Turning Point

“Don’t wait for an opportunity in bed. Go volunteer, learn, initiate, take pictures, write or even gather your social group & achieve together.”

Saed Karzoun, a Palestinian artist exhibiting at the Centre Culturel Français in Ramallah.

Having seen for myself the wall in Bethlehem and the humiliation at the check-points; having spoken with people in the Aida Refugee Camp, learnt about the apartheid on Shuhada Street, and witnessed the Zionist Tour, I found it impossible to be here and not try to do something. The injustice of the occupation of the West Bank is overwhelming.

Following a chance encounter in Jerusalem, I organised to meet the media coordinator of the International Solidarity Movement in Ramallah to find out how I could get involved.

It’s time to stop looking out of the window, and stand on the street.

A Sarha Above Nablus

Whilst still in Syria I had read Palestinian Walks: Notes on a Vanishing Landscape by Rajah Shehadeh, the Palestinian lawyer-turned-writer. In his book, the struggles of the Palestinians facing eviction from their land is weaved into the winding wadis and mountains as he finds solace in his sarha amongst the hills of the West Bank. (In Arabic, wadi means “valley” and sarha means “walk”, or “roam”.)

I had been keen to hike a little in the region. Heading to the north of the West Bank, the hills in which Nablus is contained provided an opportunity to escape both the concrete of the cities, and the issues I had witnessed over the past few days.

Rocks litter the hillside here, and olive trees flourish in the limestone soils. From the vantage of the hillside, I counted the minarets poking above the rooftops of the city below.

But this sarha came with a caution. A local man warned about going too far up the hillside: up there are the Yahud. “Jews” in Arabic*. He was referring to the Israeli settlement that suddenly becomes visible as one climbs higher. It was time to turn back.

I get the impression that it is impossible to escape signs of the occupation.

Note

* Throughout the Middle East, one often hears the word “Jews” used to refer to Israelis. Whilst I think that it comes from a refusal to use the word “Israel” and therefore acknowledge the Israeli state, I’m not sure how comfortable I am about the use of this terminology. Here, it has been used verbatim.

Update: Google also seems uncomfortable about the word: read this explanation of their search results…

A Zionist Tour

At one end of a paved square in Hebron’s Old Town stands an Israeli military observation post beside a thick, metal gate. Through a slit in the gate I can see a mass of zionist Israeli settlers. A soldier is watching over this square as the Palestinian residents of the Old Town pass through. A football with which a group of young boys are playing occasionally rolls up to my feet.

Twenty-minutes earlier, I was sat in the café of Hebron Women, drinking a cup of sweet, mint tea. The lady running it explains that the settlers will soon be starting their tour of the Old Town. At this point, I don’t know anything about this weekly event, but along with an American documentary film-maker who was in the café, we walk down to the square to find out more.

Members of the Christian Peacemaker Team (CPT) and Temporary International Presence in Hebron (TIPH) begin to congregate. They will be observing the event to ensure that nobody is mistreated by the soldiers. Tensions are particularly high this week because the previous day, a Palestinian man was shot dead by an Israeli soldier.

A little later, the gate opens and Israeli soldiers burst into the square, waving around their rifles. Once the area is clear, the mass of Jewish settlers begin to congregate behind the soldiers lines, ready to begin their tour of the Old City. The few Palestinians who remain in the area watch on.

I learn that this takes place every week. The settlers come into this region of H1 — which is controlled by the Palestinian Authority (PA) — accompanied by Israeli soldiers, nominally to visit sites important to Judaism. In reality, this is a show of strength, and an (unnecessary) reminder to the Palestinians of their presence and the belief in their Biblical right to this land. The young men contemptuously sneer as they stand behind the might of the Israeli military.

For around an hour, they walk around the Old Town, whilst the IDF soldiers close off the streets through which they will travel, thus disrupting the lives of both the residents and the shopkeepers as they do so. A CPT volunteer points out the soldier who had shot the Palestinian man only yesterday; he is still very much in active service.

Occasionally, they let women with shopping pass through, but the majority of the time, people must keep their distance. We are told to keep back ten-feet from the last soldier. Whole groups of men, women and children are forced to wait. Throughout this time, Israeli Border police randomly stop Palestinian men, checking their identity papers. All of this in the area of Hebron which is nominally under PA control, and in a city which lies in the heart of the Palestinian Territories.

» A set of my photographs documenting the event are here.

Shuhada Street

Initially arriving in Hebron, it had a bustling, lively atmosphere. Having spent the last few months in the populaire quarters of Middle Eastern countries, I felt at home in the souk of the Old City. But walking down these narrow streets where shopkeepers called out to the mass of customers passing before them, the commerce suddenly ended. I could almost draw a line at the point where life seemed to stop, and the streets were instead lined by closed shop-fronts.

