REPORT #10: GAZA, a SETTLEMENT and ISRAELI PEACE GROUPS

Last week was "Mid-term orientation week" in EAPPI-speak, but, despite its name, it was really excellent. The idea was to take us out of the West Bank for 5 days—including most of a day off in Haifa and Acre—to see a broader picture.

The focus was on Israeli peace groups. It is part of our EA remit to work with Israeli (and Palestinian) peace groups although in Jayyous the only one we work with and that to a limited degree is Machsom Watch who have been monitoring and influencing what goes on at checkpoints for 10 years. We had heard from three such groups before we started work, and we now added another three. I shall mention them all below and in another Report, but in general they are small, and not seen as having much influence on Israeli society or government. But they are wonderfully courageous and dedicated people, and deserve all the support we can give them.

All of us also visited a settlement, Efrat, near Bethlehem to hear a talk by the PR man. It was a beautiful place, one of a string of settlements across these hills. The talk was interesting, but not especially persuasive. But that's another story.

And we spent an afternoon at Yad Vashem, the impressive Holocaust Museum in Jerusalem

We four British EAs also met an impressively knowledgeable representative of Mr Blair's Quartet Office, and the also impressive British Deputy Vice Consul in Jerusalem during this week, but that's also another story.

1.  Sderot and Gaza—"Othervoice" (www.othervoice.org) 

·      Wednesday morning we were in Sderot, about 2 miles from Gaza and subjected for 9 years to rocket attacks from there. It was almost surreal—English-looking, slightly rolling countryside with fields growing a variety of crops. However the hay had been gathered, so the season was more advanced than in the UK. Sderot itself was pleasant, a town of 20,000 people many of them Russian immigrants. Looking closer, however, I saw a safe room attached to each house or apartment, and reinforced blockhouses at each bus stop. New, reinforced schools are being built to replace old, vulnerable ones. When the siren goes off, a rocket can land somewhere after 15 seconds so there is little time to take shelter. Indiscriminate attack on civilians in this way is contrary to International Humanitarian Law.

·      An Israeli woman and man described in moving terms the emotional traumas associated with living under unpredictable rocket fire, especially where their children were concerned. A visit to the supermarket becomes an "emotional project" and taking a minibus load of children to school a gut-wrenching experience. The reaction of most people in Sderot has been intolerance: they no longer care about the people who live in Gaza. These two courageous people reacted differently. They remembered the 1½ million people living under siege in Gaza, and set up "Othervoice"  a non-political group  to campaign for an end to the siege of Gaza and different and creative actions that can lead to a long-term solution to the conflict in their area. They make contacts with people in Gaza, including regular phone calls, and seminars with young Gazans.

·      Ceasefire: the ceasefire from June to November 2008 was a chance for Sderot to get back to normal life. But the Israeli attack in December 2008/January 2009 was really frightening for these two: people in Sderot were delighted but these two were against the attack and felt very isolated. They had heart rending phone calls from friends in Gaza. The walls of their houses shook the whole time. "War pollutes your heart". An article "Not in my name and not for my security" received huge media coverage. A letter just sent calls for the end of the siege.

·      Gaza: seeing Gaza from a small hill was also surreal. It was quiet, and there was no indication of the violence wreaked upon it nor the appalling living conditions of the people.

·      Pre-1948: the tragedy is that pre-1987 relationships between Israelis and Palestinians in the area were good—visits to the beach, and markets for shopping. Before 1948 the area was very mixed with 40-50 Palestinian villages and many kibbutzim. During 1948/9, the villages were destroyed and the population of Gaza increased 5-fold with an influx of refugees mainly from the north

.2.  Rabbis for Human Rights

·      This is a small group of 180 Rabbis—American and Israeli—who take seriously the injunctions of the Torah, "Justice, justice shall you pursue" and "Happy are those who act justly, who do right at all times" (Deut. 16.20 and Ps. 106:3). Founded in 1988, they are the rabbinical voice of conscience, and RHR is the only religion-based peace NGO in Israel—other peace groups are overwhelmingly secular.

·      They don't take a position on the big political issues but campaign on the issues that affect ordinary Palestinians such as land rights. So they organise bus loads of Israeli to go olive picking every October and have a West Bank Human Rights Coordinator whom we have met. He takes a very pro-active non-violent attitude to human rights and land rights abuses and is very willing to intervene, especially where settlers are concerned.

·      Rabbi Yehiel Grenimann gave us a fascinating analysis of the development of the settler movement.

·      See www.rhr.israel.net.

3.  New Profile (www.newprofile.org)  

·      Two Israeli women members told us about this small group which is concerned about the militaristic nature of Israeli society. They believe that Israeli culture generates an image of a world in which war was, is and will always be inevitable, a necessary and acceptable way of solving our problems. That is certainly my impression from outside.

