Hebron: Palestinians storm international mission

About 300 Palestinians attacked an international observer mission in the West Bank city of Hebron on Wednesday, throwing stones, smashing windows and trying to set a building on fire to protest Danish cartoons seen as insulting Islam.

Sixty unarmed mission members were in the building at the time, said Gunhild Forselv, a spokeswoman for the Temporary International Presence in Hebron, or TIPH, which serves as a buffer between Israeli settlers and Palestinians in the volatile city.

Eleven Danish members of TIPH left more than a week ago after protests against the Danish cartoons began sweeping across the Muslim world, Forselv said.

The protesters, most of them youths, chased away outnumbered Palestinian police who were stationed outside the mission more than a week ago because of the unrest Forselv said.

PA police intervene

But reinforcements were called in, and police took up position again, pushing back the protesters and regaining control of the situation. By that time, protesters had smashed nearly all of the windows in the mission's three-story office building, and battered three TIPH cars.

IDF troops arrived at the site after the protest was subdued.

Caricatures first published in Denmark, then reprinted in various European newspapers, showed the Prophet Muhammad - itself an offense because Islamic tradition bars the depiction of the faith's founder. Fueling the outrage was one cartoon showing Muhammad wearing a bomb-shaped turban.

The offending cartoons have touched off protests in the Mideast, Muslim countries in Southeast Asia and Europe with aggrieved demonstrators issuing death calls and demanding a boycott of Danish and European goods.

Demonstrators attacked the mission's office building and sleeping quarters, smashing windows and trying to storm the structures. “Denmark out of Hebron,” and “We will redeem our prophet,” the crowd chanted.

At one point, some of the youths forced open the door of the office building and got inside, but TIPH observers waved their batons in the air and drove them away, Forselv said.

The international observer mission in Hebron had decided, in consultation with the Hebron governor, to maintain a low profile, and temporarily canceled regular patrols, which resumed Wednesday, Forselv said. She said they had received assurances earlier from Palestinian groups that the mission wouldn't be attacked, and on Sunday, one group issued a public statement of its support for TIPH and pledged to protect it.

TIPH, made up of unarmed observers from Scandinavian and other European countries, was established in 1994 after a Jewish settler killed 29 Palestinians at a Hebron holy site. The observers are supposed to help reduce friction between the city's 500 Jewish residents and 170,000 Palestinians.