Nablus takes first defiant step

The Mayor, Ghassan Shakah, feared a social explosion. Khaled Abuzant, a butcher, wanted to sell his mutton before his flock died of starvati...

The Mayor, Ghassan Shakah, feared a social explosion. Khaled Abuzant, a butcher, wanted to sell his mutton before his flock died of starvation. Farid Quadah needed to buy milk for his children.

First by the fearful dozens, then by the tentative hundreds and on Tuesday by the defiant thousands, the citizens of Nablus poured into the streets and marketplaces, reclaiming their besieged West Bank city in the boldest demonstration of civil disobedience against the Israeli military in the 22-month uprising against continued occupation.

Palestinian bombing kills 7 at Israeli university

Jerusalem: A Palestinian bombing killed at least seven people and wounded more than 80 in a crowded cafeteria at lunch time on Wednesday at the International Students Centre of Jerusalem’s Hebrew University.
The military wing of the Islamic militant group Hamas said it carried out the attack in revenge for an Israeli air strike in Gaza last week that killed its commander and 14 other Palestinians, including nine children.
Police said it appeared a bomb was planted in the cafeteria in the Frank Sinatra International Students Centre, on the university’s Mount Scopus campus near Arab East Jerusalem, a departure from militants’ usual pattern of suicide attacks.
The centre — named after the late American singer Frank Sinatra, a financial donor — was a popular gathering place. Arabs, Jews and foreign scholars had long felt cloistered from the perennial West Asia conflict. —Reuters

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‘‘We’d had enough,’’ said Shakah, referring to the 37 days of curfew imposed since Israeli forces reoccupied Nablus and six other West Bank cities. The shutdown was interrupted only by sporadic suspensions of a few hours to allow residents to restock barren kitchens.

‘‘We were scared, but we had to do something. We were afraid of an explosion among our people.’’ So the Mayor and other local officials began spreading the word.

It passed from house to house, block to block and neighbourhood to neighborhood. At 8:30 am on Sunday, the 60-year-old city leader walked where he had dared not go for more than five weeks of military occupation: his office.

The contagion spread quickly among a populace fed up with being cooped up at home, cut off from livelihoods and deprived of basic necessities, services and dignity.

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For many residents, opening shops or strolling the streets was an act of insubordination against a despised occupying force. For others, it was an act of survival.

Khaled, 70, who watched 25 of his sheep die last week for lack of feed and water, saw more cars appear on the streets. On Monday, he slaughtered a sheep and unlocked the doors to his meat shop on Faisal Street.

For three days, the Israeli soldiers who have aligned tanks and troops on two sides of town have taken no action against the residents. Nablus has been subject to one of the toughest crackdowns and in theory the curfew’s still in force. ‘‘We have no intention of clamping down on the local population,’’ said Raanan Gissin, spokesman for PM Ariel Sharon.

On Tuesday, the city appeared to cast off the shackles of the past several weeks and blossomed with open storefronts, market umbrellas tilted against the blistering heat and a stream of pedestrians.

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The warrens of the Old City that three months ago had been booby-trapped in preparation for attacking Israeli troops were lined with shops spilling their wares into the narrow alleyways — rows of children’s shoes, vats of gooey sweets, stacks of underwear and mounds of bread. (LATWP)

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