·      A military culture: they showed us a series of advertisements  which were truly horrifying in their use of the military and military images to sell perfectly normal consumer products. It is also true that armed soldiers are everywhere in Israel—I saw three in a beach resort on the Dead Sea on Saturday. It goes further than that in the sense that entry to the army at 18 is rarely questioned, and the army is so revered that army service is seen as the route to senior jobs in civilian society: a career officer will retire on full pension at age 44, and will likely then go straight into education, perhaps as a headmaster, or industry as a senior manager or director. The  military presence in schools is ubiquitous: uniformed women act as teaching assistants, and students can take time off from school for induction into the army. School and kindergarten playgrounds usually have models of tanks, fighter planes, etc, for kids to play on or with.

·      The senior levels of the army and the government are almost interchangeable with Prime Ministers usually having been senior commanders.

·      The high-tech military industrial complex is very important and successful in Israel which, in its various wars and attacks, can trial new weapons and systems.

·      Avoidance: it is quite possible to avoid military service, but young people cannot easily access the necessary information. Incitement to refuse to serve is a criminal offence, so Newprofile has to be very careful to provide a counselling network only to people who ask, and never to approach the public "cold". A right wing group took them to the High Court alleging incitement, but charges were dropped.

·      Avoidance on religious grounds by Orthodox Jews is increasing—30,000 pa are now excused.

·      There is no discussion in Israeli society about how large the army needs to be—it just recruits as many youngsters as it can.

Mike Barnes,

12 May 2010

REPORT #9:

I give below two incidents—small in the scheme of things—which indicate the uncertainty of life here and the inability of Palestinians to influence events that concern them: in one case, a roof was taken over by the Israeli army who decided they wanted to use it without permission to keep an eye on neighbours and a local road. In the second, a farmer going to plant out Za'atar as he and his neighbours have often done is refused access to his land on what seem entirely spurious grounds. Note that the restrictions on movement and access imposed on the Palestinians as a consquence of the occupation are contrary to their human rights unless imposed for security or military reasons, and that the Separation Wall/Fence within the West Bank was judged by the International Court of Justice to violate Israel's obligations under international law (July 2004).

1.  A NIGHT UNDER OCCUPATION

It’s the frightening and relentless nature of this occupation that must make it so hard to bear for the Palestinians. This example is one we just happened to become involved in, but such things are happening day and night all over the West Bank.

A contact we know quite well called me at 9pm just when we were preparing food before going to bed. His English is very limited, and I thought he said that soldiers were in his house and had been there for some hours. We four EAs took a taxi—his village is some miles away—and met him outside his village. He explained that soldiers were not in his house but in the house of a friend in a nearby village. They were on the roof, and had been there since 7am that day. It is quite common for the Israeli Army to take over a house and confine the Palestinians who live in the house  to one room. Here 11 soldiers had taken over the roof—most roofs here are flat with a wall around—in order, they said, to keep an eye on the main road and people in the village. So we went to the house and were invited in under the watchful eyes of the soldiers on the roof. The family of husband, young wife and 3-month old baby had indeed been confined to the downstairs since early that morning, but there were three particularly distressing aspects to this occupation of their house. Firstly they were quite naturally scared stiff. Secondly their mother, father and three sisters in their early 20s lived in the house just across the yard. In this conventional Muslim family the presence of soldiers and men on the roof overlooking their house had made it impossible for the women to venture outside. Thirdly the soldiers had planted an Israeli flag on the roof, an act which would raise doubts and perhaps suspicions in the minds of neighbours and friends.

Having heard all this, we called Machsom Watch, an Israeli peace group. They said that as long as this was an authentic military action and the soldiers were not behaving badly or destructively—as they sometimes do—we could do nothing to get them to go away. We decided that the best thing we could do was for the women in our EA group to support the family by staying overnight with them—by now it was getting quite late—and the family welcomed this. So I came back to our house and the women EAs stayed. The soldiers left at 7am the next day, and had been walking and moving equipment on the roof all night. Nevertheless they left the roof clean and tidy. Perhaps the EA presence had encourage this, but certainly our presence had given the family some comfort.

The reason given for the occupation of the roof—to keep an eye on the main road to Qalqilya and the people in the village—didn’t really make sense since this particular house is set back from the road behind a marble factory and is right at the end of the village. Another possible reason for choosing this house is that one of the men of the family had been in prison, but since this is true for huge numbers of Palestinian men that didn’t seem a valid reason either. The likely reason is that this village has seen a lot of activity by soldiers in the last couple of weeks, including the detention of two young teenage boys for an hour at gunpoint at midnight, and this was just a normal part of what occupation soldiers do.

2.  LIFE at an AGRICULTURAL GATE

If life here were not so deadly serious, it would be very good farce.

