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.
Just months after the Israeli assault that killed 1,390 Palestinians, I visited Gaza. Among dozens of painful stories I heard, one family stood out. I spent several days with Kamal and Wafaa Awajah, playing with their children, sleeping in the tent they were living in, and filming their story.
Wafaa described the execution of their son, Ibrahim. As she spoke, her children played on the rubble of their destroyed home. Kamal talked about struggling to help his kids heal from trauma.
What compelled me to tell the Awajah family’s story? I was moved not only by their tragedy but by the love for their children in Wafaa and Kamal’s every word.
Palestinians in Gaza are depicted either as violent terrorists or as helpless victims. The Awajah family challenges both portrayals. Through one family’s story, the larger tragedy of Gaza is exposed, and the courage and resilience of its people shines through.
16 December 2010 | International Solidarity Movement
On December 3, 2010, three leaders of the Ni’lin Popular Committee Against the Separation Wall were released from Israeli military prison: Ibrahim Amireh, coordinator of the Popular Committee; Hassan Mousa, spokesperson; and Zaydoon Srour.
Israel wrongfully imprisoned them for 11 months in apparent retaliation for their role as leaders of the nonviolent movement. During their imprisonment, Saeed Amireh, Ibrahim’s 19 year-old son, stepped forward as a powerful leader of the efforts to free his father.
ISM interviewed the four activists on December 15.
Ibrahim and SaeedSAEED AMIREH: I want to talk about the strategy of the Israeli occupation here in Ni’lin.
In 2004, Israel began to build the separation wall. Back then, there were no [organized] demonstrations and no organization like the popular committee we have now. We just went there, thousands of us, to stop the construction. One protester lost his eye to a rubber bullet.
We didn’t give up; we continued our protests against the annexation wall because it is just a way to steal more of our land. If we stay silent, they will continue to steal our land.
In 2008, they started to build the wall again and we surprised them with a large number of demonstrators. At our demonstration on May 27, 2008 the Israelis used a new strategy: high violence against us. There were many soldiers: if we were maybe 400 [demonstrators], they were 300 [soldiers]. We demonstrated every day and we could stop the construction for maybe 5 minutes but then they would shoot live ammo, tear gas, sound bombs and rubber bullets. They were surprised when we kept returning the next day and bringing greater numbers!
They wanted to stop us because the other villages joined in as the nonviolent popular struggle developed. We had with us international activists, Israeli activists and the media.
HASSAN MOUSA: Before our arrest, there were just 4 to 5 sites [of organized protest] in the West Bank. Now, there are about 50. If you suppress the people, the people will rise up. [Israel] committed very brutal crimes against our people, but our reaction was contrary to their expectation. When they shoot our people, the people realize who our enemy is. More and more oppression creates more and more resistance.
AMIREH: Our organization, the popular committee, represents the families and the farmers. Because we had the idea that nonviolent protest is the most effective form of protest, all of the people followed. We could stop the bulldozers for hours and it annoyed [the Israeli military].
Their new strategy against us was the curfew. Starting on July 5, 2008, no one could leave their house without the threat of being shot and killed.
On the third day of the curfew, the other villages came to support us and break the curfew – all of us went outside our houses! Two demonstrators were shot and one spent six months in the hospital, but both lived. When they saw shooting didn’t work, they arrested people for breaking the curfew. When they saw arrests didn’t work, they shot and killed 10 year-old Ahmed Mousa during a demonstration on July 29, 2008. [Ahmed is Hassan Mousa’s nephew.]
HASSAN MOUSA: I lost my 10 year-old nephew. It was terrible for me. He was my favorite nephew and a special part of our family. He was shot by an Israeli soldier in the head and died instantly. I don’t want anyone – Israelis or anyone in the world – to lose someone near and dear to them because of conflict.
Ibrahim and his youngest son in front of illegal wall and settlementsAMIREH: They thought that we would be scared, but after the funeral – that same day! – we made another protest against what they did to Ahmed and against the Apartheid wall.
The soldiers began night raids against our village and our family’s house was raided 25 times. My father was targeted because he was elected to be the coordinator of the popular committee. They arrested him and sent him to a military prison underground in Jerusalem under very harsh conditions. They beat him and insulted him and tried to get him to sign papers against those who participated in the demonstrations.
They continued the night raids and arrested 150 guys who had been in the protests to reduce the size of our demonstrations. They were surprised when they saw the women continue on instead of the guys. They could break our high spirit or destroy our protest!
I was one arrested during the horrible night raids. I was held from December 22, 2008 until April 2009. It was during my last year of high school and all of my future depended on my grades. I had a 94 percent average in my classes. They wanted to destroy my future and punish my father who wanted to see his children educated.
