Author: ISM Media Group

Reflections on our arrest….

You go through a strange range of emotions while incarcerated. Being shackled at the ankles forces you to shuffle painfully, ungainly, slowly. It reduces you to an infirm.

Our arrest was a strange experience..

It was an immense joy to see over two hundred Palestinians cheer at their removal of the massive concrete blocks which have obstructed their road, their lives, for years.

Their cheers before and during the removal were nothing compared to those which followed the heaving aside of the last intrusive Occupation block. The efforts of the Palestinians, with the help of some Israelis and internationals, bore fruit after about 40 minutes of coordinated heaving and pulling. It is the act of physically repelling the barriers, rather than simply using a tractor to push them aside, that makes the accomplishment so much sweeter.

So when, on our way to lunch after hours of activity in intense heat, we saw the military bulldozer readying to replace the immense blocks so laboriously pushed aside it was an instinctive and reflexive response to run to the site to try to prevent the roadblock replacement.

Being only 5 activists, with as many blocks to cover, we opted to try to individually prevent each block from being moved. Retrospection ever crystal clear, a more unified resistance would have been more effective.

The arrest came following the words: “this road is now a closed military zone,” referring to the Palestinian road upon which we sat. Papers in Hebrew were produced, but unable to verify their validity, and very aware of their spontaneous birth, we sat on. The papers were a sham, the kind the army drafts up on the spot and waves merrily when it wants to contravene established laws and boundaries. Yet, it is miraculous manifestations of military orders like these which do, in the end, serve the purpose: to bend the law and achieve a specific goal. In this case, the goal was the removal of the activists and the replacement of the roadblocks.

One by one we were carried or dragged away from the roadblocks’ site, relocated roadside between military jeeps, while the bulldozer did its work. Cement blocks were re-installed, and a new layer of blockage dug out from the earth walls surrounding the road, piled on top of the cement to create a two-tiered blockage.

One of the two males detained had his hands cuffed tightly behind his back, the soldier having first pulled his arms back and upwards at painful angles.

Legally, soldiers are allowed to detain internationals only for up to three hours, after which they must be released. Before the three hours’ detention had elapsed, long after the re-installation of the roadblocks, police arrived and began questioning us. We were taken to the Ariel settlement police station for further detention.

From the moment of being arrested until my release, the other female international and I were kept in handcuffs and/or ankle shackles, only temporarily removed for most, but not all, bathroom visits—on one occasion, we were indeed forced to use the toilet while shackled together at the ankles. Friday evening, the first evening of my arrest, was spent in handcuffs in a waiting room in the men’s prison. Saturday before, during, and following the trial I was shackled at the ankles. I was made to sleep thus Saturday evening.

Friday night, the other female arrested and myself were not provided with a jail cell, nor with beds or blankets. With the television on all night at a very loud volume, showing a movie that bordered on pornography and which the police would not turn off, and with the lights on for most of the night, no place to lie down, and the chill from the air conditioning, it was impossible to sleep. Despite repeated requests, the police officers made no attempt to improve the conditions, instead mocking and taunting us.

While the tendons at my ankles hurt, chaffed by hard-edged shackles, and I could only shuffle past accusing eyes, I refused to feel “guilty” or be relegated to sub-human, as their stares would imply. I was there only because of their flawed, racist system of oppression which ignores even its own High Court ruling.

The arrested males were given dingy cells and sparse food.

The conditions presented to us by the Israeli judge at Saturday’s trial were unacceptable: the judge chose to ban us from the West Bank cities of Ramallah, Nablus, and Bethlehem simply because those were cities in which we had mentioned we had friends. As we did not produce passport ID, we were taken back to jail for a second night. This night, despite the judge’s order to at least provide me with a cell, I was made to sleep in a room with a female police officer, still shackled at the ankles.

The next morning, I was awoken and made to sit for several hours, still shackled, before being taken for the 2nd trial. At this trial, our state-appointed lawyer did not communicate with us and it was only through the aid of an Israeli friend that we were told the conditions of our release, which remained the same as the previous day. Feeling our options were limited, our passports present, we signed and were released.

Having the passport of white skin and a young woman’s face, I was nonetheless treated with more sympathy and privilege than Palestinian counterparts are given.

Lest I dehumanize my jailers just as their system does the general population of Palestinians, I must recognize that they are cogs in a machine, humans filling a role they perceive to need, that of security enforcers, against a population they perceive as threatening.

It is over and again the System that is greatly racist and flawed, cunningly devised and enforced.

Overall, aside from three very sarcastic and provoking male police officers, the police were generally humane, though still blindly fulfilling their role in the Apartheid regime and not fulfilling their obligations to provide arrestees with a cell, to remain arrested but unshackled.

While some of the female police officers, young women, acted with more consideration, most of the male officers showed disdain and disrespect to all of us arrested.

In allowing ourselves to be arrested, we hoped to highlight the very serious issue of roadblocks and checkpoints in Occupied Palestine, as well as to send a message to the residents of Sarra and surrounding villages that we see their suffering and are committed to joining in their struggle. It is an honour to work with dedicated Israelis like the Israeli Anarchists who, for many years, have endeavored to fight the Occupation and its policies, also suffering arrest and abuse at the hands of the IOF.

