“The Other Side of the Story” – Part 3/3

A new day. We rented bikes from the kibbutz cycle centre and found some dirt-tracks snaking through the surrounding country-side. That morning at breakfast we had heard several ‘Qassam’ rockets falling in the distance but our hosts did not seem concerned as we set out. We visited the original site of the kibbutz, a few kilometres closer to the Gaza border.  The 1948 settlers who built the plain, grey house, now abandoned and pot-marked with bullet holes, are heroes to modern kibbutz residents; seen as brave pioneers who defended the Zionist dream from the savage Arab (read Palestinian refugee) raids.

David, Debbie and I were sick of politics but it confronted us more and more the longer we stayed on the kibbutz. Another friend of Dani’s accompanied us that day. She too had the olive skin of Eastern heritage yet, unlike our host, she supported Zionist settlement in the West Bank. She told us of a desire to raise her family in a settlement like Beit El. This is the largest settlement in the Ramallah area with rows of clean white houses lining perfectly preened streets, whose lamps glow warm yellow at night. In the shadow of its razor-wire fortifications lies Jalazone refugee camp, lit by anaemic fluorescent strip-lights, where we spent time teaching English to children in grey classrooms with broken garden furniture and no heating. A second later talk had turned to forthcoming holidays abroad. It felt as though moral boulders were crashing about in my head.

“The Other Side of the Story” – Part 2/3

 

We were standing in the foyer of the factory, with its state-of-the-art machinery humming behind walls, printing most of Israel’s bills, bank statements and paper advertising. With the election of Israel’s first ring-wing Likud government in 1977, kibbutzim that did not diversify soon collapsed, unable to survive the growth of commercial agriculture. This kibbutz took on the challenge – as did many others – and today thrives as one of the richest, ostensibly socialist communities in Israel. We all knew that as our host’s community grew and grew, old neighbours 10km away had come to rely entirely on UN food aid, only occasionally enjoying electricity and likely unable to recall the last time they visited a bank.

That evening we dined with several hundred kibbutz residents in the communal hall. The dishes on offer seemed endless, mostly cooked in Eastern European or Mediterranean styles. There was wine and an enticing racket of conversation as the Shabbas drew to a close and the observant and non-observant relaxed together. To my left sat Dani’s parents, her father an Iraqi Jew and her mother Yemeni. Their families were both forcibly transported to Israel to boost the fledgling state’s population after 1948. Although they are as patriotic as Israelis come, there is a hint of unease in their voices as they tell their stories of lost roots. Moreover, the couple certainly have no illusions about the corruption and hawkish policies of their current government. This conflicted heritage, combined with strong liberal politics makes their welcome feel genuine and uncomplicated. They seem to realise the importance of neutral go-betweens like us and hope more will follow…

“The Other Side of the Story” – Part 1/3

 

Walking to our evening meal.

 

Following recent events in Gaza I want to write about the closest I ever came to that strip of land and to experiencing the life of an Israeli living beside it…

Having met Dani (not her real name) during our Negev road-trip, Debbie, David and I were eager to visit her and her family on a kibbutz located less than 10 km from the Gaza strip, theoretically within easy range of Qassam rockets. The kibbutz would be a massive change from our usual environment and would hopefully be the setting for some instructive and constructive encounters. As we left Ramallah, we knew certain friends at university we suspicious of our motives for the trip, and there were some we had avoided telling altogether.

I’m sure most will imagine the kibbutz as simple farm buildings housing a collective of long-haired idealists. First, forget those clichés. Instead, picture a slightly run-down Centre Parcs village, dotted with blue stars on white. Think chalets of varying size and age arranged in neat rows, secluded by verdant trees and tropical shrubbery. Think landscaped gardens with northern European-style play grounds and for each of these several basic bomb shelters; solid, elongated arches of reinforced concrete, book-ended by two slabs that leave enough room to enter from either side. The residential areas and adjoining open spaces cover several kilometres.

The Form of Oppression; Ni’lin Protests

 

 

The Friday protest at Ni’lin is widely considered the more intense counterpart to that held at Bili’in. Both towns are resisting the separation wall in one form or another. While at Bili’in that wall is already completed, and the protesters occupied with trying to remove it, at Ni’lin the situation is less developed.

An Israeli settlement sits atop one side of the valley that defines the current western extreme of Ni’lin. Before the settlement was illegally established, the land it occupies was part of the town. This valley ends in a U-shape, the curve of which remains no-man’s land during the protests, while locals stand along their ridge and IDF soldiers face them from the settler side. 

A politician is a politician is a politician… Obama and East Jerusalem

Barack Obama will not bring about change where change is most needed. Back in June, the democratic candidate, in one of his first public gestures of solidarity, addressed AIPAC, the American Israel Public Affairs Committee. At a time when a presidential candidate is working day and night to secure support from all sources, this event was nothing remarkable.

However, his speech included a specific reference to Jerusalem that demonstrated his intent to continue the American government’s uncritical pro-Israeli stance. The line in question is this;

“Jerusalem will remain the capital of Israel and it must remain undivided”

To say the US government’s stance is controversial is nothing new. To say it is wrong is only to agree with the Fourth Geneva Convention, the United Nations and every single other one of its nation members.

While this is not current news, Obama’s recent election and his appointment of Rahm Emanuel, whose father was an Israeli militant, as Chief of Staff warrant an exploration into the possible ramifications of his presidency for the city’s Palestinian inhabitants. Barack Obama has been hailed as a shining light and ran his campaign with the slogan “Change We Need”. In the celebration frenzy that followed his success it is hard to remember that for thousands in East Jerusalem, that promise of change has already been retracted.

