Sir, -

Following the recent Jerusalem bus bomb, Knesset members, professors and senior reserve army officers started a hunger strike opposite the government offices in Jerusalem. The strikers had asked Israelis to visit them to show solidarity with their demand that Prime Minister Rabin heed President Ezer Weizman's call to suspend talks with the PLO.

On Thursday, August 24, a group of residents of Rishon Lezion including myself left the city at 3 p.m. on a rented bus to visit the hunger strikers in Jerusalem. When we reached the Shapirim junction just before the Tel-Aviv-Jerusalem freeway (about 50 km to the west of Jerusalem) a large group of policemen signaled us to stop and pull over to the side of the road. A police officer entered the bus and informed us that until he receives further instructions we would be detained "to prevent a disturbance of the public order" by demonstrating in Jerusalem.

After an hour, the officer told me that we would only be allowed to return to Rishon Lezion Central Bus Station accompanied by two policemen. After our return, small groups of three or four drove to Jerusalem in private cars.

Later we learned that our experience represented a pattern repeated throughout Israel. "Suspicious" buses (with no marking of a regular route, or with protest signs, or with predominantly religious-looking passengers) and private cars were stopped and held up for several hours as far as 100 km from Jerusalem. Some buses were driven to the local police station for further investigation of the passengers. Passengers who tried to get off the bus were pushed back by club-wielding soldiers and policemen, and some were hit in sensitive areas. As the policemen generally took the keys of the detained buses, passengers were stranded for up to a few hours without air conditioning in the hot summer sun. A few with health problems fainted.

Our spokesman Dr. Ron Breiman's private car was stopped and searched, apparently because of a protest sign in one of its windows. Another Rishon resident, Mr. Yosi Sofer, hitchhiked to Jerusalem. The car he was in had four people wearing skullcaps, which apparently aroused the suspicion of policemen who stopped them at the entrance to Jerusalem. Searching the car, they found a sign reading, "Rabin, go to the President." Told that the sign belonged to Sofer, they ordered him to walk to the Jerusalem Central Bus Station and return immediately to Rishon Lezion.

In Jerusalem the roads around the hunger strikers' tent were blocked with large contingents of special police forces called "Yassam" and Green Beret soldiers, equipped with large wooden and plastic clubs. Policemen strutted on horses on the walkways and the streets. We could only get to the tent through pathways on the hills.

After an hour at the tent, we returned to the main road. The sight was dreadful. Policemen were shoving and hitting people on the sidewalks with clubs and charging them on horses. Many were injured. I could go on with many more descriptions and other people's stories to illustrate that the events described were not isolated cases.

The State of Israel is generally perceived as a democratic country in which civil rights are respected. Events of the past two years lead me to believe that the Israeli government has left the domain of the rule of law and entered the domain of regimes which rule through the political use of security forces. In today's Israel the word "lawful" has come to mean whatever the government views as legitimate.

The recent deterioration to police-state tactics has been hastened by the fact that the government represents only a minority of Jews ruling only through the support of Arab parties affiliated with the PLO. As the Jewish majority in Israel raises its voice in protest against this minority regime, the government tries to suppress opposition by the violent use of force. The resort to police-state tactics is a clear indication that the government is losing its legitimacy as the representative of the people.

Prof. Israel Hanukoglu,

Rishon Lezion.