The police detained 23 persons today for forcibly trying to prevent them from blocking access to the Yamit region in northern Sinai to infiltrators supporting the “Stop the Withdrawal” movement. The detainees, Orthodox Jews mostly from the religious township of Kiryat Arba on the West Bank, adjacent to Hebron, are being held without bail in various parts of the country pending legal proceedings, the police said.
The arrests occurred after police clashed with some 200 religious demonstrators at Moshav Priel, near Yamit, this morning. Some demonstrators boasted to Israel Radio that about 100 members of their group had managed to evade security patrols and enter the area. The purpose of the infiltration is to build up the Jewish population in the area and thereby prevent Israel’s withdrawal from northern Sinai, scheduled to be completed April 25.
Army roadblocks set up over the weekend were still in place today on approaches to Yamit, the Gaza Strip and southern Sinai. Police and soldiers checked the credentials of all travellers, allowing only bona fide residents of the sealed-off areas to enter.
The ultra-nationalist Tehiya Party presented a no-confidence motion in the Knesset today over the sealing off of the Yamit area. It will be debated tomorrow and is certain to be defeated.
BEGIN THREATENS TO FIRE EITAN
Meanwhile, an angry Premier Menachem Begin threatened today to fire Chief of Staff Gen. Rafael Eitan if there was any repetition of the statement Eitan reportedly made to the demonstrators at Yamit yesterday. According to Israel Radio, Defense Minister Ariel Sharon informed the Knesset’s Foreign Affairs and Security Committee of Begin’s warning to Eitan.
The Chief of Staff urged settlers massed at an army roadblock at the approaches to Yamit to remove the barricades they had thrown up around the town to prevent access by troops.
“If you remove your barricade and if I can return the situation to what it was previously, I will try,” he said. He was referring to the situation which has prevailed during the past few months whereby opponents of the withdrawal from Sinai were allowed to enter the region without interference by the army.
Eitan added that he would “personally go to the person whom I need to go” for that purpose, apparently meaning Begin. Israel Radio reported today that Begin told Eitan, “One more statement like yesterday’s and you will be fired.”
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