Resistance in the West Bank

Youth Watching Land being Demolished by Bulldozers

Monday, June 2

By Gerald Lenoir

The Village of Nal’in, West Bank

The twelve of us in the delegation, two guides and the tour bus driver traveled to the village of Nal’in in the West Bank. The community originally consisted of 58,000 dunams (1 dunam = 1/4 acres) of land. With the establishment of the Green Line, delineating the Israel-Palestine border in 1948, 40,000 Dunams of Nal'in became part of the Israeli state. On the hillsides surrounding the village on three sides, we saw Israeli settlements that take up another 8,000 dunams of Nal’in’s land, leaving the village with only 8,000 dunams.

Now the village of 5,000 people faces another immediate threat—a land grab by Israel in order to build a section of the infamous apartheid wall to separate the village from the Israeli settlements. The mayor of Nal’in explained that the community is confronted with three forms of aggression. First, the wall will consume 2,500 more dunams of village land. Secondly, the wall affects villagers economically. We walked with him through the area and he showed us the red Xs on many of the 500- to 700-year-old olive trees, marking the route of the wall through a fertile field that provides the livelihood for many of the residents.

Finally, the main road to the village will be closed to Palestinians and open only to the Israeli settlers. The part of Nal’in that is on the other side of the road will be connected by a tunnel, the access to which will be controlled by Israeli soldiers. They can open and close it at their discretion, potentially cutting off the access of some villagers to services and schools.

In the shallow valley below the field of olive trees, we watched the Israeli workers operating huge earth moving machines digging out the path of the wall. We stood and took pictures of the intruders breaking up the soil and rocks that did not belong to them.

The people of Nal’in are actively resisting the construction of the wall and the occupation. They hold regular demonstrations against the wall that involve villagers and the local and international supporters.

As we watched the Israeli workers preparing the path for the wall, one enraged villager shouted to us about the insanity of the situation. “They are stealing our land!” What about my children!” he yelled. He introduced us to a teenager in the group of 20 or so villagers that accompanied us. Under the yellow baseball cap that the youngster wore was a white bandage wrapped several times around his head. He had been shot the week before by an Israeli soldier for throwing rocks at one of the earth movers.

After a while, we made our way to the home of one of the villagers whose house was under a demolition order. Israeli solders could come at any time with a wrecking crew to demolish his home because it was built without permits, a daily occurrence in villages throughout the West Bank. We sat on the patio in a circle with the Mayor and other villagers, sipped fresh mint tea, and talked about the occupation and the resistance. Many of them felt that the Palestinian Authority, the administrative body of the Occupied Territories, was corrupt and ineffectual. Several of them also felt that the Palestine Liberation Organization was “on life support” in the words of one villager and needs to be resuscitated.

The Village of Bil’in, West Bank

After leaving Nal’in, we went on to the village of Bil’in, another community under siege. Like Nal’in, for years, the Israeli settlers have been confiscating thousands of dunams of land that were once part of the village. A section of the separation wall is also slated to cut off their village and consume large portions of its land. Bil’in residents have been the most vocal and militant in their opposition to the wall. Some of the villagers invited us to come to the next demonstration on Friday.

We split up into three groups of four and stayed overnight in the homes of three brothers who were born and raised in the village. Four of us stayed with Emad Bornat, a filmmaker who lives in a two-bedroom house with his wife and four sons, ages 3 to 12 years old. Fortunately, Emad spoke English fluently.

Emad’s kids were kids. They sat in the living room with us and gawked at us, asking us questions and playing with each other. When I asked the oldest boy, Mohamed, if he liked to play soccer, his younger brother corrected my American accent and told me the correct way to pronounce soccer. The youngest boy, Jibril sat across from me and made faces at me. I returned the favor, to his delight. We laughed for awhile and when he got tired of the game, he wandered away to play with his brothers and to crawl in and out of his father’s lap.

Emad said that he had been shot with rubber-coated bullets 15 times by Israeli soldiers while he filmed the weekly demonstrations. He showed us two video cameras that had been destroyed by the soldiers, one with a bullet still lodged right below the lens. He joked that maybe he should bring two cameras to the demonstration, one to film with and one for the soldiers to destroy. We laughed but the sight of the bullet in the camera that could have been in Emad’s face was not funny.

Emad also told us that he had been arrested several times and that soldiers could appear at any time and drag him off to jail. That is the reality that he lives with everyday.