Support Needed: Settler to face court for Assaulting HRWs: Septmeber 6th 1pm

On the 6th September 2007, 1:00pm, a court will convene at the Israeli Peace Courts to bring to trial a mature Israeli Settler who attacked two international human rights workers on the 27th July 2007.

The incident took place on a piece of Palestinian land located between the illegal settlements of Kiriat Arba and Givat Havot. On the 27th July 2007, a number of human rights activists had convened to accompany a Palestinian man and his family in accessing his land directly between Kiriat Arba and Givat Havot. The piece of land, although legally Palestinian is coveted by the settlers who have gone so far as to erect a tent upon the land and claim it to be a Synagogue.

As the two activists walked towards the land, a mature settler, believed to be a resident of Givat Havot, brandished a large spiked stick and proceeded to attack a German man and a British lady as they were walking towards the land. Both were left shaken and with severe cuts and bruises. Video footage clearly demonstrates that this was an unprovoked attack and that the activists had not undertaken anything to encourage the aggression.

Footage of the incident and greater detail relating to the incident can be found at the following link:
https://www.palsolidarity.org/main/2007/07/28/tel-rumeida-violent-settler-attacks-human-rights-workers/

This case is one of few out of the numerous attacks that take place against Palestinian and International activists who seek to defend the rights of Palestinians and are attacked in the process of doing so. The majority of attacks do not make it as far as the courts due to insubstantive evidence or difficulties encoutered with police investigations. We hope that we can achieve justice in the face of continued violence and oppression by Settlers who wish to denigrate the Palestinians and prevent Activists from acting in solidarity with them. We need to show that we will not walk away even when faced with harm and we hope that justice will prevail.

We hope that as many people as possible can attend the hearing and offer their support.

For additional information please contact Rose 054 224 9179

Haaretz: The fruits of his efforts lie on the wrong side of the separation fence

By Meron Rapoport

Sharif Omar Khaled had a little bit of satisfaction last week. His guava trees bore fruit for the first time. They had ripened relatively early, he said, because of the hot weather.

Sharif Khaled, who is known to everyone as Abu Azzam, looks like a moshavnik from days gone by. True, he doesn’t have a mustache, but he has a little paunch, an old tractor with a wagon and he can talk about his trees without end: olive trees, citrus trees, avocado, apricot trees,
almonds, guavas. His greatest pride is his loquat orchard: 14 dunams last year yielded 47 tons of fruit. A most impressive record.

In the past two months, Abu Azzam has seen his 3,600 trees only from a distance, from the top of the hill where his village, Jayyous, lies. When I visited this Palestinian village (not far from Qalqilyah) some four years ago, I felt as if I were in a moshav – tractors with drivers in
mud-covered rubber boots filled its streets.

This feeling has dissipated. The number of Jayyous residents who engage in agriculture has decreased for a simple reason: the separation fence. In his area it was completed three years ago and it cuts off the residents of Jayyous from their lands. To reach their farm land, they require a permit from the Civil Administration, and these are given out less and less often. Only 90 of the 4,000 residents of Jayyous are today permitted to work their lands. For three years, Abu Azzam was one of the lucky ones who received a permit. On June 23, he was informed that the permit would no longer be renewed, “because of opposition on the part of security
elements.”

Abu Azzam is not the only person whose permit was not renewed. In the past few months, people in Jayyous say, 29 farmers have had their permits canceled, all of them ostensibly for security reasons. In Abu Azzam’s case, this refusal seems surprising, in the best-case scenario, and evil in the worst case.

Abu Azzam goes abroad three or four times a year. He has been to Sweden, Britain, India and Spain. Now he can chat a little in Italian after studying for three months in Pisa. But he cannot go to his loquat trees.

The word “coexistence” has all but disappeared from the lexicon of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. But not with Abu Azzam. He struck up ties with Israelis who participated in the protests against building the fence in the Jayyous area four years ago, and since then he has taken pains to nurture those ties constantly. Every year hundreds of Israelis come to
help him and other farmers from Jayyous with their harvesting in fields that have remained on the Israeli side of the fence. “They don’t want money and even bring along their own food,” Abu Azzam says with admiration. “They simply want to help us.”

Abu Azzam particularly remembers one of the Israeli acts of assistance: In December 2004, Israeli bulldozers pulled up several hundred olive trees in a private plot belonging to one of the residents of Jayyous. “The Israelis came to replant the trees,” he says. “They walked several kilometers on foot because the army did not permit them to bring their vehicles to the
fields. Even the elderly among them went on foot. How old is Uri Avneri? He also walked. We were altogether some 50 Palestinians, 200 Israelis and 100 policemen and soldiers. Several hundred villagers from Jayyous watched us from behind the fence. They were extremely moved. It was a very good feeling to see the Israelis planting the trees with us.”