At about 0830 on Saturday morning I was called by a farmer at an agricultural gate some 2 miles from here. He said his papers were in order, but the soldiers would not let him cross over to his land on the Israeli side of the Wall/Fence. The only way of dealing with incidents is to actually go there, so I took a taxi down to the Gate below Jayyous, and met him there. He explained that he wanted to plant za’atar* on his land but that he was not allowed to take the several thousand small plants he had prepared through the Gate today although the soldiers on duty yesterday allowed him to do so then. So we went to talk to the soldiers. It appeared that his permit gives him permission to farm his land on the Israeli side, but they suspected that he might sell the small plants rather than plant them himself and his permit does not cover business activities. A further complication was that another man was to help him plant the Za’atar without cash payment but with the promise of one third of the crop, a very common arrangement between farmers here, but in this case it apparently raised questions in the soldiers’ minds as to whose crop this was and whether it was some kind of sale. The farmer was adamant that he just wanted to plant his Za’atar and had to do it today if the plants were not to die, but despite arguments back and forth for the best part of an hour, the soldiers insisted in a fairly pleasant way that, although they wanted to help the farmer, they were simply following the law. They suggested we could phone the District Commanders Office but yesterday was Friday, and the office was closed. They also suggested he go to the DCO office and get his permit rewritten. Finally I suggested that one of them could accompany the farmer to his land to make sure he planted rather than sold the plants, and they agreed to this: they phoned a military colleague who turned up in a jeep to go with the farmer to his land. The soldiers emphasised to me that this was a one-off for yesterday but it seems the problem was solved at least for the day.

This small incident indicates the problems farmers have for even the simplest task and how the interpretation of the rules changes from day to day so that planning is impossible. There is also the fact that this man was very assertive and articulate in English and Hebrew as well as Arabic, and that I was there. There would be many less assertive and capable farmers who would simply have turned round, gone home and lost both their plants and a day’s work. And finally there is the cost of all this to the Israelis—five soldiers, phone calls back and forth, and at least an hour’s time.

*Za’atar is a small herb, very popular and so widely grown in fields in this area on both sides of the Wall/Fence. Zaytoun have the product, and some of you may have bought some from me in the UK.

Mike Barnes

3 May 2010

REPORT #7: AREA C

Introduction

Whenever you talk to a Palestinian here about housing, house demolitions, village expansion, settlements or land you will very quickly hear the words "Area C". Israel implements its occupation by restricting Palestinians' use of space in many ways, but that little phrase indicates one of its most common methods. Israeli use of Palestinian space includes restrictions on building and construction, appropriation of West Bank land for settlement building, Wall/Fence construction and unspecified military purposes, the closure of areas as "firing zones" and nature reserves, and closures that restrict Palestinians' freedom of movement and access to essential services.

Summary: Area C and its effects

Area C has a profound effect on  the life of Palestinians and yet few people outside Palestine have any idea of its significance. Area C comprises some 62% of the area of the West Bank, it is the only contiguous part, splits the West Bank into small pieces often called "cantons", and is where most of the smaller settlements and Israeli roads are located. According to the World Bank, Area C also acts as a major constraint on Palestinian economic development. The purpose of this Report is to briefly set out what Area C is and how the Israeli Government uses it. In effect it seems to me that Israel treats this 62% of the West Bank as though it were its own sovereign territory. In fact, as we all know, according to UN resolutions and international law, the West Bank (and Gaza) will be the lands of the putative Palestinian state.

What is Area C and how did it arise?

·      Areas A, B and C were a result of the ill-fated Oslo Agreements of the 1990s.

·      A map showing areas A, B and C is attached.

o     Areas A and B include the major Palestinian cities (Area A) and the countryside in light brown which contains smaller Palestinian towns and villages (Area B). In total they comprise 38% of the West Bank. Area A is under Palestinian civil and security control. Area B is under Palestinian civil control but joint Israeli/Palestinian security control;

o     Area C is the grey and yellow areas comprising 62% of the West Bank. The grey areas are designated by Israel for settlements or military use only, and Palestinian building or construction there is totally forbidden.  In the yellow areas, planning restrictions make any Palestinian building or construction virtually impossible while settlements are expanded and new ones started. The yellow areas contain many of the smaller Israeli settlements and roads, and is contiguous. Area C is under total Israeli control—civil and security.

·      This division was intended as a temporary arrangement: the 1995 agreement setting these areas up was a transitory step in what were expected to be continued negotiations which would (among other things) gradually transfer control of Area C to the Palestinian Authority (PA) by 1999. However negotiations became stalemated during Netanyahu's previous period as Prime Minister and collapsed altogether in 2000.

·      In effect Israel now treats Area C as though it is Israeli territory—62% of the West Bank!

·      According to the UN, the division of the West Bank into Areas A, B, and C has not altered the status of the entirety of the West Bank as occupied territory.

·      More than 400 Palestinians villages have part of their built up area in Area C, and 150 are entirely located  in Area C. It is estimated that 150,000 Palestinians live in Area C.

·      Many Palestinian villages in the Jayyous area are designated Area B but are surrounded by Area C and this is quite common.

This is all very complicated: why does it matter?

It has a huge impact on the daily life of Palestinians.

