Rabbi Medan’s Words at the Demonstration in front of the Court on Wednesday, February 2, 2011
demanding the release of the 4 hikers who had been arrested the Friday before
while defending the group from an Arab attack

“Bad winds blow in the triangle Police, State Attorney’s office and Media”

Bringing those arrested following the hike in Gush Etzion to the Hebron police station, after being under arrest for five days, and possibly tin order to keep them under arrest, attests to the very bad winds that blow from the direction of the Hebron police, especially, and of the Israel Police, in general.

The police did not see a body, and no one knows who died and what was the cause of death. Those arrested had weapons, but it’s doubtful whether they fired, while the police in its statement to the media immediately accused them of intentional murder, without checking anything. None of the Arab rioters, who deliberately endangered the lives of the hikers, was arrested. No one who has never seen heavy rocks fired from slingshots from the top of a hill at hikers in an inferior position, many of whom were elderly, can understand the concrete meaning of such danger. Firing in the air in these circumstances was a reasonable solution, while if the danger would have continued (and perhaps it would have), even more than that would have been needed.

But the police weren’t interested in the Arab rioters, nor in the danger to the Jews. It wasted no time in arresting whoever it could from among the Jews, and without checking anything, it accused them in the media of first-degree murder. In consequence, innocent people spent five days in jail, and this was not enough for the police! This wasn’t the first time that the Hebron police automatically, and without bothering to investigate, have exonerated the Arab rioters and their Jewish supporters, while harassing settlers who work for their livelihood and innocent hikers, and I know of many such instances.

These bad winds in the police come from the top. It’s easier to accuse the Jews in Judea, Samaria, and Gaza. This doesn’t require confronting the violence of the Arabs and their Jewish supporters. This doesn’t require confronting the media, that is sympathetic to the violent side, specifically. This is how an unholy alliance has been working for some time between the State Attorney’s Office, that hates the Jewish settlers of Judea, Samaria, and Gaza for no reason, the press, that fans the fires of contention as much as it can for the sake of sensation, and the police, that wants an easy life for itself, without confronting the strong and the violent, and without confronting the State Attorney’s Office and the media. This is the spirit of the current Police Inspector-General and the minister above him.

It should be recalled that things were a bit different in the past. In the time of Uzi Landau as Police Minister, the police acted mainly against the Arab rioters. It worked hard, but it had not inconsiderable successes in this. And this means that tomorrow this could be different. The question is what will be the spirit at the top. Today the police wants an easy life, and to accuse innocent hikers of first-degree murder is more convenient for it. Unfortunately, today I don’t expect anything from the police. I came here to call upon the young and energetic Knesset Members from the Likud – Danny Danon, Tzipi Hotovely, Yariv Levin, and others among those who are capable of putting some color back in the pale face of Zionism, not to let this harassment pass silently, and to put the police in its place.

to watch Rav Medan speak (in Hebrew) at the vigil:
http://www.inn.co.il/News/News.aspx/215180