Let Us Love...

Back "Home"

2006-08-24T01:26:00.001-04:00

I arrived back "home" in Natchez, MS on August 18 and will spend the next few weeks in MS, La, & Fl. I don't plan to continue blogging. But when/if I work with CPT again, I'll probably post here again. I added a few more pictures from Palestine at http://www.flickr.com/photos/angelapalestine/.

Some other news- CPT now has a small team in Kurdistan, Iraq right now. Please continue to hold all of the lives there in prayer. If you would like to have access to CPT news or recieve email updates from the Iraq, Palestine, or another CPT team, you can join any of the CPT Yahoo groups via the website http://cpt.org.

(These are pictures of our new puppy, Sadi. My 2 younger sisters & I surprised our mom with a new puppy from the humane society for her birthday. She was not as excited about the new puppy as we were, but now she loves her...)

Thank you so very much for your love for justice and for your prayers & actions for the situations in Palestine and Israel.
Peace.

Let justice roll on like a river, righteousness like a never-failing stream. (Amos 5:24)

Consider Jesus who endured such hostility against himself from sinners, so that you may not grow weary or lose heart.
(Hebrews 12:1-3)

A Day in an Israeli Settlement/Military Base

2006-08-22T13:11:00.000-04:00

My last full day in Palestine-Israel was August 10. I spent that day traveling north (not too far north- still in the west bank) to an Israeli settlement called Harmesh to visit a friend who is stationed there in the Israeli army.

On the way to Harmesh I talked with some Israeli soldiers on the bus (the bus stops were full of young women and men heading to war). These particular guys do not want to be there, but they feel like they have the responsibility to fight for Israel. These soldiers are reservists and have already served 3+ years in the Israeli military when they were 18. Now they are 25 yrs old. They are stationed in a settlement that is slated for demolition (meaning, it is an illegal settlement even under Israeli law & the military is planning to evacuate it). I asked if the Israeli settlers in that particular settlement are violent and angry about the pending demolition. "No!," one soldier said, "These settlers are not ideological settlers. They want to leave. They are just waiting for the government to give them money."

These particular settlers are there because it is cheap to live in Palestine. I think I understood the soldiers to say that the government subsidizes the settlers homes.

The soldiers asked why I was there so I told them about the situation in At-Tuwani. They were surprised at the things I said- I don't think they believed that Palestinians are suffering. They have never been in Palestine except as soldiers.

One soldier told me, "Well, if Israel were to give them [Palestinians] one thing, then they would just keep taking. The Palestinians are never satisfied." I told him that I wouldn't be satisfied if my life was as restricted as the people of Tuwani & I asked if he would be.

He changed the subject and said, "But that is all the news shows. You never see dead soldiers on the news. You don't see our suffering. When I was in the army before, we carried out dead soldiers. The world never saw them."

I said, "I'm sorry... Why is that? Why don't we see the army's suffering on the news?"

I don't know what he has seen. I know it must be awful and I wish I and the rest of the world could see his pain. We should see his pain. If we support sending kids off to fight, we should see what we are doing to them and be willing to enter their pain with them.

He & I talked for a little longer and then he told me that we had reached my stop so I said goodbye- "Peace be with you."
"Shalom..."

I have to admit that I was pretty nervous about hanging out in a settlement and/or at a military base. I felt a little dishonest by being there... The settlers did not know that I was living and working against the occupation in a Palestinian village & only 1 of my Palestinian neighbors knew that I was going to visit a military base/settlement. In retrospect, I think it would have been fine, and even good, to tell both, but the opportunities never arose & I didn't seek out the conversation. I also wonder if I reject any attempt at solidarity when I take advantage of opportunities that are not available to Palestinians. For example, no Palestinian could take a bus into Harmesh. I was also nervous about how I would react to that environment. Like, would I be able to smile and enjoy time with my friend while we sat in a settlement? or, would he notice how uncomfortable I was & would that upset him?

My friend was waiting at the bus stop for me in the seemingly abandoned settlement of Harmesh. He said he had not spoken to a single settler since he had been there. The settlement was gorgeous, lots of flowers and it overlooked a beautiful valley and several Palestinian villages. When we turned the first corner, this guy with tatoos and piercings and no shirt was washing his car. I looked at my friend as if to say, "Is he a settler?"

Settlers in At-Tuwani are very religious (or at least claim to be very religious). The men & women are always covered, the men have long curly side burns, and men definitely do not have tatoos or piercings. My friend knew what I was thinking & he laughed & said, "Angela, these settlers are not religious. They are just here because it is cheap."

As we approached the guy, he greeted us and then invited us in for tea. He and his girlfriend live together in the cute, small house. They pay 100 shekels a month for rent, less than $25. Israel is not a cheap place to live. This rent is ridiculously low. He said they get such cheap rent because the owner of the house wants to keep it occupied.

There are only 22 families living in the settlement of Harmesh right now. But, this guy said that many settlers will move there soon before the government evacuates the settlement because they want to recieve money from the Israeli government. From what this settler and the soldiers on the bus said, it sounds to me like the Israeli government exploits the poor by using them to occupy stolen land? When they are no longer useful politically, the government pays them off to move? (That's not to say that these settlers are not responsible for the fact that they are living in an illegal settlement on stolen land. They are.)

The settlement seems so quiet. This settler was the only person that we saw in the streets, but he assured us that Harmesh is not a nice place to live. At this point, his girlfriend came in from her job, cleaning other settlers' homes. She told us that she hates all Muslims. Twice in the last 2 years settlers from Harmesh have been killed by Palestinians.

I know nothing about the area around Harmesh so I don't know specifics about the history of that particular settlement or about the violence done to Palestinians who live nearby.

I only heard a few stories from this 1 settler couple in Harmesh. She is a maid and he is a struggling (and very, very talented!) musician. My friend and I sat and sipped tea while he jammed on his guitar, she smoked, and they both told us stories. We all watched the equivalent of Israeli MTV, making fun of the whacky outfits & hairstyles. We talked about life, music, work, the weather... normal things. It would have been a very normal afternoon with very normal people- except that we were an Israeli soldier called to duty because his country is at war, 2 Israeli settlers living on stolen land because they are poor and rent there is affordable, and a random girl from the U.S. who is living & working in a Palestinian village.

What I Take With Me

2006-08-09T14:00:00.000-04:00

I finished with CPT for the summer and left At-Tuwani today. Tomorrow I will go a little north to say "bye" to a friend at a military base. strange, I know...

I have been trying to get in touch with a good, good Israeli friend since all of this chaos with Hizbollah began and since I read that Israel was calling up thousands of reservists to the military. I finally heard from him Sunday night.

“How are you?,” I asked. “Fine, but the army got me,” he said. “Oh no… oh no... I am so so sorry...” That is all I had to say. What do you say to someone whose plans for life were just interrupted by bombs and missiles?

We talked late into the night. He told me his plans after the army, I told him mine after Palestine. I sat on the roof staring at the stars. He sat in an abandoned factory, whispering so not to wake the 30 other soldiers with him.

“What is the biggest feeling that you will take away from here?,” he asked me. It took me a while to answer, but then I whispered, “right now, sadness, my friend. A heavy, heavy heart. For Palestine, for Lebanon, for Israel, for the world. Sadness is what I take.”

I thought to myself, “I am sitting with Palestinians in an occupied village weeping with my Israeli brother who is now carrying a gun in another occupied village.” What a strange, complicated, sad world we live in… That is what I take with me.

It was after midnight when we finished talking. I sat on the roof for while and then went inside to put on pajamas. The Operation Dove members had lit a candle and were sitting around it singing Nada Te Turbe. (translation- Let nothing distress you, be not afraid.) I don’t know why we were having worship at such an odd hour of the night but it was beautiful, perfect timing.

For the next 2 weeks there is a children’s day camp in the village. It’s organized by Tay’ush, an Israeli peace group, along with the women of At-Tuwani. The camp is for all of the nearby children. Children from the village of Tuba must pass the settlements of Ma’on and Havat Ma’on in order to reach camp. Like going to school during the year, it is impossible for the Tuba children to make it to At-Tuwani without an escort. The Israeli settlers have beaten them, tried to take some of them, and attacked the military escorts. In order to prevent internationals from accompanying the children through the settlements, the army is escorting the children to camp each day. One jeep drives in front, 25 or so children walk behind it, and another army jeep follows in back. It's pretty absurd that it requires the army for children to go to summer camp one village over?

The camp is amazing. The children have music class, and art, and games… laughter and a little freedom. It is so healthy. I only pray that the children can continue to make it to camp safely.

Monday the Israeli organizer of the camp came to our house to visit. Among many things, she shared that 2 of the Israeli volunteers have had family members killed by Hizbollah rockets in the north. She spoke of the despair that they all carry around as Israelis.

She feels “so much responsibility for the disproportionate massacre” that Israel is conducting in Lebanon and in Gaza. She spoke of understanding the violent feelings of Hizbollah and others in the Arab world and, yet, she thinks the violence is unproductive. Bombs lead to more bombs. Deaths to more deaths. She cried as she spoke of Israel’s actions. “Now Lebanon will hate us for another 100 years and any peace with Palestine is postponed,” she said. “I want children, but I cannot raise children here! Send them to Israeli school?! Have them wave that flag?! We cannot even celebrate any holidays! Every holiday represents Israel killing someone…,” she wept. “And, mothers… I see them on TV, mothers of soldiers. They are proud to send their sons and daughters off to fight. Why can’t they see!? They are like the proud mothers of suicide bombers! It is the same thing!! Mothers sending children off to die!! & for what?! It is the same! This meshing of religion and state, and religion and the military. It is a dangerous thing! It is frightening. Israel and Hizbollah- they are the same in this way- religious fanatics fighting for God.”

She looked at me and lowered her voice, “I’m sorry… I can talk about this for hours. It is all I think about now.” I looked back at her & said, “I understand... I think…”

During parts of the conversation I felt like she could replace the word “Israel” with “the U.S.” and replace “Hizbollah” with the general term “terrorists” and I would be saying the same words. I think I understand her shame, her sadness, her fear. It is shameful when your home is known all over the world for murdering children. It is sad to witness the destruction in one’s own country and against one’s enemies. And it is scary to see one’s religion being used to defend murder.

“What do I take with me?,” my dear friend asks me- The love of my Israeli sisters and brothers- their tears and fear. I take the resilance of my Palestinian sisters and brothers- their strength and resistance. I take the laughter of the children- their handshakes and dirty faces. And I take sadness, sadness for a place absolutely ravaged by violence and for a world that sits by and lets children suffer.

In spite of everything, I still believe
that people are really good at heart.
I simply can't build up my hopes on a foundation
consisting of confusion, misery, and death.
I see the world gradually being turned into a wilderness,
I hear the ever-approaching thunder which will destroy us too,
I can feel the suffering of millions,
and, yet, if I look up into the heavens,
I think that it will all come right,
that this cruelty will end,
and that peace and tranquility will return again.
- Anne Frank

Village Stories

2006-08-09T13:08:00.001-04:00

We had several tour groups come through At-Tuwani this past week. When groups come, we take them around the village, telling them stories of the village as we point out the places where the stories took place. Usually, several people from At-Tuwani share their personal stories with the tours. I thought I would repeat some of the stories of 3 of the families’ stories…

(I know this is really long- the 3 stories are separated with dashed lines. I will post pictures soon but the connection is way too slow to do that right now.)

I'll start with Yousef*, a close friend of the team’s and our translator. One of the things that Yousef tells every group is that his story is not completely unique. “Every family has stories like this,” he says. Every family in At-Tuwani (and I would assume surrounding villages and maybe even all of Palestine?) has stories of direct abuse by Israeli settlers and soldiers. I will write a few of Yousef’s family’s stories here, but these stories are only a few of many.

Members of Yousef’s family were first attacked in 1986, around the time that most of their land was violently stolen by Israeli settlers. When Yousef shares “his story” with visitors, he usually begins by saying, “I want to tell you about my mother.”

Yousef’s mother is a strong, strong 75+ years old woman. In April 2004, while Yousef was in a meeting with a group of Israeli peace activists, he heard screaming and someone came to tell him that 8 settlers were by his mother. In this area, Israeli settlers equal violence.

Yousef ran up the hill where his mother was grazing their sheep. Eight settlers had pulled off his mother’s hair covering and were beating her with her shepherd’s staff. Blood was running from her mouth. The settlers were trying to steal her sheep. When Yousef ran towards his mother, one settler with a gun began shooting at his feet. He continued running as the settlers began beating his mother on the ground with rocks. His mother continued to struggle to get her sheep. The Israeli peace activists caught the incident on tape and brought it to the police.

Yousef’s family filed a report, but the Israeli police did nothing about the settlers beating a 75 year woman grazing her sheep.

Three weeks after his mother’s beating, Israeli soldiers came to At-Tuwani and demolished his two brothers’ homes. And in June 2004 Israeli settlers filled the family’s water cistern with dead chickens.

Israeli soldiers raided homes and terrorized village children for more than a solid month in the summer of 2004. Eventually Tay’ush, an Israeli peace organization, began sleeping in the village. They caught the soldiers’ abuse on tape and it made the Israeli news, which caused the violence to decrease. Soon after, CPT and Operation Dove began a permanent presence in At-Tuwani.

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Recently, each morning we have been going out before 7 am with Adam*, a 31 year old shepherd from At-Tuwani. We go out and sit in his family’s hills while he grazes and waters his sheep.

Adam’s family lives in a house slightly outside of At-Tuwani, very, very close to the illegal Israeli settler outpost of Havat Ma’on. Like the Yousef’s family, Adam’s family began experiencing repeated settler attacks and having their sheep stolen in 1986.

These stories are straight from the notes of another CPTer, Art Gish. Like the stories of all the families in the village, there are too many to write here. I deleted some pieces. Adam’s family has seen their children, wives, husbands, parents, and friends beaten, shot and humiliated time after time. They have sought justice only to find that it is not available to them here.