·      Construction of any kind in Area C, be it a private home, an animal shelter or a donor-funded infrastructure project, requires approval by the Israel Civil Administration (ICA)  which is under the authority of the Israeli Ministry of Defence. This approval will in almost all cases be refused or, at best, long delayed.

·      New or expanded houses: The simplest and very common case is a Palestinian village in Area B but surrounded by Area C. Israel does not allow expansion of the village into Area C to cope with a growing population. If anyone builds in or extends a house or a school into Area C, he will be served with a demolition order and the building destroyed today, tomorrow or in the future. This is what happened in Harris—see my Report #6—and another 25 Harris houses in this position have demolition orders as well.

·      Existing houses: Demolition orders are placed on houses that have stood for many years but that Israel now deems to be in Area C. Several houses in Salfeet district are in this position as is a small village, Izbat at Tabib, near here. The whole village of 40 houses has been here since the 1920s, but it and a lovely school have demolition orders to make room for settlement expansion and an industrial zone.

·      Infrastructure projects: major projects such as construction or expansion of schools or medical clinics and shelters or the rehabilitation of water infrastructure all require communities, NGOs or international funders to go through a lengthy and complex permit application process to the ICA. Approval is not guaranteed. For this reason, the World Bank considers the ICA to be a "major constraint" to implementing projects in Area C.

·      Water is hugely important in what is a relatively dry area, and, apart from household and industrial consumption is used by both Israeli and Palestinian farmers for irrigation of many crops. Using the powers of an Israeli Military Order of 1967 that requires permits for all water structures, Israel monitors and intervenes to control all water related activities in Area C. Thus

o      Jericho, which badly needs a proper sewage system if its water supply is not to be polluted, is Area A—under full Palestinian control—but is totally surrounded by Area C. Any repairs, modifications or new construction in relation to water for Jericho therefore needs approval of and cooperation with the Israeli military authorities.

o     Jayyous water is another example. An application for a permit for a  project to supply Jayyous with water from its wells via a new pipeline has been pending with the ICA since 2002.

How does a Palestinian apply for a permit to build/extend his home?

S/he must meet a number of criteria including:

·      The person submitting the application must be able to prove that s/he owns or has the right to use the land. Land registration,  property tax, or inheritance documents are required. This can be very difficult: most land in the West Bank is not yet registered, and if several people own the land together each must sign in person.

·      The proposed construction must be in conformity with an approved planning scheme that is detailed enough to enable planning permits to be issued. This is the hurdle on which most applications are rejected.

Planning restrictions in Palestinian areas

The planning regulations used by the Israel Civil Administration (ICA) under the authority of the Israeli Ministry of Defence to control new and modified construction in the West Bank are very complex, and some go back to the British Mandate period. Two points which contrast the favourable treatment of Israeli settlements compared to Palestinian villages and towns in Area C are:

·      Consistency with existing plans:

o     Palestinian permit applications are usually rejected on the grounds that the proposed construction is inconsistent with existing development plans. However the ICA has produced development plans for only a very few of the hundreds of Palestinian villages in Area C. For other villages in Area C British Mandate Law is applied. This essentially treats these areas as for agricultural use but with some ability to build. However the ICA  now rejects most applications for building permits here, too.

o     Plans for Israeli settlements: by contrast the ICA has approved development plans for almost all settlements located in the West Bank. These are much more favourable than the few development plans for Palestinian villages both in housing density (2.7 to 12.8/hectare compared to 24-70/hectare respectively) and population density (11 times lower for Israeli settlements compared to Palestinian villages).

·      No Palestinian participation in the planning process

o     No Palestinian participation: Jordanian Law applied in the West Bank before 1967 allowed for (Palestinian) community participation at central and local government level in the planning and zoning process. This was nullified in 1971 by an Israeli Military Order. As a result, the current planning system applied to Palestinian communities is highly centralised within the Israeli Civil Administration with no Palestinian participation in the preparation of development plans.

o     Full settlement participation: the West Bank Military Commander is able to appoint a Special Local Planning Committee (SLPC) in a "new planning area", that is, for Israeli settlements, and virtually all settlements have SPLCs. These Committees issue building permits in line with plans approved by the ICA and are responsible for enforcement.

Mike Barnes

28 April 2010

Notes

1.    The occupying power, Israeli is responsible under international humanitarian law for ensuring that the basic needs of the occupied population are met, to administer its occupation in a manner that benefits the local Palestinian population, not to discriminate against the local Palestinian population, and not transfer its own population into the territory under occupation. Under international human rights law, Israel must ensure that Palestinians enjoy their human rights including the right to housing, health, education and water, among others.

2.    This report is based upon a UN OCHA Special Focus entitled "Restricting space: the Planning Regime Applied by Israel in Area C of the West Bank"  dated December 2009. See www.ochaopt.org. 

REPORT #6: EMOTIONAL UPS AND DOWNS AGAIN

I had intended to write about something else THIS time, but once again yesterday I encountered the high and low of life here within a couple of hours.