But let us not get confused. Abu Azzam is a thorn in Israel’s side, albeit a small thorn. He travels a great deal abroad and on most of his trips speaks out against the “apartheid fence.” He was part of the Palestinian delegation to the International Court of Justice in The Hague, as a
“farmer from the area,” and he says things that are unequivocal and scathing. He appears in international forums abroad, and sometimes his confrontations with Israeli representatives end in unpleasant tones. This year in February, for example, he participated in a discussion at
Cambridge University. “The Palestinian delegate in Briatin did not arrive, and I was the sole Palestinian in a forum with about 10 Israelis,” he says. “They asked me whether suicide bombers can be part of a peace process. I was impolite and asked them whether attacks by an Apache helicopter on schools could be part of a peace process. There was an unpleasant argument.” Did these scathing remarks lead to the cancellation of Abu Azzam’s permit? It is possible.

A Civil Administration spokesman responded that Abu Azzam had a hearing before a committee that considered his request to renew his permit. The request was considered “bearing in mind the security needs of the State of Israel, and it was decided to turn it down.” Abu Azzam says that the committee members asked him where he had gone the last time he visited abroad. “I said that I was in Sweden in May, and then they asked me ‘where
were you in February?’ I had the feeling they were talking about the conference in Cambridge.”

Perhaps there is another reason. One of Abu Azzam’s friends once warned him that eventually they would cancel his permit to work his fields. “Your problem is that you have too many contacts with the Israeli left,” his friend told him.

Either way, Abu Azzam is convinced that the Israeli authorities are not in favor of ties between Israelis and Palestinians. He views the lack of ties as one of the reasons that the number of Israelis who participate in the activities he has organized has not grown. “It is as if the Israelis are not interested in knowing what is happening on the other side,” he says.
Is Abu Azzam indeed a security menace? Anything is possible, but on the face of it, at least, it appears that this possibility would be strange. He is 65 years old, a former Communist, and the distance between him and Hamas is very great. He has been arrested only once, 20 years ago, for refusing to evacuate part of his lands in favor of the nearby settlement of Tzofin. One of his sons was detained for nine months under administrative detention, but that was more than three years ago. Another of his sons always gets permits to go to Haifa port to fetch goods for the company he runs in Ramallah. This son, too, by the way, did not get a permit from the Civil Administration to go to the family’s fields. He can travel to Haifa but not to his father’s guavas and loquats.

Sources in the Civil Administration say that attempts were made on their part to persuade the Shin Bet security service to give Abu Azzam a permit, but the Shin Bet was adamant in its refusal.

Abu Azzam has a simple explanation for this persistent refusal: “They want us to forget about our lands, for us to emigrate from here.”

Victory for Bil’in and the Non-Violent Struggle


MEDIA ADVISORY: Victory for the residents of Bil’in village

4th September 2007:

Following popular non-violent resistance through joint struggle between Palestinian, Israeli and international activists, a court decision has been made in favor of the petition by Bilin village to change the current route of the Apartheid Wall.

The court decision dictates that the military are obliged to plan and implement a new route for the wall. It has been ordered that the new path will allow for all Palestinian agricultural land to be on the Palestinian side. Furthermore, the court has ordered that the state should not take into consideration the area earmarked for Stage B of the planned expansion of Matityahu East.

During the proceedings, it was of note that the court made a rarely heard reference to military considerations and security. The court stated that in respect of security considerations, the current route of the wall runs in a topographically inferior path thus indicating that the original route had been planned with the prime consideration being the planned expansion of the settlement rather than of security.

The Supreme Court decision comes after years of continued struggle and resistance to the illegal confiscation of village lands. It is seen as a victory for the path of non-violent resistance and joint initiative from both the Palestinian and Israeli participants.

Although today’s decision is seen a victory in the struggle against oppressive consequences of the Israeli Occupation and a victory for the villagers of Bilin, it is important to recognize that the route of the wall still deviates from internationally recognized armistice lines and is still in violation of international law, resolutions and advisories made within the International Court of Justice and within the UN Security Council.

For more information please go to the Israeli Supreme Court Website, www.court.gov.il
(unfortunately the decision is only in Hebrew)

Alternatively please contact:

Neta Golan: 059 8 184169
Attorney Michael Sfard: 0544 713930 alternatively 03 607 345
Mohammed Khatib : 0 594 135 3636
Jonathan Pollock: 054 632 7736

14year old boy detained for trying to steal a landmine

A temporary checkpoint was erected in Tel Rumeida, Hebron, complete with a landmine placed on the road. Human Rights Workers noticed a young boy being detained. HRW’s approached the boy to enquire over what was going on. It was established that he was 14 years old and therefore too young to have an ID card. When asked, the soldiers said he had been trying to steal the landmine.

The boy was kept for a total of an hour and a quarter after which he was finally released. No charges were brought against the child, soldiers merely claimed they kept him for so loing as they were “waiting for orders”.

It is unknown whether the land mine was still live or not, however it casues great concern to the residents of Tel Rumeida as well as Human Rights Workers that such offensive weaponry is present in such a residential area.