A Personal Profile: Mohammed Ali

Meet Mohammed - one of our translators for the village research we're doing in Battir.  . Though he is not a refugee, he has only been outside the "West Bank" a handful of times: to Jerusalem twice - once as a little kid and once later on, illegally - and outside the wall once to get to Hebron (located in Palestine). Mohammed lives near Mt. Herodium, though he's never climbed it because he's forbidden to due to an Israel military base at the top (tourists can visit for 25 shekles, apparently). He studied at Bethlehem University where he majored in English and minored in Translation. His dream job is to work as a translator in Bethlehem, which is what he is currently doing. He would also like to attend grad school, somewhere in Palestine, or possibly in London. If he could go anywhere in the world, at the moment, he would choose Britain, though he would be happy going anywhere.

                When I asked him, "If the occupation ended tomorrow would Palestine...........," he absolutely lit up. He sees the solution to the difficulties in Israel and Palestine right now as ending the occupation, which he defined as having all the Israeli soldiers leave and allowing Palestinians to return home. Though he recognizes that some feel that if the occupation did indeed end tomorrow, Palestine might not be able to support itself as an independent nation because of certain corruption, Mohammed believes that the people would be able to unite and live peaceably. He also welcomed any Jews who currently live inside the West Bank to remain in their homes, pointing to the fact that Muslims and Christians live in harmony, as brothers.

                                                                                                                -- Heather

Second Weekend in Bethlehem District

When I imagine a vacant Israel and Palestine the description that comes to mind is a haunted theme park with ghostly silhouettes of barbed wire, steel cages, and concrete grey barriers. In the future when people begin to study the ruins of Israel and Palestine what will they think? Will they think that the Israelis were working to contain some ancient and evil ravenous creatures? Surely that must be the case, with the measures taken to ensure security of those on the outside. I’ll get back to that subject soon.

Saturday, we once again set out to tour Bethlehem, I thought to myself “how much could there really be left to see?” and I would soon find that this town may not have the breadth of land that it once did, but it runs miles deep. The day consisted of several events that, as I reflect on them, remind me of a theme park or perhaps a circus. (*It is important to note that throughout this entire session we had the aid of a translator.)

                First we saw the caged family. The caged family lives underneath a bridge that was set in place to link Israeli settlements together. The family located under this bridge has lived there for over 18 years, long before the bridge was ever erected. Before that they had lived their lives in Palestinian refugee camps, so having this home outside of the camps was a dream come true. One day Israeli soldiers came through and said “we’re putting a security fence here, this is now a military zone.” This particular fence separates the rest of Bethlehem and Palestine from the newly declared military zone and the surrounding settlements. The fence closed this family in. The entire interview that we had with the woman of the house was conducted through a solid mesh steel gate about 14 feet in length and 9ft in height. Beyond the gate, going up the valley on both sides, were continuous spools of barbed wire leading to a firmly positioned cylindrical concrete watch tower. Here sat a simple family, raising goats and sheep, growing and harvesting olive trees, and struggling to live distanced from civilization. At first there were Israeli soldiers stationed here 24hrs a day, letting the family in and out 2 times a day for necessities only. The son who was attending school at the time was young, angry and would struggle and fight with the soldiers every morning.  Eventually his father had taken him out of school because he was afraid that the soldiers might kill him, the woman explained that it is easy to justify killing a Palestinian “all they would have to do is say that he had a knife.”  “So,” she said, “he has no future.” After a little time and a lot of international attention they were able to contract a lawyer to defend their case in the Israeli courts. They were granted a key to the gate so they can come and go almost as they please. The soldiers were eventually replaced with cameras. There are still downfalls in that no one is allowed within the gate, not even doctors. I struggle to think about what would happen if there was a fire and no emergency vehicles were let in.

                Second were the man in the wall and the tree keeper. The man in the wall and the tree keeper both have the same problem; the “security wall”. In two different cases the wall is causing the same problem, it is cutting off the life source of these individuals. On one hand there is a man and his family surrounded by 18ft concrete pylons that cut him off from his inherited land. This older man had groves of decades old olive trees uprooted by Israelis in the name of a secure road for settlers to travel on. The man has no problem with the necessity of the road, just the path along which it has been built. In fact he said that this road is not safe enough. Assuming that the Israelis do indeed have security in mind, he recommended that they reroute the road around the mountain to cover it in concrete and make it truly safe. Any individual would be able to easily throw an object over the wall and onto the highway under the roads current construction plan.

