Volunteers with the International Solidarity Movement are encouraged to write personal reflections about the work they engage in with Palestinian communities, the events they experience, and the people they meet. These journals offer the human context often missing in traditional reports or journalism. These articles represent the author’s thoughts and feelings and not necessarily those of the International Solidarity Movement.
19th September 2015 | International Solidarity Movement, Al-Khalil Team | Hebron, Occupied Palestine
The children of the Jabari family in Jabari neighbourhood of al-Khalil are singing along to a Palestinian children’s television show. It is a sunny Saturday morning but in the small living area, six tiny children sit with their mothers who explain to us that they do not go outside because of the settlers. They quietly recite every word of the television songs to themselves.
Jabari family’ children
With the massive illegal Israeli settlement, Kiryat Arba – home to nearly eight thousand Israeli settlers, directly facing their home, Saturday morning’s aren’t the only time the Jabari family is being affected. They have a newly built synagogue behind them, along with an Israeli police station. All are connected by a path that brings settlers along the family property on a regular basis. “The settlers jump behind our home in the night. They bang on the children’s windows and terrorize them.”
Path alongside Jabari family home
International human rights observers from the ISM and others have been providing protective presence for the family who, with so many children living in the home, haven’t had running water since the second Intifada. Their well, fronting the home, contains more trash than water and once they are able to procure the resources to repair it, it is subject to the same assault the family themselves endure month in and month out.
Jabari family well
“During the Jewish holiday, the settlers filled the streets praying loudly. They shouted curse words at us.” Settlers had built a synagogue tent structure in recent months which was ordered demolished by the Israeli court system. Yet even with this small justice being done, a greater injustice persists. The land, belonging to Palestinians, has now been declared by Israeli forces to be a ‘closed military zone,’ which makes it off limits to all but Israeli military personnel.
However, settlers routinely frequent the area to pray under the protection of the Israeli army, while Palestinians are barred completely from entering. For the Jabari family, protective presence carries on as does the settler violence, harassment and constant intrusion into their lives.
16th September 2015 | International Solidarity Movement, Al-Khalil Team | Hebron, Occupied Palestine
On Monday and Tuesday was the Jewish holiday of Rosh Ha’Shannah, the Jewish New Year.
Group of children having to pass Israeli soldiers blocking the Palestinian market
In al-Khalil (Hebron), Israeli forces have taken this occassion to make the already tough every-day life of Palestinians in this segregated and oppressed city even more difficult.
Israeli forces during a night patrol in the Palestinian market
The omnipresence of the Israeli forces throughout the city was increased even more, forcing every Palestinian, whether elderly, little child or adult to navigate around the many closed checkpoints, groups of heavily armed soldiers right in front of their own doorsteps and throughout most of the city and their armored jeeps and trucks, blocking the already obstructed roads to schools and homes.
Young boy navigating the illegal Israeli occupation
With even more holidays approaching, Israeli forces are expected to increase the level of harassment, intrusion and collective punishment of the Palestinian people trudging through every day life in Israeli military controlled al-Khalil (Hebron).
Israeli forces taking over a Palestinian house as a look-out
13th September 2015 | International Solidarity Movement, Al-Khalil Team | Hebron, Occupied Palestine
International Solidarity Movement human rights monitors spend the afternoon at the Women in Hebron embroidery cooperative where Palestinian women are empowering themselves and persisting with grace in a colourful and beautiful way in a community space amidst the horror of the ongoing military occupation of their home.
Women in Hebron shop in the old city of Hebron
Silverware clinks on plates, numerous excited voices float above the large trays of food laid out and loud bursts of laughter punctuate most bites of food. We are in the colorful and warm ‘Women in Hebron’ embroidery cooperative space in the village of Idna in the Hebron district. And we are surrounded by the women who keep the business running and the spirit of community and empowerment nearly bursting the center at its very seams.
From the worn hands of an elderly woman rushing her crease-patterned hands through the weaving of a carpet stretching the length of the cooperative itself to the bright eyes of 14 year old Yafa Slemiah whose mother founded Women in Hebron, at this cooperative, there is space for everyone.
“We welcome everyone here. People from all over the world have come to work with us. We open our home to them; there we have an entire floor dedicated for volunteers, three rooms and three bathrooms, they have free food and can travel with us. …And we teach them embroidery.”
Palestinian woman in the cooperative creating a carpet by hand.
From humble beginnings in 2005, the cooperative itself now boasts a beautiful shop in the souq. The shop is the only woman-run establishment in Hebron and it is rare to pass the richly colorful, craft-filled space without coming in contact with the welcoming smile of Leila, the shop owner, Yafa’s aunt and sister of Women in Hebron’s director, Nawal Slemiah.
Currently, Nawal is traveling through America promoting the cooperative, thus her enthusiastic and kind daughter sits with us as both translator and story teller- conveying what Women in Hebron means to those who are a part of it, creating breathtaking bead-work and embroidered traditional Palestinian dresses for weddings and events, holidays and parties.