Emad’s wife prepared a delicious meal of what she called French chicken, a salad, pita bread, hummus and French fries. One of the members of the delegation, Fulani Sunni-Ali, spoke to her in Spanish. She is a Palestinian from Brazil who moved to the West Bank. She spoke Portuguese and Spanish, besides Arabic.

After dinner, the other members of the delegation joined us and Emad showed us footage from the documentary he produced about the wall. It showed villagers and international supporters actively challenging Israeli Defense Forces. He captured footage of soldiers beating, tear gassing and firing at demonstrators. He filmed the demonstrators pushing back against a wall of defense forces. It was scene after scene of intense actions and counteractions. Many of us bought copies of his documentary, “Bil’in Up Against the Wall” to bring back with us.

The next morning, we ate breakfast and took pictures with the family and said our goodbyes. Emad shouted to us as we walked away from his house, “Let’s keep in touch!” We all agreed that we definitely would.

Thoughts on Outsourcing and Outlawing Indigenous Thinking

Dheisheh Camp -- “It is illegal for a Palestinian to have a good mind,” Naji Owdah, a representative from Al-Feneiq Center, told our delegation. Al-Feneiq, which translates as “Phoenix,” is located in the Dheisheh Camp, just outside of Bethlehem. The camp was established in 1949 as a temporary site for the Palestinian families coming from one of the 46 villages that were destroyed by Israel. Today Dheisheh remains home to 12,000 individuals living on less than 1/2 km2. During our recent overnight stay, Owdah informed us that Al-Feneiq, which serves as one of the camp’s community centers, had been destroyed several times previously by the Israeli army. The Palestinians keep rebuilding the center, hence, its name.
During the evening presentation, which included a discussion with Suheir, his wife, Owdah referred to critical thinking several times, at one point stressing that “we [Palestinians] have no army, no guns. We have nothing but our minds.” I have heard discussion on critical and creative thinking several times during our journey to the Occupied West Bank, and it is a subject that we Indigenous Peoples within the geopolitical borders of the United States are concerned with as well. As a university faculty member working in the Indigenous and American Indian Studies discipline, I am interested in the ways that pro-Native academics are nourishing intelligent and ethical Native-oriented thinking among students and other colleagues. It is my hope that this current nourishing will contribute to the future work of sovereignty.
It is clear that that our respective and collective Nations (and descendents) are relying on our ability to shape and focus our resources—including our intellectual capabilities—to liberate our lands (i.e., sovereignty and self-determination). This involves long-term thinking, a strategy often referred to simply as “7-Generations” (recognition that our decisions involve the generations to come). Visiting Al-Feneiq reminds me that we Indigenous Peoples can contribute and volunteer our resources despite everything the United States continues to do to impede our current struggle for liberation.
For example, throughout conventional K-12 pedagogy, the U.S. discourages or prevents the fostering of our allegiance to our nations and tribes while it simultaneously encourages historical amnesia. The U.S. also encourages us to believe that we ought to live only in the Diaspora, or sites of relocations, away from our tribal homelands and communities. To circumvent this continued colonization, we take it upon ourselves to contribute to the flourishing of our communities and the stabilizing of our lands/territories, including the restoration of treaty making. All of this requires the ability to utilize a basic tool that we can all possess—our thinking.
Critical and creative thinking. We all possess it but it is not so simple or self-evident to use intelligently. There are many reasons why, including that in this time in our history, the United States attempts to undermine our struggle for self-determination by setting up mechanisms that encourage Indigenous Peoples, as one of my colleagues refers to it, to “outsource” our thinking to the United States. When we can no longer think for our benefit our tribes, but instead think for the benefit of the United States, this is colonization. Anytime we put the interests of the U.S. ahead of our respective nations and tribes, this is colonization. Anytime we work for non-native communities at the expense of our tribes and nations, this is colonization. Anytime we hesitate or refuse to contribute to the spiritual, cultural, economic, social, environmental, political, and intellectual well-being of our tribal communities, this is colonization. Anytime we make apologies for the U.S., this is colonization.
Owdah’s thoughts on critical and creative thinking, coming as they do from a life lived within Israel and U.S. sponsored genocide and occupation, reminds me that the fostering of Indigenous self-determination thinking is the responsibility of our communities. Our ability to think for ourselves and for our People (and never for the United States) is one of the sources of our right to live as Indigenous Peoples and Nations. When an Indigenous individual has a good mind, which means a sharp mind, a decolonized mind, a mind that works on behalf of the People, then such a mind might be considered a national security risk to the United States. It is the responsibility of Indigenous Nations to support such critically-conscious, pro-Native individuals.
For more information about the Dheisheh Refugee camp, see
http://www.dheisheh-ibdaa.net/dheisheh.htm