MOUSA: Before my arrest, the town was invaded by dozens of soldiers during night raids. I talked to one of their commanders when he asked me why we were protesting. I told him that there had never been protests here before they built the wall that caused us so much suffering. I said give me back my land, and I will stop protesting.
When they arrested me and brought me to court, I was astonished to hear the charges against us. They accused me of throwing stones. How could a person who is 37 years old and an English teacher be throwing stones!?! I said I am never a person who has believed in raising his hand against another. If I am throwing anything, I am throwing my words, speaking truth to the soldiers.
They accused me of having contacts with foreigners. If that is illegal, then this interview is illegal right now! I said that these foreigners came to Palestine through their Israeli airport and they had come here to work for peace and freedom.
Saeed near apartheid wallThird, they accused me of incitement. I asked them to define the word and they refused. If you consider incitement helping the injured, taking care of prisoners, helping those people who are suffering because they lost their land to the annexation wall – then, let the world know I am guilty.
Last, they accused me of joining a protest that is not permitted. There is an irony here. They grabbed up my land and now want me to ask for a permit to express my disagreement. I will never ask for a permit to protest on my own land. I was not protesting in an Israeli city.
They sent me to jail for a year and fined me 9,000 shekels. But the whole time we were in jail, the protests never stopped.
[Being imprisoned] is beyond description. Our state of mind was terrible. All the time, we were thinking about our families, our kids. We got relief from the other prisoners, sharing stories and jokes. But I told them that I didn’t want to share my feelings. I want to forget. It is beyond description.
There is a lot of injustice against us. We want peace and justice on the ground, but Israel is not respecting that. The Palestinian people lack the right of expression, right of worship, right of movement. I think the Palestinian people are right to resist nonviolently.
Once you have a goal, you have to keep moving toward it. Despite the grabbing of our land, the suppression, the night raids, we will never seek vengeance; we will seek justice. I want peace and tranquility to prevail on this land, to put an end to the hatred. I will keep going toward this dream. Even if we don’t achieve it quickly, even if I die, at least I will have planted the roots.
We have a lot of challenges and obstacles, but I hope we will overcome them.
AMIREH: In our nonviolent struggle in Ni’lin, hundreds have been shot, hundreds have been arrested and five have been killed by the soldiers. They do what they want, but our hope is that we will tear down the wall, and our hearts are still full of hope that we will reach our aim.
Timeline of the struggle in Ni’lin:
2004: Construction of the annexation wall begins and then is halted by nonviolent protests. Both the Israeli Supreme Court and the International Court of Justice side with the villagers of Ni’lin and rule the wall illegal
2008: Construction of the illegal wall resumes. Upon completion, the apartheid wall steals nearly one-third (approximately 30 percent) of Ni’lin’s land. The village forms the Popular Committee Against the Separation Wall. Repression increases against Ni’lin; hundreds are arrested in night raids, and Ibrahim Amireh’s permit to work in Israel is revoked.
May 28, 2008: Nonviolent demonstrations begin, seeking to block the construction of the wall.
July 5, 2008: Israeli army imposes total curfew on Ni’lin.
July 8, 2008: After three days, villagers from the surrounding areas join the residents of Ni’lin in a a demonstration to break the curfew. The Israeli military shoot two demonstrators who survive.
July 29, 2008: Ahmed Mousa (10), the nephew of Hassan Mousa, is shot and killed during a nonviolent demonstration.
July 30, 2008: Yousef Amira (17) is shot and killed during a nonviolent demonstration.
December 22, 2008: Saeed Amireh was arrested during a night raid.
March 13, 2009: ISM activist Tristan Anderson was critically injured by a high velocity tear gas canister, which struck him in the head
2009: Israel establishes checkpoints around Ni’lin attempting to prevent Israeli and international activists from participating in the nonviolent demonstrations.
June 5, 2009: The Israeli military shoots five demonstrators, killing one – Yousef Akil Srour.
October 2009: Nonviolent demonstrators symbolically tear down a part of the concrete annexation wall. Israeli soldiers reinforce the wall with metal beams.
January 12, 2010: Ibrahim Amireh, Hassan Mousa, and Zaydoon Srour – leaders of the popular committee – are taken from their homes and arrested during a night raid.
December 3, 2010: After 11 months in prison, Amireh, Mousa and Srour are released. Another 10 political prisoners from Ni’lin remain behind bars.
4 December 2010 | International Solidarity Movement, Gaza
On Saturday, the 4th of December 2010, three people were shot and injured at the northern border near to Bait Lahya. All of them sustained multiple fractures that required surgery, and two of them were hit with ‘dum-dum’ bullets, which explode on impact.
