October 7, 2018 | International Solidarity Movement | As-Sawiya, Occupied Palestine
A group of Israeli soldiers, one Israeli policeman, and one Israeli settler harassed a group of Palestinian and international olive pickers in As-Sawiya village yesterday, demanding identification and threatening to expel the harvesters from the area.
Soon after the group began work, they noticed security vehicles from the nearby settlement of Alia arrive and park along the settler road above them. The occupants of the vehicle got out of the car and stood along the road for some time, taking photographs of the olive pickers. Soon thereafter, a team of Israeli soldiers arrived, along with an Israeli police officer in an Israeli police vehicle. The soldiers and police officer immediately approached the olive pickers and asked for IDs. One Israeli soldier filmed the entire interaction with his mobile phone, while the police officer photographed the passports of all the international harvesters. He returned the passports immediately, but held onto the Palestinians’ IDs for a much longer period of time, walking away from the group to make a phone call and visibly sorting through the IDs. After the phone call, he appeared to photograph one or more of the Palestinian IDs before returning them. The officer then tried to tell the group that they needed to leave. The team refused, with the Palestinians insisting that this was their land and they were there for the olive harvest.
During the confrontation, a settler came and sat nearby, watching. After the confrontation, the settler, along with two Israeli soldiers, remained on the scene for an additional 20-30 minutes, trailing the olive pickers. Eventually all Zionists left and the rest of the day’s harvest proceeded without incident.
As-Sawiya is slowly being surrounded by Alia as it expands along three sides of the village and encroaches on its land. The particular area being harvested yesterday was among the closest to the Alia settlement.
ISM London is offering a day of pre-training for prospective volunteers who are interested in joining the International Solidarity Movement on the ground in Palestine.
Any volunteer is required to participate in training before joining activities in Palestine. Attending the training session in London will give you a chance to get a first impression of ISM and the kind of work you would be doing, receive training, connect with former volunteers and have your questions answered.
The training will take place on October 6, 2018:
Time: 10:30-16 Venue: LARC (London Action Resource Center)
62 Fieldgate St
Whitechapel
London
E1 1ES
7 September 2018 | International Solidarity Movement, Ramallah team | Khan al-Ahmar, occupied Palestine
After an Israeli court ruling on September 5 2018 confirmed the eviction and demolition of the Palestinian Bedouin village of Khan al-Ahmar, residents of the village, Palestinians from across the West Bank and international activists have gathered each day in solidarity at the village, awaiting the arrival of the Israeli forces.
On the morning of September 7, 2018, around 09:40, as approximately 40 Palestinians and internationals were peacefully enjoying morning tea and coffee, a busload of an estimated 40-50 people from the Israeli zionist hate-group “Im Tirtzu” pulled off the highway by the village and approached. The Palestinians and internationals who were gathered at Khan al-Ahmar met the Israeli hate group at the entrance of the village before they entered it. The Palestinians questioned the purpose of the group’s presence were met with verbal insults and accusations of anti-semitism.
The non-violent presence of the Palestinians and international solidarity activists put pressure on “Im Tirtzu” to retreat back to the highway. Israeli forces; police, military, and border police, met the groups by the highway and proceeded to don their full riot gear. As “I’m Tirtzu” awaited their bus for pick up, the police demanded that the Palestinians and internationals return to Khan Al-Ahmar, even physically pushing several individuals. Police also forcefully grabbed the Palestinian flags in a show of unnecessary aggression as people were retreating.
By September 7 at 13:00, between 400-500 Palestinian solidarity activists, official Palestinian activist groups, government officials, media personnel, and international activists gathered under the tent at Khan Al-Ahmar for a prayer service. Following the prayer service, the group migrated to the highway, referred to as Route 1, to occupy the street in a peaceful demonstration of their resistance to the threatened eviction. Dozens of Palestinian flags waved in the breeze as demonstrators blocked highway traffic, chanting songs of resistance in Arabic. Fully armed police and military officers forced demonstrators off the street under threat of physical violence. The demonstrators moved but continued the protest for another 45 minutes by the side of the highway.
