Israeli Pays With His Life for a Faith in Coexistence

JERUSALEM â€”  Amos Tajouri was a regular visitor to the tiny Palestinian town of Naalin. He counted many of the residents among his friends. He frequently stopped to buy vegetables or have coffee.

On Thursday, a masked Palestinian gunman approached a Naalin restaurant where Tajouri was waiting for an omelet, shot him dead and fled.

And so Tajouri, a Jew, became the latest victim in bloodletting that has claimed more than 750 lives in 11 months. He was not a soldier, nor a settler or stone-thrower. He was a 60-year-old retired construction worker and father of three who, almost uniquely, still thought he could live a life of coexistence despite the overwhelming hostilities all around.

“He is here almost every day,� said Taha Khawaja, mayor of the West Bank town. “He comes and goes, and nobody bothers him. We all know him. Why would someone want to hurt him?�

Khawaja recalled a friendly, jocular man who brought milk and other groceries for Palestinians restricted to Naalin because of military closures. He’d ferry people around in his truck, for a nominal fee but more as a favor. Villagers could count on Tajouri to take their olives and produce to market when their own travel was curtailed, as it has been frequently since the start of the uprising.

Khawaja was speaking by telephone from Naalin, a dusty town of cactus and stones badly shaken by the murder. The Israeli army closed off Naalin and confined everyone to their homes after the shooting while it sought the killer or killers. Three suspected accomplices were reportedly arrested.

“I am 90% sure the killer was not from here,� said the distraught mayor. “No one from here would hurt him.�

The area around Naalin is a stronghold of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine, whose top leader was assassinated Monday by Israeli forces. The group’s military wing has claimed responsibility for several revenge shootings in the days since. PFLP slogans covered many walls and garage doors in the town.

Israel has prohibited its nationals from entering Palestinian-controlled territory since the armed uprising began in September. The army reiterated that ban Thursday.

But Tajouri’s relatives told reporters that he had many Arab friends and chose to continue visiting them, even though his wife and children begged him not to.

A son-in-law, who asked that his name not be used, said that as hard as the family tried to keep him at home, Tajouri was “old enough to make his own decisions.�

Tajouri, an average-size man with gray, curly hair, a mustache and glasses, frequently breakfasted in Naalin, just a couple of miles inside the border of the West Bank and not far from his Israeli hometown, Modiin. He had lent money to his friends, the Amira family, to open the storefront restaurant and was sitting outside when he was killed.

Mursia Amira was in the kitchen, cooking up Tajouri’s omelet, when he heard the shots. He rushed out and found his old friend in a pool of blood. He saw the assailant, hurled a chair at him and then ducked when more shots rang out. The gunman escaped, and Amira ran to the nearest Israeli military checkpoint to report what had happened.

“We are all weeping for him. It’s a shame that he died. It’s a shame on the village,� Amira told Israeli radio.

Another relative, Monir, choked up as he was interviewed. “He was like one of the villagers. What is going on--I don’t understand what’s going on. . . .�

Members of the Palestinian family sobbed openly and rolled on the ground in an emotional mourning for their Jewish friend. Just a year ago, Israelis and Palestinians, especially along the line dividing Israel and the West Bank, interacted and did business together. Israelis frequently shopped in towns such as Naalin, while Palestinians by the thousands worked in Israel.

It seems a distant memory, but Israelis used to travel to Palestinian-ruled Jericho to lunch and buy clay pots, or to Tulkarm for humus. Israelis had even started to go on tours to the Gaza Strip. And in Naalin, Israelis frequently stopped at the gas station to fill up.

That has ended.

Israeli officials blamed Tajouri’s killing and others on a climate of visceral animosity fostered by inflammatory media under the control of Palestinian Authority President Yasser Arafat. Hatreds on both sides have festered during this conflict, to the point that each dehumanizes the other and does not see its suffering.

Tajouri and his friends in Naalin were an exception.

Naalin is under Israeli security control and Palestinian civic authority. However, Israeli authorities were warning again Thursday that such places remain dangerous.

“How many Israelis have to be murdered until they realize the dangers of entering [these] villages?� asked Col. Ilan Paz, the area commander. He spoke in Naalin as Tajouri’s body was being wrapped in black plastic and removed.