Category: Journals - Page 21 - International Solidarity Movement

Nowhere to hide: New illegal observation tower in occupied Hebron

3rd October 2016 | International Solidarity Movement, al-Khalil team | Hebron, occupied Palestine

Israeli forces put up a CCTV observation tower in the Ibrahimi mosque area, further increasing not only their all-encompassing surveillance of Palestinians, but also their slow but steady illegal annexation of more and more Palestinian land in occupied al-Khalil (Hebron).

At the end of last week, Israeli forces in a ‘secret’ over-night action put up the observation tower, surrounded by dozens of cement blocks and barbed-wire. Located in a corner between Palestinian houses, the observation post with a container and all the surrounding paraphernalia is just another step in the illegal annexation of yet more land. In recent weeks, Israeli forces have increased their illegal annexations of the tiny strip of Shuhada Street still accessible to Palestinian pedestrians and stepped up the game of creating a coercive environment directly leading to forced displacement of Palestinians in the Tel Rumeida area.

CCTV surveillance tower newly put up in Palestinian neighborhood

This observation tower is fitted with a camera that reaches high above the houses in the neighborhood, thus watching Palestinians constantly. This feeling of permanently being watched for Palestinians is combined with the ever present controls and humiliations at the more-and-more militarized checkpoints. Palestinians are watched, humiliated, numbered, deprived of their most basic human rights – occupied not only physically by the Israeli occupation forces, but also mentally. They can never tell whether they’ll be allowed through a checkpoint (something that solely depends on the respective soldiers whim), whether their children will be tear-gassed on their way to school or arrested, or even whether they’ll be gunned down by Israeli forces at a checkpoint and left to bleed to death. Any and all of these forms of collective punishment are enforced by the Israeli occupying forces on the entire population of civilians in complete disregard of any care for international law or humane treatment of the occupied indigenous Palestinian population.

The Tel Rumeida neighborhood, Shuhada Street, and the area around the Ibrahimi Mosque are already linked by a settler-only street that has been ethnically cleansed of Palestinians in the aftermath of the Ibrahimi Mosque massacre. Restrictions in the Tel Rumeida neighborhood (declared a ‘closed military zone’ solely enforced on Palestinian residents for almost a year now) and around the Ibrahimi Mosque (where Palestinians are often prevented from passing checkpoints on a age-limit between 15-30) have escalated in a very short amount of time, making life for the Palstinians as hard – or rather impossible – as possible, leaving them with no choice than to leave. The only and clear aim is the forcible transfer of all Palestinians in this area, thus geographically linking the illegal settlements in an area ethnically cleansed of any Palestinian presence.

CCTV camero on top of the surveillance tower

No matter who wins the US Presidential election, Palestine has already lost

3rd October 2016 | International Solidarity Movement, al-Khalil team | Hebron, occupied Palestine

One week ago, the United States and much of the world turned on their televisions to tune into the 2016 Presidential debate. Advertised as the most anticipated debate in a generation, millions watched as Democrat Hillary Clinton sparred off against Republican Donald Trump on US economics, foreign policy, and who would be the most well suited candidate to sit in the White House. On the critical side, much has been said on Trump’s abrasiveness and Clinton’s inability to reconcile her and her husband’s failed policies in the past. There is also much talk from the “progressive” side of US politics (those originally seeking the nomination of socialist Bernie Sanders) of voting for neoliberal Clinton as the “lesser evil” against neofascist Trump.

photo credit: Brian Snyder - Reuters — photo credit: Brian Snyder – Reuters

While much can be said and argued about which of these candidates might be the best (or least worse) choice for the American people, the debate failed to take into consideration a very important demographic – everyone else in the world! US domestic policy has forever been tied to its foreign policy, a foreign policy that has left countless bloodied bodies around the world from Argentina to the Philippines while Americans sit and contemplate their next big investment. As an American citizen currently residing in Israeli occupied Palestine, I viewed this debate in a much different light. Since the US gives more aid money to Israel than any other country through its government and countless zionist charities, the political course of the US is the number one factor determining the future of the occupation.

