Is it acceptable?

Is it acceptable for teenagers to throw stones at passing cars?  Is it an acceptable response to search and tear gas a school? I think not.

EAs in Bethlehem were recently contacted by the Home Land Trust (HLT) saying that their school at Tuq’ua had been searched by the army. It had then been closed for the day. HLT asked if we could go and show our presence at the school, because nobody else would be there to monitor the situation - neither the police nor the press.

Upon arriving near the school, we saw a crowd of people on a nearby hill, whom we later found out were boys from the school. There was a number of soldiers in the area.  We counted two full platoons, along with 10 vehicles. On one side of the school, a group of soldiers were using a rooftop as a lookout point, and another group had occupied a kindergarten on the opposite hillside.

We later found out from the teachers that the army had showed up at about 7AM, searched the school, and thrown tear gas into several rooms.  Then they started shooting in the air out in the schoolyard. The teachers were overcome by the tear gas.

A couple of the students we met indicated that they had thrown stones, so we asked them to drop the ones they were carrying, and they did. They said they were carrying them as they walked towards us because they were afraid that we were enemies.

The situation felt like a precise military operation. There was even a command-central down the road. As we moved towards some soldiers up the road to go to the school, we were told that the area was under military control, and we were not allowed to enter. When we told them we had an appointment with the teachers, they answered that the teachers were no longer in the school.  So we moved down the road in an effort to see what we could see and do.  We came across another group of soldiers, together with their commander.  We talked to him and at last we were allowed to go to the school to see the teachers.

Meanwhile the students on the hill had started running across the road, up another hill and behind a house. The students sitting on the hill were shouting, chanting and waving with a Palestinian flag in support.

As time progressed, the army realized what the students were doing. They moved in behind the house, sending the students back to the other side, to the hill near the school. In order to achieve this, they fired teargas canisters.

When after a while things settled down, the students began to leave for their homes. But the damage had been done.  As if to affirm their presence, the army shot some more tear gas at the departing students.

When snowballs are thrown at my car in the winter, I get out and tell the teenagers to stop it.  I don’t call the army. I don’t demand that all the teenagers in the area be held all responsible for the actions of a few. That would only increase the problem. If only the Israeli army could see it that way.