World

Hebron Wedding Postponed as Families Evacuated Amid Military Lockdown

By Mosab Shawer

Israel’s military operation in Hebron’s West Bank has disrupted daily life, including the postponement of a wedding. Haidar Yahya Tamimi, 27, had finished preparing his home, bought new furniture, chosen his wedding suit, and sent invitations to about 1,000 people. After four months of preparations, he was due to marry his fiancée, Ruba, on Friday. Instead, he was forced to leave his home in the al‑Jalada neighbourhood, and the wedding has been postponed indefinitely.

Haidar is among thousands of Palestinians displaced by an Israeli military operation that began after two Palestinian gunmen killed two Israeli soldiers at a checkpoint at the western entrance of Hebron on Oct. 23. Both gunmen were killed by Israeli forces. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu ordered an immediate lockdown in Hebron, and bulldozers destroyed buildings near the attack site and went house‑to‑house in al‑Jalada and Ein Deir Baha, where the attackers lived. By Monday, more than 3,100 Palestinians had been forcibly displaced, according to the municipality.

Haidar works as a radiology technician at the Palestine Red Crescent Society Hospital in Hebron. He had been preparing to celebrate his wedding on Friday, with a feast scheduled for Thursday evening. He and his fiancée had chosen the furniture for their new home together, as well as his wedding suit, a photograph of which he showed Al Jazeera. On the evening of Oct. 23, when Hebron was declared a closed military zone, Haidar and his family were ordered to leave their homes along with other residents of al‑Jalada and Ein Deir Baha. They departed in the middle of the night, taking only what they could carry. Everything the couple had prepared for the wedding was inside the house, out of their reach.

Haidar says they do not know when they will be able to return. He was able to get to a spot nearby where he could see the house, but could not approach it because of the Israeli military. "I looked at the house and saw that my dream was supposed to happen here, but it has been postponed indefinitely," he said. He saw Israeli soldiers around the house and says relatives showed him security‑camera footage of the soldiers entering his home. The current condition of the house is unknown. As for the wedding, the couple have yet to set another date. First they need to know when they can return home.

More than 100 businesses have been affected by the lockdown. For example, the al‑Jalada offices of Rukn al‑Asala, a travel agent specialising in Muslim pilgrimage services, have been closed. Agency manager Kamal al‑Sharif, 35, has been unable to reach the office where he has worked with his father for 16 years. The agency was organising an Umrah pilgrimage to Saudi Arabia for 15 people, set to depart on Wednesday. With the prospective travellers’ passports still in the office, and locals uncertain when the lockdown will end, that trip is likely to be postponed or cancelled. Other documents in the office include seven passports that Kamal says arrived from the Chinese embassy on Oct. 22, the day before the lockdown. They belong to traders who had planned to travel to China on Oct. 26. The traders have their visas, but not their passports, and have been unable to travel. One trader, a man in his 30s who did not wish to be named for security reasons, said he had been preparing to attend an exhibition in China where he could source equipment for his family business. His flight and hotel bookings have now been cancelled, and the trader is stuck, not knowing when he will be able to get the products his business needs.