paraphernalia at the scene. The spokesman said that there were two incidents of stone-throwing, separated by an hour. In the second, the activists’ faces were covered.

The Ramat Migron outpost is located on the same hilltop as the Migron outpost, which is due to be evacuated later this month, but they are not connected.

Chanamel Dorfman of Ramat Migron denied the charges of stone-throwing, and instead claimed the police had come to Ramat Migron to harass the scores of teens who had gathered there for Shabbat.

Dorfman said that the police and Border Police came to Ramat Migron three times in the span of 24 hours – first at 1 a.m. on Saturday, then at 5 p.m. and then just after Shabbat ended. The arrests occurred at 5 p.m.

Dorfman further charged that the security forces had destroyed one of the temporary wooden structures in the small outpost. He provided The Jerusalem Post with 11 photos of the demolished structure.

In a separate incident, security forces on Saturday destroyed a temporary structure in the fledgling Mitzpe Avihai outpost outside of the Kiryat Arba settlement.

MK Michael Ben-Ari (National Union) on Sunday wrote a letter to Shas ministers in which he complained that the Border Police had desecrated Shabbat by demolishing structures.

He asked them to clarify if the rabbinical leaders supported demolitions on Shabbat.

But according to the Border Police spokesman, the Mitzpe Avihai demolition did not involve a home, or even a permanent structure, but a temporary construction more like a succa.

Both the spokesman and the Civil Administration of Judea and Samaria said there is a policy against home demolitions on Shabbat.

He denied reports that a wooden structure had been demolished at the Ramat Migron outpost on Saturday.