Palestinian and international solidarity activists will maintain a presence over the coming week in the village of Khan Al-Ahman alongside the village’s residents, who are all anxiously awaiting the arrival of the Israeli army set to carry out their eviction plans.
August 31st 2018 | Kristin Foss, International Solidarity Movement | Ramallah
I woke up feeling sad today. I’m just so sad. I’m crying now, I started crying in the supermarket, I cried a little when a farmer refused my money for grapes. I think that today, I’m just going to cry. Maybe I need it.
Yesterday, I was called by a friend to ask if ISM could spare some people to come to a place I can’t even remember the name of now. There are too many places, too much need for assistance. I wrote about it earlier though. Ras Karkar, the village is called. I remember now. The Israelis are going to build yet another illegal settlement there. Their village is already surrounded by three: in the North, in the South, in the East—and now the Caterpillar machines and the soldiers have arrived to block the West; to build yet another illegal settlement, trapping the villagers. It’s illegal according to international law of course. But, what is international law? It doesn’t apply in Palestine. The Israelis know it; they’ve never had to comply. The US has made sure of it, and the rest has accepted it.
The man who alerted me is my age; he has a professional job, a nice car. But he spends his free time alerting people, travelling to places where he is needed and getting beaten up by 20 year olds with machine guns. He does not get to go home and have a nice dinner with his wife or play with his kids. I guess he could. But then, will his kids even have a country when they grow up?
A man who is sending me live videos is my dad’s age. I’ve been watching the videos, videos of normal people, new friends I have not even met yet, although I recognize a few. Normal people, being brutally pushed over by young soldiers from God knows where, but from this land they are not.
I’ve watched videos of men trying to push heavy machines with their arms. I can feel the desperation. I want to be there. But today it’s only me here and I can’t go alone. I guess I could, but I don’t dare today. I need a time-out. Maybe my fear is stronger than my solidarity. I don’t want to die.
Rachel Corrie died. She was in ISM too. I don’t think she could have imagined that they would actually do it. That they would run her over with a bulldozer, as she was visible to all, standing in front of it, but they did. They killed her with a bulldozer. Her solidarity was stronger than her fear. The Israelis got away with it. They got away with it, and they call her Saint Pancake. She was 23, and they ran her over with a bulldozer for trying to stop a house from being demolished. She was American, and the US did nothing. Palestinians remember her still, with respect and dignity, gratefulness and immense sadness. The Israelis make fun of her. Most Americans don’t even know her name.
I’ve been reading comments that people have left in the comment sections of interviews with me, some say “third time lucky,” or “if she is there knowing the risks it’s her own fault, she deserved it,” etc. Then I think of what these same people say about my Palestinian friends: that they are an invented people, there was never a place called Palestine. If a nurse gets killed tending to the wounded, she is Hamas. If a school or hospital gets bombed, then Hamas was storing weapons there. If a child is murdered, his parents are using him for sympathy. It’s inexplicably inhumane. I have never witnessed anything like this, people denouncing a whole people. It is so unspeakably evil. How does it feel for Palestinians to read this; to read that they don’t even exist? To be faced with this evil? When all they did was to be born on their own land, and all they do is try to live under an inhumane occupation.
The thing is that the people who make these comments are the ones with the power. They are on the current winning side. Obama, Trump, Theresa May, Macron, Trudeau, Erna Solberg… these are the people that are on Israel’s side, and pour money and support into its government. They have the power, they have the money, they have the media and they have the politicians.
My own government doesn’t even care that five Norwegians were brutally beaten up, threatened with murder and arrested after being illegally boarded in international waters, or that I’ve been shot twice. I think they find us a nuisance. They blame us for being here; that we should not be here, that it’s the Palestinians who need to reconcile. I don’t even know what that means. They say that dialogue is the only way, and the Palestinians have to reconcile. There is no dialogue here, it’s all pretend. There is only violence, oppression, murder, land theft and politicians keeping up the facade that there is dialogue, while the press helps keep this game of pretend going. The Palestinians must reconcile… I think they mean that Palestinians must forgive and forget, get on their knees and hand over the keys they have left. I asked the representative for Norway what they meant with reconciliation—she did not know.
