AT-TUWANI: Report, “A Dangerous Journey: Settler violence against Palestinian schoolchildren under Israeli military escort” by Christian Peacemaker Teams and Operation Dove now available
This report was released October of 2008, attacks by Jewish settlers on Palestinian childen walking to and from school in Occupied Palestine continue to this day, unabated, which all can read of on CPT's website.
The report concludes, “Nearly four years after the Israeli military’s agreement to provide an escort, and the affirmation of this agreement by the Knesset Committee for Children’s Rights, the situation of the children … has worsened. The children continue to be harassed and attacked by Israeli settlers … The Israeli military, which was given a mandate to ensure the safety of the children, has consistently failed to do so.”
During the school year, up to 25 children from the villages of Tuba and Maghaer al-Abeed, located in the South Hebron Hills of the occupied Palestinian territories (OPT), attend primary school in the village of at-Tuwani. The children walk to school, usually on a road that passes between the illegal Israeli settlement of Ma’on and the illegal1 settlement outpost called Hill 833 (sometimes called . “Havot Ma’on” or “Ma’on Farm”

. The children use this road because it is the most direct, taking them to school in 20-30 minutes. Alternative routes through the hilly landscape can take up to 75 minutes, but nevertheless are occasionally used for safety reasons. For years armed settlers have harassed and attacked the children on these routes. By the start of the 2002 school year, one-third of the school-aged children from Tuba and Maghaer al-Abeed had stopped attending school in at-Tuwani because of the harassment and attacks.
In 2002, Ta’ayush, an Israeli Jewish-Arab peace group, began visiting the children. They occasionally walked with the children and began to apply pressure on the Israeli military authorities to take action toward a definitive end to settler violence. On 27 September, 2004, a joint team comprising members of Christian Peacemaker Teams and Operation Dove (hereafter “internationals”

began accompanying the children on the short route to school. Settlers attacked these internationals and the children twice in the fall of 2004.2
In response to this violence, the Israeli District Coordinating Office (DCO), the section of the army that coordinates civilian affairs in the OPT, made a verbal agreement with the mayor of at-Tuwani that the DCO would begin a daily escort of the school children along the short road from Tuba to at- Tuwani. In November, 2004, the Israeli Knesset Committee for Children’s Rights met to discuss the safety of the children from Tuba and Maghaer al-Abeed during their walk to and from school. The Committee affirmed the need for the military escort. The Committee focused on settler violence and instructed the Israeli police to take full responsibility for prosecuting settlers who used violence against the children. Member of Knesset Avshalom Vilan indicated that if no progress was soon made in these investigations, the Committee would arrange a meeting with the Commander of the Central Command.3
The twice-daily escort of the children, in addition to prosecution of violent settlers, should safeguard the children’s rights to safety and education as ensured by multiple international
agreements and by Israeli law.4 However, the Israeli police rarely apprehend or prosecute any of these settlers. Even with the daily military escort, the children are frequently victims of violence by settlers and even the soldiers charged to protect them.
In 2006 a group of influential Israeli intellectuals wrote a letter to Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert demanding that the children’s safety be ensured and the settlers be held responsible for their criminal actions:
"Beyond the shame inherent in the very necessity of providing a military escort for
children and the [State’s] helplessness in the face of the assailants, it appears that the
escort in its present format cannot protect the children ... A situation in which elementary
school children are exposed to attacks from lawbreakers without adequate protection is
insufferable. The right to obtain an education is a basic human right, and ensuring its full
realization is the responsibility of the State of Israel. We demand that the IDF be
instructed to provide the village children with full and adequate protection that will
ensure that they get to and from school safely. We call on the authorities to deal with the
rioters, the residents of Ma’on and the Ma’on Farm outpost, with the full force of the law,
and not to stand in the way of the activists who are assisting the village children".5
Furthermore, on 30 May 2006, the Israeli DCO issued demolition orders for 18 illegally built structures inside the Hill 833 outpost. Defense Minister Amir Peretz stated that this action was a direct response to repeated attacks by Hill 833 inhabitants against Palestinian school children.6 Peretz stated: “We are talking about a very serious trend, one that has no place in Israeli society. We will not permit lawbreakers to continue to target helpless children and everything will be done to bring an end to such incidents.”7
http://cpt.org/files/Palestine-School-Accompaniment-Report-2006-2008-Dangerous-Journey.pdf
This report is from 2012, documenting continuing attacks by settlers on Palestinian children, near At-Tuwani.
AT-TUWANI: Israeli military refuses to escort Palestinian children to summer camp despite settler attacks
[Note: This morning, 27 July, settlers attacked Palestinian children and At-Tuwani team members accompanying them on their way to summer camp in the village of At-Tuwani. Details will follow.]
On Saturday 26 July, at least four settlers from the settlement outpost Havat Ma'on threatened fourteen Palestinian children from the village of Tuba, as they walked to summer camp in the village of At-Tuwani. The children, accompanied by two members of Christian Peacemaker Teams (CPT), left Tuba at around 7:30 am and walked to the area where the Israeli military escort is meant to meet the children on their way to At-Tuwani. Israeli settlers from Havat Ma'on walked towards the children, shouting and jeering
A CPTer called the military immediately, explaining the dangerous situation for the children. The military personnel told the CPTer, "the army should come any second". However, ten minutes later when the military had not arrived, the CPTer called the military escort personnel and was told that the military was not coming to escort the children. The military personnel said, "the commander had not given orders for the escort" and then refused to give their names. When the CPTer asked the name and brigade of the commander, this request was also refused, and she was told to speak with the District Coordination Officer (DCO) (the branch of the Israeli military that deals with civilian matters in the occupied Palestinian territories). The military's refusal to escort the children forced them to walk unescorted, by a longer route, to the summer camp. They faced further taunts and jeers from settlers along the way.
On 22 July, the military also did not escort the children. Only seven children were willing to risk walking alone to At-Tuwani. The children informed CPT that at least eight other children did not attend the summer camp because they were too afraid to walk without a military escort. On the morning of 23 July, the military again refused to escort the children. The children were chased by three settlers, one of whom was masked and carrying a stick, while they walked unescorted to the summer camp.
In the past week, the mayor of At-Tuwani has had several meetings with the DCO in an attempt to arrange a military escort for the children. The DCO refused his request for an escort and told him the children should walk the short, direct route to summer camp, unescorted.
In 2004, following international media coverage of the settler attacks against the school children on this route, an Israeli Knesset committee, the committee for Children's Rights, recommended that the Israeli military provide a daily escort for the school children. In 2006, Israeli Defense Minister Amir Peretz stated that the illegal outpost of Havat Ma'on should be dismantled because of the settler violence towards school children, and and Israeli authorities issued evacuation orders. During the 2007-2008 school year, settlers used violence against Palestinian school children on at least fourteen occasions. To date the 2006 evacuation orders have not been enforced
AT-TUWANI: Israeli military refuses to escort Palestinian children to summer camp despite settler attacks | Christian Peacemaker Teams
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