Mixed Reactions, Confusion over Cabinet’s Declaration on Hebron

The Cabinet’s declaration Sunday that Jews have the right in principle, to live in Hebron, drew mixed reactions and some confusion over what, if anything, the government intends to do about it. The 10-day curfew on Hebron was lifted Sunday night. However, tension continues in Hebron and surrounding areas. Arabs reportedly plan a massive rally at the Al Aksa Mosque in Jerusalem to protest plans to resettle Jews in Hebron.

Some nationalist and religious militants were angered by the Cabinet’s failure to announce a decision to establish a Jewish presence in the West Bank Arab town forthwith. Others, who support the idea of a Jewish return to Hebron, were convinced that the Cabinet will act when it. convenes again next Sunday. Moderates, who believes a move into Hebron would be an unwarranted provocation, further endangering the autonomy negotiations with Egypt and the U.S., seemed satisfied that the issue is dead for the time being.

Rabbi Moshe levinger, leader of Kiryat Arba, the Gush Emunim stronghold adjacent to Hebron, accused the government of “mumbling again, “MK Haim Druckman of the National Religious Party, urged the government to implement its decision “within a week at the latest.” David Levy, a Herut MK, insisted that the Cabinet.” declaration was “not a compromise” but a decision in principle to restore Jews to Hebron, He said he expected the Cabinet to adopt concrete proposals at its next meeting.

But doveish ministers and their aides saw the declaration in principle as a device to shelve the issue. “It is dead,” one ministerial aide said last night. Seasoned observers took note of a proposal advanced during the Cabinet meeting by Minister-Without-Portfolio Moshe Nissim of Likud’s Liberal-Party wing, a hardliner who was the only Liberal minister to support the Cabinet majority against his colleagues who urged caution.

He suggested the establishment of Jewish institutions of learning in Hebron instead of installing a few families there. He said that the Hesder Yeshiva, located in Kiryat Arba, would be a suitable type of school for Hebron. Its student body is organized on para-military lines and carries out guard and patrol duties. Yehoshua Slomo, who was murdered in Hebron on Jan, 31, was a Hesder student.

Informed sources said Nissim would submit his proposal formally at next Sunday’s Cabinet session if another hardliner, Agriculture Minister Ariel Sharon, mode a formal proposal to settle Jewish families in the Arab town.

DEMAND RENOVATION OF BUILDINGS

The militants insist that the government seize and renovate buildings that were owned by Jews who were massacred or forced to flee Hebron during the Arab uprisings in 1929. They have five buildings in mind for immediate occupation by Jewish families.

But Attorney General Yitzhak Zamir has ruled out three of men on grounds that they are protected by leases held by a local Arab school. They are the old Hadassah clinic, the Hassan building and the Romano building. The Hadassah building has been occupied by women from Kiryat Arba for the past few months.

It is owned officially by the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees (UNRWA) which obtained it from the Jordanian authorities before 1967. The building was seized by Israeli forces during the Six-Day War. Zamir cautioned that a Jewish civilian presence there could serve as a basis for legal action by UNRWA against the government.

The Romano building presently houses a girls school run by the Hebron municipality, Kiryat Arba residents have been holding prayer sessions outside the school and small groups of them have been picketing. They claim the Military Government promised them that they could take over the building as soon as the curfew was lifted.