I started the day in Salfeet where I had been for the last three days meeting old friends from Salfeet Friends of Watford and discussing plans for the future. Those of you in Watford will be glad to hear that plans for our project for musical and cultural education in Salfeet are progressing well—news to follow soon—and that our Salfeet friends sent their best wishes to you all. 

The highlight of the morning was a visit to Abdul's kindergarten in the village of Kifr Dik. There are three of these. They are for pre-school children and parents pay—in Abdul's case, about £10 per month, although as he said, parents can't necessarily pay every month. Abdul's kindergarten is different. He has built it himself in his garden: three classrooms, with toilet and a playground. It's just like any nursery school in the UK: rows of desks with lots of small beaming faces, pictures on the wall, and English and Arabic alphabets displayed. It's overcrowded because it's so popular. He and his wife teach all subjects but also music—he himself plays the Arab lute, and his teenage son is an accomplished singer and performer on keyboard. So, as happened when Keith and I were there 15 months ago, I was treated to a class singing songs with Abdul walking around the room leading on his lute. His love and enthusiasm for these little people and their enthusiasm, energy and singing were lovely to see and hear. I then sat with him in the sunshine in the garden while he explained how much he wants to build a bigger school so that he can teach more children.

An hour later as I was leaving to catch the minibus back to Jayous I got a phone call—everyone has a mobile and EAs are instructed to keep theirs on at all times. This was news of a house demolition in a village called Harith which was on the route of the minibus towards Jayous. So I got off at Harith, and an old man in a very battered old taxi took me to the far end of a quite large village. And there it was: what was a house until the Israeli army arrived two hours before was now a tangled pile of metal wires and broken concrete in front of a lovely terraced olive grove. I had read of house demolitions, and seen films of them taking place, but it's different when you actually see a destroyed house. This house had just been completed, and the family was due to move in in the next week or two. In that sense it was less appalling than usual when a home—not just a house—is demolished, very often with most of the family possessions inside because the Israeli army turns up with no notice, and observers find the family sitting outside trying to get over the shock of what's just happened to them. But as someone said to me this morning, that house was someone's dream and the family worked for 5 years to achieve it. In this village of perhaps 4000 people, several homes have recently been demolished, and 25 have had demolition orders served upon them. This means that at any time, tomorrow, next week or next year a bulldozer will turn up early one morning and destroy your house. The anxiety and lack of security that this causes to the family and especially the children—50% of those affected by house demolitions are children—can only be imagined. Why does Israel carry on with this inhuman policy—remember that this is occupied territory, and such a policy contravenes various human rights and Geneva Convention provisions specifically those relating to protection of an occupied population and discrimination? The answer is that this and other houses here and in other places were built in contravention of Israel's zoning and permit laws which prevent Palestinian villages from expanding to allow for the growth of their population. By contrast Israel's own settlements on occupied Palestinian territory are encouraged to expand for their growing and illegal populations. It's reasonable to ask, of course, why Palestinians build a house when they know there is a risk of it being demolished. The answer is the usual "between rock and hard place" situation: they know they will never be able to obtain a permit from Israel to expand their old house or build their new house, but their family is expanding or they want to get married and start a new home—the custom here—and they feel they have no choice.

The Israeli Committee Against House Demolitions (ICHAD) estimates that over 24,000 houses have been demolished in the West Bank, East Jerusalem and Gaza since Israel conquered these territories in 1967. If each house contained 7 people, this amounts to around 170,000 people affected, many of them children, in a 2005 population of about 3.8 million. To put this into context, the equivalent for the UK population of about 60 million would be 360,000 houses destroyed with an affected population of around 2.5 million. See www.icahd.org and www.procon.org.

Mike Barnes

15 April 2010

REPORT #5: EMOTIONAL EXTREMES in JAYYOUS

Emotions in Jayyous are extreme and rapidly move from one extreme to the other. Yesterday was a case in point.

Our team of 4 was having our weekly Sunday evening team meeting—writing reports for last week, sorting out priorities, and agreeing activities for next week. Suddenly there was a noise of fireworks, and cars blowing horns and driving up and down the street outside. A young man had been released after 8 years in an Israeli prison. We had realised very quickly that it's quite impossible to plan anything here, so, dropping the admin, we joined other people walking towards the village centre under the street lamps and visited the home of the celebrating family. I went upstairs to join the men—father, uncles, cousins and friends—in a smallish room and was made very welcome with a coffee and smiles all round. One uncle spoke good English. It appears that the young man had been arrested for demonstrating and stone throwing at Israeli jeeps, the most common cause of arrest by the Israeli army. The family had been told a few days ago that he would be released. Men and boys came and went. After 15 minutes or so, it seemed appropriate not to intrude further on such a happy family occasion, so I also said my goodbyes and left. My colleagues Ewa, Inger and Florence were sitting downstairs in the small garden under the lights surrounded by small children and happy women and stayed on longer. Then we resumed the admin.