But there is another side. On this side there are the Palestinians, the people of this land, and some of us, international and Israeli activists who stand with them in solidarity. All we have is truth, dignity and humanity. We have this, but no power, unless everyone gets involved. Now, after getting shot twice, they talk about me, only because I’m a European woman—and thank god I videoed it. There are so many, just so many who would speak better than me, Palestinians, whose fate is incomparable to what happened to me. I’m a bit ashamed, but I will try to use it. If they all got the attention I got, would people care then? I would like to think so.
I still believe in humanity. I don’t believe there is any left in Israeli politics, but there is enough in Palestine to make up for their lack, when Palestine is free. But where is the global humanity, where are all those who say that we must never forget? Don’t ever forget, but don’t ignore what is happening now, because this too will have a horrible end if people do not react. This is not a history lesson, this is today and this can be stopped, before it becomes another shameful period of human history. Palestine can still be free. This cannot go on, it cannot!
Kristin Foss is an ISM volunteer who was shot twice in one week with rubber-coated steel bullets by Israeli soldiers in Kafr Qaddum. The first time with her hands raised, along with another female ISM volunteer from Iceland, and the second time while standing up against the wall of a shop. Below, see an interview with Kristin on Russia Today:
26th August 2018 | International Solidarity Movement, interview by Mariana | Asira al-Qibliya, occupied Palestine
A photo of Hakima from 2013
Asira al-Qibliya is a village near Nablus that has been terrorised by the illegal Ytzhar settlement since 1982. In any moment of the day or night, settlers can arrive in the village and make violent incursions against the people or damage their property, including cars and houses. The people of Asira al-Qibliya live in complete insecurity and fear for their physical safety daily.
This is the story of Hakima Motlaq, a human rights activist and a tireless advocate for the empowerment of the women and children in the village. Here, she tells Mariana about a recent attack on the village’s inhabitants by soldiers and settlers.
“On 25th August at 4pm, soldiers came and put up two flying checkpoints, preventing any access to Asira and the nearby village of Urif that borders Asira. Then, accompanied by a group of settlers, the soldiers assaulted 10 workers in the big Asira quarry.
First, the workers were detained and forced by the soldiers to stand with their arms held up for half an hour. After this, the soldiers searched them and then assaulted them by kicking them in the legs and then hitting their bodies with their guns. Not satisfied, the soldiers forced them to lie down and started to walk on them. This torture lasted an hour and a half.
After this time, they handcuffed the workers with plastic handcuffs and started asking hem where they were hiding their weapons. Not receiving any satisfactory answers, they searched throughout the quarry, but not finding anything, they finally freed the workers and removed the checkpoints.
Me and the mothers, wives and children of the workers lived terrible moments during this time and feared the worst, because for two hours we couldn’t contact them or reach the place. Fortunately, no one was seriously injured.
Only a week ago, in the same quarry, the settlers came one night and destroyed a new GBC excavator, setting it on fire.”
“Asira is a very old village with Roman ruins. So it dates back to the Roman age with a lot of evidence of the Ottomans being here as well. Some of the Roman ruins lie in the west of the village. The village lies 14 Km south of Nablus and is 6,440 dunams in its size. The population is 3,200. But 50% of the population are refugees of the 1948 war, mostly coming from Haifa.
The main problem we face is the occupation and the settlements. In the beginning, the settlement had only 18 dunams of land that had once belonged to Asira. But now they have 1,800 dunams of land taken from 6 villages, including Asira, but also Burin, Madama, Huwwara, Urif and Einabus. But also they come to the villages up to 3 times a week at the moment. They burn cars, burn trees, burn crops. So we’ve had to stop planting crops nearby to the settlement as they always come and destroy whatever we plant.
When they come at night they are also causing a big problem for the children in particular. The children suffer from insomnia, bed wetting and their performance at school is worse all due to the psychological effects of this constant fear. Even when they play you can see it. They are always playing violent games like “settler and Palestinian” where they hurt each other. This is their favourite game and they pretend to shoot each other and all the parents are scared for their children and the psychological damage that is being done to them.