The houses above these shops have been taken over by Jewish settlers, citing their “Biblical Right” to this land in the heart of the Palestinian Territories. Barbed-wire & mesh covers the top of the street due to these settlers throwing rubbish—and sometimes rocks—onto the Palestinians below. A few shopkeepers have kept their shops open in this part of town, but the rest have been forced out of business.

At the end of the souk stands an Israeli checkpoint, its turn-style controlling the movement of people into the part of Hebron referred to as H2. In 1997, the city was split into H1 & H2: H1 is under the control of the Palestinian Authority; and H2 is under Israeli control. Within Hebron, Israeli settlers account for approximately 1% of the population, yet Israeli forces controls 20% of the city. Bear in mind that Israeli settlements within the Palestinian Territories are illegal according to the Fourth Geneva Convention. Within the Old City, the settlers number around 500. They are civilians, yet they are permitted to carry automatic weapons.

Shuhada Street used to be the most important commercial street in the city. Access to it has been restricted since 1994 when Dr. Baruch Goldstein, an Israeli settler who immigrated from the United States, massacred 29 people and injured a further 150. It is since this event that Shuhada Street has been closed to Palestinian commerce, pedestrians and traffic. The Israeli military justify this to protect the 600 Israeli settlers who live there. Under a ruling by the Supreme Court in 2007, Palestinians are entitled to use the road, but the Israeli military has refused to implement the decision.

Just outside of the checkpoint, three Palestinian shopkeepers keep their shops open, sometimes suffering abuse from the passing settlers. Trade is slow, and the rest of the street resembles a ghost-town. The only people passing past the soldiers posted there are the occasional tourist, such as myself, and on the Sabbath, groups of settlers going to the synagogue.

Drinking a coffee with one store-holder, he explained how life was now like here. When it was time to leave, I was urged to buy something. “Make it my first sale of the day”, he said. At 3pm.

Aida Camp

The dominating watch-towers built into the side of the West Bank barrier look-out over a piece of waste-ground. Streaks of red-paint run down the side of them, like blood running down grey concrete skin. On the hill opposite stands a mass of two-storey concrete houses — the Aida refugee camp — living under the shadow of the winding walls of this barrier of segregation. The camp was established in 1950 by the United Nations Relief & Works Agency (UNRWA) to cope with Palestinians fleeing from the newly-created Israeli state.

Across this waste-land walked Muhammad-Ali, a 48 year-old Palestinian who lives in the camp. He explains that last year, on this piece of land, four children playing here were shot by Israeli soldiers from the watch-tower. The image of the paint running down them suddenly represents the bloody repression which is issued from within their walls.

We walk across to Muhammad’s house in the camp as he explains that soldiers regularly leave their concrete enclosure at night, coming into the camps at two or three o’ clock in the morning, hammering on doors. They force people out into the street — children are crying as they are made to stand outside in the cold & the rain — and their houses are searched. The lump on his 76 year-old mother’s wrist is a reminder of the night, seven years ago, when she was thrown to the ground, breaking her wrist. She still has pain in her shoulder. People here are scared every night when they go to bed.

The camp is severely overcrowded — in 2006 it was estimated to have a population of 3,260 refugees, covering an area of 0.71 square kilometres — although it has not been able to expand significantly since its creation sixty years ago. The buildings are limited to two-storeys. Thirty-one people live in the three rooms of Muhammad’s family’s house.

In the summer, there are shortages of water, and the sewage and water networks in the camp are poor. There is no ground on which they can grow food, yet the on other side of the wall I can see open hillsides rolling below the Israeli settlements.

Unemployment is also a major problem. The UNRWA quotes unemployment at 43%, and is “affected by the increased inaccessibility of the Israeli labour market”. Muhammad explains that he used to work as a mechanic, but with the creation of the wall, he lost his job as he could not travel there. The UNRWA try to provide some employment — such as street-cleaning — but there are not enough jobs. Once you sign-up, it may be possible to work for one, two or three months in a year, but this is all. He would like just a small amount of money with which he could start a shop, selling fruit & vegetables, but right now, it is hard enough finding money to buy food for his family.

Despite the hardship that they face, his family were incredibly friendly, welcoming and hospitable. As they served tea, and sent-out a child in search of biscuits, I felt incredibly guilty taking the food of these people who struggle for their daily existence. But trying to refuse offers of food and drink in Arab cultures is impossible. Offering money to them is offensive.

Back in the hostel that night, people would ask “have you had a nice day”. I didn’t know how to reply.