In November 1999, Adam’s family went to plow their fields. They met thirty settlers and three soldiers at their field. Adam and his cousin went to the soldiers and asked why the settlers were on his land. The settlers then attacked. They threw rocks at them and the tractor, and came and beat them. Adam was hit on the head and was unconscious for ten minutes. They were injured and bleeding. The soldiers watched and did nothing. The soldiers even shot at the family as they walked over the hill. They had to wait for one and a half hours for the soldiers to get an ambulance to take them to the hospital in Beer Sheva.

In 2001, four settlers on horses approached Adam’s father, who was old and sick, and could not walk well. One of the settlers attacked his father with a horse whip. They tried to catch Adam’s brother, who ran away, but lost one of his shoes in the flight. Settlers took the shoe and cut it into pieces.

In 2002, Adam went to plow his land. Settlers, soldiers and police came. The police confiscated his tractor, took it to Susia, and held it for more than a month. The police offered Adam a deal. They would give back his tractor if he signed a release, giving his land to the settlers. He refused, and ended up paying a 1,000 shekel fine to get the tractor back.
Later in 2002, his brother, home from the university, was sitting reading under a tree. A settler came and attacked him. His brother was arrested and fined 500 shekels.
Adam’s father was very sick in 2002. They took him to a hospital in Hebron, but the doctors said they could not help him. They released him to die at home. On the way home, four settlers stopped their car on the main road, took his father out of the car, pulled the tubes out of his body, and assaulted the others with their gun stocks. Soldiers came and did nothing. Twenty days later Adam’s father died.…

In August, 2003, the family had gone to a wedding in Yatta. When they came back, they heard shooting and saw his son was bleeding. Bullets were hitting the ground around them. The settlers then left in a settler security car. The wounds were superficial, except for one person with a head fracture.

At 2:00 that same night, soldiers came on Adam’s roof where he was sleeping, knocked him down, and asked for his identity card. They beat his brother. The soldiers took the ID cards with them and said they would be back at 7:00 in the morning. Adam called Ta’ayush. They came with an Israeli journalist before the soldiers arrived. Adam told the Israelis to hide, because if they were seen, the soldiers would act politely. When the soldiers came, they spoke very rudely to the family and tried to beat his brother. The Israelis came out of hiding, after which the soldiers quickly gave back the IDs and left.

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Fatima and Fadil* are our neighbors and the owners of the home in which CPT and Operation Dove lives. They have four young sons, ages 1-12. Like every other family in At-Tuwani, they have experienced direct attacks from Israeli settlers and soldiers. But like every other family, they continue to struggle to remain in their village and to raise their children in a healthy and peaceful environment.

Fatima is a leader in the village, maybe even the leader. She is full of life. Fatima has a great smile and a clever sense of humor. She married at age 16 and moved from Yatta, the nearby town, to the village of At-Tuwani. Fatima will tell anyone that .life as a village woman is hard. .

Fatima started a women’s co-op in the village. The women make beautiful rugs, dresses, baskets, other handicrafts, and olive oil. They sell their items in a museum next to our common patio. Tour groups come by, hear Fatima’s speech, and shop in the museum. The men of the village respect Fatima and appreciate the work of the women’s co-op. At times, the women’s co-op brings in over 40% of the village income. Basically, Fatima takes care of the village finances, as well as organizes a way for the women to gain more financial independence.

I love living so close to Fatima and Fadil’s family. Their family spends so much time together and they really seem to enjoy each other. They teach their adorable children love, hospitality, strength and wisdom. When I go to the roof to sleep at night, I often look up and see Fadil praying on their roof. When I wake up, Fatima is by the house making bread. In the afternoon, the children play on the hammock in our common patio and with toys that random tour groups leave.

The other day an army jeep drove through the village. It stopped by our house where Fatima and family were eating lunch and rolled down the window. The soldier asked, “Is everything ok here?” Fatima’s 5 year old son looked worried and said, “No… You are here.” Fatima’s children, like all of the children in the village, understand what it means to live under occupation. They recognize the occupation as evil and begin to resist it and to seek freedom at a very young age.

Amidst the chaos of violence, Fatima and Fadil have made a home of peace for their children. Amidst the despair of occupation, the women’s work is a beacon of hope for the whole village. And amidst the hatred of war, they manage to teach their children to love.

* not their real names

A-Tuwani Update July 18 - 31

2006-08-05T14:34:00.000-04:00

During this time period, the team accompanied shepherds from At-Tuwani andsurrounding villages in the early morning. Their activities included grazingtheir flocks and watering them from cisterns next to Israeli settlementoutposts.

During this period on several occasions (22 and 27 July), Israeli soldiersresponded to settler invasions of Palestinian land by removing or trying toremove the Palestinians from their own land. These actions are incontravention of the recent High Court ruling that Israeli soldiers have anobligation to protect Palestinians on their land and that removingPalestinians is not an acceptable alternative to restricting the settlersand protecting the Palestinians.

In addition to members of Operation Dove (the Doves), Christian PeacemakerTeam (CPT) members on the project during this time were Angela Davis,Maureen Jack, Rich Meyer, Heidi Schramm, Diana Zimmerman and a guest ofCPT.

Tuesday 18 July 2006
While accompanying shepherds at a cistern near the settlement outpost ofAvigail, Zimmerman and a Dove encountered some settler boys from the outpostwith their flock of goats. The boys grazed their animals on Palestinianland. A soldier posted at the outpost watched the boys but did not stopthem.

Thursday 20 July
A lawyer from ACRI (Association for Civil Rights in Israel) who is workingwith the people of At-Tuwani called to find out if the roadblocks blockingthe access to Yatta remained in place.

According to the lawyer, the Israeli Army assured her that they moved theblocks to allow a donkey to pass the roadblock easily. Davis walked down tothe roadblock, but nothing was changed. She took pictures and sent them tothe lawyer.

The entire team spent the whole evening and a sizable part of the nightparticipating in a large village wedding celebration.

Friday 21 July
The wedding party continued with CPT and Operation Dove in attendance.

Saturday 22 July
Jack and Zimmerman attended an action sponsored by the Israeli peace groupTa'ayush at the Palestinian village of Susiya. Palestinians, Israelis andInternationals gathered to clean up a house burned by a settler on 5 Julyand to replace the tarp roof. About an hour after the work started fiveyoung settler boys approached the area. They ranged in age fromapproximately nine to eighteen. Although they were not visibly armed, theyhad articles of clothing wrapped around their heads, obscuring their faces.The leader of the boys demanded that the group move out of the area. Shortlyafterwards the army arrived and asked the group of Palestinians, Israelisand Internationals to back up a bit. One soldier said "Please do thisbecause the settlers are upset and this will make them happy." The groupreturned to the work of cleaning up the house and ignored the settler boys.The soldiers remained and prevented the boys from walking among theparticipants of the action. After about an hour, the boys left the area.

Sunday 23 July
Just before noon the team received word that a police jeep was in At-Tuwanivillage near the school. When they arrived on the scene, the Israeli policewere cutting the license plates off the car of a man from the village. Theyalso told the man who owned the car to come with them to the police station.The police would not say why they were taking the man with them, but did saythat he was not under arrest.

The team later heard that the police fined the man 1000 shekels(approximately $225 U.S.) for driving on the settler road. Because theopening by At Tuwani is blocked, the man drove his car from Yatta to theclosest opening in the wall, which is two kilometers from At-Tuwani. Afterdriving through the opening he drove the two kilometers to the village. Thepolice claimed that he did not have the right to use the road and fined him.

Tuesday 25 July
In the morning Davis received a call that the army was in the nearby cavevillage of Mufakara. When Davis and a Dove arrived fifteen minutes later,the army was leaving the village. According to members of the village, asettler from Avigail came close to the village to graze his goats onPalestinian land and asked the army to protect him. The settler also leftsoon after the internationals arrived.

Thursday 27 July
Davis and Jack along with two Doves accompanied a shepherd in Khorubavalley, an area outside At Tuwani where settlers frequently harassPalestinians. While they were there, some settlers, along with a settlementsecurity officer from Ma'on observed them. A bit later some soldiersarrived and after speaking with the settlement security officer, approachedthe group.

The soldier acknowledged that the shepherd was on Palestinian land but thought that the Palestinians should leave because their presence made the settlers upset. The soldier said that the Palestinians should avoid thearea because the settlers may hurt them.

Friday 28 July
A friend of the team informed them that the Israeli high court heard apetition asking that the roadblocks blocking vehicle access to Yatta to bemoved. The judge promised to rule on the case in a few days.

Sunday 30 July
Meyer, a Dove, and a CPT guest walked to the cave village of Tuba for avisit. On the way there, they took pictures of the new army communicationtower recently constructed near Tuba. According to the residents of Tuba,the generator at the tower is constantly running, keeping them awake atnight.

Monday 31 July
In the afternoon, Meyer, a CPT guest and a Dove visited Susiya Antica, anarcheological dig near the Palestinian village of Susiya. It was the siteof the Palestinian village of Susiya until twenty years ago when the Israelimilitary expelled them. Afterwards the three returned to Susiya and showed amap of the site to a family there. One of the daughters of the familypointed to where her family lived. She was six years old when they wereforced to leave. She is not allowed to go back and see her family's caveand former home, although it is less than one kilometer from the tentvillage where her family now resides.

At-Tuwani Update July 8 - 17

2006-08-05T14:27:00.000-04:00

Each morning during this period the team went to Bier Jabareen, a cisternnear the Avigail outpost, to accompany shepherds from Mufakara and Sh'ebBotom as they watered their flocks. They also accompanied shepherds fromTuwani as they grazed their flocks in Humra. In addition to members fromOperation Dove (called "Doves"), CPTers on team during this period wereAngela Davis, Maureen Jack, Rich Meyer, Heidi Schramm and Diana Zimmerman.

Saturday, 8 July 2006
Meyer and a Dove were in the village of Susiya overnight and participated ina water pumping action sponsored by Ta'ayush, an Israeli peace group.Minutes after the tractors arrived at a Palestinian cistern near an Israelimilitary outpost, soldiers intervened and would not allow the group to pumpwater from the cistern. The soldiers declared the area a closed militaryzone and threatened to arrest anyone who remained. The group withdrew fromthe area.

Afterwards, several members of Ta'ayush along with Meyer drove to thevillage of Tuba to photograph a new gate that blocks the road from Tuba toAt Tuwani. On the drive back to At-Tuwani, settlers stopped the vehicles byblocking the road. The settlers spit on Meyer through the open truckwindow. The police arrived, coaxed the settlers off the road, and allowedthe vehicles to pass.

When the group arrived back in At-Tuwani, Israeli soldiers approached them,said the area was a closed military zone to all nonresidents, and orderedall the Israelis to leave. They did not request that the internationalsleave.

In the afternoon, Zimmerman and Davis monitored a temporary checkpoint setup by the border police at the entrance to At-Tuwani.

Sunday, 9 July 2006
A representative from the Israeli group Yesh Din (literally, 'there is alaw') and an Israeli lawyer visited At-Tuwani. They spoke with men fromTuba, Susiya, Magaer Al-Abeed and At-Tuwani about the difficulties they haveexperienced. The lawyer indicated that he would file charges in relationto various incidents in the hope that the Israeli judicial system wouldinvestigate them.

Monday, 10 July 2006
Shortly before 10:00 p.m., three army vehicles entered At-Tuwani. Two ofthem drove toward the Hill 833 outpost after stopping briefly. Zimmermanspoke with the soldiers from the third vehicle. They said that they wereresponding to a report that someone was throwing stones. The soldier wouldnot say who filed the report nor who was supposedly throwing the stones.Zimmerman called some families in the village, but no one knew anythingabout stone throwing. After less than fifteen minutes, the soldiers left.

Tuesday, 11 July 2006
At 11:00 a.m., the team received information that an Israeli constructioncrew was working near Tuba. Jack and Zimmerman walked via an indirectroute to Tuba to avoid potential problems with settlers. When theyapproached the work site, the workers did not object to the CPTers'documenting their work. The man in charge said that they were building acommunications tower for the army. The CPTers then walked to Tuba to passon this information to the villagers there.

Several truckloads of water arrived in At-Tuwani, provided by Oxfam. Most ofthe cisterns in the village received some water.

Wednesday, 12 July 2006
In Humra, two Doves saw an army humvee. Four soldiers were by the vehiclehaving what appeared to be a picnic. After half an hour, they left.

Thursday, 13 July 2006
From Khoruba hill two Doves took photographs of the army's newcommunications tower near Tuba.

At 10:10 a.m., Davis photographed a crane truck lifting cement blocks toblock the gap in the low wall on the north side of settler bypass road 317.Shortly after 1:00 p.m., Davis, Jack and Zimmerman responded to a reportthat soldiers were on the road. There they found several villagers andtheir vehicles stranded on the Yatta side of route 317. (See 17 July CPTnetrelease, "Access from At-Tuwani to Yatta blocked.")

Friday, 14 July 2006
After 4:00 p.m., a villager called to say that he had heard that the blockshad been removed from the road. Davis and Jack went to investigate; theblocks were still in place.

Sunday, 16 July 2006
Two members of the International Committee for the Red Cross visited thevillage. They informed the team that they have submitted complaints withthe Israeli military about crimes committed by the settlers during theprevious few months. The team gave them pictures and video documentation ofincidents that occurred during the spring.

Monday, 17 July 2006
Leaders from At-Tuwani and surrounding villages met with a representativefrom the Israeli army to talk about water distribution for the Masafer Yattaarea and the problems caused by the roadblock along route 317. The armyrepresentative said that the roadblock will be removed "soon." He refused to give a date.

Maintaining Normal Life

2006-07-30T07:35:00.000-04:00

As Israel’s wars in Lebanon and Gaza rage, people in At-Tuwani attempt to maintain “normal” life.