- June 2008

This Is a Story About Land and Segregation

The story about Palestine is about Oppression and Land. Critical thinking is key here, and it is way over due, but folks must look beyond their subjective lense and step into reality. We must look at the reality that Israel fears and the life that Palestinians must endure in the name of Israeli fear and livelihood. There are many contraditions, issues and concerns. Yet, there is one principaled problem: Palestinian people are being occupied by Israelis.

The Wall: a physical barrier that has separated Palestinian neighborhoods from each other in the name of security. Yet, this very wall has extended beyond the designated green line border to grab more land for Israel and include land that settlers have confiscated. Why is this ugly wall okay?

Our First Real Time in Israel - Proper - Galilee: Nazareth, Ein Hod, Haifa, Sakhnin

We had a pretty heavy weekend. It's Sunday night, and we are exhausted! We've done so much, its been hard to process - but at lunch and dinner we've been able to get into some really interesting conversations.

We took a trip up north to Galilee and stayed over night in Nazareth. We also visted Ein Hod (a Palestinan town in Israel) and Haifa. Up until this point we were only in Jerusalum and the West Bank. We got a chance to talk to some folks who are Palestinians with Israeli citizenship. This was a huge discussion that got into the struggle of Palestinians with Israel citizenship in comparison to Palestinians living in Jerusalem or the West Bank. No, life as a Palestinian Isreali is not fair and equal. Palestinians face a huge amounts of institutional racism. To get a look at how the other side lives, we went to Haifa, and got a small glimpse of how an average israel lives(it looked like the US) For the first time i saw Asian food. More to come. So tired, but well put up some pictures.

As a side note, the amount of information that we are processing and questioning is amazing. We are getting into ideas and questioning things like Zionism, the state of Israeli, connecting the struggles from Baltimore to Palestine, US/Mexico Border wall and the Israeli WALL, are Jewish people a race, the holocaust, Palestinian resistance, Solidarity, and so much more.
- koyuki

Our Trip Up North: Galilee

Thursday, May 29th: Hebron - Hard Place for a Palestinian, Nice Place for an Israeli Settler

Day 3 in the West Bank, Occupied Palestinian Territory

Thursday, May 29, 2008

By Gerald Lenoir

On the Road to Hebron

Fifteen of us traveled in a tour bus down Route 60, a road that only Israelis are allowed to drive on, on our way to Hebron. The Apartheid Wall snaked along side, dividing the Jewish settlements from the Palestinian villages. The Wall and the buffer zones on both side of it, gobble up 10% of the West Bank land and break up Palestinian land into South African-style Bantustans, with no access to the grape vines and orchards where Palestinians have labored for centuries. No access to grazing lands for their livestock.

As we made our way, our guide Kasem related to us the history of the area.
One and a half million Palestinians live in the West Bank, while half a million Jews live in 170 Jewish only “legal” settlements and 100 “colonial spots,” settlements that even the Israeli government admits are illegal. In the Hebron District, there are 32 Jewish settlements and 20 colonial spots that are home to 20,000 Jews. In the very heart of the Palestinian City of Hebron itself, there are four colonial spots.

The bizarre labyrinth of road lead from one Jewish settlement to the other, dotted with military towers. Only vehicle with yellow license plates that identify Jewish travelers and commercial vehicles, like ours, are allowed on the roads. We spotted Palestinians walking or riding donkeys close to our path.

We passed gleaming settlement after settlement, all fortified with Israeli troops, private security guard, security towers every few miles, check points, and road blocks. We also passed a Palestinian refugee camp, a shanty town established in 1948 when Israel was founded. The shacks that house 20,000 Palestinians stand in sharp contrast to the new housing complexes of Jewish settlement that surround it.

Entering Hebron
After an hour, we reached the outskirts of our destination. After driving to two check points that were inaccessible—one was for military only, the other was unstaffed—we reached the gate to Hebron. The guard at the gate, who, to my surprise, was black (probably an Ethiopian Jew), asked for all of our passports. He took them and after a few minutes, returned them to us and allowed us to enter Hebron.

