Summer Camp Volunteer
On our last morning in South Hebron Mountain, breakfast was interrupted by Israeli settlers advancing on shepherds outside of the Palestinian village of Susia. This happens here every couple of days, and the situation is usually diffused before a confrontation breaks out. Today, the settlers turned around and returned to the ideological Susia settlement, escorted by soldiers, after a short interaction with villagers and internationals. Still, this occurrence set a mood of claustrophobia for the internationals here, as we began to understand the lives of Palestinians whose lands are threatened from all sides.
After a couple hours of completing work in Susia (Such as clearing sand out of a cave and digging holes for future toilets and water storage), we left on a tour of H1, the area of Hebron City where Palestinians are allowed, and settlers are not. We walked first through the Old City, where the majority of shops were closed and boarded up, and we were followed by particularly unrelenting young vendors, shoving into our paths pendants of Handala, the iconic Palestinian cartoon of a 5-year old 1948 refugee. Our tour guide later explained the desperate economic situation of the Old City here, where hundreds of shops have been evicted by the army since the Second Intifada, and thousands of residents have left the city because of checkpoints and curfew, which lasted from late 2000 to late 2003. Curfew in the West Bank is not only at night, it is a 24-hour house arrest, with slots each week of a few hours when residents can leave their home to buy supplies. Needless to say, Hebron’s economy is still suffering greatly.
Walking through the city, evidence of settler violence is everywhere. Some areas of the market are situated below settlement apartments, so Palestinian shopkeepers have constructed roves of metal screen to protect people from objects thrown by settlers from windows. As you walk under the screens, you can see large rocks, metal poles, plastic bags (apparently, originally filled with stink water or urine), and layers of garbage. Around many corners, roads are blocked off to separate H1 and H2.
We also visited the Tomb of the Patriarchs, the religious site that theoretically began all of the violence. We entered the mosque half, where bullet holes are still visible from Baruch Goldstein’s attack, a settler who shot and killed 29 Muslims during prayer. It was this attack, in fact, that led to the curfew of Palestinians in Hebron, not an attack by Palestinians against settlers. Of six tombs, two each are situated in the Mosque and the adjacent synagogue, but the tombs of Abraham and Sarah can be viewed through windows from each side. Peeking in from the mosque, we could see Jewish worshippers through another window, and a pane of bullet-proof plastic between the windows. On our way out of the tomb, we passed a group of trainee Israeli soldiers on a tour of the mosque (a mat was laid down for them because they wore shoes inside). Hebron City certainly is one of the most disturbing places I have ever been.
We returned to work at Omer Kher, the Bedouin village beside Karmel settlement. This village has been here since 1980, and the settlement since 1986, and today the village has 22 families, about 150 people. Over the last five years, about 18 structures have been demolished. We originally planned on building a dozen toilets for the village, but a few days before construction began, the military confiscated out building supplies and threatened to demolish all illegal structures: basically, the entire village. Instead, we helped to clear fields, build a new chicken coup, and repair a road leading from one section of the village to another. The village was incredibly hospitable and welcoming, serving us delicious rice, tea, and traditional Bedouin bread. The children of the village were especially excited, following us through the worksite while giggling and giving us hugs. During work breaks, I spent time with a kind and charismatic 16-year old girl from the village, who happily showed me around and brought me into the hills with a donkey to gather water. Many villagers here are highly educated and ambitious, an interesting contrast to their extremely modest living conditions. Because many of their structures are demolished, they live in tents of sheet metal and canvas. Electricity is top priority for the village: electric lines run right over them into the settlement, although they are not permitted to have electricity. In a village like this, it is clear how the military takes extraordinary steps to stunt economic development.
After about an hour of work, a few military vehicles pulled into the village, and soldiers and one settler told us to stop working on the road. It was illegal to lay down gravel, so for a while we continued clearing rocks, to which the soldiers also objected. Ezra, an Israeli activist, wanted to continue working, but the villagers were understandably nervous about further demolitions. Without much resistance, we stopped working, leaving our work unfinished. The villagers thanked us for our solidarity, even though the concrete results of our help were miniscule, and we all had a renewed sense of respect for Palestinians who continue to resist amidst great risk and frustration. This was a sad end to our activism in South Hebron, but it was a telling example of military treatment of Palestinian villages here. We returned to Anata, disappointed and shocked.