On the way back to our house I called in on a shopkeeper, a very nice man who had invited us to his house to meet his wife and children a few evenings ago. His news was very different. Both his eldest son and his brother's eldest son—both teenagers—were arrested in the middle of the night on 2 February, one of a group of 5 young men arrested from the same extended family. The accusation was the same—stone-throwing. A judge had been due to give sentence yesterday so both men went to the prison. For the seventh time judgement was postponed, until 24^th May for our friend's son and until 2^nd May for his brother's, perhaps because he had hired a private Israeli lawyer at substantial cost. The possibility in either case is a 4 or 5 year prison sentence. Our friend was allowed to talk to his son, but only across a large room. Visiting is not easy: a permit from the Israelis is of course needed. The prison is in Megido in the Galilee north of the West Bank, and expensive to get to. The expense of having a son in jail is also high. Food and items such are cigarettes and soap have to be provided by the family, and the prices charged are much higher than they would be if bought from our friend's shop. He explained that he felt totally powerless, unable as a father to do anything to help his son. He himself has heart problems and really needs treatment which he can't afford. Hiring expensive lawyers is for him out of the question. "This is our life", he says. What is there that can be said except express support and sympathy.

Further light was thrown on prison life when a few days earlier we interviewed a young man  of 19 on the very pleasant veranda of his family home. He had been released from prison a few days before. He was arrested 7 months earlier just after midnight, interrogated in the family guest room, then, with his arms handcuffed and his eyes blindfolded, taken by jeep for further interrogation and imprisonment. He had been taken to court (a military one) 7 times, and said he was never told what he was accused of but suspects it was for taking  part in the numerous demonstrations held in this area. Three other young men were also arrested that night. The others have not been released.

He described prison life as very boring and hard: roll calls at 5am, poor food, visits only from his younger brother—his parents could not get permits, some books, and endless TV. The guards could be brutal. Some younger prisoners can get access to school books to continue their studies but he could not—he will resume school now he's out. He found the whole experience frightening and intimidating—who wouldn't?—and is not likely to demonstrate again. So the Israeli army has achieved its presumed objective.

One result of his imprisonment is that his father, who had a permit to work in Israel, has now lost it and no one in the family—he has 5 brothers—will ever get one. The reason  is that members of the family are now terrorism risks because they might feel like taking revenge for this young man's imprisonment. The logic is impeccable, but what happened to Judaism's values of justice and mercy here?

As I hear more and more of these stories, it seems to me more and more that this Israeli occupation is not only oppressive and violent but vindictive and vengeful. I mean by this that in their treatment of the Palestinians, the Israeli army seems determined to grind everyone down with one small injustice and humiliation after another, however petty. Perhaps I was naïve to expect an occupation to do anything else.

I have read estimates which plausibly suggest that over the years since 1967, half of the Palestinian male population has been imprisoned at one time or another.

Mike Barnes

12 April 2010

REPORT #4: JAYYOUS: MAP of the AREA

I have so far sent reports describing Jayyous, and its agricultural gates and checkpoint into Israel. However I have found that it's impossible to make sense of what's happening here without looking at a map of the area, so that's what I will do in this report.

I attach a map of the area which includes Jayyous. This area is located inside the Green Line (see below) about half way up the West Bank. On a map of Israel/Palestine, the nearest large town, Qalqilya, bulges out towards the Mediterranean in the west so that Israel at this point is at its narrowest. Qalqilya is only a few miles from Tel Aviv or Netanya.

Making sense of the map--facts

It's quite complicated, so let's take it step by step.

·      First locate the Green Line which is represented by a dotted green line running from the middle top to the bottom. This dotted green line follows the bulge of Qalqilya in the middle and left of the map. The Green Line is the armistice line from the 1948/9 war, and is the internationally recognised border for the West Bank of the putative new state of Palestine.

·      Second: moving eastward (to the right) you will see a red line which snakes backwards and forwards as it goes towards the bottom of the map. This is the route of Israel's Separation Wall/Fence which in this part of the West Bank is complete.

·      Third: you will see some dark purple and lighter purple patches. These represent Israeli settlements and areas earmarked for future settlement expansion respectively: Zuffin in the north, Alfe Menashe in the middle, and Oranit and Sha'are Tiqwa in the south at the bottom of the map. You will see that these are actually east (to the right) of the Green Line and located on what is supposed to be Palestinian territory.

·      Fourth: you will see some yellow areas which represent Palestinian towns and villages. Qalqilya is the largest of these with a population of about 50,000. Jayyous with its population of around 3500 is at the centre of the map just over halfway up and is circled. It is close to a zigzag in the red line.

·      Fifth: there are faint green areas in the areas of each of the settlements and between the Green Line to the west (left) and the red line representing the Separation Wall/Fence. These are the so-called seam-zones. These include Palestinian land part of which has been confiscated by Israel and part of which still belongs to Palestinians who access it via agricultural gates which I described in my last Report and which are marked by green crosses on the map.

