On 23 June 2006, Duduzile Masango, a South African volunteer participating in the World Council of Churches Ecumenical Accompaniment Programme in Palestine and Israel (EAPPI) under the auspices of the South African Council of Churches, was attacked by a Jewish settler in the Old City of Hebron.

Duduzile and her three colleagues have been involved in accompanying children through checkpoints in the Old City, because the children are frequent targets of stone-throwing, kicking and spitting by the Israeli settlers who occupy three sites in the Old City. On the day of the incident, Duduzile and her colleagues were waiting near the Cordoba School, as Ecumenical Accompaniers regularly accompany girls to and from the school. Below is Duduzile's account of the events. On 10 July, Dr. Melaku Kifle, Acting Director of the WCC's Commission of Churches on International Affairs, wrote to Israel's Ambassador to South Africa to draw attention to the attack and request remedial action.

Harry (Tel Rumeida Project) and Duduzile Masango (EAPPI) were maintaining a presence near Cordoba school, Hebron. We were guarding the path being built because settler kids usually come to wreck it. While we were sitting by the school path looking down at the Beit Hadassa settlement, five settler children showed up who appeared to be aged between 8 - 13 years. They came towards us and stood about three metres away. They started gathering rocks and bricks. We had our back-packs on the ground at that time. We stood up, and they started smashing the path and the wall. We called them off, but they ordered us to sit down and be quiet in a very aggressive manner. They continued damaging the path and started threatening us with stones and kicking Harry.

The children tried to take my bag but I managed to grab it back. I started calling for help from the soldiers who were down by the stairs. The soldiers came and Kathy and Jonas from ISM were coming up to Harry. When the soldier was by the stairs with me, the kids had Harry's bag and threw it down to Shohada Street next to the settlement building. I ran back down the stairs with the soldier shouting and trying to stop the kid who was now running away with the bag. By then, other elder settlers had come out from the building and were on the street yelling at us and telling the children to hit us.

When I was down at Shohada Street, I was confronted by a settler woman. I assume she was in her early forties, wearing a purple t-shirt, with a maroon scarf on her head and a dirty-pink towel hanging on her shoulder. She was about 5 feet tall. I tried to get away from her, but she blocked my way while yelling at me in Hebrew. I didn't understand most of it but some words like "you Hitler people, you die, you smell", came out. She had a very hateful, angry and violent expression in her face and eyes. By then the soldier was right next to me and I was explaining the situation to him and asking him to follow the child who stole Harry's bag. Suddenly the settler women covered my face with something, and put pressure on my face as to suffocate me. I could feel that it was a towel and with my hand I tried to pull it off. When I succeeded my eyes were filled with tears. Her expression was full of hate, and she was at the same time angry and fearful. I nearly hit her face but controlled my emotions, remembering my non-violence training. I tried to smile but she became even more furious ad started yelling again.

At that time there were three soldiers on the scene. They tried to stop the women but she somehow managed to get around them and the next second the towel was again wrapped around my face. She even used more pressure this time and I was terrified, thinking of dying in the hands of settlers. When I finally managed to pull the towel away, I realised that there were more settlers around us and four meters away were two settler men with their rifles. In the meantime, Harry and Kathy called for the police, and they did not take long to come. I was relieved seeing the blue van, and we gave them our explanation of the whole scenario. The settler woman was still there, just a few meters away, still yelling. In addition to the physical attack we had raw eggs thrown at us by settlers through the windows of the building.

When I told the policeman what the settler woman had done, he asked if I could prove it. He said: "Do you have a picture of the attack? You always carry cameras, why didn't you take pictures this time?" I tried to explain to him that it is impossible to take pictures while having a towel around one's face and struggling to get fresh air. The police man replied that he could not believe our testimonies as long as we didn't have any proof. Harry said that he could testify to my story, so the policeman replied that Harry was on my side and that his testimony was not valid as he would always support my version of the story.

While arguing about that, the child who ran away with Harry's bag came out from the settlement. We identified him to the policeman, and again he asked us for proof. The only proof that an incident happened was my bruised leg from a stone that was thrown at my leg from a settler kid, but since I had not taken any pictures of him throwing stones, it was not proof enough. Harry went with the police to file a complaint regarding the stolen bag. After the incident I went home.

Later Harry called telling me that he found the bag, but the lens of the camera was smashed, the memory card was taken and his sunglasses were missing.

Four days after the incident I am still limping and having pain in my leg.

Duduzile Masango
Ecumenical Accompanier
Beit Hadassa settlement, Hebron
23 June 2006

The Ecumenical Accompaniment Programme in Palestine and Israel (EAPPI) was launched in August 2002. Ecumenical accompaniers monitor and report violations of human rights and international humanitarian law, support acts of non-violent resistance alongside local Christian and Muslim Palestinians and Israeli peace activists, offer protection through non-violent presence, engage in public policy advocacy, and stand in solidarity with the churches and all those struggling against the occupation. The programme is coordinated by the World Council of Churches.

The World Council of Churches is a fellowship of churches, now 342, in more than 120 countries in all continents from virtually all Christian traditions. The Roman Catholic Church is not a member church but works co-operatively with the WCC. The highest governing body is the assembly, which meets approximately every seven years. The WCC was formally inaugurated in 1948 in Amsterdam, Netherlands. Its staff is headed by General Secretary Samuel Kobia from the Methodist Church in Kenya.

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