                On the other hand we have the tree keeper. The tree keeper is a wall of a man standing at about 6’5” who sported a brown set of coveralls spotted with signs of dirt and oil. He had a very polite and jolly demeanor and was more than willing to share his opinions. He told us of the wall and occupation and how it had dramatically decreased the size of the land that the town was built on. In front of him sat a trailer full of olive tree pieces. He said to us “this is what I get from the Israelis” with a slight chuckle. He pointed at the security wall, which lie within 30 ft of his back door, and said “this wall cannot be solely for security purposes because I can easily see over it from my second floor” one of our translators and guide for the day, Marwan, pointed out that “from this spot someone could easily harm and Israeli settler with a small gun,” so it stands that this is not only a wall for “security” but for securing more lands in the West Bank. The tree keeper said proudly in his hearty voice “we have the oldest olive trees in the world in this village,” Marwan once again chimed in and exclaimed “A Japanese university came and did a study examining the tree and found it to be 4 or 5,000 years old.” They now want to move the fence around to annex this tree into Israeli occupied Jerusalem.

                We rounded out the day with the good doctor who gave us a lecture on non-violence and action. As he clicked through his power point presentation he arrived at a slide with a graffiti-ridden wall that read in white lettering “To exist is to resist.” This is what it has come to for the Palestinian people. To simply live means to defy the intentions of their oppressor.

                The Israelis have turned Palestine into their own little circus. Inadvertently perhaps, but it has happened nonetheless. The attractions are real people with real lives that are being ever pressured because of the suffering of another race. A race that believes that they are owed a state of their own,  because they have suffered and struggled for it, because they have bled and died for it, and because it has been given to them from the hands of God himself.  Who can really blame them? That though, does not justify the incitement of suffering on another race.

                The Israelis are not trying to eradicate the Palestinians. They are trying to discourage them through any means possible by taking control of, and manipulating the settings in which Palestinians live. They have a monopoly on imported goods, they only allow permits and development if it is to their benefit even if it is vital municipal systems like sewer treatment, they limit travel to Jerusalem which is the religious hub of all of Israel, and the unemployment rates are outrageous at 50% in Gaza and 35% in the West Bank. Unemployment levels are due to the confiscation of village agricultural land.

                 I’ve come to Palestine expecting a downtrodden people and instead found inspiring examples of perseverance, loyalty, and steadfastness that will stick with me forever. This is it. This is human interaction at its worst and its best. For every action there is an equal and opposite reaction and the reaction here is the deeply rooted existence of the Palestinian people. For every kilometer of land the Israelis take, the Palestinians just root themselves a kilometer deeper. The Palestinians are living their lives and they’re getting better at it by the day.  So when that future society sifts through the sands of history here in the holy land they will find that the Israelis were not containing an evil within the walls but a struggling piece of humanity that flourished in the face of adversity.

*These are my thoughts somewhat compiled from my experiences thus far and are subject to change. (In my commercial disclaimer voice.)

--Dan Warfel

Delectable Treats

AFTEEM

"I just consumed my weight in hummus, pita and falafel" ....no, seriously! Since we've been here we've indulged in many, many delicious rounds of Palestinian food ranging from Middle Eastern commodities such as hummus and falafel to more traditional dishes like maqluba (upside-down eggplant, rice, meat and cauliflower casserole), shawarma, zaatar (spice blend) and foul. YUM! 

Step 1: Falafel

Last night, we had the great blessing of putting our culinary skills to the test and learning how to cook Palestinian food at a fantastic restaurant in Bethlehem called Afteem. With all 14 of us crammed in their tiny little kitchen, it was quite the site to see. Imagine if you saw a huge group of Palestinians behind the counter at a restaurant were you chose to dine!

We started off learning how to prepare the falafel which consists of chickpeas (11 pounds of chickpeas), parsley, onions, hot peppers, garlic and various spices. Fortunately, they had already soaked the chickpeas for 6 hrs before we arrived. The ingredients were put through a food processor into a large bucket and then mixed together by hand, ready then to be fried.

Mixing the falafel!

 

11 lbs of chick peas for hummus

Next, we learned how to make hummus (and they have THE BEST hummus in the world here). Stated with another 11 pounds of chickpeas and added in salt, lemon, garlic, hot pepper and sesame oil. All those were mixed together in a large blender which was pretty sweet. Then, put into two gi-mungo bowls to serve to the restaurant.

Sarah & Kateland chopping vegetables

 After that, we headed right into chopping up vegetables to make Arabic salad which consists of cucumbers, tomatoes, parsley, onion and some spices. 