·      Sixth: there are four crosses in red circles and one in a green circle. These are major checkpoints by which settlers (red) and Palestinian workers (green) can enter Israel. There is also a cross in a blue circle which is a checkpoint for entry by Palestinians into Qalqilya. It is currently unused but could be re-introduced at any time. You will see that it is one of only two entrances to the town which is circled completely by the Wall/Fence. The other entrance is the route marked by a "T" in a black circle which joins two Palestinain sections of the West Bank. The "T" is a tunnel under the road used by Israeli settlers who can enter Israel via the Jaljoulia checkpoint.

·      Finally (at last!) you will see some black, grey and red dotted lines in the three seam zones. These represent future re-routings of the Wall/Fence ordered by Israeli courts as a result either of legal cases brought by Palestinians or of practical operational difficulties caused by the current route of the Wall/Fence.

What on earth should we make of this hugely complicated arrangement?

To my mind, the evidence shows from the early 1970s successive Israeli governments pursued a project to colonise the West Bank by placing settlement towns and roads at strategic points on Palestinian land. Alfe Menashe was started in 1983 and is now a town of 6500. Zuffin was built later and has a population of some 2000. Both are within easy reach of Tel Aviv. When the decision to build the Wall/Fence was taken in the early 2000s, it was built partly for security reasons but also unilaterally to set a future border between Israel and the putative Palestinian state. As such it had to include the major settlements within Israel, especially those close to the Green Line. The result is the hotpotch of walls, fences, roads and tunnels we see close to Jayyous today. Some other areas of the West Bank and East Jerusalem are equally complex for exactly the same reasons.

We should note that all this activity by the Government of Israel is considered illegal by most countries of the world including the USA, the UK and the EU for the following reasons:

·      First: the Israeli settlements are on what is considered Palestinian territory both in the Jayyous area and elsewhere in the West Bank. As such they are illegal in international law, specifically the 4^th Geneva Convention (1949) article 49 which prohibits an occupier from settling its own population on the land it is occupying.

·      Second: Israel started to build the Wall/Fence in 2002 at the height of the second Intifade with its suicide bombings by Palestinians. Its stated aim in building the Wall/Fence was security for and protection of its citizens. Israel could have built the Wall/Fence on the Green Line, the putative border, but instead chose in many places to build it well inside Palestinian territory, in some cases many km inside, so as to incorporate its settlements on the Israeli side of the Wall/Fence. Because of this, the Wall/Fence was judged illegal by the International Court of Justice in 2004. The advisory ruling stated that Israel should dismantle those sections of the  Wall/Fence built on occupied land,  return land to the Palestinians, and compensate Palestinians where restitution was not possible. For its part, the international community should ensure that this was done and that Israel should observe international humanitarian law. We still await any actions along these lines!

The map comes from the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (UN OCHA). You can find this and similar maps of other areas on their website (www.unochaopt.org).

Mike Barnes

10 April 2010

REPORT #2 from JAYYOUS

The Ecumenical Accompaniment Programme in Palestine and Israel (EAPPI)

Churches in Jerusalem. The Programme aims give a voice to people whose voice is not heard, and to support local and international efforts to end the Israeli occupation of Palestinian lands and bring a resolution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict based on international law and relevant UN resolutions for the benefit of both Palestinians and Israelis.

The team

The team of Ecumenical The EAPPI was set up by the World Council of Churches in 2002 at the request of the Heads ofAccompaniers (EAs) in Jayyous is one of six placed at "hotspots" around the West Bank. The others are in East Jerusalem, Bethlehem, Hebron, Yanoun and Tulkarem. The four members of the Jayyous team are Inger (Norway), Ewa (Sweden), Florence (Switzerland) and myself (UK). We and other EAs live in Palestinian communities, and offer protection by our being here, we monitor and report on violations of human rights and international law, listen to and report the stories of the people, and support Israeli and Palestinian groups working for peace. On our return home, we speak about what we have experienced to inform the public and our governments, and to press them to take appropriate action.

Jayyous—general

Jayyous is a village situated near Qalqilya almost on the Green Line—the pre-1967 line which is agreed internationally to be the border for a future Palestinian state on the West Bank—in the mid-West Bank with a population of around 3500. It is on the western edge of the hills of the West Bank, and Tel Aviv and Netanya are always visible to the west some 10 miles away, as is the Mediterranean on a clear day. There are maybe 400 households in the village, most of which belong to one of seven extended families or clans (my word). The culture is very traditional and Muslim, with most older women wearing hijabs and long coats—although the teenage girls seem to wear jeans with Hijabs—and a pronounced separation between men and women. So in many households my presence as a man will mean that the women will not join the group. Hospitality is also traditional and generous: if you visit a family, you will be offered a cold drink and a sweet snack followed by tea and then coffee. We have already had several large and very plentiful meals. The "international house" where we live is on a long main street with houses, small shops sometimes with the words and a recitation of the Quran on a TV screen just inside, a taxi and minibus rank, several mosques, very little traffic, donkeys braying and many children large and small who play on the street as I did when I was a child. They accompany you wherever you go shouting "hello", "what is your name?" and "where are you from?". It's fun to start with but becomes a bit wearing.