(picture of a man and his son waiting for a donkey to come get their bags that they carried off their tractor. The man and his son were coming back from Yatta on the day that the soldiers placed blocks along the road, trapping his tractor on the other side of the wall from At-Tuwani.)

We asked one of the leaders in the village what the village wants to do in response to the concrete blocks that the army recently placed blocking At-Tuwani’s access to much of the West Bank. The villager replied, “Nothing. There are many things going on in the village right now… Like, people are getting married.”
(picture= groom giving the bride jewelry at a pre-wedding party for the women of the families.)

He went on to say that the village is also a little wary of protesting the wall right now because the Israeli’s army’s response may be very violent. Because all of the media is focused on the north, the army and settlers have a bit more freedom to terrorize Palestinians right now without the world watching. Also, he said, many phone calls and letters to the commander about the blocks will just get lost among the many responses to Israel’s current wars. So… the village is trying to “lay low” and avoid the wrath of Israel at this point in time.

The villager’s reply that “people are getting married” contains so much wisdom. “Normal” life for Palestinians here is resistance. There have been 3 weddings over the past 3 weeks. Each wedding is a weeklong party. Basically, we have been partying for the past 3 weeks- dancing & drinking tea until the wee hours of the night. The last 2 weddings occurred after the army blocked the road to Yatta. Both of these weddings were between men from At-Tuwani and women from Yatta. The brides had to ride in cars over large dirt mounds that the army has placed in the road between Yatta and At-Tuwani. Then the cars from Yatta dropped the brides off by the concrete blocks. They got out in their wedding dresses and squeezed between the blocks. The rest of the wedding parties walked up the hill to At-Tuwani and other cars came to pick up the brides on the At-Tuwani side of the blocks. This lack of freedom of movement is ridiculous. But people find ways to maintain some type of normalcy despite it.
(picture 1= bride and party entering a home in At-Tuwani for the final wedding party, picture 2= a child in At-Tuwani with henna on her head. Many of the women dyed their hair with henna for the weddings. They sleep with henna on under a plastic bag or scarf. In the morning, one's hair is red.)

Last week one of the men of the village was driving on the Israeli bypass road 317, the only way to get to Yatta and much of the West Bank now that At-Tuwani’s road is blocked. The police followed the villager back to At-Tuwani, took his license plate and took the villager to the police station. The police claimed that the license plate was an illegal Israeli tag. However, we have the tag on video tape. It is a Palestinian tag. Also, there is no other way for the man to travel now that the army blocked the road. Another man from the village traveled by foot and public taxi in the midday sun (which is very hot) to the police station to pay bail. When he arrived at the police station, the police said bail was 2000 shekels. The villager refused saying, “That is too much. I’ll pay 1000.” The police agreed to 1000 shekels. This sounds to me like there was no legal process going on? There was no official bail set, no paperwork- only a Palestinian man illegally detained and 1000 shekels handed over to the Israeli police.

So… the village of At-Tuwani and the nearby villages in the South Hebron Hills are cut off from their main market town and from most of the West Bank by a low wall. When the soldiers placed the blocks in the road, they said that Palestinians would now have to go down the settler road (which is very dangerous because of potential attacks by Israeli settlers) and around to a checkpoint before reaching Yatta. An At-Tuwani man was caught using the road, like the soldiers told him to do, and the police unofficially “arrested” him and made him pay 1000 shekels (a little over $200). At-Tuwani is a village of 150 people, no running water, electricity for 4 hours a day by a generator. They are suffering a severe drought and have very limited crops. Along with their livestock, they depend on buying and selling in Yatta.

The low wall and blocks do nothing for security. It makes one wonder if they are only meant to make life so difficult for Palestinian villagers that they eventually leave.

Thursday we were out on Khoruba Hill with a Palestinian shepherd. Israeli settlers got angry and called the army to come tell the shepherd to leave. The army came and we spoke with them for about 45 minutes (long enough to distract them from harassing the shepherd and to give the shepherd time to finish watering his sheep). One CPTer told the soldiers, “But this is Palestinian land.” The soldier said, “Yes, I guess it is… but the problem is that those people (the settlers) are very violent… they do not want the Palestinians here. Today they called us (the army), tomorrow they may call us… but eventually they will take matters into their own hands and be very violent… and the army and police will arrive too late.” Conversations almost identical to this one occur regularly. Soldiers regularly chase (or attempt to chase) Palestinians off Palestinian land. Then the soldiers tell us that they know it is Palestinian land but the settlers are "crazy" or "violent."

There is no law here. Well, on paper there is law. There is Israeli law, military law, international law… but when it comes down to it, Israel does what it likes. It has more weapons and billions of dollars from the U.S. It does not matter if the land is legally Palestinian or Israeli. Israeli settlers decide to steal land from Palestinians and the Israeli army often protects them while they do it. It is illegal under every law and people recognize its illegality, but lawlessness continues...

Woe to those who make unjust laws,
to those who issue oppressive decrees,
to deprive the poor of their rights
and withhold justice from the oppressed of my people,
making widows their prey and robbing the parentless.
What will you do on the day of reckoning,
when disaster comes from afar?
To whom will you run for help?
Where will you leave your riches? (Isaiah 10:1-3)

Israel's "Lack of Resources" Close in At-Tuwani

2006-07-23T03:56:00.000-04:00

While we are out of the line of bombs and rockets from Israel, Gaza, and Hizbollah, the dangers of daily life for villagers in At-Tuwani and the surrounding areas remain the same. In some ways they have even increased with these wars.

There are 2 settlement areas very, very close to At-Tuwani. One is called Ma’on and one is called Havat Ma’on. I think all Israeli settlements are illegal under international law as the Fourth Geneva Convention, article 49, paragraph 6, states that The Occupying Power shall not deport or transfer parts of its own civilian population into the territory it occupies. Some settlements are both illegal under international law and illegal under Israeli law.

Havat Ma’on is one such settlement. Israel has issued a demolition order for the illegal settler outpost of Havat Ma’on. It was scheduled for several weeks ago. Then Israel began attacking Gaza so they put off the evacuation of “violent, illegal settlements” for 1 week. More than 1 week passed and Israel said it will evacuate Havat Ma’on and other “violent, illegal settlements” when things in Gaza calm down. Supposedly, as long as Israel is fighting in Gaza and Lebanon, they lack the needed resources to perform and evacuation of this small illegal outpost.

Last week (July 13) I went to Jerusalem for a one-day conference on Israeli Law. As I returned to At-Tuwani I noticed a military jeep and a large flatbed truck placing concrete blocks across the one opening in the road in front of At-Tuwani. (In June 2006, the Israeli military built an eighty cm high "security" wall along the north side of bypass road 317. This construction took place despite the fact that a legal case appealing the military's decision to build the wall is still in court. At-Tuwani was one of the “fortunate” villages- When the military constructed the low “Security” wall that prevents many Palestinians from reaching Yatta, their market town, an At-Tuwani resident parked his truck in the way and the construction crew agreed to leave an opening approximately 5 meters wide in front of At-Tuwani. For almost a month, people have been able to reach Yatta by going through this opening.) This closure cuts off At-Tuwani and the surrounding villages' access to Yatta and the vast majority of the West Bank.

I arrived just in time to see the last block drop. I asked the soldiers why they were doing this. They said, "Because bad people use this road." I pointed out to them that "the wall is only 80cm high, it does not run where there are ditches by the road, and I just squeezed through the blocks. How exactly are these blocks going to keep 'bad' people from using the road?" (Plus, when I asked them, the soldiers knew nothing about any 'bad' people actually using the road. He just said, "I know they are here." ummm... ok.)

By 1pm that afternoon, we received a call saying there were problems at the road. Several Palestinians with their tractors were stuck behind the newly placed blocks. A person can fit through the blocks, but a tractor cannot. Even a donkey loaded with anything cannot fit. We waited at the road for 3 hours.

More and more police and army came and more and more Palestinians arrived from Yatta and were stuck on the other side of the blocks. The soldiers told the Palestinians that they would have to take a 15 km detour and pass through a checkpoint at Zif. Keep in mind that this is 15 km on a tractor and that the Palestinians would have to pass several Israeli settlements on the way. None of the Palestinians were willing to take this risk so eventually they parked their tractors there in the valley (behind the hills so that Israeli settlers could not see the tractors and damage them). Ironically, the war with Hizbollah was used as a reason for all of this military activity by the At-Tuwani road.

While Israel claims it does not have the resources to evacuate Havat Ma’on, they continuously find the resources to attack Gaza and Lebanon and to harrass farmers and shepherds in At-Tuwani.

The main effects on At-Tuwani and the South Hebron Hills of Israel's wars are that the people here are ignored by people other than settlers and military. All of the media is focused on the north (and rightly so), which allows the military to more freely harass Palestinians in the West Bank (in the name of "security") without the rest of the world noticing or caring.

Cycles of Violence

2006-07-22T14:11:00.000-04:00

We are safe here in At-Tuwani. Thank you very much for your concern and especially your prayers, but do not worry about us- I am in the South Hebron Hills. I am not near the bombs or rockets. In fact, a few days ago one of the villagers suggested that his house could be used as a place of refuge for some who are fleeing their homes in the north.

We get very limited news while in Tuwani. We get random messages from our neighbors like “Israel bombed the Beirut airport,” “An apartment in Haifa was hit,” and “Israel is bombing the roads and bridges in Lebanon.” Yesterday, in Yatta, I began reading the news online. I read for 10 hours, until 5am. It sickens and saddens and angers me. I am worried for my friends, Palestinian and Israeli, not to mention the entire country of Lebanon.

We are already seeing the effects of this war in the West Bank. Israel has tightened its grip on Palestinians in the name of “security.” I worry about my Israeli friends who are reservists in the army. Military service is not optional here. When an Israeli turns 18, he or she is part of the military for 3 years (sometimes 2 for women). Those (men at least) who finish their service are automatically reservists.

(picture= As they chase a Palestinian shepherd off the shepherd's land, young Israeli soldiers near At-Tuwani explain to CPT and Operation Dove, on tape, that they wish the Israeli settlers would leave because they think the settlers are crazy. They also explain to us that they have to be here if they do not want to go to prison.)

Many Israeli soldiers think what they are being forced to do is wrong. Soldiers near At-Tuwani tell us this often. It is not uncommon for Israeli soldiers to refer to the settlers as “crazy” or to tell us that they do not like what they are doing but they must do it to avoid prison. There are organizations in Israel for soldiers who are speaking out against the military and Israel’s actions in and against Palestine. “Breaking the Silence” is an organization specifically for soldiers in Hebron- it is one of the worst places to have to serve because the soldiers feel they “have” to do such horrible things to people and the settlers are incredibly violent, even against the military. Although the soldiers do have an option out of the military, it is not an easy choice. I have a lot of sympathy for the soldiers. A lot. The average soldier that we encounter is between 18-22 years old and has to be in the army or spend time in prison. All Israelis are required to serve in the military whether they agree with it or not (unless they have special circumstances) They must go to the army at age 18, postponing university and any other plans for their lives. A good Israeli friend of mine told me that the only way he stayed sane and kept from being brainwashed in the army was to begin meditating. He does not ever want to serve in the military again and yet, like most Israeli guys his age, he is a reservist. His 2 younger brothers are still in their mandatory 3 years of service. If he is called out, his parents will have all of their 3 children off at war, a war which no one in their family supports. To think of friends potentially going to war breaks my heart. It keeps me up at night and restless during the day. It is so so sad… much like the U.S., Israel is destroying its own society, as well as other societies, with enormous violence.

This cycle of violence that continues to spiral out of control reminds me of Judges 19-21. In Judges 19 a Levite and his unnamed concubine stay at a house in Gibeah while traveling on their way home. In the middle of the night, “wicked men” come to the house and demand to have sex with the Levite man (22). The owner of the home is too hospitable to allow the male Levite to be harmed by these wicked men. So, the owner of the home suggests that rather than harm the man, the wicked men take his “virgin daughter and his concubine…and… use them and do whatever [they] wish to them” (23-24). “So the man took his concubine and sent her outside to them, and they raped her and abused her throughout the night, and at dawn they let her go” (25). The Levite, who allowed this to happen to his concubine in the first place, is so angry at what the wicked men have done that he takes the dead body of his concubine home, chops her into 12 pieces and sends her throughout Israel demanding that everyone, “Consider, take counsel and speak out” (30).

The Israelites respond to this hideous crime by gathering “four hundred thousand soldiers armed with swords” (20:2). Together, all of the men decide to take revenge on Gibeah for the crime of these wicked men against the concubine (or, maybe they consider it a crime against the male Levite? A destruction of the Levite’s property, his concubine?) The men say they will “give [Gibeah in Benjamin] what they deserve for all this vileness done in Israel” (10). In the course of the battles, tens of thousands of Israelites and Benjamites die. After Israel finally defeats Benjamin, “Israel went back to the towns of Benjamin and put all the towns to the sword, including the animals and everything else that they found” (48). Over 65,000 “valiant fighters” (46) dies, but also all of the civilians of Benjamin are put to the sword for no apparent reasons? Only 600 Benjamite warriors escape.

The generous Israelite men decide that the 600 Benjamites who escaped need wives, but “the men of Israel had taken an oath at Mizpah: ‘Not one of us will give his daughter in marriage to a Benjamite” (21:1). The men decide that it is a good idea for the 600 Benjamites to have wives from Jabesh Gilead, since that tribe failed to gather at Mizpah when they made the oath. “So the assembly sent 12,000 fighting men with instructions to go to Jabesh Gilead and put to the sword those living there, including women and children” (21:10). They killed every “male and every woman who [was] not a virgin” (11). But, there was a problem- the 12,000 “fighting men” only found 400 women who “had never slept with a man” (12). The assembly sent the 400 women as an offer of peace to the 600 Benjamites, but “there were not enough for all of them” (14). However, the men of Israel come up with another plan- Knowing that the annual festival of the LORD at Shiloh is approaching, “they instructed the Benjamites, saying, ‘Go and hide in the vineyards and watch. When the girls of Shiloh come out to join in the dancing, then rush from the vineyards and each of you seize a wife from the girls of Shiloh and go to the land of Banjamin” (20-21).

