Ma'on, Har Hebron

Ma'on
מָעוֹן

Ma'on/P.S.Maggioni Settlement
Ma'on
Coordinates: 31°24′48″N 35°09′50″E / 31.41333°N 35.16389°ECoordinates: 31°24′48″N 35°09′50″E / 31.41333°N 35.16389°E
District Judea and Samaria Area
Council Har Hebron Regional Council
Region West Bank
Founded 1981
Founded by Nahal outpost

Ma'on (Hebrew: מָעוֹן) is an illegal Israeli settlement and a moshav shitufi in the Judean Hills of the West Bank, located south of Hebron and north of Beersheba. It is part of the Har Hebron Regional Council. The international community considers Israeli settlements in the West Bank illegal under international law, but the Israeli government disputes this.[1]

Name

The word 'Ma'on' in Hebrew means 'dwelling.' It refers to a biblical village said to stand on the borderlands of the desert, in the highlands of Judah, which is mentioned in Joshua (15:55), identified in modern times with Khirbet Ma'in, about 3km to the west.[2]

Geography

View towards Har Hevron

Ma'on is located in the southern Judean Hills at about 863 m above sea level.[2]

History

The Arab village of Ma'in was a conical settlement on a hill, 1.25 kilometres south of Carmel, and 3 kilometres east of Susiya, with the ruins of a castle still visible, and cisterns, lying about 9 miles south south east of Hebron.[3]

The Israeli outpost was first established in 1981[4] as a paramilitary Nahal outpost. It is located on one side of the main road between At-Tuwani and Tuba, east of At-Tuwani. The first civilian population, members of the Orthodox Zionist youth movement Bnei Akiva settled there in 1982.

Settlement expansion

In 2001, settlers, described as 'fanatics' by David Dean Shulman,[5] established the outpost Havat Ma'on (also named Hill 833 or Tel Abu Jundiya) on the other side of the main road.[6] In 2003, settlers took over Palestinian land near the road, which was abandoned due to ongoing settlers attacks;[6] on 25 December, several new outposts were set up.[7]

In 2005/2006, the settlers expanded a chicken farm south of Hill 833. In 2008, the location was fenced, impeding vehicular traffic on the road. In 2009, new caravans were placed near Ma'on, on a slope north of the road and laid the foundations for 12 buildings. In March 2010, the settlers built houses in the new outpost.[6]

Settlers violence

Settlers of Ma'on are known for persistently terrorizing the local Palestinian population. In the late 1990s, Palestinians using the road between Ma'on and Hill 833 increasingly came under attack from violent settlers. Eventually, the Palestinians could no longer use their road and nearby lands.[8] In 2010, United Nations OCHA reported frequent attacks by settlers from the Ma'on outpost on schoolchildren who used the road.[9]

In 2011, Christian Peacemaker Teams reported 5 attacks by settlers from the outpost Havat Ma'on on internationals and Palestinians within 30 days. On 13 July, three settler youth attacked Palestinian shepherds. On 18 July, 3 masked settlers armed with clubs attacked two shepherds and members of the At-Tuwani peace team.[10] In July 2012, Operazione Colomba reported an attack by masked settlers on a child and volunteers of "Operation Dove".[11] In January 2014, settlers threatened shepherds. At the end, the army arrested a shepherd. The following days, Israeli soldiers chased shepherds in the same area.[12]

Agriculture

Ma'on and nearby settlement Carmel jointly operate a dairy with about four hundred cows. The average daily production per head is about 38 liters of milk.

According to The New York Times, the settlers of Ma'on "luxuriates in water piped in by the Israeli authorities" while the nearby Palestinian locality of Tuba "struggles to collect rainwater".[13]

Legal status

Israel captured the West Bank from Jordan in the 1967 Six-day War and has held the territory under military occupation since then. The international community considers Israeli settlements to be illegal under international law as violations of the Fourth Geneva Convention's prohibition on the transfer of an occupying powers' civilian population into occupied territory.[14] Israel disputes that the Fourth Geneva Convention applies to the Palestinian territories as they had not been legally held by a sovereign prior to Israel taking control of them. This view has been rejected by the International Court of Justice and the International Committee of the Red Cross.[15]

Notable residents

Udi Davidi is an Israeli singer, musician, lyricist and composer who lives on a farm in Ma'on raising sheep and composing music.[16]

References

  1. ↑ "The Geneva Convention". BBC News. 10 December 2009. Retrieved 27 November 2010.
  2. ↑ 2.0 2.1 Jodi Magness, The Archaeology of the Early Islamic Settlement in Palestine, Eisenbrauns, 2003 Vol.1 pp.96-97.
  3. ↑ Carl Friedrich Keil,Commentary on the book of Joshua, T. & T. Clark, 1857 p.386
  4. ↑ 'Statistics on Settlements and Settler Population,' B'tselem 1 January 2011.
  5. ↑ [Dark Hope: Working for Peace in Israel and Palestine,] University of Chicago Press 2007 p.18.
  6. ↑ 6.0 6.1 6.2 The dangerous road to education, pp. 28-29. Christian Peacemaker Teams, December 2010.
  7. ↑ OCHAoPt, Update for oPt (24 – 30 December 2003), p. 7
  8. ↑ A Dangerous Journey:Settler Violence Against Palestinian schoolchildren Under Israeli Military Escort2006-2008, p. 17. CPT/Operation Dove August 2008. On
  9. ↑ AREA C HUMANITARIAN RESPONSE PLAN FACT SHEET August 2010. Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA), 30 August 2010.
    -″For example, attacks by settlers from Maon outpost, on 5 – 10-year-old children walking to school from Tuba and Maghayir Al Abeed to Tuwani, were so frequent that an army jeep is needed to escort the children to and from school.″
  10. ↑ AT-TUWANI: Three settlers of Havat Ma'on attack internationals in Meshakha Valley, South Hebron Hills. CPTnet, 19 July 2011. Including photo's and video.
  11. ↑ Havat Ma’on masked settlers traumatized palestinian child in Humra valley. Operazione Colomba, 30 July 2012
  12. ↑ Four Palestinians and two Operation Dove volunteers arrested in South Hebron Hills in last three days. CPT, 20 January 2014
  13. ↑ The Two Sides of a Barbed-Wire Fence, by Nicholas D. Kristof, June 30, 2010, The New York Times
  14. ↑ The settlers' struggle BBC News. 19 December 2003
  15. ↑ Legal Consequences of the Construction of a Wall in the Occupied Palestinian Territory International Court of Justice, 9 July 2004. pp. 44-45
  16. ↑ http://www.pirsumeinisa.com/udi.html