A child standing among the ruins of her family home, 2005. Credit: Kareem Jubran, B'Tselem

Lines that Divide; A Case Study

It was past eight and the night was fully upon us as we unknowingly passed our exit to Birzeit. I think The Doors were playing through the speakers of the little Chevy and it sucked all three of us into a trance after two days spent traversing boar country north of Qalqillia. I drove on mental auto-pilot. As the empty road carved its pristine route down into a right hand curve and past a new military watch-tower, David was the first to notice that none of this seemed familiar.

Away in the pitch black, beyond the obscuring glare of motorway lights, we could see the cabins of a new settler outpost and a small factory further off. A road sign to Ramallah directed us into the area, turning hard right down a narrow road that would eventually lead to a larger settlement and a lesser-used route to Jerusalem.

Despite so many signs of habitation, we saw no one. Having passed well beyond our destination, we had also lost any clear sense of our location in relation to landmarks like Aatara check-point, Ramallah and Beit El settlement. The darkness was oppressive and the area felt abandoned.

Life at the Wall

Four of us recently rented a car. Taking into account the size of the West Bank relative to the cost and convenience of public transport, we concluded that we could get a lot more out of travelling independently. Two weeks later and we will be returning what turns out to be a very expensive little vehicle, but not before it delivered us into a good number of memorable situations.

The olive harvest continues to be a major fixture. Driving away from cities into the villages and tiny hamlets north of Nablus, we spent time with farmers the organised groups never reach. These communities are interesting for the fact that they usually, although not always, avoid the tension and violence that strangles areas closer to Israeli settlements. We followed the partition wall through this region over two weekends, experiencing life on the literal edge of Palestinian society. 

 

Encircling the city of Qalqillia. Two gates in, two gates out.

Harvest Time

The time has come for Palestinians, where they are able, to harvest this year’s olives from their trees. It’s a family affair. While mothers, wives, husbands, fathers and older children climb and reach for the crops, toddlers and babies mill about or sleep under the shade of branches, on the tarp stretched out to catch falling olives. Walk through the country side outside of large towns and you’ll come across one, two or maybe a dozen such groups, encounters that will be followed hard upon by offers of sugary tea or rich coffee. Simply passing by is not an option.

Various organisations rally together bus-loads of suitably international looking groups of volunteers, willing to provide a protective presence at sites where groves sit on disputed land, in the shadow of Israeli settlements. Past experience has shown that angry settlers are less confident about getting violent when foreigners are around, i.e. human beings whose complaints of attacks will not be ignored by soldiers and the police.

Our Birzeit lot joined one such contingent last week, on a trip to villages south of Nablus. The northern West Bank is the area most densely populated with settlements, all classed as illegal under international law. There are pockets of peaceful co-existence, though still under strict military control. For instance, whilst visiting the short run between Jayuus and a village called Kufr Jammal, locals assured us they could work in peace, with only the frustration of military occupation to deal with. We even witnessed a tractor load of Palestinian farmers joking and chatting in a strange Hebrew/Arabic blend with three young IDF soldiers manning the checkpoint that cuts their land in half.

“I read the news today, oh boy…”

It’s sometimes hard to write about what I see here, because I know that concurrently, dozens of journalists are doing the same thing and putting their own slant on events. Short of keeping subject matter confined to my eating patterns, it’s almost certain that my posts will repeat news already widely accounted for, and this never applies as much as when a killing is involved.

Last week three young Palestinian males were shot dead and a handful of others injured by IDF soldiers in three separate although not unrelated incidents. Relative peace was broken when a 17-year-old from Jalazone refugee camp, near Ramallah, was killed outside Beit El Israeli settlement. The plethora of reports fall on one of two sides; either he was preparing to throw Molotov cocktails over the settlement wall or, this cover story is being used to justify the murder of loitering teenager.

Following this, during a protest at Jalazone camp against the first killing, a 20-year-old was gunned down and others injured. With tensions peaking and both sides loudly playing the blame game, a third young man was killed later in the week. The threat of firebombs was again used as justification.

Teargas Cured My Asthma

Bil’iin is one of the most famous protest sites along the Israeli West Bank partition wall. The vast majority of this wall and its remaining projected route are located inside Palestinian lands, east of the internationally recognised Green Line border. However, at Bil’iin, where the wall becomes a reinforced fence, its damaging effects are unusually pronounced.

  
In 2004 the International Court of Justice let it be known that the path of the barrier, which runs through Bil’iin’s olive tree groves and houses, was unlawful. A week prior to this Israel’s own high court had ruled essentially the same thing. Nothing happened.
  
In 2007 the Israeli Supreme Court ordered the barrier at Bil’iin to be re-routed, while at the same time legalising an Israeli settlement that encroaches on the town’s land to the west of it. Although the military said it would comply with the re-routing order it has so far done nothing. With the settlement still expanding it’s hard to see how the situation will change. A cynic might say the IDF is stalling until the settlement reaches close enough to the disputed stretch of barrier for the Supreme Court to justify reversing its order…

  
Since 2005, Bil’iin residents, mostly young men and boys have been making weekly marches up to the site of the fence. There they throw stones, get loud and attempt to dismantle the section that cuts across their land. Usually international observers and solidarity members provide a peaceful presence, although they will often help with the dismantling too. In recent weeks, we’ve heard reports of increased violence both here and at the sister site of Nil’iin. So, we thought we’d better take a look for ourselves.