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Palestinian Children and Israeli peace
activists at the demonstration.
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Gush Activists: “Let Them Go To School!”
More the a thousand schoolchildren, boys and girls from 6 to 14,
wearing their school uniforms and carrying bags, demonstrated today
(Monday, 13.9) at the wall that is being built in a-Ram. The pupils
carried posters demanding: “Let Us Study!”
150 Israeli activists of Gush Shalom, Ta’ayush, Bat-Shalom, Rabbis for
Human Rights and others joined the protest.
Throughout the demonstration, giant cranes continued to lift concrete
slabs into place, and a strong force of the Border Police was deployed
along the path of the wall. “They are waiting for one boy to throw a
stone, in order to attack us with tear gas and rubber-coated bullets, like
last time,” said Uri Avnery. However, the teachers succeeded all through
the demonstration, with the help of mayor Sirkhan Saleimeh, in preventing
even one stone being thrown, though the distance between the pupils and
the Border Policemen was only a few yards. After most of the demonstrators
had already dispersed, some children threw stones and the policemen
promptly stormed forward and used tear gas.
Since the Israeli Supreme Court permitted the government to build the wall
in this particular sector, the wall has been going up at great speed. Only
a few “holes” remain. When the wall will be finished, it will cut the
children of a-Ram off from their schools which are located on the
“Israeli” side of the wall, at a distance of a few dozen meters. Some of
the schools will have to be closed and their pupils will roam the streets,
because the remaining schools, already overcrowded, will not be able to
absorb them. Haaretz reports today that a similar situation exists in
near-by al-Issawiyeh.
This is only one of the problems caused by the wall, which is cutting off
a-Ram residents from their businesses and working-places, hospitals,
universities and even their cemetery.
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Soldiers at a “hole” in the wall, before the attack.
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At the head of the march: Member of the Palestinian Parliament, Abd
al-Kader, Uri Avnery and MK Ahmed Tibi.
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