Map Position 1 Abu Najah Assault
In early July, 2003, I interviewd Najah the son of the man blinded by a settler attack in 1996.
Abu Najah is an 85 year old man, now blind and in severe pain from an assault by a Jewish settler. He was tending his sheep peacefully on land that had been in his family for hundreds of years when a huge powerful Jewish man attacked him. The settler (whose name is Golhamel) had been carrying an M16 and a sack, but put them down to approach Abu Najah. Golhamel set upon Abu Najah with fists and rocks, then picked him up and threw him against a pile of rocks. The settler then found a stick and hit Abu Najah repeatedly around the face and head until the stick broke. Abu Najah was by this time unconscious.
Abu Najah had been tending sheep at a place the villagers call Arjoum, perhaps 200 meters north and up hill from the houses. A herder from the nearby village of Beit Furik had been tending his sheep across the draw (gully, wadi) at a place called Thabet Mountain, perhaps 200 meters away. He cried out when he realized what was happening, and then Najah, the old man's son, and other villagers heard him. They rushed up the hill and found a blood-cover body, but he was alive.
This was the days before settlements and Army guard posts had encircled Yanoun, and the roads had not yet been closed. So Abu Najah could be driven to the Rafidia hospital in Nablus, where he stayed 3 days. He had been blinded in his right eye. The doctor recommended that he be taken to the hospital in East Jerusalem where an eye specialist could treat him, but there was no money for that.
Over the years Abu Najah has been losing sight in his other eye so that now he is for practical purposes blind. To go anywhere in the house he has to feel his way along the walls. Every day he takes morphine tablets, anywhere from four to twelve, and rarely goes out of the house. Very sad.
Najah went with the witness from Beit Furik to the Israeli police station at Huwarra. They told him to bring the attacker to them and they could investigate. Nothing came of it. The Israelis were not interested in investigating an attack on a Palestinian.
The people of Beit Furik were well acquainted with this giant Jewish settler who had terrorized them for some time. It was he who started what was to become the encirclement of Yanoun. At first there was one lone trailer (mobile home, caravan) on top of Mohammad Mountain as an outpost of Itamar settlement. About the same time as Abu Najah had been attacked, a man from Beir Furik, Mohammad al Zalmot had been killed by a settler, all evidence pointing to Golhamel.