Falafel

Frying the falafel

We ended our cooking class frying up the falafel which was an interesting process. HUGE wok full of oil and an ice cream scoop device to form the falafel patties and plop them in the oil to deep fry them. Everyone had their turn, though for some it came a bit more easily than for others ;) Our guide, Elias, definitely showed us all up making it look easy.

Pita and hummus

Perhaps the BEST part of the evening was when we all got to sit down together and enjoy a fabulous feast! After, we got to hear a bit about the history of the restaurant which was started in 1948. What a wonderful evening full of delicious food and new friends!  

Jessie, Brie & Adrian enjoying dinner!

Katie & Jess helping, too

Dan & JNess

Katie chopping vegetables

Cyri helping fry falafel

                                                                                                                             

Volunteering in the Villages

Bumping along the road, I sat hands gripped onto the seat in front of me, so as not to slide into Eric or Dan sitting on either side of me. The little yellow taxi whipped around the curves, wildly maneuvering the potholes and jostling us over the speed bumps. Arriving at our destination, we piled out of the car nodding “ma’ salama” to our driver and headed inside to the counsel building where we were to conduct our interviews for the day.

As Katie mentioned in the first blog post, we are volunteering with Holy Land Trust (HLT) while here in Bethlehem. HLT works to encourage non-violence as a means for strengthening and empowering Palestinian people to develop spiritual, pragmatic and strategic approaches for resisting oppression. As volunteers, we are conducting research work in two local villages to learn about the social, and environmental impacts of the wall on these communities. Four of us are working in a village called Nahaleen. Located in a valley surrounded by four Israeli settlements, Nahaleen has been greatly affected by the occupation. Since 1967, the members of the village have suffered many problems including environmental degradation, loss of land, imprisonment, random attacks, the list goes on. Our job as volunteers is to collect historical and current information on Nahaleen and compile a report for HLT.

As we sat around a table in the counsel building listening to different villagers, we began understanding what it really means to live in this village. The first man we spoke with, Mohammad Abdul Rahman Shakarna, was born in 1943 and has grown up in Nahaleen observing the major changes that have occurred over time. As Mohammad described the many challenges he and his village have faced over time, I was impressed at how calm he was. Until 2003, Mohammad worked as a shepherd, traveling throughout the land with his herd of 350 sheep. Since 1967, he has struggled to find land to feed his livestock or safe areas where he is not harassed by settlers or Israeli soldiers. In 2003, Mohammad’s son was headed home with his herd of sheep when Israeli settlers captured and imprisoned him and took all his sheep. Mohammad went to the police (the Israeli police, since there was no Palestinian police force at the time) to explain his situation and reclaim his goats. After the settlers denied having took the sheep, the police ignored Mohammad and did nothing. Driving back in the police car, Mohammad spotted one of his goats on the side of the road. Leaping out of the car, he picked up his goat, and hustled back to the police car. When he was told he couldn’t get in the car with his goat, he proceeded to walk, and the police car drove away. After placing his goat down, it took off and led him to where the rest of his goats were being kept. Hiding out until the settlers guarding the goats left, Mohammad quietly opened the enclosure, let the sheep out and tried to quietly leave. As he was leaving, he was confronted by two Israeli settlers, closely followed by two more. After dodging stones thrown at him and a slew of threats, Mohammad picked up two stones in defense. The settlers backed away and Mohammad was able to escape.

After much hard work and time spent with the police, Mohammad was able to get some of his herd back, and his son was released from jail. But what now? Since the settlements have taken much of Nahaleen’s land, and all of the water in the village has been polluted, Mohammad’s family can no longer keep the sheep herd. He now has only 40 sheep left, which bring him no profit. “It is for passing time,” he told us. It is no longer economically viable to keep livestock for shepherd in Nahaleen. But he keeps his sheep in order to hold onto his and his village’s history.

Immersed in a constant battle against land loss, encroaching settlements, and pollution problems, Mohammad and his family continue to live in this small village. So why do they stay in Nahaleen, when there is so little land and so many hardships? We asked another farmer from the village why he remained in Nahaleen and why it was important to him. He looked at us blankly and then exclaimed loudly, “It is home!” Of course he would continue living in Nahaleen! His family, his history, his life is all there. How can he give that up?

Na’am, the former head of the town counsel elaborated on the idea of Nahaleen and its place as a home for the villagers: “We believe that if we are living here in Nahaleen, it is a part of the resistance to the occupation. We accept this.” After a moments pause he shrugged and said, “Where else to go?”