“So that is what the Benjamites did” (23). They accept 400 virgins from Jabesh Gilead, after the other members of the virgins’ families were slaughtered, and they seized 200 young dancing girls from a festival in Shiloh. This was all a result of "wicked men" from Gibeah raping and torturing the unnamed concubine in Chapter 19. Men went to war, killing tens of thousands of soldiers, wiping out entire villages, and torturing more and more innocent people, namely women.

Like the suffering in Judges, the innocent still suffer today because of the actions of “wicked men” and poor decisions and actions by assemblies of the powerful with their own interests in mind. Lebanese, Israeli, Palestinian, Iraqi and U.S. civilians, mothers, fathers, brothers, sisters, young soldiers, orphans and widows all suffer because they are considered “collateral damage,” when wartime decisions are being made.. For the Israelites and Benjamites, for Israelis and Hizbollah, Palestinians and Israelis, the U.S. and Iraq, Sunnis and Shi’as, violence begets violence. It spirals out of control and does not bring peace.

Streams of tears flow from my eyes

because my people are destroyed.
My eyes will flow unceasingly,

without relief, until the LORD looks

down from heaven and sees.
What I see brings grief to my soul
Because of all the women of my city
. .(Lam 3:48-51).

(picture that a child in Iraq drew last summer. It is a picture of a US tank shooting a baby while a mother watches helplessly. Above the tank are two soldiers shooting another child. I am not sure what the other people in the picture are doing. This is the violence that this child witnesses.)

At-Tuwani Update June 28 - July 7

2006-07-22T09:50:00.000-04:00

DAILY ROUTINE
Each day the team accompanied local shepherds as they grazed and wateredtheir flocks in the early morning. Water cisterns throughout the region aredry, except the cisterns nearest to Israeli settlements and military bases.In addition to members of Operation Dove ( called Doves), CPT's partnerorganization in At-Tuwani, CPT members during this period were Angela Davis,Rich Meyer, Heidi Schramm, and Diana Zimmerman.

Wednesday 28 June
Davis and Zimmerman accompanied the shepherds to Bier Jabareen, just belowthe Israeli outpost settlement of Avigail. An Israeli soldier at thesettlement watched. About halfway through the watering process, two settlerboys with a flock of goats approached the cistern but stayed above it,closer to the settlement.

A Palestinian shepherd told the team that recently the High Court inJerusalem ruled that Israeli soldiers must make sure that Palestinians aresafe on their land. (For details of this ruling of 26 June, seewww.acri.org.il.)

Thursday 29 June
Zimmerman and a Dove accompanied Palestinian shepherds to Bier Jabareen. Two settler boys and their goats came near to the cistern but did not interferewith the watering. As the Palestinians headed home, Israeli soldiersapproached the Palestinian shepherds. The soldiers claimed that in thefuture the Palestinians needed a permit to water their flocks at thecistern. The soldiers left after ten minutes.

At 3:45 p.m., a Palestinian from At-Tuwani called and said that settlerswere by his house. By the time Davis, Zimmerman and a Dove arrived, thesettlers were gone. The Palestinian reported that two settlers came fromTel Abu Jundiya (Hill 833) to within about fifty meters of his house andthen returned to the trees. He said that in the morning the same thing hadhappened around 9:00 a.m..

At 5:00 p.m. a Dove saw groups of settlers in several locations in andaround Tel Abu Jundiya (Hill 833). An Israeli friend of the team said thata settler organization had conducted a solidarity tour of the outpost.

Friday 30 June
At 9:15 a.m. Davis and two Doves filmed a settler polluting acistern--between Khoruba and Humra, below Hill 833--by bathing in it.

In the early afternoon, a delegation from Rabbis from Human Rights andTa'ayush came to the nearby village of Qawawis to replace hay bales burnedby settlers. Israeli military and police observed the gathering but did notinterfere.Saturday

1 July 2006
At 7:45 a.m. a Palestinian from At-Tuwani called to say settlers were nearhis house. By the time CPTers and Doves arrived, the settlers had left.The family said two settlers had come close to the home.

At 5:30 p.m. internationals and Palestinians observed settlers walkingaround Hill 833 outpost but the settlers did not approach the village.Sunday

2 July 2006
Davis and two Doves accompanied Palestinian shepherds to Bier Jabareen. AnIsraeli soldier watched from the outpost. At 9:25 a.m., two soldiers camefrom the outpost and spoke with the first soldier. The soldiers then cameto the cistern and spoke in Hebrew with the Palestinian men that werewatering the sheep at that moment. The Palestinian shepherds said thatthe soldiers claimed that the land and the cistern were off-limits toPalestinians. The Palestinians disagreed.

The soldiers made some phone calls then spoke with Palestinians again beforeleaving. The shepherds reported that after checking, soldiers said that thePalestinian shepherds are allowed to water their sheep there but only oneflock at a time may be at the cistern.

Monday3 July 2006
Meyer and a Dove went to Bier Jabareen with Palestinian shepherds to watertheir sheep and goats. After about half the flocks received water, threesoldiers walked down from Avigail and ordered all the shepherds to leave.The Dove talked to the soldiers while Meyer called Israeli advocates, thenMeyer and the Dove waited with the shepherds a hundred meters east of thecistern. An hour later one Israeli soldier returned and said the shepherdscould water their flocks at the cistern, only they should approach frombeside or below, and not cross the ridge to the east any higher than thecistern. By this time the flocks had dispersed, and none returned to thecistern.

Tuesday 4 July 2006
Davis, Meyer and a Dove went to Bier Jabareen in the morning. A settlementsecurity officer and one soldier watched. Once when a herd of sheep waitingtheir turn at the cistern grazed above the cistern, the soldier went to talkto the shepherd. All the flocks received water without further incident.

Around 5:00 p.m. three settlers attacked a Palestinian shepherd from MagaerAl-Abeed, his son and their sheep. The three settlers drove up in a truckthen attacked them with rocks hurled from slingshots. The settlers broketwo sheep's legs and hit the nine-year-old Palestinian boy in his left leg.Meyer called the Israeli police. After thirty minutes, a police jeep withtwo officers arrived in At-Tuwani. When Meyer told the police that thevictims of the attack were in Magaer Al Abeed, not At-Tuwani, the policesaid they are afraid to drive to Magaer Al Abeed. One police officer saidthat the Havot Ma'on settlers are supposed to be evacuated and he "will beglad when they are gone." He said, "We are only two police. We need awhole army to go in there. The settlers will break our windows." They saidthat the victims of the attack needed to come to At-Tuwani to make thereport. Later, the team learned that the police told the victim of theattack the same thing--that they are afraid of the settlers. The victim ofthe attack asked the police, "If you are afraid of the settlers, how do youthink I feel?"

Wednesday 5 July, 2006
Twelve flocks came for water at Bier Jabareen. The settlement soldierwatched from a distance, but no incidents occurred.

At 9:35 a.m. the team received a report that a settler set fire to aPalestinian home near Susiya. Meyer and a Dove went to Susiya. Theyarrived as a police jeep left, and found that the tarp roof had been burnedoff of a stone house. The team learned that the police had arrested theIsraeli settler suspected of lighting the fire.

At 12:20 p.m. two Israeli soldiers delivered an order for a closed militaryzone. The area affected is twenty-four dunams (six acres) at the junction ofthe road from Yatta and route 317. One soldier said the military needed touse some land for forty-five days because they have a "big operation."

Friday 7 July 2006
At 4:45 p.m., Zimmerman, Schramm and a Dove saw Israeli soldiers stoppingPalestinian tractors and vehicles coming from Yatta. These includedvehicles coming to At-Tuwani for a wedding ceremony. The soldiers weredemanding that some drivers take the license plates off their cars.Zimmerman approached the soldiers to ask them to allow the wedding party topass, and a few minutes later the wedding party drove into At-Tuwani,including a few vehicles without license plates. The Israeli soldiers laterallowed the wedding party to return to Yatta without hindrance.

"If I can't dance...

2006-07-08T03:50:00.000-04:00

... I don't want to be in your revolution." (Emma Goldman)

I fell in love with At-Tuwani Wednesday night. There was a wedding party, one of like 5 or 6 before the actual wedding. At these parties, the men and women split and do separate things. The women had fun drinking tea and dancing. The men sat around, smoked and watched television.

As the women gathered, I looked around the room at all of those beautiful, beautiful mothers and daughters as they shed their hijabs (head coverings) and I thought, "yes... i could love this place..." I realized that this was my first time to be with only women since I arrived in Palestine. Life is different in a room full of only women. I like it. There is more freedom- more room to dance.

ana min amerca

2006-07-07T14:28:00.000-04:00

Since I began working with CPT, the same question has nagged me- By walking with people through injustice do we succeed in undoing oppression or in maintaining systems of oppression?

In Hebron we walk with children through checkpoints each day. An international presence often, though not always, prevents soldiers from detaining students for too too long.

CPT and other international groups regularly accompany farmers in their fields in order to prevent settler violence against the Palestinians and to prevent the military from chasing Palestinians off their farmland. This works- if one’s goal is simply to use the land for that one day. Or in Hebron, to go to school that one day.

It puts a bandaid on the situation. But what about long-term? Israeli settlers still have the power to abuse Palestinians. The Israeli government still receives billions of dollars from the U.S., much of which it uses for military operations against Palestinians. Israel still practices land confiscation and home demolitions. Gaza is still one large prison in which children and adults fight and die. Palestinians are still prevented from reaching their jobs, families, and land. The system does not change just because we walk one child through a checkpoint or sit in a field with one farmer. If anything, I wonder if an unjust system is strengthened by the fact that we as internationals use our unearned privilege to put bandaids on unjust situations.

While sitting in the field with Mahmoud (not his real name), he told us “The soldiers beat my sheep when you don’t come with me.” A few weeks ago teammates said that Mahmoud was so frustrated with this that he wanted CPTers and Operation Dove to hide behind a tree in the settler outpost and wait for the soldiers to come beat his sheep and catch the soldiers on video tape. He says that every time he is alone, the soldiers beat his sheep. For several days we sat with Mahmoud while his sheep grazed. Everyday settlers came out of their house and everyday the military came and told Mahmoud that he had to leave (but they did not beat his sheep). The military was wrong. Mahmoud did not have to leave. The land belongs to a family in a nearby village. Eventually, the soldiers chased Mahmoud away from that land. The day that they finally made him leave, they let us (the internationals) stay on the land (we were debating the law with the soldiers so it took a second for us to realize the absurdity of what was happening). The land definitely does not belong to me. Why was I allowed to remain while Mahmoud had to leave?

Another villager told us “The soldiers are just waiting until the minute you leave… then…” & he just shook his head...

A child in the village once told a soldier who was detaining his father, “be nice or my father will call the internationals.” What does this dynamic teach children?! They see their fathers detained by Israeli soldiers and beat by Israeli settlers. They know that Israelis can use certain roads and go certain places that Palestinians are forbidden. They know that the settlement next door to them has electricity and water while they do not. They know Israeli children can go to school without being beaten. Then they see these random internationals walk into their village with the power to alter certain situations. For some reason, Israeli soldiers can beat Palestinians on public streets but they cannot beat them in front of me? Who am I that soldiers think twice about what they do in front of me and my video camera? Why are they not held to the same accountability in front of Palestinians? Frequently when soldiers are detaining Palestinians they let the Palestinians go when internationals simply come into view. We have some power, but why? Where does it come from? Skin color? Passport?

By relying on these unearned and unjust privileges to put temporary “bandaids” on immediate physical problems, do we encourage a system that privileges citizens of certain countries? I cannot find a way to answer “no” to this question. I think our presence reinforces our privilege and in that way disempowers Palestinians.

Yet, Palestinians in the South Hebron Hills invited us here and want us to stay. Many say that our presence empowers them to go where they may not go otherwise, etc. i.e. our privilege allows them access to what would otherwise be Jewish-only… so what do we do?

In our last meeting, another CPTer raised a similar question to the one with which I have been struggling- Are we reinforcing systems of oppression by exploiting our privilege? We came up with no real answers except that CPT’s work on the ground here in Palestine is part of a larger movement. Being in Palestine is often just putting a bandaid on the immediate abuse. We write about the situation and work with other groups who take a more active role in changing policies and systems.

I do not know how to live in right relationship with my neighbors here and around the world. How do we live justly with Palestinian sisters and brothers? Is it by staying in the U.S. and working to change the U.S.’s unjust policies toward Palestine? Or is there some better way to live and work with Palestinians here in Palestine? A way that does not use or depend upon privilege? Is there a such thing as solidarity?

Our work is based on a belief that the nonviolent ways of Jesus actually work- that nonviolence is more powerful than violence, that good overcomes evil, love hate, and peace war. But when everything is entangled with different systems of privilege, I find it hard to know if it is the power of nonviolence or the power of passport that is at work in different situations here.

Stop Attacks in Gaza

2006-07-07T12:46:00.000-04:00

As many of you have seen in the news, there is a huge humanitarian crisis in Gaza. Israel is targeting civilians and civilan infrastructure. "The EU condemns the loss of lives caused by disproportionate use of force by the Israeli Defence Forces and the humanitarian crisis it has aggravated," said Finnish Prime Minister Matti Vanhanen. Israeli Prime Minister Olmert told his cabinet, "I take personal responsibility for what is happening in Gaza. I want no one in Gaza to sleep at night. I want them to know what it feels like." What exactly does Olmert want people in Gaza to know??? “Sonic booms shatter the night skies, making sleep all but impossible. Waking in the morning, mothers cannot prepare breakfasts, nor children shower and wash - there is so little water. Leaving home, children find the streets and alleys en route to schools strewn with sewage. Delivery of water and maintenance of sewage disposal is dependent upon electricity – a sporadic commodity these days," says the UN Relief and Work Agency.

