srael on Sunday began tearing down a section of its contentious West Bank separation barrier near a village that has come to symbolize Palestinian opposition to the enclosure, the military said.
The rerouting marked a major victory for the residents of Bilin and the international groups that have backed their struggle. But they said it fell short of their demands to remove the structure from the village altogether and vowed to continue with their weekly protests.
The dismantling of the section near the village of Bilin comes four years after Israel's Supreme Court ordered it torn down, rejecting the military's argument that the route was necessary to secure the nearby Modiin Illit settlement. Planning and legal wrangling held up its removal until now.
Col. Saar Tzur, the regional brigade commander, said the military has begun taking apart a 2-mile (3.2- kilometer) stretch of the barrier and has replaced it with a 1.6 mile-long (2.7 kilometer) wall adjacent to the settlement. He said the new route would give the military less response time in case of a potential infiltration.
"This is a new threat but we can handle it," he said, adding that the work would be done by the end of the week.
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