I was so moved by out time in Nahaleen, and I know many more stories await us over the next three months. The more I see, the move I realize how little I know. There is so much I need to learn, so many stories to hear, and so many different sides to the same history. This has been the most eye-opening, inspirational, and thought provoking two and a half weeks of my life. I look forward to just how amazing the next two and a half months will be!  

                                                                                                -Sarah Oakes

Second thoughts from Bethlehem

Our third full day here. SO WEIRD. I can’t believe it, it feels like we’ve been here for a week at least! The time has been going by both fast and slow, definitely a paradox! (A paradox has been one of our themes for the trip:) )

Currently, we’re staying in Bethlehem, the birthplace of Jesus. We’re living in a Christian neighborhood, called Beit Sahour, while the downtown area of Bethlehem is mostly Muslim. We visited the Church of Nativity yesterday, which is built over the cave where Jesus was supposedly born. Our guide said that people used to live in caves so when the Bible said “there was no room at the inn” it means there was no room at the front of the cave. So Mary and Joseph had to go to the back of the cave with the animals for Mary to give birth to Jesus. Seems strange, but I guess this guy knows more about life back then than I do! Either way, the church was beautiful and there were many pilgrims coming to see this holy place. It was pretty cool.

We spent the rest of the day touring Bethlehem by bus, and visiting the two places we will be volunteering for the next month. One is called the Holy Land Trust (where the majority of us will be working, including myself) and the other is the Palestinian Wildlife Society (where the other few will be working). Both are really cool organizations working on some really powerful issues. At the Holy Land Trust, our group members will be doing a major research project by going out into two different villages around Bethlehem, and interviewing villagers about the effect of the separation wall and Jewish settlements within their village. Sounds pretty cool, especially that we will be able to interact with actual people that are being effected by the wall and settlements. The Wildlife Society works a lot with youth and the rest of the community to raise awareness about wildlife and the environment in the area. They study native animals and tag birds to observe their migration patterns. Our group members will be working on the society’s website, fundraising projects, and public relations with the community.

 We’ve also started to learn some Hebrew and Arabic, which has been really fun but really hard! Apparently Arabic and Mandarin are the two hardest languages to learn, and I’m sure Hebrew isn’t far behind.

This morning was our first day on the job at the Holy Land Trust (HLT from here on out) and we went to a nearby village called Nahhalin. It’s right outside Bethlehem, and if Bethlehem has a much lower standard of living than Tel Aviv, then Bethlehem is like Tel Aviv compared to Nahhalin. Most of the buildings are fairly dilapidated, there’s trash everywhere, most of the roads are gravel, and things are just pretty gray. The village is entirely surrounded by Jewish settlements and the separation wall, which means there is only one road in and out of the village. In 1948, the village consisted of 24,000 dunhams of land (one dunham is 1,000 square meters) and now they only have 13. From 24,000 to 13. Where did the land go you ask? Remember how I said the village is entirely surrounded by Jewish settlements? Ding ding! There’s your answer.

Sidebar on Jewish settlements: A Jewish settlement by definition is a Jewish town that was built in the West Bank, or on what would technically be considered Palestinian land. They have huge cement walls that separate these towns from the nearby Palestinian towns, as well as Israeli military police that are always on guard. But the settlements are constantly growing, so the walls tend to be closer to the Palestinian towns nearby rather than on the borders of the settlement. This usually means that Palestinian farmers are cut off from their land (usually olive groves), which is often the entire source of their income and livelihood. This, not surprisingly, has created quite a disturbance between Palestinians and Jewish settlers. But since the Israeli military is constantly on guard, there’s not much the Palestinians can do about it without going to jail. Of course, under Israeli occupation, Palestinians aren’t in control of the rest of the West Bank either, they are only in control of the more highly populated cities like Bethlehem, Ramallah, Nablus, etc. The rest of the land is either controlled by Jewish Settlements or Israeli military control. This means Palestinians must go through checkpoints to get from one Palestinian city to another, so they cannot freely move about the West Bank. They also may not go into Israel or even Jordan without permission papers, which are almost impossible to get, so that means means they are basically stuck in their own cities. Ok, that’s probably enough background for the moment, moving on...

So anyway, Nahhalin was entirely agricultural and they’ve been forced to leave their lands, which have been confiscated, and become more service oriented in their jobs within the village limits. Also, since they’re surrounded by Jewish settlements, and since the fence or separation wall (it comes in both forms) usually extends farther out from the settlement to create a buffer zone and room to grow, this means that the Israeli government’s plan for Nahhalin is to just fence in the village itself. So the separation fence could potentially go around the border of the village, cutting them off from what olive groves they have left, and even a school that is located on a hillside just a little too far outside the city (literally a few meters too far). So, not only would the fence cut them off from the outside, but that means they would have no more room to grow from the inside. In 1967, there were 3,000 Palestinians living in the village, and now there are 7,000. But there is nowhere for all these people to go since they can’t build anywhere, thus creating major implications. Three or more families to a house, water shortages, huge sanitation issues (a whole other blog post will have to cover that), job shortages, trash collection problems, you name it. To put it briefly, these poor people are living in a ghetto, but they have no other options.