This action alert was sent out on June 30 by the U.S. Campaign to End the Israeli Occupation. I really suggest taking some action to try to stop the targeting of civilians by Israel. This alert offers 4 suggestions.

ACTION ALERT: Stop Israel’s Attacks on Gaza June 30th, 2006

BACKGROUND: Israel is using weapons supplied by the United States to target Palestinian civilians and civilian infrastructure in the Gaza Strip in violation of the US Arms Export Control Act and the Geneva Conventions.

* On June 9th, Israel shelled a beach in Beit Lahiya killing 8 civilians and injuring 32. At the site of the killing, Human Rights Watch found evidence of a 155mm artillery shell consistent with those fired from an Israeli M-109 Self-Propelled Artillery. Between 2000-2005, the United States licensed to Israel $69,163 worth of M-109 spare parts and 155mm artillery shells.*

* On June 13th, Israeli aircraft fired missiles at a van in an extrajudicial assassination of two Palestinians in Gaza City. A second barrage of missiles fired shortly afterward killed nine Palestinian bystanders.

* On June 20th, Israeli aircraft fired at least one missile at a car in an extrajudicial assassination attempt on a road between Jabalya and Gaza City. The missile missed its intended target and killed three Palestinian children and wounded 15.

* On June 27th, Israel launched a massive invasion of the Gaza Strip. Israeli aircraft fired missiles targeting civilian infrastructure. In illegal acts of collective punishment, Israel demolished three key bridges, the Gaza Strip’s only electricity generation plant, and part of a university, thereby endangering Palestinian human rights to food, water, health, electricity, education, and freedom of movement. Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert admitted that the purpose of these measures is to “apply pressure” to the civilian population of the Gaza Strip.
The Israeli air force fighter squadrons are composed of Lockheed Martin F-16I Fighting Falcons and Boeing F-15Is, which fire US-manufactured AMRAAM, Sidewinder, and Sparrow missiles. Between 2005-2005, the United States licensed to Israel at least $1.062 billion of spare parts, engines, and missiles for its F-15 and F-16 fighter planes.*

Israel’s month of killing civilians and destroying civilian infrastructure in the Gaza Strip is a clear reminder that Israel remains the occupying power of the Gaza Strip despite last year’s “unilateral disengagement”. Living under military occupation, the Palestinians of the Gaza Strip are “protected persons” under the terms of the Geneva Conventions. Israel’s targeting of civilians and civilian infrastructure in the Gaza Strip is a violation of the Geneva Conventions and constitutes war crimes.

In addition, by using US-supplied weapons to commit these atrocities, Israel is violating the terms of the US Arms Export Control Act and Foreign Assistance Act. The Arms Export Control Act restricts the use of US weapons to legitimate self-defense and internal policing; US weapons cannot be used to attack civilians in offensive operations. The Foreign Assistance Act prohibits US aid of any kind to a country with a pattern of gross human rights violations.

TAKE ACTION: Hold Israel to account for its killing of civilians and destruction of civilian infrastructure in the Gaza Strip.

1. This extended holiday weekend, organize a protest or vigil in your community. Distribute flyers at your community’s July 4th celebration to educate people that Palestinians are not free to enjoy independence and self-determination because of US support for Israel’s denial of human rights to Palestinians. Post your event on our on-line calendar at: http://www.endtheoccupation.org/calendar_input.php

2. Contact the White House, State Department, and your Members of Congress to demand that Israel is held accountable for its violations of the US Arms Export Control Act and Foreign Assistance Act and urge that military aid to Israel be cut off as required by law. Click here to send an email: http://www.democracyinaction.org/dia/organizationsORG/uscampaign/campaign.jsp?campaign_KEY=4460

3. Write a letter to the editor or op-ed for your local newspaper and call your local talk radio stations to protest Israel’s atrocities in the Gaza Strip and highlight US support for these actions. For contact information for your local media, click here: http://www.congress.org/congressorg/dbq/media/

4. Make a donation to support humanitarian efforts to reprovision the Gaza Strip with much-needed medical supplies for Palestinian children. The Middle East Children’s Alliance, a member organization of the US Campaign, is accepting tax-deductible donations to send medical supplies. Click here to donate: http://www.mecaforpeace.org/GazaMeds.html

* Statistics for US weapons licensed to Israel are compiled from the State Department’s annual report to Congress pursuant to Sec. 655 of the Foreign Assistance Act. For more information, click here: http://pmddtc.state.gov/

About At-Tuwani...

2006-07-06T09:08:00.000-04:00

I think I already mentioned this… Tuwani is a gorgeous village. (More pictures from At-Tuwani are at http://www.flickr.com/photos/angelapalestine/ in the "Tuwani" set.) At-Tuwani is a Palestinian village of a little more than 150 people in the South Hebron Hills. Many Palestinian families have been dwelling in caves in the South Hebron Hills for hundreds of years. There are 4 or 5 main families here. Almost everyone is related to everyone else and everyone knows everyone. While Hebron is more inner-city and a pretty rough place, At-Tuwani is very rural and friendly. There is no crime within the village (of which I’m aware). Our door is wide open, even at night & most of us sleep outside. I sleep on our neighbor’s roof, under the stars and wake to the sunrise each morning. Every morning I open my eyes, sit up, & think, “God, this is amazing...” &... then I crawl back under my blanket, cover my eyes & go back to sleep for another hour or so :) I think living like this is good for the soul. In many ways, Tuwani is a little paradise.

But then there is occupation. Most mornings we go out around 7am and sit in the hills with shepherds until 11 or 12 while their sheep graze. Every day that I have been here we've encountered Israeli settlers, police, soldiers or all three. These encounters are not pleasant. Occupation is not nice.

People in At-Tuwani and surrounding Palestinian villages suffer a lot of abuse at the hands of Israeli settlers, soldiers, and police. The first Israeli settlers came to At-Tuwani in the 1980s. Settlers began attacking Palestinian shepherds with clubs in 1984. More recently, settlers have filled an At-Tuwani water cistern with dead chickens, contaminating all of the water and making it undrinkable (April 2004). Settlers also put rat poison in the fields, poisoning At-Tuwani sheep and goats (Spring 2005). They have also poisoned drinking water, stolen livestock, and beat and harassed people. The history of abuse by settlers and soldiers to Palestinians in At-Tuwani alone is ridiculously long, not to mention the abuse all over Palestine. Every family in At-Tuwani has suffered direct abuse. (Lots of details in CPT-Tuwani's media packet at http://www.cpt.org/hebron/documents/Tuwani_media_packet.doc)

CPT joined Operation Dove, an Italian organization, and began a permanent presence in At-Tuwani last spring. Before then CPT had a temporary presence beginning in September 2004. Both CPT and Operation Dove try to keep at least 2 members in At-Tuwani at all times. We share a 1-room house and work together as 1 team. During the school year, CPTers and Operation Dove used to walk with children from the nearby village Tuba to the school in At-Tuwani. The Tuba children have to walk past the settlement of Ma’on and the illegal settler outpost of Havat Ma’on.

On September 29, 2004 5 masked settlers came out of the illegal Havat Ma’on settler outpost to attack during the walk to school. The settlers beat two CPTers with chains. They broke one woman’s arm and leg and punctured a man’s lung. The settlers also stole the woman’s money, passport, and cell phone. Then on October 9, 8 masked Israeli settlers attacked CPTers, Operation Dove, a villager from At-Tuwani, 2 people from Tuba, and 2 members of British Amnesty International with sticks and slingshots. In Febreuary 2005, CPTers and Operation Dove were attacked by settlers as they walked with a shepherd grazing his sheep. This time several volunteers obtained bruises. One member of Operation Dove was severely beaten. He sustained a broken jaw, permanent eye damage, and memory loss. After the October 2004 attack, the army and police decided that internationals could no longer accompany the Tuba school children. The military recognizes that the Israeli settlers are extremely violent and pose a significant threat to children going to school and decide that that all accompanipent would be done by the military and police.

Sometimes the police escort works well for the children- there was once a group of soldiers that the children called "the good soldiers." & sometimes there are problems with the police escort. Sometimes it does not show up, sometimes it is very late, and sometimes Israeli settlers attack the Israeli police and soldiers. One time when settlers attacked the police escort, the Tuba school children jumped in the Hummer to hide. The military and the school children sat in the hummer while settlers attacked the vehicle. Supposedly one of the children asked a soldier, “Are you afraid of the settlers too?” The military escort protects the children at times, but often the military and police are powerless in the face of Israeli settlers. At other times, the military looks on while settlers abuse the children. And, sometimes the soldiers are the ones abusing the children. Sometimes the escort drives so fast that the children cannot keep up even while running. Once a settler woman tried to take a small Palestinian child- the military watched and did nothing. Other children had to grab the child to keep her from taking him.

Other than direct violence by settlers, soldiers, and police, the villages in the south Hebron hills are currently enduring a severe drought and protesting a low “security” wall that hinders normal trade and travel.

The low wall is 80 cm high and runs along Route 317, the highway that separates At-Tuwani and neighboring villages from Yatta, their main market town. Before the low wall, villagers could walk across the highway and bring their flocks and products to Yatta to sell. Some people work in Yatta and some go to school there. Others need to drive cars and tractors to Yatta. The wall is low enough for a healthy person to climb, but livestock and vehicles cannot pass the wall. There is an opening in front of At-Tuwani. So as of now Tuwani villagers can still go on the road to Yatta. But people from several nearby villagers must walk down Route 317, passing Jewish settlements, in order to find an opening in the low wall. This is very dangerous for Palestinians. The risk of Israeli settler violence against them is high. Plus, I'm not sure how an 80 cm wall helps security? The only purpose it seems to serve is to restrict and inconvenience Palestinians in hopes that life will become so hard for Palestinians that one by one Palestinian families will leave the area.

Lack of water is a HUGE issue here. While the Israeli settlements have running water, the Palestinian villages have almost-dry wells. When a village is very low on water, they take their sheep and goats to nearby wells to water the flocks. Two cisterns that still have water happen to be very close to Israeli settlements (but still on Palestinian land). Lately we have been going with shepherds from a village called Mfakara to a large well near the illegal settlement of Avi Gail. The first day that the Palestinian shepherds tried to use this well, soldiers chased them off. The next day we went with the shepherds. For several days, soldiers would appear and tell the Palestinians that they could not be at the well. But the soldiers have not actually made anyone leave the well since we have been going. Finally one soldier came to correct the other soldiers. He said that actually the Palestinians can use this well. The settlement of Avi Gail is illegal even under Israeli law. The well is not in the settlement and is on Palestinian land. There is no reason why the well would belong to an illegal Israeli settlement. Some settlers in Israel have swimming pools, bath tubs, and access to the sea. Our neigbor in Tuwani puts her 1 year old in a bucket with an inch of "gray" (re-used) water so he can "swim." I'm not sure that there is a total lack of water. I think perhaps there is enough water (despite the drought)- the water just needs to be shared more equally. There are regular demonstrations around villages in the South Hebron Hills in attempts to get water.

CPT At-Tuwani Update June 16-27

2006-07-06T08:21:00.000-04:00

This is an update that CPT-Tuwani sent out to our Palestine list serve. It's a shortened version of our daily log-

Daily routine:
Each day the team accompanied local shepherds in nearby areas; because of the warmer weather, the shepherds tended to go out in the early morning and then again in the late afternoon. In addition to Operation Dove (Doves), CPT’s partner organization in At-Tuwani, CPT team members during this period were Angela Davis, Diane Janzen, Heidi Schramm and Diana Zimmerman.

Friday 16 June
Davis, Schramm and a Dove accompanied shepherds in Khoruba valley. After an hour of grazing, soldiers arrived and threatened to make the area a closed military zone if the sheep grazed on a hill close to an area claimed by settlers. The shepherd continued to graze his sheep and the soldiers observed.
In the evening, the team helped water and tend the olive tree in the garden that the village dedicated to Tom Fox.

Saturday 17 June
In the morning while accompanying shepherds in Khoruba, Schramm and two Doves noticed people running from the village of Tuba. They called a friend who lives in Tuba who said that settlers had just come into the village and stolen the family donkey. Schramm and a Dove walked to Tuba and remained with the family until the police arrived, after more than ten phone calls, to investigate the crime. The police refused to go into the outpost to look for the stolen donkey.
Soldiers again approached the shepherds grazing in Khoruba and told them they could not graze their sheep in the area. The team saw the soldiers speaking with some settlers and settler security before approaching the flocks. The areas that these soldiers said were closed, were areas that soldiers of the previous day said were open for Palestinian use. When questioned about his orders, one of the soldiers said, nodding his head toward the settlers observing from a hill, “I know they are a little crazy, but they don’t want you here, so you must leave. After all they are still Israelis.” The shepherds decided to leave rather than risk arrest.
In the afternoon, the army and border police set up a checkpoint along 317 outside At-Tuwani. Soldiers and border police officers assaulted one of the men from the village. The man told the team that he was assaulted when did not approach the correct soldier. He said the soldiers and border police said different things to him, and then hit him when he obeyed one over another.

Sunday 18 June
An Israeli settler vehicle drove through the village but did not stop.

Monday 19 June
While on Khoruba hill accompanying shepherds, Israeli police officers approached Schramm and a Dove and demanded to see their passports. One of the police officers told the two that when they are present with the Palestinians it makes it impossible for him to do his job.