Not far into Hebron, we came to another check point that separated Hebron 1, the Palestinian-controlled sector of the city where 40,000 Palestinians live, from Hebron 2, the Israeli-controlled sector of the city, where 120,000 Palestinians and 400 Jews live under the watchful eye of 1,200 heavily armed Israeli soldiers.

The helmeted Israeli soldier in green fatigues approached the bus with his finger on the trigger of a submachine gun strapped across his shoulder. Again we produced our passports for him. He went to the guard booth, made a phone call and returned to the bus to tell us we were denied access and that we would have to go back to the police station to get a special permit. Our Palestinian guide and driver has Israeli government-issued green cards that allowed them in the West Bank but they also had to be subjected to an additional security check.
We turned around and made the short trip back to the police station where we received the permit. Finally, after over 30 minutes of navigating the checkpoints and security matrix, we were allowed to enter Hebron 2.

The Rabbi, the Peacemaker and the Palestinian Shopkeeper
Our first destination was Biet Hadassa, a Jewish settlement in the heart of Hebron. At a Jewish Center built on confiscated Palestinian land, we met with Rabbi Simcha Hochbaum, a rightwing settler from the lower eastside of Manhattan. He gave us a tour of the exhibits in the center and talked to us about being Jewish in the second holiest city for Jews and Muslims.

His message was that it is better to be a live Jew living in Israel that to be a dead Jew, the victim of a Holocaust. He justified the occupation by relating to us the story of what he described as a massacre of Jews by Palestinians in Hebron in 1929. Kasem later told us that the struggle in Hebron in 1929 was part of a larger struggle between Palestinians and Jews, when Jews attempted to seize the western wall of Old Jerusalem, the so-called Wailing Wall that is sacred to both Muslims and Jews. After a member of our delegation challenged the Rabbi’s views, he told us about how good Jews have been to Palestinians, giving them schools and education, and that they were better off under the Israeli government that they had been under the Ottoman Empire. He spewed hatred and paternalism towards Palestinians.

Our next visit in Hebron was with a group called Christian Peacemaker Teams (CPT). David Jansen’s talk with us was in direct juxtaposition to the Rabbi’s. CPT is an ecumenical group that travels to conflict areas around the world and supports oppressed peoples. David told us about their work in getting in between Israelis and Palestinians at the point of conflict and trying to mediate. They also escort Palestinian children to school because they are often subjected to taunts by Israeli soldiers calling them terrorists and to attacks by Israeli children and adults. David said that the estimates of Palestinian unemployment in Hebron range from 40 percent to 60 percent. He also talked about CPT’s work with indigenous nations in Canada in supporting their sovereignty rights and the need to challenge white privilege, his own included.
Our discussion with a Palestinian shop owner gave us some insight into the impact of the occupation. He told us that before the Israeli setters came to Hebron, the market place was thriving. The Israeli government forced them to relocate the market and because of the restricted travel, many Palestinians no longer shop there and the shopkeepers barley survive. We saw the poverty around us. Young school children begged us for dollars. They carried what they called Ibrahimi buckets, containers filled with soup given to them by the workers at the Ibrahimi Mosque.

Palestinians, the shopkeeper also told us, are subject to daily humiliation by the setters who confiscated the apartments above the market place and rain down trash and urine on them from open windows. He was, nevertheless, defiant and vowed to resist the occupation.

The Ibrahimi Mosque
Now on foot, we navigated two more checkpoints to enter the Ibrahimi Mosque. The Israeli government divided the mosque into two sections—one for Jews and one for Muslims. The Mosque contains shrines to Abraham, his wife Sarah and their children and their wives. Underneath the mosque, where no one is allowed to go, their bodies are buried. Kasem showed us the spot in the mosque where, in 1994, an imam and 28 praying Muslims were gunned down by Barak Goldstein, a radical Jewish settler from Brooklyn. Goldstein entered the mosque with a semiautomatic weapon, past armed Israeli guards. When his weapon jammed he was attacked by Muslims and beaten to death. During the evacuation of the mosque, 10 more Palestinians were killed by Israeli soldiers.

We left Hebron with better understanding of Palestinian and Jewish life in Occupied Palestine. We saw the good life of Jews who enjoy a superior standard of living, their privilege protected by hundreds of armed guards and soldiers, and the life of Palestinians who suffer the day-to-day poverty, humiliation and oppression of occupation.