Trump and Clinton thus used the debate to showcase their complete disregard for the people of West Asia – what we in the US refer to as the Middle East. Despite their many disagreements, both candidates hold the same mantra regarding this rich and complex region: Go after terrorism, no matter the cost! Trump used this point to attack Clinton, saying that the US invasion and occupation of Iraq, which Clinton indeed supported, “created the power vacuum” that Isis (known in this part of the world as Daesh) filled. This is very true, yet Trump’s surprisingly seeming anti-imperialist analysis came crashing down when he added his own two cents to the solution – we never should have pulled out the troops in the first place! If the US occupation had just continued, Isis would never have existed, says this logic.

Many would expect such imperialist rhetoric from Trump, though many have seemed incapable of recognizing the same tendencies within Clinton’s talking points. Clinton fired back at Trump, saying that US occupying forces were pulled from Iraq because “the new Iraqi government would not have protected them”. This colonial apologist language was backed up by her praising of NATO forces for supporting the occupation of Afghanistan, an occupation that has existed in different forms up to the present day. In order to attack Trump for claiming that “America’s allies need to pay their fair share” in terms of military alliances, Clinton finished by saying that she would work with “America’s allies” until the end.

The Israeli state and its illegal settlements in the West Bank are funded directly by the US government and zionist charities within that country. This ambulance, donated by a family from the US state of Michigan, was parked outside the illegal settlement of Beit Hadassah in occupied Hebron.

These “allies” Clinton and Trump speak of join the US in being some of the most oppressive, militaristic nation states that exist on the map. Top among them is Israel. During Trump’s speech to the American-Israeli Political Affairs Committee (AIPAC), he praised “[America’s] cultural brother, the only democracy in the Middle East, the state of Israel”, and vowed to “veto any attempt by the UN to impose its will on the Jewish state”. Anyone looking for a less hawkish alternative would find no ally in Clinton who claimed to “ensure Israel maintains its qualitative military edge” while expressing, “For the security of Israel and the world, we need America to remain a respected global leader, committed to defending and advancing the international order”. She even went as far as to encourage the young people present to “oppose the alarming Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions movement known as BDS”.

What both of these Presidential candidates have proven through their rhetoric is that no matter who wins the Presidency, zionism has already won in the United States. When politicians speak of Israel’s “security”, it is code speak for the racist and militarized occupation of the Palestinian people. When President Obama signed the recent $38 billion dollar weapons deal with Israel, he signed it in Palestinian blood. American bullets pierce the skin of Palestinians standing up for their rights. American guns are used to intimidate Palestinian shop owners as settlers parade through their market places. American tanks and jets rain death upon Palestinian communities. And American bulldozers destroy Palestinian homes to make way for illegal Israeli settlements. Both Trump and Clinton have shown that “business as usual” will be taken to far more dangerous levels. Palestine has already lost the US Presidential election.

Rifle-fired tear gas canister shells used against unarmed Palestinian youth in the streets of Bab al-Zawiye in occupied Hebron. These crowd-control weapons are bought with money from US aid packages to Israel, usually directly from US arms companies.

If you stand with Palestine, the time has come to admit that the election is nothing more than a distraction from the solidarity work that must be done. To support the Palestinian people is to act not with your ballet but with your body. Join Palestinian solidarity groups and take to the streets of every major city demanding an end to this support of apartheid. Proudly take up Clinton’s mantle of “bully” and actively take part in the BDS movement to call out and cut off the corporations that profit from land grabs and state violence in Palestine. And, of course, come to Palestine and bear witness to the brutality of the Israeli occupation and the undying resiliency and wonderful hospitality of the Palestinian people.

The people of Palestine have asked for our unconditional and uncompromising solidarity. It is time we answered their call.

Reduced to a number – robbing Palestinians of their humanity

25th September 2016 | International Solidarity Movement, al-Khalil team | Hebron, occupied Palestine

Palestinians in the closed military zone in occupied al-Khalil (Hebron) are reduced to a mere number. Imagine ‘loosing’ your identity to a foreign occupying army not only taking your land, but attempting to take your personality, your identity, your whole existence; reducing you to a simple number on a piece of paper, stripping you of your humanity.

This is everyday reality for Palestinians in the area declared a ‘closed military zone’ by the Israeli forces, an area that has just recently been expanded and now covers all of the Tel Rumeida neighborhood and the tiny piece of Shuhada Street that has not yet fallen prey to Israeli attempts of continuous illegal annexation. At Shuhada checkpoint, the main checkpoint leading from the H1-area supposedly under full Palestinian control into this ‘closed military zone’, Palestinians are subjected to the all too common Israeli forces’ humiliation, delays, and ‘security-checks’. At any of the checkpoints leading into the ‘closed military zone’, all Palestinians are reduced to a mere number on a list of ID-numbers and names.