Thursday 22 June
Schramm and Davis observed a temporary Israeli checkpoint along route 317. The soldiers operated the checkpoint for about 90 minutes before leaving. They allowed the Palestinians to pass after cursory checks of cars and ID’s.
Davis and a Dove along with a Palestinian friend visited a family in Karmil, a nearby town. One child from the family was killed and three were injured last year when they found unexploded ordinance near the village of Jinba. The father requested that in the future members from CPT accompany him to the site of the explosion to see if any pieces remain. The family believes it was an Israeli bomb but needs evidence for proof. The father said that he is not ready to return yet.

Friday 23 June
A friend of the team reported that two days earlier settlers prevented shepherds from watering their sheep near the Palestinian village of Susiya.
In the evening soldiers set up a checkpoint along route 317 outside At-Tuwani. Soldiers allowed most cars to pass with minimal searching. Soldiers stopped one Palestinian car for about 40 minutes because one of the men in the car did not have his ID. Eventually the soldiers allowed the car to pass.

Saturday 24 June
Davis and two Doves attended a demonstration in the village of Imneizil. The people of Imneizil do not have an opening in the low “security” wall that runs along route 317. Without an opening in the wall, it is very difficult for them to travel north to Yatta and the rest of the West Bank. During the demonstration an officer from the District Coordinating Office (DCO) in Hebron (the civilian affairs branch of the Israeli military) verbally promised that an opening will be made in the wall.
In the afternoon the Israeli army again placed a temporary checkpoint along route 317 outside At-Tuwani. Zimmerman and two Doves observed the checkpoint for an hour until the soldiers left.

Sunday 25 June
A Reuters television crew interviewed Schramm about CPT’s work in At-Tuwani and the effects of having the settlement of Ma’on and outpost of Havot Ma’on so close to the village.

Monday 26 June
Two Doves accompanied shepherds from the village of Mufakara as they watered their sheep. On Sunday three soldiers prevented one of the women from watering her sheep from Beir Jabareen, a large cistern near the Israeli settler outpost of Avi Gail. The people of Mufakara are taking their sheep to this cistern because the water level in Mufakara cisterns is critically low and used only for human consumption.
The morning grazing and watering occurred without incident, but on the journey back to Mufakara two settlers approached the shepherds and told them the land was forbidden to them. The shepherds continued home. Twenty minutes later a police vehicle, with the two settlers inside, approached the group and told them they were leaving a forbidden area. The police stated that an officer from the DCO would come to Mufakara to tell them the same thing. The DCO officer never came.
In the afternoon, Zimmerman and a Dove accompanied the same shepherds from the morning. The shepherds grazed their sheep in the previously declared forbidden area without incident
The team learned that settlers set thirteen large bales of animal feed on fire the night before near the village of Qawawis.

Tuesday 27 June
Zimmerman and two Doves accompanied the shepherds from Mufakara back to the Beir Jabareen cistern to water their sheep. A settler boy with some goats herded his flock near the well and a soldier from the outpost of Avi Gail observed the activity; no one approached the group or halted the process.

Pictures

2006-06-26T17:13:00.000-04:00

Here are a few pictures from Hebron & At-Tuwani. I'll try to add more there on my next day with internet-
http://www.flickr.com/photos/angelapalestine/

No More of This!

2006-06-26T16:54:00.000-04:00

I moved to At-Tuwani last Thursday, June 15. There is no internet there. But I get a day or 2 off every 7-10(ish) days. So I’ll try to write something during those days off. CPT has an apartment in Yatta, a town not too far from Tuwani (I don’t know the miles- I know it is a 25 minute walk and then a 15 minute taxi ride.). We come to Yatta for a shower and internet on an off day. I just had 2 wonderful and relaxing days off. I spent all day yesterday at a spring outside of Jerusalem with a good Israeli friend of mine, with whom I volunteered at an AIDS orphanage in Ethiopia. Now I’m in Yatta for the night. When people go on “days off,” they usually return with world news, fruits, peanut butter, and other treats.

Last Friday a teammate returned from days off in Yatta with news of a bombing in Basra, Iraq, of dead soldiers, and of a “state of emergency” in Baghdad. After hearing the world news that she shared, I walked up a hill to sit under “the big tree,” amidst the beauty of At-Tuwani and to try to remember that there is a good God- A God who sustains hope and life amidst the despair and death in Iraq, and the injustice and imprisonment in Palestine.

I love the village of At-Tuwani though I do still want to be in Iraq … But I learned that I will not be going to Iraq this summer. Two women from CPT went on a short trip to northern Iraq a couple of weeks ago. Now no CPTers are in Iraq, but they are looking to send a small experienced team in again. The team will be CPTers with Iraqi residency because it is becoming close to impossible for us to get visas. Because I have neither a lot of experience nor a visa, I will not be able to go to Iraq this summer. It’s frustrating to hear news from Iraq and not be there with people.

I keep wondering how many more people have to die before we realize what a terrible, terrible mess we have made in Iraq. When will we learn that more guns and more bombs will not bring peace to Iraq or security to the U.S.?

In Iraq, coalition forces hold over 14,000 people in prison. According to the Red Cross, 70-90% of these detainees have no charges (not to mention that the U.S. has no authority to imprison people in an occupied country- therefore making 100% of Iraqi detainees without legitimate charges). There is no way that actions such as these by the U.S. help U.S. security. Actions like these make people all over the world legitimately hate us.

When I was in Baghdad last June we met with a man at the Iraqi Assistance Center in the fortified Green Zone. He told us that they used to track detainees by a name, number and crime. But they had stopped using the category of crime because “most of them are not real anyway.” Can you imagine a whole society terrorized by the threat of prison- specifically the threat of brutal prison where many have been tortured and some killed? People are taken from their homes and families because of their gender, race, and/or location. Families often do not know the whereabouts of those detained for months or years. Most detainees are innocent sons, husbands, and brothers. About 70-90% have NO charges against them. This is completely illegal and immoral.

Families who have suffered through sanctions are now struggling to survive in a country ravaged by urban warfare. Many Iraqis have fled, causing Iraq to lose large numbers of workers- doctors, teachers, etc. Others cannot get to work because of bombs and checkpoints. Last summer several Iraqi people told us that they wanted the U.S. occupation to end, but they were afraid that if the U.S. left there would be civil war. Others simply wanted the U.S. to leave immediately. The U.S. did not leave and now, a year later, the headlines read “At Least 26 Killed in Iraqi Violence,” “Iraqis Call State of Emergency in Baghdad,” and “Deadly Street Battles Prompt Daytime Baghdad Curfew.”

Over 2,500 U.S. troops have died and hundreds of thousands of Iraqis, mostly civilians. We invaded Iraq in the name of democracy, freedom, security and even in the name of Jesus. But we have not brought democracy or freedom. We have brought death, captivity and civil war. And I find it difficult to fathom that the God who dwelt among us as Jesus, and who dwells among us now, condones such bloodshed.

How can we kill in the name of Jesus? In the name of a man who, while being executed, prayed, “Father, forgive them…” A man who preached turning the other cheek, love of enemy, and unconditional forgiveness… a man who, when his own disciple defended him by cutting off the ear of one who came to arrest him, Jesus healed his enemy’s ear and reprimanded his disciple saying, “No more of this!”…”Put away your sword.” (Luke 22 & Matt 26)

If we wish to act in the name of Jesus in the world, I wonder why we do not try living as Jesus lived- selflessly, justly, and honestly.

While sitting under the stars, sipping mint tea in a village meeting in At-Tuwani last week I started giggling. My teammate looked at me funny so I turned to her and said, “So this is a what a meeting of terrorists is like, huh?” She smiled & sarcastically said, “I guess so. I guess this is what the U.S. and Israel are searching for”- a group of Arab men sipping tea and discussing the stars, water shortages, and the possibility of using their land and keeping their homes.

Often when we ask the Israeli soldiers why they are in the village or why they are preventing shepherds from watering their sheep or why they are detaining young children on their way to school, a common answer is, “We are looking for terrorists.” One of the villagers said that once when a soldier asked him about the location of terrorist activity, he paused, thought about the meaning of terrorism, and then said, “I think they live in Havat Ma’on,” the illegal Israeli settlement nearest Tuwani.

Settlers in Havat Ma’on have poisoned the village’s drinking water and grass, causing many sheep (the villagers' livelihood) to die. The sheep that did not die could not be sold because neighboring towns heard of the poisoning and would not buy Tuwani products. This winter a settler entered the village and began shooting a machine gun. Thankfully, no one was hurt. Almost daily the settlers prevent shepherds from using Palestinian land and water cisterns. Despite these acts of terror, it is the Palestinian shepherds and farmers who are labeled “terrorists.”

It seems that our understandings are twisted. We can open a dictionary, read the meanings of democracy, freedom, security, and terrorism, and see that the definitions and many of our claims do not match. We can look at the outcome of the Palestinian democratic elections and see that it is not democracy that the U.S. or Israel wants. Palestinians democratically elected Hamas. We can look at the horrendous prison “system” in Iraq and see that the U.S. is not overly concerned with the freedom of the Iraqi people. If we want security, we should not make more enemies by abusing and killing people. And if we are looking for terrorists, we should look to all who use unlawful and extreme abuse and violence. Perhaps we need to rethink the question that the Israeli soldiers are always asking, “Who are the terrorists?” Who is illegally detaining and imprisoning people? Who is killing hundreds of thousands of people in the world? And Who is making money from it? Who are the terrorists? And, is all of this really in the name of God? or is Jesus still crying out, “No more of this! Put away your sword.”?

A Glimpse at Hebron

2006-06-13T19:18:00.000-04:00

I'm moving from Hebron to At-Tuwani on Thursday. Tuwani is a small village in the south Hebron hills where CPT has a team. I've been meaning to share a little bit about the history of Hebron... Here is a bit before I leave Hebron. I was lazy- so a lot of this information was typed up by another CPTer a while back. It is in italics.

Hebron is an amazing city full of history. I love walking the streets and paths with my teammate John. He knows the buildings and the history well and he loves this place. He always says things like, “Just think, it’s likely that Abraham and Sarah walked this same path.” Or, “Rebekah probably drew her water from this spring.”

We can see Machpelah (Genesis 23), or the “tomb of the patriarchs (the mosque/synagogue where Sarah, Abraham, Isaac, Rebekah, Jacob, and Leah are reportedly buried) from our roof and we walk past the tomb each day. (it’s odd that it is called the “tomb of the patriarchs” since the tomb was originally for Sarah, the matriarch…)

Hebron is one of the oldest continuously occupied cities in the world… Herod the Great built a wall around the Cave of Machpelah, the tomb of the Patriarchs, portions of which are still visible. A church was built on top of Herod's structure during the Byzantine period. The building was later converted to a Mosque during the Arab conquest in 638, re-converted by the Crusaders into a church in 1100, and reconverted into a mosque under the Mamluk Turks in 1260.

In the 1500's, Jews fleeing from the Inquisitions in Europe founded the Jewish Quarter in Hebron. (Incidentally, Muslims fleeing from Spain for the same reason also settled in Hebron around this time. One can see the Spanish influence lingering in certain place names, such as Al Andalus mall and Cordoba school.) In the early twentieth century, the Jewish community swelled when hundreds of Hasidim from Poland came to study there.

From all reports, it appears that the Jewish and Arab communities lived in peace...

The 1929 massacre in the Jewish quarter continues to live as a recent memory in the minds of both Jews and Arabs in Hebron. At least 67 men, women and children were hacked to death by an Arab mob. Almost 400 residents of the Jewish quarter, however, were saved by their Arab neighbors. (Presently a group of Jewish families who lived in Hebron pre-1929 are speaking out against the illegal Israeli settlements and military abuses that take place against Palestinians in Hebron.)

CPT talked to an old man in Hebron who was 13 at the time of the Hebron massacre. He had served as a "shabbos goy" to a family living in the community (i.e. he came into the house to turn the lights on and off on during the Sabbath.) On the morning of the massacre, he watched British soldiers among the Arab mob open the gates and tell the mob to "get the Jews."

Hebronites claim that the mob was entirely composed of people from outside Hebron.

In 1931, 31 Jewish families returned to Hebron and re-established the community. In 1936 the British evacuated them, saying they feared another massacre.

In April of 1968, Rabbi Moshe Levinger and a band of armed settlers, posing as Swiss tourists, took over the only hotel in Hebron and stated that they did not intend to leave. To appease them, the army gave them an abandoned military camp on the outskirts of Hebron. This site became the first settlement here, the settlement of Kiryat Arba (which is now a very large Israeli settlement right outside of Hebron).

Now there are 4 other settlements actually inside the city of Hebron. These numbers are not exact- but there are around 140,000 Palestinians in the city of Hebron and around 500 Israeli settlers inside the city of Hebron, in the 4 settlements (Avraham Avinu, Beit Romano, Beit Hadassah, and Tel Rumeida), as well as a couple thousand Israeli soldiers.

We walk by Avraham Avinu settlement each day as we leave the Old City of Hebron. The Israeli settlers throw their trash out their windows and into the souq, the Palestinian market. Here is a picture of the nets on which Palestinians in the Old City rely to keep the settlers’ garbage out of the stores and streets. One can see everything from furniture to beer bottles to dirty Kleenex overhead as one heads to school, work, or worship. Very lovely….

In February 1994, the settler Dr. Baruch Goldstein entered the Ibrahimi mosque and massacred 29 Muslim men and boys as they prayed on the last Friday in Ramadan. The Israeli Defense Force (IDF) shot more in the demonstrations that followed. A large monument to Baruch Goldstein, "the martyr," lies near the entrance of Kiryat Arba in Meir Kahane park. (Goldstein was beaten to death with a fire extinguisher by two men in the mosque. The Israeli Defense Force shot them.) Some Jewish Israelis come there to pray.

(Here a Palestinian man prays inside the mosque by the tomb of Abraham.)

In response, the army put all Palestinians in Hebron under curfew for two months, but allowed the settlers to roam the streets freely. By the time our Christian Peacemaker Team arrived here in 1995, Palestinians expressed as much bitterness about the collective punishment as they did about the massacre. Curfew means that all Palestinians had to be inside their homes by a certain hour and sometimes for days at a time. Curfews prevented people from working, going to school, seeing family, worshipping together, and even buying food.

