Ofrah, near Ramallah, was the first bridgehead of the Gush Emunim movement in West Bank hills north of Jerusalem. Recently human-rights activists have succeeded in prying information on the settlement from government repositories, relying on the Freedom of Information Act. The evidence shows that most of the settlement is built on land owned by other people.

The latest report was published today by B’Tselem. Using land registry documents, the organization found that most of the land on which the settlement stands is registered as the property of individual Palestinians. Besides that, the settlement lacks any of the basic town planning approval necessary for construction. Built on stolen land, without permits, the comfortable bourgeois neighborhood is in fact a crime made tangible – and a prime example of how the settlement effort has corroded the rule of law.

In 2001,26 years after Ofrah was founded, the next generation of settlers set up the outpost of Migron. As AP’s Matti Friedman reported a few days ago,

It was never officially approved by Israel’s government, but the government nonetheless provided security, an access road, and infrastructure for electricity and water.

Settlers claim they bought the land three years later. But Friedman’s careful investigative work reveals that the sale is not just a forgery, but a sloppy one at that.

The sale by one Abdel Latif Sumarin supposedly took place in California in 2004. But:

There’s no evidence Sumarin ever visited America, his family says he couldn’t write English, and public records show he died in 1961. The notary in California says he did not sign the paper either.

Indeed, the signature on the document doesn’t match the notary’s, and the name of the seller is misspelled. The Israeli company that supposedly bought the land isn’t located at the address listed for it in court documents. I could go on, but it’s simpler just to refer you to Friedman’s detailed report.

Full disclosure: Friedman is a friend and former colleague of mine from the Jerusalem Report. At a time when too many newspapers are closing up their bureaus in Jerusalem, it’s some comfort that AP is picking up slack with investigative reporting.

Another AP reporter, Amy Teibel, complements that report with a look at the eviction of settlers from the House of Contention in Hebron, and the violence that followed – intended to deter the government from future evictions. (More disclosure: Teibel quotes me. Nonetheless, it’s a solid piece.) She writes:

An increasingly alienated minority of the 275,000 Jews who have settled in the West Bank since Israel captured it from Jordan in 1967 is taking matters into its own hands. They are attacking Palestinian civilians and Israeli troops every time the government acts against settlers, and calling the operation “price tag” — meaning the toll they would exact in resisting evacuation.

So they break Israeli laws, fight Israeli troops, and claim to be Zionists. Right.

Meanwhile, politicians are again egging each other on for a ground assault in Gaza. The resumption of rocket fire at Israeli towns is indeed unbearable. But the logic of an invasion seems to follow an Israeli saying, usually used sarcastically, “What won’t work with force – will work with more force.” It ignores tough questions, like what we’d do with the territory once we conquered it.

As Daniel Levy recently wrote in Ha’aretz:

Israel’s overall approach toward Gaza is dangerously mistaken. A siege designed to depose Hamas rule (a problematic goal in itself, but that’s another story) risks triggering a social collapse that would have devastating consequences for all concerned. Anyone in search of a cautionary tale, and a peek at a possible future scenario for Gaza, should look at Somalia – which has the dubious distinction of having reintroduced piracy to the daily news lexicon, and from which Ethiopian troops are now planning to withdraw following an ugly two-year occupation.

All this makes a depressing picture. So I’ll end with a splash of optimism from afar, provided by New Yorker writer Jeffrey Toobin in a discussion group (and quoted here with his permission):

Rahm’s middle name is Israel.  And Barack’s is Hussein.  I mean, the U.S. should get some kind of cosmic credit for that pair.

Yes, that is a nice symbol. May they cash in their cosmic credit for some wisdom about how to pursue a diplomatic solution to all this.

NGO Monitor, Gerald Steinberg’s group, which tracks human-rights groups for anti-Israel bias, sent me its annual report. I don’t claim the resources to monitor every detail of its monitoring. But a section in the report on B’Tselem helps illuminate an underlying bias in the work of the bias-hunter.

The report quotes B’Tselem Executive Director Jessica Montell as acknowledging

that Israel is held to a higher standard within the international community and “in some ways Israel is discriminated against and disproportionately criticized.” But she also stated, “Israel is a democracy that holds itself to a higher standard. And I think that’s appropriate,” a comment which denies the universality of human rights. [my emphasis]

Does holding Israel to a higher standard in fact defy the universality of human rights? Sometimes, depending on context. Some groups, especially foreign ones, notice only Israeli offenses, because they begin by being offended that Israel exists.

But there are three essential flaws in the NGO Monitor argument against B’Tselem on this point. First, an Israeli group demanding that Israel live up to its own standards is demonstrating dedication to this country and its ideals. In the same way, for instance, civil rights groups who fought Jim Crow in the U.S. demonstrated the highest patriotism. There were defenders of the old order in the U.S. who could never accept this; for them anyone who assailed the sanctity of segregation was anti-American. Andrew Sullivan recently cited this comment by the late, unlamented Jesse Helms regarding Martin Luther King:

King’s view of American society was thus not fundamentally different from that of the CPUSA or of other Marxists. While he is generally remembered today as the pioneer for civil rights for blacks and as the architect of non-violent techniques of dissent and political agitation, his hostility to and hatred for America should be made clear.