Jayyous—how things seem

People are usually welcoming and friendly. Some speak reasonable English, most a smattering or none at all. If meeting for the first time, for example at one of the Barrier gates we monitor, they usually ask where I are from. If I say "from Britain", those who can will often say "Ah Balfour—all your fault". This morning a man said instead "The people of Britain are good but your government is no good". I have to agree with both comments! However, underneath the graciousness there is always the underlying situation which here is about land and checkpoints, and the stories are heartrending. A young man with 4 children visited us the other day. He has some land on the Israeli side of the Barrier and so needs a permit to work it. He sometimes gets a permit, sometimes for a month sometimes for 6 months, but often is refused and has to apply again, the situation he's in now. He is never given a reason and the whole system seems arbitrary: it is perhaps the intention to demoralise and demean. In addition he was shot in the foot by a soldier at one point. I couldn't get the reason from him, but the upshot was a month in hospital, 6 months recuperation and a foot that doesn't work properly anymore. On the positive side, there is a lot of building going on often, we are told, with funds from Palestinians living and working abroad. This perhaps indicates some optimism—which I doubt—but more likely a "life must go on" attitude. In Ramallah there are lots of fancy commercial and apartment buildings going up. Here in Jayyous, houses are usually extended as income allows and families grow, or built for his future family when a man gets married. They are constructed of reinforced concrete as in many other Mediterranean countries and have steel bars sticking up for the next floor when required or affordable.

Jayyous - economy

The economy here is based on agriculture with trees of many kinds—olive, lemon, almond-- herbs and vegetables. Not many years ago, Jayyous was a prosperous village supplying olive oil, fruit and vegetables to the West Bank and export markets. But in 2003, Israel built the Separation Barrier, not on the Green Line but well to the east of it, taking—confiscating—land and water supplies from the West Bank into Israel including much of the land owned and farmed by the people of Jayyous and the water that lies under it. The result for Jayyous farmers is limited or no access to their lands, much reduced production of olives, fruit and vegetables, and unemployment and considerable poverty. Land in this part of Palestine is not just land that can readily be bought or sold. It is and has been passed down the generations within the families, and no Palestinian would voluntarily give up his land. The effect of losing land to the Israelis and their settlements is therefore very deep and profound, especially when you can see both land and settlements from Jayyous, a constant reminder of the loss.

Jayyous—the Separation Barrier—what it is and how it works

That Israel was concerned for the security of its citizens at the height of the 2^nd and violent intifada is understandable, but it seemed then and does now that it was also determined to take as much Palestinian land for its current and future settlements as it could. As the route of the Barrier—here a high fence with a road either side and fences and barbed wire on the outer side of each road—was announced, the villages and towns along the route organised protest marches and demonstrations, and took court action in Israel against the proposed route. Some of these protests were successful in moving the Barrier somewhat to the west, and this happened in Jayyous: the Barrier was moved leaving a wide scar on the earth, but some farmers recovered some of their land. A second re-routing in Jayyous has now been agreed by an Israeli court. This will again give some land and water back to the Jayyous farmers, but a substantial amount remains in Israeli hands. Meanwhile any farmer wishing to farm his land on the Israeli side of the Barrier has to apply for a permit to go through the agricultural gates set in the Barrier. These are open for short periods in early morning, noon and early evening, and we monitor their working regularly. Permits are granted for only a few of the farmers wanting them—some 20%--and for limited and variable periods, and maybe for only one member of the family when the work of several is required, for example, to harvest their olives in October/November. Permits may be and often are withdrawn with no reason given. The result is huge and understandable frustration and anger on the part of the farmers, as well as loss of potential work and income.

Jayyous—schools

There is 10 years of compulsory and free school attendance in Palestine, 6 years in primary school and 4 years in secondary school. Pupils can stay on for a further 2 years which is voluntary and usually leads to university. We visited the schools on Thursday morning with a Norwegian group in town. The boys school had 203 and 160 students in the primary and secondary sections respectively, the girls school 382 students in all years. The buildings were in good condition and the pupil/teacher ration better than in the UK at 10-15. The teachers seemed really enthusiastic, but equipment such a computers, science labs and sports facilities were very seriously lacking. There is also a kindergarten for 4 to 6 years olds with 145 children. This costs the equivalent of £10-16/month. Their main need is for a new bus to pick young children up from outlying villages but play facilities were also lacking. Funding for teachers is provided by the Palestinian Authority, with buildings provided by the UN and the USA with some support from Spain. Teachers are not well paid, and sometimes not paid at all. They were on strike for 1 day this week with a 3-day strike planned next week.

Mike Barnes

3 April 2010