So our job in volunteering with the HLT will be to study these issues, collect data on what kind of effect the wall and settlements are having on environmental issues in this village (mostly water and sanitation problems), and then put this information into a workable report so that the HLT can start taking action to help them. There are 8 of us volunteering for HLT, so 4 of us will be working in Nahhalin and the other 4 will be working in another village that we will visit and learn more about tomorrow.

So far, this has been an incredibly eye opening experience. Seeing firsthand how these people are living is just unbelievable. Even my shower this morning was entirely different. Palestinians have to pay double what Israelis pay for water, so we try and help them conserve as much as possible. Therefore, “Navy” showers are the way to go. Turn on the water, get wet, turn off the water, soap up, turn on the water, rinse, turn off the water, you’re done. Actually I tried to take a shower last night, but I guess the water tank fills up at night because there was no hot water left. Literally, I turned the knob for the hot water and only drops were coming out, and they weren’t hot. Fortunately it was warm this morning, but jeez. When I think about the 5-8 minute showers I take at home that are always hot and available 24/7, it amazing that this is the way these people always live. They don’t get to go home to nice showers in 3 months, this is their constant way of life. And that’s just showering, there are hundreds of other major differences that I’m not even aware of yet. It’s just mind blowing.

So anyway, that has been our experience for the past few days! Excuse the length of this post, but it seems important to explain some of the background for these issues we are learning more and more about every day. We look forward to learning more about the Israeli perspective in a few weeks, thanks for reading!

Lehitra’ot! (Goodbye in Hebrew

Ma’salaama! (Goodbye in Arabic)

-- Katie Duntley

First thoughts from Bethlehem

If anyone had asked me a year ago if I ever thought I would be in Israel today I would have shook my head, not even hesitating to think about the question. Funny how things change because here I am (!) in the birthplace Christ.

I have a fleece blanket draped over me and every other sentence I have to take a break from writing so I can gaze out across the city. It is captivating and constantly draws my eye, its stone walls whisper secrets of the ancient past in my ear. It is 7 PM and the sun has already been down for about three hours, city lights twinkle and a damp cold has set in (thus the fleece blanket…and the two fleeces I am wearing and the gloves and the hat).

Orion sits boldly on the horizon and right below it I can make out the distant shape of mountains, mountains that I have been told are in Jordan.  I woke up in Tel Aviv this morning – the business capital of Israel and what the world recognizes as the political capital, ran along the beach and romped in the Mediterranean sea – and now I’m here, in Bethlehem. In a mere hour we drove from one side of the country to the other.

Bethlehem couldn’t be more different from the bustling, thriving Tel Aviv. Steep hills dominate the landscape, stone houses crowd around olive groves, it’s cold and Christmas lights twinkle from every window. The people that live in the West Bank are both Muslim and Christian but they are united under the common banner of being Palestinian. An imposing concrete wall surrounds the city cutting Bethlehem off from Jerusalem and any contact with Israel proper. I can’t imagine what it would be like living in a walled area, cut off from the wider world, especially in such a small place. Israel at its widest point is only 60 miles across.

Tomorrow we launch right into our volunteer work. Seven students are going to be at The Holy Land Trust and the remaining four will be volunteering with a wildlife refuge. I’m not yet sure where I will be going but I’m excited either way. I am really looking forward to interacting with the local people. I feel like there is so much to learn from them. I’m interested to hear their views on the conflict and the possibility of peace. I want to learn as much Arabic a possible and I hope to have the chance to learn more about Islam. We are staying in the Christian quarter of the city but earlier I could hear the call to prayer for the Muslims.

There is so much to experience here, so many things I want to explore and discover, I hardly know where to begin. I feel open to experiencing anything. For example, this morning at a corner market I bought cereal that came in a technicolor box (come to think of it the cereal was technicolor too), complete with bowl, milk and spoon…It was a good one time experience.

I feel like I haven’t even begun to touch on the things I’m thinking about or what I’m doing here. However my fingers are white with cold and I’m afraid I can’t physically keep writing.

Ma’ salama!

                                                                                -Jess Lewis