I am not going to spend a lot of time here explaining that by fighting for the proposition that “all men are created equal,” King was in fact pro-American. Given that the Israeli Declaration of Independence promises that Israel will

ensure complete equality of social and political rights to all its inhabitants irrespective of religion, race or sex; it will guarantee freedom of religion, conscience, language, education and culture; it will safeguard the Holy Places of all religions; and it will be faithful to the principles of the Charter of the United Nations…

it follows that Israelis who aspire to reach that standard are displaying patriotism. Such a group may in fact devote less attention to Palestinian offenses against human rights, because the group’s primary concern is improvement of its own country. And yes, such a group’s statements may be manipulated and misused by vicious foreign critics. If you are not willing to take that chance, you have to close down democracy.

Likewise, on the international stage, a country that seeks favorable international treatment as a democracy does indeed have to reach a higher standard. A few months after 9/11, I wrote a piece in the Washington Post (unfortunately, now behind the paid-archives wall) on Israelis who had been arrested and held in solitary for no crime but being foreign in the wave of paranoia that swept America. Part of my argument was that

When America compromises on civil rights… it’s not just a domestic issue. The United States presents itself in the world arena as defending those rights. The State Department issues reports of other countries’ actions in that realm… Once the United States shows it is willing to sacrifice human rights to fight terror, it loses its ability to criticize others.

Israel asks for U.S. support on the grounds of being the Mideast’s only democracy. For years, it has been negotiating for a relationship with the EU in which it would gain all benefits of membership except for a vote in EU bodies – again, on the basis of being a Western democracy. We’ve asked to be judged by a higher standard.

Third, and most basic, NGO Watch Monitor ignores the mastadon standing in its office: The Israeli occupation of the West Bank is built on a lasting, structural violation of human rights. Not the original act of occupying the territory in a defensive war, I stress. But the occupation regime, including the settlement enterprise. Civilian settlement itself is banned under the Fourth Geneva Accord – regardless of the West Bank’s unresolved sovereignty. Under the two-tier legal system, settlers enjoy the full political and legal rights and status of Israelis, while Palestinians do not. Israeli security measures are far more onerous than they need to be to defend the State of Israel – because in large part, they are designed to defend the settlers living illegally in the West Bank. The rule of law is constantly, consistently undermined in order to maintain and expand the settlement enterprise. (If you read Hebrew, it’s worth looking at Shaul Arieli’s analysis of the destruction of the rule of law in the Bilin affair.)

It is impossible to defend human-rights discourse, as NGO Monitor claims to do, without acknowledging this. It is the epitome of the defense of Israel to seek to eliminate this stain.

Dov, the guy who owns the hole-in-the-wall computer lab, explained to Elliott and me that the operating system was only in English; he didn’t have Arabic Windows. As for service, he said, that would be no problem, "as long as he brings it here."

Unfortunately, Muhammad Abu Arkub, to whom we were delivering the computer, has about as much chance as getting a permit to enter Jerusalem for a computer repair as he does of getting back his wife’s gold. Dov wasn’t being snide. He’s the old-fashioned gruff kind of guy who curses about everything and then puts in twice the work fixing your computer that he planned and charges no more, and would be embarrassed if you mentioned it. But the village of Wadi al-Shajneh, in the South Hebron Hills, is beyond where he does service calls. He was surprised when Elliott explained why we were buying the computer. "And you with a kipah ," he said. Not that he objected to what we were doing.

Elliott read about Muhammad in a Ha’aretz article by Gideon Levy, a few days after we went to Hebron to give a washing machine to Ghassan Burqan. If you read my previous post (Journey to Hebron: Nightmares and Hope ), you’ll remember that Ghassan had bought his own washing machine and was carrying it to his home in the Israeli-controlled side of Hebron when he was stopped by Border Police, beat up and arrested. The machine disappeared. In memory of our late friend Gerald Cromer, Elliott decided we should bring Ghassan a replacement.

Muhammad’s home was searched by soldiers who arrived at midnight. They said they were looking for weapons. The search lasted two hours. Muhammad, his wife Lubna, their two small daughters, and Muhammad’s younger brother Rami were all kept under guard in Rami’s home – a single-room shack built onto the side of Muhammad’s house. When the search was over, and the family rushed back into the main house, they found their computer and television smashed. And, they say, the jewelry box where Lubna kept her gold was gone.

Rami ran to where the soldiers’ jeeps were parked, sat down in one, and demanded the gold. Normally a Palestinian could expect arrest for such behavior. Instead, the soldiers pushed him out and left. I measure that as oblique, partial evidence confirming a theft took place: Arresting Rami might have required explaining the incident to higher-ups, and Rami would told why he jumped it in the jeep.

A gift of gold, from groom to bride, is part of Palestinian wedding customs. It’s not just for beauty; it’s a financial asset for emergencies. Muhammad, 24, had given Lubna 200 grams of gold, 7 ounces, over $6,000 at today’s prices.

