Hebron Yesterday: What Happens When You Appease the “Left”

So much for using WAZE. 

WAZE as you know is the GPS system that virtually everyone in Israel uses to navigate from one place to another. If you want to drive from Neve Atif on the Lebanese border to Eilat on the Red Sea, just put your address in Eilat into WAZE and about 7 hours later you will be in Eilat.

However, WAZE is not without its shortcomings.

Here in Israel, one of its main problems is that in an attempt to get you to a place in the shortest amount of time possible, the system will take you into the heart of Palestinian terrorism.

Last month, for example, an Israeli motorist was attempting to drive from Gilo to the Mt. of Olives. Unfortunately, WAZE directed him to go through A-Tur–a notoriously dangerous neighborhood. As he was driving through, he was suddenly attacked from all directions by Arabs throwing “rocks” and other projectiles. He barely escaped with his life.

Yesterday, a similar incident occurred. Five American tourists wanted to visit the Cave of the Patriarchs in Hebron. WAZE got them to Hebron, and then directed them down a street in the Jabal Johar neighborhood toward their destination.

What happened next was completely predictable. Palestinians attacked the car with “rocks” and Molotov cocktails:

From yesterday: this is what happens when an Israeli drives down the wrong street in a Palestinian controlled area (picture YNET).

Another picture of the car:

After the blaze.

Two of the Americans were “moderately” wounded, but all five of them would have been killed in the Palestinian attack had not another Palestinian come to their rescue. 

Fayez Abu Hamdia, who lives directly across from where the car burned, told this to Israel news last night:

“As soon as we saw that a mess was starting outside, my family and I managed to bring them inside and we quickly closed the doors. We gave them water to drink and tried to tell them that they were safe, but they didn’t speak Arabic. We are all human first and foremost. That’s how everyone should behave.”

How right Abu Hamdia is and how thankful the tourists were. And not only the tourists. When the IDF finally arrived on the scene 40 minutes later, they too thanked Abu Hamdia and his family for their noble actions.

But there is a darker side to this story.

Basically, it should have been impossible for the Americans to get to the Jabal Johar neighborhood in the first place. In fact, it would have been impossible two weeks ago. 

What happened?

In response to repeated efforts of international activists and Israeli leftists, the IDF Hebron Brigade Commander–under the direct orders of so-called “Defense Minister” Moshe Ya’alon–removed a checkpoint it had had for more than a decade at the entrance to Jabal Johar.  

Had that checkpoint been in place, the tourists would not have ended up where they did–WAZE or not.

This point was not lost on Baruch Marzel, long-time Hebron resident and Israeli activist:

“The Hebron Brigade commander is peronally responsible for the attempted murder in Jabal Johar because he ordered the IDF position there removed just two weeks ago.

The commander took the soldiers who had been protecting Jews and repositioned them at the Hazon David Synagogue to stop Jews from praying there. When the brigade commander is obsessed with pleasing the “left”, it is no surprise when there are Jewish casualties.”

Of course, Marzel is absolutely correct.

How many times have we seen Israelis wounded and killed because the Israeli government idiotically tried to please the “Left”?