Any sign of humanity – erased with the humanity of the Palestinians, who are not persons, but just another number on a long list of numbers. At any of the checkpoints leading into the ‘closed military zone’, Palestinians are one of those numbers – and without a number, they’re nothing. It’s as simple as that, with a number, registered with a foreign occupying army as a resident in your own home, your own neighborhood, you can make it through the checkpoint. Being a number, you might – and only might, as soldiers at the checkpoint can virtually do whatever they want with complete impunity – be allowed to go to your own home.

But being without even a number, not having one’s existence reduced to this mere number on a list, a Palestinian is nothing, nothing. You’re either reduced to a number, or you’re not, not at all. You don’t exist, you don’t have the ‘right’ to go to your home, a ‘right’ being something that the occupying army is almost priding themselves for giving you, for being so nice to even permit a Palestinian to become this mere number on a list. As a number, you might be allowed to go home, to bring your shopping through the checkpoint to your house, as a child to ride your bicycle and eventually be allowed to pass the checkpoint with it. A number might be allowed to pass the checkpoint to go to school or back home after school finishes, to reach their home when their sick, or be carried out of the checkpoint in medical emergencies, as ambulances are not allowed on the ‘settler-only’-road.

A number is ‘privileged’ by the Israeli occupying army to do all these things, to be granted the slightest possible pieces even of the most basic human rights. But a nothing, a no-one, someone that didn’t make it on the list? A father visiting his son and grandchildren. A daughter visiting her sick mother. Siblings coming to congratulate for a birthday or new-born baby, to celebrate a new family member, a family birthday, an important holiday, that traditionally is celebrated with the extended family. A nothing is no-one, nothing is allowed, nothing is possible.

A nothing will be denied at the checkpoint by soldiers ‘just following orders’, soldiers who, if hearing the slightest doubt due to their inhumane, racist and apartheid actions, will refuse that they’re political. In a situation where a soldiers mere presence as the occupying army at a checkpoint denying Palestinians the right to reach their homes or loved ones is a political statement. A statement of support of the apartheid and racist regime that calls itself the ‘only democracy in the Middle East’. Soldiers would defend the action of only checking and numbering Palestinian residents with ‘Israelis don’t pass from this checkpoint’ – openly admitting their racist and apartheid actions, but choosing to defend them as ‘just following orders’. Actions that any human being must recognized are non-defendable, non-excusable – and solely, openly and deliberately aimed at annihilating the existence of a people.

Anyone defending these kind of actions, of reducing a group of Persons to numbers on a list, and trampeling the mere existence of the one’s not dehumanized and humiliated like this, with their feet making them nothing, denying their whole existence; can not hide behind a uniform or orders, or excuse their behaviour. Reducing people, persons with wishes and hopes, dreams and fears, to a number, robbing them of their identity and personality – their humanity – to mere numbers on a list, or even a nothing, a no-one.

First day in Al-Khalil

6th September 2016 | International Solidarity Movement, al-Khalil team | Hebron, occupied Palestine

Today was my first full day as an ISM’er in Al-Khalil (Hebron).

A regular part of our work is to monitor Israeli checkpoints beside schools in the mornings since the teachers ask for an international presence. Often there can be problems with violence between Israeli forces and Palestinian children. Another reason ISM is there, is to count the number of school children using the checkpoint, to see how many children are suffering from this daily stress, which sadly, is part of normal life under the occupation. The data we collect is passed on to NGOs who collects data on children in the whole of Palestine. It is necessary for children living in the H2 area to pass through this checkpoint to reach their school. The Palestinian children are often subjected to intimidation and harassment as they are searched in claustrophobic rooms within the highly militarized structures. This morning i was monitoring Qeitun checkpoint with two other ISM’ers.