According to Levy, the B’Tselem human rights organization has testimony of a dozen or so similar incidents in the area in recent months. I want to be careful: A complaint isn’t proof. (Muhammad filed a complaint with the Israeli police in Hebron. Unfortunately, there’s very little chance that the investigation will lead anywhere and that he’ll ever get answers.) If these reports are true, a small number of soldiers are exploiting the opportunies for corruption provided by the occupation, which has created a realm of "ein din ve’ein dayan," as Talmudic texts say: No judge and no justice. Give young men guns and power to search homes to stop terror attacks, and have a "justice" system that ignores abuses, because the abuses are against people who lack the vote and are therefore transparent politically – and you will get abuses. The answer, ultimately, is to end occupation.

After the search: The remains of Muhammad’s computer

With the ultimate not scheduled soon, Elliot suggested that we replace Muhammad’s computer. We had donations left over for the washing machine from my friends at Kehillat Yedidya, our progressive Orthodox congregation. The gold was beyond our means, but we could do what we could, with the thought after all that were Gerald around, he would have done it. Yehiel, who works for Rabbis for Human Rights, drove again: Three men with graying beards and skullcaps, driving south, out on Highway 60, on a hot June morning, past the roadblocks, past the red tile roofs of Efrat stretched out in suburban comfort over the terraced hills between the Palestinian villages. The road looped east past Kiryat Arba and Hebron. At junctions near Palestinian villages stood tall pillboxes: cylinders of grey concrete with gun slits at the top, like chess pieces placed on the board of the south Hebron Hills, to show that player with the grey pieces controls the board.

At one checkpoint near the settlement of Otniel, we picked up Musa, the B’Tselem field worker. Then we turned into the Palestinian town of Dura. Muhammad has a barber shop there. The main street is well kept; new stores and apartment buildings have been built recently. A truck with Palestinian plates and the word "Spring" in Hebrew on the side – the name of a soft-drink brand – was delivering to local grocery stores: Musa says the town is relatively prosperous, so the amount of gold that a young man buys his bride is known to be large there, and in the neighboring villages, like Wadi al-Shajneh.

Muhammad’s house is a small one on a dirt road. He invited us to sit in Rami’s shack: a bed on one wall, pillows around the others on the floor for guests. On one wall Rami had taped a photo of himself and some cut-out pictures of beautiful women, clothed but provocative: A bachelor’s room. On the small stereo he had a disc that appeared to be Islamicist speeches. The room was a small village museum to the infinite contradictions of the human soul. Yakut, Muhammad’s three-year-old daughter, danced around the room looking at us. She had curls, and tiny stud earings.

Muhammad and his daughter with Musa and the new computer

This was the difference between Wadi al-Shajneh and Hebron: In Hebron, a three-year-old Palestinian had to be told that the bearded men who’d come in the house were not settlers, that one need not fear them. In the village, the child was unafraid, despite the night of the search. Musa said that Otniel is a quiet settlement. The settlers of Hebron and Kiryat Arba are known as violent, and the ones from the outpost of Havat Maon are "criminals." On Highway 60, settler drivers sometimes try to run Palestinians off the road. But inside Wadi al-Shajneh a three-year-old had not yet learned to hate or fear. This a reason for hope: A generation of Jews and Palestinians might be born who could live without fearing each other.

Elliott had brought a bracelet for Lubna, Muhammad’s wife. He didn’t say where or how he got it. Muhammad took it to her. She appeared at the door, dressed full length in black, wearing a head scarf and a beautiful smile, and thanked us and vanished. The three strangers sit with the master of the house, and the woman is in the tent, Elliott said. And from here, I asked, do we go to take the measure of Sodom, and what should we report?

Muhammad said that before the Israeli search in his house, he’d been called in several times by the Palestinian security services for questioning. On the Israeli side this is called effective cooperation. On the Palestinian side the word to be used would be "collaboration" and it cracks the legitimacy of Abu Mazen’s regime.

I am glad about any bombs found before they find their way to Jerusalem or Beersheba. But security measures, especially harsh ones, without the hope of a political solution – without the hope of the occupation ending – are like healing the skin over a deep wound. Beneath the healing, the abcess festers and the poison spreads.

The destroyed computer and TV were still in the yard. The computer had been pulled from its case; the fan hung out to one side. The TV was a black frame with no screen. Mute relics, unable to provide testimony to anything but force and speed.

Elliott explained to Musa and Muhammad what the technical papers in Hebrew said. Muhammad would have to get an Arabic operating system, he said. He said we’d brought this as mitzvah. Muhammad, who’d once worked in construction inside Israel, before the second intifada, didn’t remember that Hebrew word till Elliott said that "Allah wants…" and then Muhammad shook his head "yes."

Then we shook hands, and waved to Yakut, and drove back through hillsides, terraced with vineyards and olive groves, the twice-loved hills waiting for human beings to stop fighting over them like two angry young men who think the way to show love is jealousy and fists.