Women in Hebron
23 year old Haneen sits beside Yafa, her work with the cooperative began four years ago. “My mom was sick, pregnant with twins and already had twins. I had to leave school in the sixth grade to care for her. There was no work for a woman who is uneducated. But I knew how to embroider and here I can teach other women.”
And like all other elements of life in the occupied territories, the work of Women in Hebron and Leila’s shop in the souq do not go untouched by the cruelty of their occupiers. “Shops in Hebron gets lots of water from the rain because the soldiers close the gates separating the settlers from the old city. Our area floods so the settlers can stay dry.” This was the reality this past April in Hebron when heavy rains flooded the souq to staggering chest level heights, destroying shelf-fulls of embroidery Leila made by hand at the cooperative to sell at market.
Yafa’s frustration is clear, “Can you imagine making items by hand for months? Months. Things that take days to transport to the shop, only to have it flooded out so people who stole your land can stay dry?” Another way the occupation effects the cooperative is by deporting volunteers with Arabic names or those who come stating that they are visiting the West Bank to do embroidery work. “The volunteers have to lie and say they are visiting Tel Aviv or they do not get through at the airport.”
For those who do get in, they join a group of women dedicated to keeping Palestine alive. Haneen describes her commitment to her culture and keeping resistance alive, creatively so, “It’s very… tradition is very important in Palestine. It is very important that people know about what is happening in Palestine.
Hand-making carpet in the traditional Palestinian way.
Through our work, people will know about traditional Palestinian culture. They will come to know the situation here. We will let people know we are not terrorists. I can help make a difference and then I can teach embroidery to my daughters.”
Isma has been at the cooperative for three years. At 24, with limited education, Isma’s options were few. “Not only do uneducated women have a difficult time finding work, but also the occupation limits us severely. We are unable to travel.
We have no airport. If we want to go anywhere or do anything, we must go through Israel to do it and they do not want to help us.” Nawal welcomed Isma into the cooperative, allowing her to cook and clean while learning the machines, she is now one of the women who train the volunteers who come in.
Handmade small bag. Front: Men can do something
To be a volunteer with the cooperative, you are not only welcomed into Nawal’s home, you learn how to run the website, answer the emails, process the sales- the entire business side of the cooperative is shared alongside the teaching of the handcrafting. They also have a colorful nursery within the cooperative so women with children can bring them along as they work.
After lunch, Yafa and the others walk us through a room with shelves made bright by their wares. Shelf after shelf houses beaded wallets, purses, scarves and even bookmarks that can be personalized, all kaleidoscopic, all made by the hands of those who are economically and socially strangled by an occupation that seeks to end them- all binds broken in the process of free creation. One of the women laughs and holds up a beaded wallet that says “Women can do anything.” She then turns it over, “Men can do something.”
Handmade small bag. Back: Women can do anything
Before leaving them to their work, we sit with Yafa a few more moments. She describes the world she knows, “The occupation has taken over everyone’s lives. At this moment, if you walked outside and didn’t see a soldier you would wonder why not. The women working here all have to worry about the occupation when they consider each day they spend at the cooperative. ‘What if I’m not home and the soldiers raid my home? What if I’m gone too long?’ Occupation is always the first thing to think about. In Palestine this is normal. She can die. I can die. The soldiers can kill us and the people may talk about it for one day, one week, but here this is normal life. During the time the world hears about a Palestinian getting killed, like the 18 month old baby the settlers burned to death recently, three more Palestinians are killed. The occupation makes our lives gross.”
The occupation doesn’t only entail soldier harassment and collective punishments enacted against Palestinians as a whole. Settler violence is a daily and worsening issue. “They are building a fence above our homes now because the settlers throw eggs down on us. They throw rocks. When we are at home in the middle of the night, we do not wear our hijabs, only to have male settlers jump into our homes in the middle of the night and see us this way before running out again. This can never happen for ‘normal’ people. You do not see this in Europe or anywhere else. So this is very different for us.”
Some of the handmade products made by Women in Hebron.
With the occupation ‘coming first,’ the all-encompassing hurdle to be considered by the people who are subjugated and oppressed by it, the Women in Hebron are utilizing a rich and generational tradition to perpetuate their culture and their resistance to a system who would sooner end their lives than to better them.
They are dichotomous existences these women lead of both fighting oppressive social and power structures whilst building and creating a world where all voices are heard, where they see more friends in a day than they see soldiers, where every facet of their lives isn’t stained with the awful truth of a military occupation and near seven decade ethnic cleansing.
The women we share this afternoon with are making more with their hands than what meets the eye. They are molding an empowering path for Palestinian women, one more elaborate- and accessible- with each passing day.
Read more about the cooperative and buy products made by Women in Hebron here.
8th September 2015 | International Solidarity Movement, Gaza Team | Khuzaa, Gaza Strip, Occupied Palestine
One year after Israel’s attacks in the Gaza Strip, the massacre in Khuzaa is vividly remembered by one of its inhabitants.