(A child walks to school through a checkpoint as a CPT delegate watches.)

Today the 4 settlements remain inside the city and the settlement of Kiryat Arba remains outside of Hebron. The main road by the Old City of Hebron that passes by the tomb is called Shuhada St. This street used to be lined with Palestinian shops and homes. Many Palestinians still live in the homes but they cannot get out of their front doors because they have been welded shut. Only Israeli settlers are allowed on the main road. Palestinians must take longer, inconvenient routes. The Palestinian shops on Shuhada St are almost all closed. The front doors to Palestinian homes on Shuhada St are vandalized by settlers. Our next door neighbor has had her window broken twice in the last 2 weeks. Israeli settlers walking down Shuhada St at night throw stones at her windows. if they fail to actually break a window, the settlers succeed in keeping our neighbor awake. It is harder and harder for Palestinians in the Old City (where the CPT apartment is) to get our of the Old City. It is like a giant prison. There are turnstiles and barbed wire and checkpoints at the openings. Some paths have been blocked off by the military.
Hebron has problems similar to many inner city situations combined with the issues of a place under occupation.

Water and Hospitals

2006-06-06T17:23:00.000-04:00

Friday, June 2, the delegation spent the day in At-Tuwani, the other place that CPT-Hebron works. Tuwani is a beautiful village. Many of the residents live in caves that their families have lived in for hundreds of years. As we walked through the village, I whispered, “Wow… It’s so peaceful here…” Children were playing, people were visiting with each other, and there were no other sounds except nature. It did not take long to shatter my view of peaceful Tuwani. Our guide, another CPTer, pointed out the nearby Ma’on settlement and the military outposts. As we walked back, a military jeep with armed men stopped us.
(picture of an olive tree that the village of Tuwani planted in memory of Tom Fox.)

There is a water shortage in Tuwani and in most (all?) of Palestine. Most homes try to keep a water reserve because Israel cuts of the Palestinian water supply during the dry summer months. Yet we were told that the Israeli settlers’ water supplies are never turned off.

Friday night we all stayed in Palestinian homes. I stayed in Bet Ummar (the town where we accompanied the farmers to their fields a few weeks ago). We stayed with a beautiful family. They have 3 children- ages 10, 8 and 5. The youngest daughter is a talented dancer with incredible rhythm. Every time that she hears music, she begins doing Palestinian dances. She and her two older brothers keep begging their parents to bring them to the nearby Dead Sea. However, Palestinians are not allowed to go to the Dead Sea. Only Israelis and foreigners may go. The mother said sadly, “What do I tell my children?” The mother said that sometimes they try to make a small pool of water for their children instead of the sea, but now "there is no water for Palestinian children." One of the other delegates said that this mother’s lament reminded her of Martin Luther King Jr’s laments for his children in a segregated society where they were refused certain rights because of their skin color.

Saturday a group of Palestinian men decided to take trucks up to their well and pump water for the village of Suseya. The well is on Palestinian land but sometimes they are attacked by settlers or harassed by soldiers when they go to get water. They asked CPT and Tay'ush, a joint Palestinian/Israeli group, to accompany them to the well. We just sat by while they pumped and the soldiers watched. Then when we got ready to leave, the soldiers followed us. It was kind of ridiculous to watch the large military vehicles rolling down the road at our walking pace. what a waste of their time… (picture of an Israeli volunteer from Tay'ush talking to the soldiers & police)

It was an extremely hot day & we were not drinking enough water. We turned off the road and into an olive grove to go sit in the shade under a villager’s tent. The soldiers began yelling at us that we could not go that way. Of course there was no reason that we could not go that way. Two soldiers jumped out of the vehicle & came after us. One was very angry. We insisted that we could sit in the shade and that we could sit under this tent. The soldiers followed us to the tent. The Palestinian woman of the house invited the soldiers into the tent as well. The soldiers decided to remain in the sun. The woman made coffee for us, and her young son offered the first cups to the two soldiers. The soldiers refused. We waited for a little less than an hour and then two taxis came to get us and the soldiers left.

After we left the Palestinian men were able to make two more trips to pump water.

That night one of the delegation members was sick. During the course of the night several others became ill. By the morning half of the delegation was very sick. They were all very dehydrated and perhaps had food poisoning as well. 6 delegation members ended up with IVs and 1 of them had to stay the night in the hospital. I’ve spent the past 3 days accompanying people in & out of the hospital. Most of those who were sick are feeling much better and are in the process of returning home right now. One of the sick delegates is still pretty ill but plans to leave for the airport in a few hours. Please pray that they all will have safe travels home and speedy recoveries. Thank you for your prayers!

The care at the hospital was amazing. The doctors and nurses (like the teachers) have not been paid in over 3 months (since aid to Palestine has been cut). The hospital, like most places here, is in an economic bind. Yet we had to convince the doctor to let us pay for the delegate's IV today. The doctor was insisting that he wanted to treat the delegate for free “for God and for [his] brother.”

CPT itself does not provide material aid, but if any of you wish to support that hospital in Jerusalem (Augusta Victoria) or the Charitable Hospital here in Hebron (which is also in great need) by sending supplies or donations, I can send you their contact information… just let me know... The hospital in Hebron said that they are in need of “disposables,” things like gloves, syringes, medicines.

In the Image of God

2006-05-31T19:12:00.000-04:00

"God created humankind in God’s own image, in the image of God God created them; male and female God created them." –Genesis 1:27

I’ve been with the CPT delegation for the past few days. We spent time with organizations and individuals in Jerusalem and Bethlehem. Now we're back in Hebron. We're learning and seeing a lot, and meeting many beautiful people. A common theme in our meetings seems to have been what it means to be fully human. And who do we consider fully human? Do we limit our definition of humanity to those like us?

We began the delegation on Friday May 26 with a visit to Yad Vasham, the Holocaust museum in Jerusalem. Stumbling through the immense suffering, one is left somewhat numb- confessing the blood that is on the Chruch’s hands- that is on my hands. The Church desecrated God’s image by actively and passively contributing to the torture and death of millions of Jews.

... And we continue to desecrate God’s image by actively and passively contributing to the suffering in the world.

Friday afternoon we met with Rabbi Arik Ascherman from Rabbis for Human Rights. He works tirelessly to uphold the human rights of Israelis and Palestinians. His work is based in the belief that “God created humankind in God’s image.” Rabbi Ascherman believes that it is not ok to demolish Palestinian homes. It is not ok that Palestinian teachers and children are detained on their way to school It is not ok that Palestinians are refused basic human rights. He works from faith in a just God who created people to live together justly.
Here is a picture of a demolished Palestinian home outside of Jerusalem.

On Sunday we talked with Mordecai Vanunu. Mordecai spent 18 years in prison for revealing to the world Israel’s nuclear program. Mordecai left Israel in order to release this information. However, the Israeli government tricked him into flying to Italy and then kidnapped Mordecai and brought him back to Israel in order to imprison him. Most of his imprisonment was spent in solitary confinement. The Israeli prison guards tried to psychologically torment him. I asked how he survived the psychological torture and retained his humanity. Though they kept him from speaking to people, he sang loudly, he read out loud, and he prayed. Technically, Mordecai has been out of prison for 2 years. Yet, he remains imprisoned in the state of Israel. He is not allowed to leave the country. Upon his release he released his anger in prayer and in church services- never in violence. He said that violence is what the government wants- the prisons seek to diminish the humanity of those captive. According to Mordecai, suicide bombings and other violent acts fuel more racist policies. The government wants to push dissenters to dehumanizing violence. Yet, Mordecai said that he survived and continues to survive by not giving in to that dehumanization, by resisting the tormentors attempts to marr the free image of God in which he was created.

Sunday night we spoke with two men from Parent’s Circle, a joint Israeli/Palestinian bereavement group. Rami, the son of a Holocaust survivor, spoke first. He began by saying, “I am a Jew. I am an Israeli. I am a human being.” Like almost all Israelis, Rami served in the Israeli military as a teenager. He was very angry after his military service and he got out of the army. Following the army, Rami married and had 3 sons and 1 daughter. On September 1, 1997, 2 Palestinian suicide bombers killed 5 people, including his 14 year old daughter. In his tradition, there are 7 days of mourning with family and friends. He said, “On the 8^th day everyone goes home and you have to face yourself. What are you going to do now? There are 2 options: 1) When someone kills your 14 year old daughter you are so angry and want to get even, but we are people so we can use our head & when I asked, ‘Will killing someone else bring back my baby?’… of course not. The other response is 2) to ask: ‘what would make someone so angry that he would kill a little girl? And another option is to ask what you can do to prevent this pain from happening to another.” Rami has come to the conclusion that hate and violence are not ways to bring about security or to prevent others from experiencing his same pain. Through Parent’s Circle, Rami connected with other Israelis and Palestinians who are mourning the deaths of loved ones due to this conflict. Parent’s Circle makes room for friendship and empathy between Palestinians and Israelis. They believe that these things are keys to ending this conflict- especially “listening to the other.” Rami decided this during an encounter with a Palestinian mother. The mother had a picture of her dead 6 year old daughter around her neck. About that encounter, he said, “I am not a religious person- I cannot explain what happened to me then. But from that moment, I dedicated my life to telling this one truth- We are not doomed. This is not our destiny.” I heard in Rami’s words a claim similar to Rabbi Ascherman’s. We are not created to hate. This is not who we are. We are created in the image of a loving God.

Rami’s close friend, his “brother” Ali, a Muslim Palestinian shared part of his storyas well. Ali comes from a refugee family. One day an Israeli settler drove by shooting from the window of his car. The settler shot Ali in the knee. Ali left the country to have surgery on his knee. While he was away, an Israeli soldier shot his brother Yousef in the head and killed him, leaving Yousef’s wife and 2 children in Ali’s care. When Ali returned from surgery, he did not want to see any Israelis. He believed they were all part of the military. After his brother’s death, he began thinking about the connection between all acts of violence. Despite his anger at the Israeli military and settlers, Ali thinks that suicide bombing is not the way to Palestinian liberation. Yet just peace is something that we must work towards. Ali said, “Peace is not just hope… It is not something to wait for. It is something to work for.” “We cannot take land, nation, etc. to the grave. We can only live as humans… We (Palestinians) are not asking a lot- only to live as we were born- as humans.”

We spent Monday in Bethlehem where a significant population of Palestinian Christians live. After passing through the horrendous checkpoint, between Jerusalem and Bethlehem, we were met with a “Welcome to Jerusalem” sign that is attached to the wall. Despite Israel’s best attempts, there is nothing welcoming about going through a concrete wall that cuts people off from their land, livlihood, families, friends, and places of worship. In Bethlehem we met with a Palestinian man who works with children and families in trauma healing. He reminded us that “there is no post traumatic stress disorder here because the trauma is ongoing.” He shared a story with us about when he learned that he was Palestinian. At age 13 he begged his mother to let him go to Jerusalem to visit the stations of the cross on good Friday. His mother let him go. He left at 6am but soldiers detained him at the checkpoint entering Jerusalem and demanded to see his ID. Because he was only 13 years old, he did not have an ID. Youth are issued an ID at age 16. The soldiers hit him, pushed him against a wall, and insulted him. Finally, 12 hours later, at 6pm, they released him back into Bethlehem. He returned home disillusioned and disappointed. His mother told him not to worry- “You lived the stations of the cross today.” He told us, “The things that you take for granted, we (Palestinians) die for.” “We do not measure distance in kilometers but by number of checkpoints. There is a theft of spontaneity.” He said, “We and Israelis are hostages of fear.”

We spent that night at the Dheisha refugee camp in Bethlehem. (here is a picture of several of the children in the camp making oragami with us.) This camp was established in 1948 when hundreds of Palestinian towns were depopulated to make the state of Israel. In Dheisha there are more than 12,000 refugees on 1 square kilometer. We stayed with a family whose brother was killed by Israeli soldiers in 2002. Later that year, the entire town of Bethlehem was under siege by Israeli troops. Another brother from the family, who was 17 at the time, was taken by soldiers and moved to Gaza. The soldiers said that they were afraid that he would want to retaliate because of his brother’s death. So, they preemptively moved a 17 year old boy to a place inaccessible for his family. The mother in the home sadly told us that she thinks people in the U.S. think that Arab people are terrorists. She said that God tells them to treat strangers kindly and, of course, her family was incredibly hospitable. Suel, a neighbor of theirs from a women’sgroup in the camp came by to sell some of their crafts. She told us her story and ended by saying, “I do not want to kill Israelis. I will go back to my original village and live by Israelis… French… whoever, as long as they treat me as a neighbor.” Suel emphasized that she wanted us to share their stories with our friends and families. She asked, “So you will go back and tell people that we are humans?!”

(A child enjoying his ice cream in the camp)

The concept that all people are in God’s image is such a central belief for many of us and yet we often fail to consider the implications of this notion. Those who are denied their basic human rights seem to understand something about full humanity that those of us who “take for granted what [others] die for” miss. One man told the U.S. citizens in our group, “You wonder why people hate you… It’s because you don’t know.” He described a visit to the U.S. His home city had just been bombed. He flipped through 81 hotel TV stations and only found news about “a man being eaten by a tiger and an actor becoming governor. This is why people hate you… because you don’t know.” (The man speaking to us did not actually hate us, he was just elaborating on why people around the world hate the U.S.) So many people here lament that they just want to be treated as human by those around them- to be treated like they are created in the image of our loving, just, and free God.

"I Am Not Leaving My Home."

