<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8" standalone="yes"?><oembed><version><![CDATA[1.0]]></version><provider_name><![CDATA[Occupied Palestine | فلسطين]]></provider_name><provider_url><![CDATA[https://occupiedpalestine.wordpress.com]]></provider_url><author_name><![CDATA[occupiedpalestine]]></author_name><author_url><![CDATA[https://occupiedpalestine.wordpress.com/author/hajarhajar/]]></author_url><title><![CDATA[Soldiers go to sleep in village threatened with&nbsp;demolition]]></title><type><![CDATA[link]]></type><html><![CDATA[<p><img loading="lazy" data-attachment-id="77421" data-permalink="https://occupiedpalestine.wordpress.com/2012/02/28/soldiers-go-to-sleep-in-village-threatened-with-demolition/kibush/" data-orig-file="https://occupiedpalestine.files.wordpress.com/2012/02/kibush.jpg" data-orig-size="723,68" data-comments-opened="0" data-image-meta="{&quot;aperture&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;credit&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;camera&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;caption&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;created_timestamp&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;copyright&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;focal_length&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;iso&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;shutter_speed&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;title&quot;:&quot;&quot;}" data-image-title="kibush" data-image-description="" data-medium-file="https://occupiedpalestine.files.wordpress.com/2012/02/kibush.jpg?w=588" data-large-file="https://occupiedpalestine.files.wordpress.com/2012/02/kibush.jpg?w=588" class="alignnone size-full wp-image-77421" title="kibush" src="https://occupiedpalestine.files.wordpress.com/2012/02/kibush.jpg?w=588&#038;h=55" alt="" width="588" height="55" srcset="https://occupiedpalestine.files.wordpress.com/2012/02/kibush.jpg?w=588&amp;h=55 588w, https://occupiedpalestine.files.wordpress.com/2012/02/kibush.jpg 723w" sizes="(max-width: 588px) 100vw, 588px" /><br />
<a href="http://kibush.co.il/show_file.asp?num=51872" target="_blank"><strong>KIBUSH.CO.IL FEB 28 2012</strong></a></p>
<p><strong>By Haj Sami Sadeq Sbaih</strong><br />
<strong> Mayor, Al Aqaba village</strong><br />
<strong> Email message from</strong><br />
<strong> aqaba2006@yahoo.com</strong></p>
<p>Via Donna Baranski-Walker<br />
The Rebuilding Alliance<br />
dbw@rebuildingalliance</p>
<p><strong>Feb. 28, 2012</strong></p>
<p>Letter to the People of Israel</p>
<p>Dear People of Israel,</p>
<p>I am the mayor of Al Aqaba, a small peaceful Palestinian Village in the Jordan Valley, in the West<br />
Bank Area C. I asked that this message be translated also into Hebrew, a language I speak when I learned it<br />
over the years I spent in Israeli hospitals. I am writing to tell you about your army’s training in our<br />
village last week. I hope you will feel reassured by my message and help, as so many of you helped<br />
over 10 years ago, to assure the future of our village.</p>
<p>On the morning of Wednesday February 22, 2012, the biting cold greeted us before dawn as we<br />
headed to morning prayers. To our surprise, Israeli occupation forces in three jeeps and military<br />
vehicles were parked in front of the main door of our mosque in our Village of Al Aqaba. We were<br />
afraid to approach, and their unanticipated presence caused a twenty-minute delay of the adhan, the<br />
Islamic prayer faithfully recited five times a day.</p>
<p>We hoped that the military vehicles would move — but no. As we walked past the military jeeps to<br />
attend the dawn prayers, we were surprised to find the jeeps running and the soldiers inside in a very<br />
deep sleep. Even after the call to prayer, they remained asleep. They must have been very tired. As<br />
we departed the mosque in the morning light — workers, famers, and students starting our day —<br />
we were stunned to see hundreds of soldiers, laying down and sleeping throughout our village, on<br />
our roads and in our fields, some right next to our homes.</p>
<p>Although the sleeping soldiers were a rare sight for the village to behold, we decided not to disrupt<br />
the soldiers and prevented any harm or disruption to the soldiers while they slept. But it was such a<br />
curious sight and we did not know what the work of the soldiers would be when they woke up, so I<br />
asked friends to quietly film. Here is our teacher’s film Israeli Army in Al Aqaba 2-22-12 <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NCeCbMeddSA&#038;context=C3266428ADOEgsToPDskKBeo3C1pWQTCsMvpILrR1Y" rel="nofollow">http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NCeCbMeddSA&#038;context=C3266428ADOEgsToPDskKBeo3C1pWQTCsMvpILrR1Y</a></p>
<p>The soldiers’ presence in our village raised a lot of fear and anxiety, especially given our history<br />
and the 2001 Israeli High Court decision that prevents soldiers from using our village for training<br />
exercises. Later many of Aqaba’s villagers found themselves wondering, ‘Where else could<br />
soldiers have parked, camped, and slept peacefully, safely watched over by Palestinian<br />
villagers? And why, if they trust us enough to sleep here among us, why do they still want to<br />
destroy our village?”</p>
<p>The Israeli Army has issued demolition orders against more than 90% of our village. Within a<br />
month of Israeli Brigadier General Moti Almoz’ December meeting with the Governor of Tubas and<br />
with me here in Al Aqaba Village, 29 more demolition orders were issued.</p>
<p>Because international organizations can call the Israeli Army, I asked Rebuilding Alliance, an<br />
American organization that is raising funds to help us rebuild our homes, to call them. An Israeli<br />
Army contact denied the soldiers were even in the village and again warned Rebuilding Alliance that<br />
any new homes in Al Aqaba will be destroyed. They said American towns would do the same as they<br />
— but, as Rebuilding Alliance replied, “American town councils create town plans, issue building<br />
permits, and inspect new structures. That’s what Al Aqaba is doing in its town, on its own land, land<br />
to which they hold clear title.”</p>
<p>The people of the village of Al Aqaba have been bearing the pain of life under occupation and<br />
theft of property since the 1967 war. As a result of the military maneuvers conducted with live<br />
ammunition by the Israeli army and settlers, the agriculture has been impacted greatly by the<br />
destruction of our citizens’ crops, growing isolation of the citizens from outside resources, home<br />
and road demolitions, and the denial of essential services to our small village, particularly safe, clean drinking water and the right to build our homes – basic human rights that every human being is<br />
entitled to.</p>
<p>Last year Occupation Forces twice destroyed our Peace Road, the road our school bus uses to get<br />
the children to school. Additionally, seven families were made homeless by destruction of their<br />
modest homes, and their goats had to sleep in the cold too when their stables were destroyed. These senseless acts of destruction especially frighten our children.</p>
<p>People of Israel, we are not a threat to you. We are your neighbors. Please recognize Al Aqaba’s<br />
town plans. Help us build a secondary school and a rehabilitation hospital. Come visit us and stay in<br />
our guest house.</p>
<p>We ask your help and we welcome you.</p>
<p>Sincerely,</p>
<p>Haj Sami Sadeq Sbaih<br />
Mayor of Al Aqaba Village<br />
Near Tubas, Jordan Valley, West Bank, Palestine</p>
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<strong>Ethnic Cleansing &#8211; <a href="https://occupiedpalestine.wordpress.com/special-topics/colonialism-ethnic-cleansing/" target="_blank">Topic </a>| Settlement Construction &#8211; <a href="https://occupiedpalestine.wordpress.com/category/settlement-construction/" target="_blank">Category</a> &#8211;  <a href="https://occupiedpalestine.wordpress.com/2010/10/29/settlements-construction/" target="_blank">Pictures</a></strong></p>
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