The three of them were civilians who have no other way to survive than by collecting scrap at the border.
Belal Elhsomi is 17 years old, but looks much younger. The sniper who shot him may have thought he was shooting a 14 year old boy. When we visited him, he had great difficulty speaking because he had just come out of surgery and had 6 irons sticks protruding from his leg for fixing the broken bone.
Usually Belal collects scrap, but today he was collecting wood 500 – 600 meters from the border in an area near to Beit Lahya. A dum-dum projectile, which exploded on impact, entered his right lower leg, smashing the bones inside.
“Israeli special forces entered in the area and hid there, I saw it”, witness Ata Elshomi explains to us. After Belal was shot, his friends took him by horse cart to a place where the ambulance could come, and from there he was brought to the hospital. According to Ata, after the shooting, all the 300 people who had been working in the area went away.
Belal’s father explained to us: “I am worried for my son, but there is so much unemployment, my son has to work.” Belal’s 26-year-old brother was injured 5 months ago in the same area, at the same distance from the border, so Belal was forced to take his place. The father has problems with his back and cannot work, so the work of this son is the only source of income for their 15 member family.
According to the doctor, Belal will need five months to recover before he will be able to walk again.
Mohammed Ata Elhosomi is married, has two sons, and shares his home with seven members of his family. Only two weeks ago he began collecting scrap. But on Saturday, at 9:30 in the morning, he was shot at in his leg with no warning shot by an M16, while working on his own in an area with about 300 people doing the same work.
He used to be a farm hand, but can no longer find such work in the sector because farming has decreased in Gaza. Since Mohammed was forced to give up his farming job, the only thing he can do is go to the border and collect scrap.
According to the OCHA report, about 35% of the cultivable land in Gaza lies in the ‘buffer zone’, the patch of land stretching up to 500 meters into Gaza which is a high risk area: anyone entering from 1000 – 1500 meters from the border is under a high risk of being shot at by Israeli soldiers. There are frequent incursions in the area, during which the Israeli army destroys fields so that farmers can no longer work on them.
“I don’t care if I will get injured; I just care about my family. I have to bring them food and for this I do whatever I can,” Mohammed stated.
The doctor showed us the x-ray on which we saw the fibula broken into many little pieces and explained to us that he is going into surgery because he “needs an internal fixing”.
When we entered the room where Marwan Mahmoud Murouf was lying, he was moving moving his head without opening his eyes, moaning, and clearly suffering. He had just come out of surgery and was not able to communicate. He had been hit in the higher part of his right leg. According to the doctor, it will take four months before Marwan will be able to attempt walking again, and he must undergo surgery because he needs internal fixes.
The father of his wife told us that Marwan is 26 years old, and has four children. He is the only one working in the family, and it was his first day of work as a scrap collector. Before this job, he worked in the tunnels.
Marwan’s father-in-law explained: “I used to work in Israel. The sons have to go to school and there is no work here. We go into the buffer zone as scrap collectors because there is no alternative. What else can we do?”
According to Ma’an news, another man was injured today while standing in front of his house, in an area in the east of Deir ElBalah, when Israeli forces opened fire on him. Another two workers were shot yesterday, and the day before. There has obviously been a sharp increase in causalities within and close to the buffer zone this month. The total number of civilians shot since March is 90, with 17 in the last week alone, and four today.
The siege is not only blocking the admission of building materials: in the last period the amount of incoming wheat has decreased alarmingly, and the average number of tons of animal fodder permitted from Israel into the coastal enclave per week has dropped from 16,000 tons to 2,000 in the last two periods, according with Ma’an.
It is brutal that Israel won’t leave any alternative to the people of Gaza than to work at the border, but will then shoot at them knowing they are civilians, and usually, visibly young.
26 November 2010 | Stella, International Solidarity Movement
Palestinian mother sitting with her kids on the rubble of her homeHow can a kid understand Israeli demolitions if neither adults can?A tent with view on the ruins of a 200 metres house
In the last few days, with a wave of demolitions, Israeli bulldozers have spread destruction and despair in the villages across the West Bank: in Qarawat Bani Hassan near Salfeet, in al-Jiftlik in the Jordan Valley, in Hizma, near Jerusalem, in Khirbet Yarza, east of Tubas, and in the South Hebron Hills.
Yesterday I went to the village of al-Rifayaia, east of Yatta in South Hebron, where at 8:15 AM Israeli forces had demolished a house that had been home to two families of twenty people (16 of them minors).
I arrived there around 1 PM, to at least show the ISM’s support and to document what had happened.
Many people were gathering around the rubble to support the two families that had lost their houses. The many kids around had disoriented expressions while they were playing on the ruins of what used to be a nice 200 square meter house.