2006-05-24T17:13:00.000-04:00

This afternoon we went to Al-Fawwar refugee camp. The families there were expelled from their villages over 50 years ago when Israel became a state. They first lived in tents. Then they built small concrete squares. Now many families have added onto the original square. Two families asked us to come. Both needed medical help, which we cannot provide. But we can suggest help from other organizations and because they are refugees, the UN provides some very limited medical care. The mother of the first family told of her exhausting trip to Jerusalem to have a surgery done on her baby boy. Her son shares the same name as one of Saddam Hussein’s sons so the military detained her and her young son for hours. The oldest daughter, a 10th grader, needs to go to Jerusalem to the hospital for a nose problem, but the family is afraid of going through a similar ordeal again. Her brother, a 4th grader, showed us scars on his leg where Israeli soldiers kicked and cut him. One day on his way home from school some Palestinian children threw stones at the soldiers. The soldiers chased him and beat him. However, he claims that he was not one of the children who threw stones.

A few hours ago, after we returned home from al-Fawwar, our next door neighbor and translator who joined us in Al-Fawwar today, knocked on our door. She said calmly, “I just wanted to let you know that I have been attacked by settlers.” We asked if she was ok and she said that she was eating dinner and settlers began throwing stones at her window. One went through and broke the glass. We went over to her house and saw glass scattered on the floor and a stone sitting in front of the sofa. She climbed out on the balcony and showed us the other stones that did not make it through her window. Her front door is on the main road, Shuhada Street, that Palestinians are not allowed to use. She cannot open her front door (we all share a back door) and sometimes she hears settlers beating on the door, trying to “encourage” her to leave. She thinks they are hassling her because she recently moved into her apartment. Before she began renting it, it had been abandoned for a while. It is not uncommon for settlers to take over abandoned buildings here in Hebron. Our neighbor is a strong and determined woman. She wanted to have her window, which faces settler-only Shuhada St., open for air (although she has metal shutters that could stay shut over the windows). She said, “Why do they do things like this?” My teammate said, “I guess they want to frighten you into leaving.” And our neighbor, who had just heard stories in Al-Fawwar from people who were forced from their homes, laughed and said, “Well, they must not know me. They should throw stones somewhere else if that is what they want. I am not leaving my home.”

Joining the Upcoming Delegation

2006-05-24T16:59:00.000-04:00

We have been making preparations for a CPT delegation of 12 that is coming tomorrow. A delegation is a group that comes for about 2 weeks to see the situation, to join in some of CPT’s work, and to report back what they see/learn to their home communities. Some delegates end up coming to work here longer. Since I have not previously worked or lived in Palestine & because I have not been on a delegation here & also because I feel a little unprepared to work here (meaning I feel like I do not know as much as I should), I am going to join the delegation for the next week. We will be meeting with lots of different Palestinian, Israeli, and international organizations. It will be a good chance to get to some of the other folks working around this area and to learn about their specific roles. We will also go down to the village called At-Tuwani where CPT also works and we take part in some other projects, some of which the delegation will plan.

If you’d like to say a prayer for me personally, I’d really appreciate your prayers that I would be more flexible… Although I was having visa issues, I was still hoping/expecting all to work out and to go to Iraq (which still may happen before the end of the summer or it may not happen at all). I want to be in Iraq so badly (though I agree that it is a good idea for CPT-Iraq to engage in as much discernment and research as necessary before sending more team members. But that still does not keep my heart from longing to be in Iraq.) I cannot explain the connection that I feel to that country and to all of the lives there. I love Palestine and remain indignant and brokenhearted over the situation here. & the need for peace & justice here is definitely no less than the need for peace & justice in Iraq. When we are on the streets or engaged with people, I am totally present here. But... in the evenings or when I read some news of Iraq, I want to be in Iraq. I don’t know why that is. & I feel guilty for having part of my heart in a different place than my body. Each day I’m feeling more and more connected to here and that is a very good thing. If you so desire, please pray that I would be more open and flexible- that I would continue to hold Iraq in my heart with Palestine, but that I would hold them both while joyfully living wherever I am.

If you would like to read weekly (delayed) updates or writings by other folks working with CPT in Palestine, you can go to www.cpt.org, click on Palestine in the left hand side and follow the links to join the Palestine email list. You can do the same thing to join the Iraq or the other projects’ list serves.

Peace & love to y’all.

What it takes for a farmer to plow his own field...

2006-05-22T15:05:00.000-04:00

Saturday we joined a group called Tay’ush (which means “we live together” in Arabic), a joint Israeli/Palestinian organization, in the village Bet Omar. Here is a picture of one of the Palestinian children sitting on the road looking at the nearby Israeli settlement (the white buildings in the distance). All of the land between the child and the settlement belongs (on paper) to Palestinian families in Bet Omar. However, those families are usually not allowed to use their land.

A group of 50-70 Palestinians, Israelis, and internationals split into 3 groups to accompany several Palestinian farmers to their land. When the farmers attempt to reach their land they are usually stoned by Israeli settlers. When our group arrived at the farmer’s land, soldiers and settlers were waiting at the edge of the land. As soon as we arrived the farmers began frantically spraying their grape vines, afraid that any minute the soldiers would begin arresting or the settlers would begin attacking. Thankfully, it was a peaceful day.

Because there was such a large group of us, the soldiers were there to protect the settlers (although we were a nonviolent group and only intended to plow and spray land that belongs to the Palestinian farmers who cannot use their own land without a caravan folks). While the soldiers were there for the sake of the settlers, their presence also kept the settlers from attacking the farmers. And, since there were so many people from so many countries, that presence perhaps kept the soldiers from intervening in the farmers’ attempts to work their land. The soldiers are in green and the man in white is a settler carrying a weapon, “settler security.”

We spent all morning and afternoon in the fields. The farmers sprayed and plowed their fields. The rest of us pulled some weeds.

It was such a beautiful day inside the field. We shared pita bread, communicated volumes across language barriers, made new friends, cared for the earth and cared for each other. The boys sat around singing (LOUDLY :) songs in Arabic and “We Shall Overcome” in English.

As I threw the Frisbee with some Palestinian children, my teammate wanted so badly to invite the settler children to play. They sat on the stone wall that separates the farmers’ land from the settlement.

The settler children made sure to stay near to the soldiers and their protective weapons. Instead of hiding behind guns and stones, I wish the precious settler children could have joined the precious Palestinian children in frisbee and songs.

"Existence is Resistance" in Hebron

2006-05-18T15:55:00.000-04:00

I got to Hebron around noon on yesterday, May 17. After quick introductions, we left the apartment to accompany a second grade girl home from school. Her mother told CPT that Israeli soldiers chased her daughter and pointed their weapons at her on her way home from school. So the mother asked if CPT would watch her daughter home. However, school let out early so we did not see her yesterday.

School accompaniment is one of CPT’s roles here in Hebron. We go out at 7am each school day and walk with Palestinian children to school through and by military checkpoints and Israeli settlements. Yesterday, soon after I arrived, while we waited by a school, soldiers demanded to search 3 Palestinian women’s purses on the street. The women had babies and it was quite awkward for them to open their tiny purses. It’s hard to imagine anything dangerous in those little purses…

After children were in school this morning, my teammate John and I went to deliver some pictures of a building that CPT has been helping to monitor to the Hebron Rehabilitation Committee. On the way we encountered several photographers taking pictures of a Palestinian home. Soldiers had thrown a sound bomb ( a loud explosive device that may burn if a person is within a foot, but generally is just an extremely loud, terrifying noise) into the home and it landed very close to a sleeping woman and child. Needless to say the woman and her child were very disoriented and afraid.

This afternoon there were six soldiers in the street outside our apartment. We moved to the side and let them pass us. As we walked into the market behind the soldiers, the phrase “existence is resistance” began to make real sense to me. I was pretty intimidated by the soldiers who were pointing their guns in various directions as they searched the market for... ?something But people in the market just carried on with life, as if they did not notice the guns (which they may not take much notice of anymore?). At one point a soldier’s gun was a few inches from one man’s head. The man did not flinch or take notice. He just kept his eyes on his friend and continued his conversation. Three Palestinian school boys maneuvered their way between the soldiers and the man at the falafel stand kept making delicious sandwiches.

Palestinians cannot drive on the main road (a road which the U.S. funded for both Palestinians and Israelis). Some families’ homes and businesses have been taken and/or destroyed. Israeli settlers that live above this market throw their trash (tons of it!) out of their windows and into the market (most of the market has netting above it to catch the settlers’ garbage, but it is still disgusting.). Palestinian children are harassed at checkpoints on their way to school. Teachers have not been paid in 3 months but most of them (those who can afford transportation) come to school each day anyway. Many women, children, and men resist injustice by living in their homes or by going to school or by playing outside or by selling falafels…

It’s kind of astonishing to me… how quickly a situation can become much more real when one sees it... Things seem incredibly complicated here in Hebron... I will try to write a little more about that soon. I just wanted to share a bit about what we’ve been doing this past day and a half and my first impressions. Peace.

Change of Plans

2006-05-15T17:24:00.000-04:00

I arrived in Israel yesterday afternoon around 3pm. I have stamps from several middle eastern countries on my passport so I had to wait in the Tel Aviv airport for a couple of hours of intense "questioning" and a baggage search. (apparently my toothpaste was alarming?) The guy next to me, who was on a 3 day business trip, had the ill luck of being named "Omar." He had been waiting 3 hours and was still waiting when I left. 3 Muslim women and their children were being held because of their names and dress, and the guy on the other side of me had no idea why he was being held. I left relatively quickly- after 2 1/2 hours. Getting past the border was a small source of anxiety for me. So I'm glad that's over!!

I stayed in Jerusalem last night, but will not be heading to Amman anytime soon. Plans have changed- The Iraq team had a long and intense debriefing session this weekend. As many of you know, 4 CPTers were kidnapped last November. On March 10, Tom Fox's body was found in a Baghdad neighborhood. Two weeks later the other 3 CPTers were released. The 4 months that our coworkers were missing and the time following Tom's death have been very challenging times in the life of CPT. After a lot of consideration, most of the Iraq team feels like there is more discernment to be done about our work in Iraq. CPT has learned a lot over these past 6 months and we plan on continuing work in Iraq. But at this time the team decided to spend some time in discernment before sending more people into Iraq. So, for the time being (at least a month but maybe longer), I'll be working with CPT in the West Bank. I'm leaving to go join the team in Hebron in a few minutes. That's all I know for now...

You Shall Go Out in Joy...

2006-05-11T19:09:00.000-04:00

For you shall go out in joy, and be led back in peace;
the mountains and the hills before you shall burst into song,
and all the trees of the field shall clap their hands. -Isaiah 55:12

I leave Monday, May 15, to (hopefully) spend the summer working with CPT in Iraq. However, I am having a little trouble getting a visa. I arrive in Israel on Tuesday, May 16 & will go by land to Jordan to work on a visa for Iraq. (I've been working on that for 2 months here in the U.S., but with no success... I haven't been denied a visa. I just haven't recieved the permission that I need for a visa. Hopefully, we'll have better luck in Amman!) After I talk to the embassy in Amman and if it looks like the visa process is going to take a while, I'll cross back over to Palestine and join CPT there until I get an Iraqi visa.

You can find details about Christian Peacemaker Teams at http://www.cpt.org/. CPT is an interdenominational effort with roots in traditional peace churches whose mission is to reduce violence and to promote conflict resolution through nonviolent means, seeking "to overcome evil with good" (Rom 12:21). These next 2 paragraphs are directly from the website & give some background of CPT's involvement in Palestine & Iraq.

CPT has been in Hebron since 1995, witnessing to the need for peace in a violent and sometimes desperate situation. Team members have sometimes (especially following Al-Aqsa Intifada)provided an alternative, first hand perspective for scores of foreign journalists who wanted to look beyond Israeli and American government analyses of the crisis. In addition to repeated bombardment of their neighborhoods, Palestinian families in the Hebron District continue to suffer ongoing effects of military occupation. Israeli authorities persist in confiscating land to expand Jewish-only settlements, tightening access to water resources and threatening to demolish homes. School accompaniment, documentation and human rights reporting, nonviolent trainings, regular visits to families involved in the Campaign for Secure Dwellings (CSD) and joining with Palestinians and Israeli peace groups to develop action campaigns that expose the face of the Occupation are all part of the Hebron Team's work.

CPT initiated a long-term presence in Iraq in October 2002, six months before the beginning of the U.S. led invasion in March of 2003. The primary focus of the team for eighteen months following the invasion was documenting and focusing attention on the issue of detainee abuses and basic legal and human rights being denied them. Issues related to detainees remain but the current focus of the team has expanded to include efforts to end occupation and militarization of the country and to foster nonviolent and just alternatives for a free and independent Iraq.

I decided to go to Iraq in the Spring of 2003, though I did not actually go until 2 years later. As the U.S. prepared to bomb Iraq in "Shock & Awe," I was hearing different perspectives from people of faith about what was really going on. As a senior in college, this was the first time that I seriously considered war alongside my faith. As I read the Bible and prayed about the situation, I was not able to reconcile bombing Iraq with what I experienced of a just and loving God. Once I decided that I thought going to war with Iraq was wrong, I felt like I had to do something. As time goes on and as Iraq is pushed deeper and deeper into destruction, I still cannot reconcile this war with my faith. I cannot reconcile hundreds of thousands of lives lost with the justice that the prophets proclaimed or with the love that Jesus demonstrated. I go to Iraq still trying to do something, though I am not always clear what that something is. I know part of it is to declare that another way is possible- that good can overcome evil and love can overcome fear. Part of it is to be with Iraqi and Palestinian sisters and brothers in this struggle and part of it is to learn more and to seek Truth...

I would greatly appreciate your prayers- Please pray that I would speak and act in love and that I would be open to the Spirit's guiding. & Please pray that children in Palestine & in Iraq (& the U.S. & the world) may walk to school without risking their lives, that parents may send children to school without fearing that their children will not return, and that we, the whole body of Christ, would rise up and act upon Jesus' command to love God, our neighbors, our enemies, and ourselves.