Dr Mohammed Qudaih lived with his family in Khuzaa, in the southern Gaza Strip, less than a kilometre away from the Israeli fence, the military turrets, and from the Palestinian land occupied in 1948.
Dr. Mohammad in his office. Photo by ISM
Mohammed, who is a surgeon, worked in his little clinic when the Israeli aggression started last July. He and his family decided to stay in Khuzaa despite the bombings were getting worse. “They raged specially over homes, schools, hospitals, ambulances… Israel’s favourite targets”.
Suddenly his tiny clinic was full of wounded people and neighbours, who believed that a health care centre would be a safe refuge against the one-ton bombs thrown by the F16 planes. Sadly they were wrong. Many of the wounded families were attacked again when the occupation forces launched the ground invasion with their powerful war machine, funded by the so-called “Western Democracies”.
Many villagers of Khuzaa, survivors from the horror of the first attack, wounded but able to survive, were killed when they were receiving medical treatment by Dr Mohammed. Both the office and Dr Mohammed’s house were crowded with hundreds of refugees and wounded people. Women’s hijabs were transformed under the snipers’ fire into bandages to stop the bleeding of children, women and wounded men. The kitchen table was quickly transformed into a surgery table, the windowless bathrooms in useless shelters against the barrage of bombs and gunshots.
Ahmed, the younger brother of Mohammed, who was only 22 years old, bled to death from a mortar while helping a woman in the clinic courtyard. 130 people were cowardly murdered by the occupying forces only in that area of Khuzaa. 520 more were wounded, mostly children and women, all of them severely injured, in face of the ruthless war weapons used by Israel against an unarmed and defenseless civilian population. More than 500 homes were completely razed in Khuzaa during the 51 days of the slaughter. But one year after Dr Mohammed clarifies “the massacre continues. Gaza is still blocked by land, sea and air, closed up tight. Where are the UN and the other agencies supposedly responsible for protecting human rights? Where are the International community and the Media? Where is the reconstruction? Where is our freedom? We won’t stop resisting as long as they keep oppressing us. We hope all these sacrifice will bring us our freedom…”.
Dr. Mohammed’s father holding the picture of his 22 year old martyred son, Ahmed and pointing to the exact place where he was murdered while trying to help a woman. Photo ISM
13th July 2015 | Peter Cunliffe | Al Khalil, Occupied Palestine
Last night at around 11:30 PM, we received a call from one of our Palestinian neighbors about an incident that was unfolding outside our window.
A group of five Israeli soldiers were guarding two Palestinian youth, who did not look to be older than fifteen. The kids were sitting on concrete steps, and the soldiers had them surrounded, so they could not get away. The boys were detained around 11:15, according to our neighbor.
As is our policy, we observed for a few minutes, and then tried to talk to the kids. One of the first things we do when Palestinians are being detained by soldiers is ask them (the Palestinians) if they are OK with us taking photos and video. The answer is almost always yes, but we always ask first.
Taking photos and videos has two purposes. The first is to document what is happening. The second is to let the soldiers know they are being observed. This sometimes leads to people being released more quickly, and the soldiers being less rough than would be the case if no one was filming.
The boys gave consent for us to take photos, and we started to ask them for their names, when the soldiers angrily told us to go away and physically forced us to move back. We kept asking them why the boys were being detained. What had they done?
One of the soldiers, who seemed to be the commander, and who we have had run-ins with before, told us he does not have justify to us what he and his men are doing. Another soldier, however, who seemed to be younger and less experienced, told us the truth… the boys did not have their ID with them. The reason they were stopped and made to sit down and surrounded by heavily armed troops was that they did not have in their possession the papers that every Palestinian needs to have on them, if he or she hopes to not be harassed by the army. I asked the soldier if this was the only reason, he said there was another one, but refused to say what it was.
We kept trying to talk to the boys, and the soldiers kept pushing us away. Eventually their father came, and after some discussions with them, he showed them the boys’ papers. It was only after this that they let them go, one by one. The incident took more than one hour.
Imagine living in a place where armed men can stop you and hold you- and if they feel necessary, confine you in a jail- simply because you don’t have a document on you that can tell them at a glance your first and last name, where you live, where you are from, and what religion you follow.
Palestinians are obliged to carry such ID on them at all times. Any Israeli soldier or police officer can randomly stop them, and demand to see it. If they don’t have it, things can turn ugly.
The boys who were detained were not threatening anyone. They were not carrying out a suicide bombing. They aren’t terrorists. They were not even throwing rocks, which the military often uses as an excuse to do detain, arrest, beat, or even kill Palestinians.
They were simply going for a walk, and some guys in uniforms thought they looked suspicious. A piece or two of forgotten ID led to an hour of stress and intimidation, and could have ended with arrests and possibly worse behind the closed doors of a police station or military base. The only crime these teens were guilty of was being Palestinian, and going for a walk.
Fortunately, their ordeal ended in a lot better way than experiences of others, who face similar situations on a regular basis in this city, and all parts of the West Bank which are under Israeli military rule.