Around 120 children, mostly boys, passed through the checkpoint in the first half an hour. There were clearly armed Israeli solders stationed in heavily armored towers overlooking the checkpoint, creating an intimidating atmosphere. There was an older Palestinian man encouraging the children to go through the checkpoint as a few of them were nervously waiting in front of them. In the midst of our counting of children we heard shouting from around the corner and saw a group of Palestinian children being chased by heavily armed Israeli border police, although we were in H1, out of Israeli jurisdiction. A few of the children thew stones towards the invading border police and before we knew what happened a soldier lobbed a stun grenade directly at the children. This grenade exploded a few metres in front of the children standing at an entrance to a junior school. I was down the street but the loud noise really reverberated through my body and sent my heart racing. It was the first time I had experienced this kind of weapon and moments after, I was still terrified. The grenade sent the children fleeing in all directions and one of them dropped his school bag. An Israeli soldier stole his bag and took it with him. As he walked past us an ISM activist asked him “why have you taken his school bag?’, the soldier muttered “to check it”. Of course this was a lie as they did not open it and I found it infuriating that heavily armed, grown men would steal the school bag of a child as some sort of immature intimidation technique.

Some minutes later few stones were thrown from the top of a building, neither us or the Israeli border police could see who was throwing them, but the border police responded with yet more stun grenades. One of the soldiers was incompetently rushing to throw so many that he missed one and it bounced off the building towards him- and it sent him scampering away. By this point there were very few children left in the street and they were hundreds of meters away from the checkpoint. But the altercation had clearly infuriated the border police and they began launching scores of tear gas canisters down the street at the remaining children. We were ushered inside a school by some teachers as we were very close to where the canisters landed. It was terrifying to hear the loud pop of the canisters launching and not knowing if they were about to land on top of you. They are heavy steel cylinders and a direct hit, especially on your head, would do some serious damage- never mind the gas that stops the children breathing and burns their eyes. In all we counted at least 6 stun grenades and 16 tear gas canisters used by the Israeli border police against the unarmed Palestinian school children. The teachers in the school told us that this was a regular occurrence and asked how they could teach students with this going on as it not only disrupts lessons and scares children in the school, but it also stops many children from attending in the first place.

It is clear to me that the soldier’s actions were not in self defense, as they had heavily defended battlements in which to remain in. Instead they choose to escalate the violence by attacking the children in order to assert their dominance and intimidate the children. My experiences of Al-Khalil thus far have proven that the occupation and militarization of large parts of the city are not for the purposes of ‘security’, as the Palestinians here are friendly and welcoming to all religions and everyone. Instead the soldiers aim to harass Palestinians and disrupt their way of life as much as they can, meaning that a normal childhood and opportunity to focus on their education is impossible.

By ISM-activist; “Hugh”

video: Border Police steals Palestinians schoolbag

Control and ID-check of Palestinians

23th August 2016 | International Solidarity Movement, al-Khalil team | Hebron, occupied Palestine

As a Palestinian you have to have your ID on you at all times, otherwise you may get detained or arrested. In Palestine they have 3 different kinds of ID. The green ID is for people who live in the West Bank. People who have this ID are not allowed to go to Gaza or Jerusalem. Then there is the green ID for people who live in Gaza, who are not allowed to be in the West Bank or in Jerusalem. And the last one is the Blue ID which is for Palestinians who live in Jerusalem, and they are not allowed to be in Gaza, a permit is needed.

Imagine yourself going to buy a few groceries, and before you leave you have to remember to take your passport with you. This is how it is for Palestinian people every day. Just the fact that you always have to have your ID on, shows clearly how controlled the Palestinian people are, and how there are huge difference on your rights, depending on what family they were randomly born into; Israeli or Palestinian.

Just imagine that soldiers can stop you any time, and there is nothing you can do about it. Not only constantly checked at checkpoints, but also randomly on the street. That’s called a flying checkpoint, and If the soldier is holding your ID you can’t go anywhere , it can be everything from minutes to hours, of them holding you from leaving.

Asking Palestinians how many times they have been detained, they normally don’t give a number, because its uncountable. When you are 16 you receive the ID, so if are younger than 16, but look older, the Israeli military can claim to see your birthday certificate. This is very humiliating, and its often just to show off their power. One of the Palestinian men explains how there is no doubt that it’s not for creating safety, but just pure harassment, when they take their IDs for hours without even checking it. A situation where they are without any kind of rights, and they face comments like:“Would you like to see your god” or “Are you hungry? You should eat something before you die”, which shows how they have no respect for them. And they express how powerless you can feel , cause you know they can do whatever they want without any punishment.