The women, even if they still had their eyes wet and red, did not forget hospitality and I was immediately offered a cup of sweet tea. Everybody encouraged me to take many pictures as if they wanted to show to the world all the details of their unjust distress.
A young man explained that his two brothers, with their families, were living in the house that was demolished. One of them was sitting not too far from us with a somber, worried expression. He won’t be able to rebuild a new house for his family. In fact, he has no permit to go and work in Israel and his economic situation is very bad.
The Israeli bulldozers didn’t even let them remove their belongings before demolishing the house.
The Red Cross visited them just before me and brought a couple of big tents, some plastic chairs, two camp stoves and a few boxes of humanitarian aid. Not enough to help them now that the cold winter is coming. I was asked if I could help them in any way, but unfortunately I could only assure them that the news about what had happened to them would be spread so that more people in the world would know how the Palestinian people are forced to live.
After a while Hamed Qawasmeh arrived. He works for the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA). He explained to me that there are not many organizations that help to rebuild houses that Israel demolishes, and that the UN can only provide some services to mitigate the harsh situation of the two homeless families.
While I talk with the UN representative, not too far from the ruins of the house the men of the family put up the two tents that the Red Cross had donated. At least these two homeless families, during the next cold winter months, will be surrounded by the warm support of their relatives and their community.
16 November 2010 | Evie Soli, International Solidarity Movement
An interview with the wives of Abdallah and Adeeb Abu Rahma
Al Eid is a holy time of the year for Muslims. Families gather and visit each other over the four holidays, which are for most a time for families to be together. When one member of the family is missing, it makes it hard to enjoy Al Eid in the same way. Thousands of families of Palestinian political prisoners are suffering because a family member is in prison. For Majida, wife of Abdallah Abu Rahma who has now been held for one year in Israeli jail under the accusation of “incitement,” every day without her husband is difficult. She expresses the pain of seeing her children missing their dad not only during Eid, but every day. Louma (8) and Layam (7) used to go with Abdallah on family visits, and are now crying when talking about their dad. His 1 and-a-half-year-old son Layath does not even remember his dad as he was only 7 months old the night Abdallah was arrested. “He says Baba when he sees Abdallah’s picture, but of course he does not know him, since he was just a baby”, Majida says. Also, for Adeeb Abu Rahma’s children, Eid is not the same without their father. Both families were hoping to have their fathers home for Eid, but the military prosecution managed to postpone the release in both cases.
Arrested in front of his children
Abdallah's wife Majida and daughters Louma (8) and Layam (8) during preparations for Eid.
I meet Majida and her children during the preparations for Eid. Louma and Layam are helping their mother in the house, while she is making the Palestinian dish “dawali” (rice rolled in grape leaves). She recalls the night when the family was brutally woken up by the Israeli Army breaking into their house: “I woke up by someone knocking the door 1:30am on the 10th of December (2009). Abdallah said it might be soldiers – because who else would come to pay a visit at that time?” Suddenly the door was broken down, and armed soldiers stormed the house. Abdallah was taken out in the stairway, with four soldiers blocking him from seeing his wife and children. He was not allowed to go back to say goodbye or to change his clothes, only his two daughters could pass the soldiers to see him one last time. He had to change from night clothes in the stairway. Nine army jeeps and dogs were waiting outside the house. Majida explains how the daughters reacted: “Louma asked: Am I dreaming? Did soldiers take my dad? Layam was asking the same – they both thought it was a nightmare.”
Missing their father
In the months before Abdallah was arrested almost one year ago, the army was carrying out frequent raids to look for him. The children were used to being woken up by masked soldiers entering the house at night, and were traumatized. After her father was arrested in the last night raid, 8 year old Layam told her mother that she was happy that the soldiers would not come back now. “Imagine how sad it is to hear that for a mother”, Majida says, “But now, when we speak about Abdallah, she cries. They both laugh and cry in the same time, because they miss him and they love him and remember him as a caring father and a friend. And I miss him too.”
While we are talking, Layath is grabbing a 2 meter long flagpole, saying “la, la l’jdar!” (no, no to the wall!), seeming as if he is on his way to a demonstration. “His name means ‘Lion’. He is small, but he is strong. He has to be strong” his mother says. He does not know what happened to his father, but he will when he gets older. The families of the people involved in Bil’in’s non-violent struggle against the Wall and settlements cannot sleep safely at night. Dozens of houses have been raided at night, and children are suffering from trauma after seeing fathers and brothers brutally taken away by masked soldiers. Sleep difficulties, bedwetting, and disorders are common consequences among children who have experienced Israeli soldiers storming their homes at night. