Part 24
Continuation of the original text, March 20th 1967
We, of East Village, had prepared a grand Moon festival for that same evening and so there was food enough for all of us. Later the people who worked in Timna came to us via the wadi. Max, a Dutch Jew, told me:
‘We came over the top and saw the burning remnants; I felt like I was having a heart failure. Irv, a burly American from Alaska, ran into the wadi shouting ‘Nazis, fascists’. We tried to save some stuff from the burning pile, but everything had been destroyed. My radio, my boots, clot-hes, sleeping bag, rucksack and all of Irv’s gear and stuff, including his fabulous collection of shells.
Max went on: ‘The soldiers ran up to us and I fled up the hill. Irv knocked a soldier down and was jumped upon by 20 others. I called them names in Hebrew (Max had been living in Israel for nearly 3 years), in English and in Dutch. A soldier aimed his rifle at me and said: ‘‘Stay there or I’ll shoot you’’. Then they ran up to me and started beating and kicking me until I begged them in Hebrew to stop.’
The next day the mayor of Eilath said: ‘O well, we needed the wadi for the camp and that there were some incidents in the heated atmosphere is not my responsibility. Israel is still at war, you see. By the way, what were you doing there, we have not asked you to stay here.’
The soldiers stayed for eight days for the Purim festivities and some silly parades. A short time after this I gave the above account, accompanied by an oral statement to Samuel Bouwman, a Dutch journalist, whom I happened to meet in Tel Aviv. As far as I know he has never published these events.
Jan Ploeg
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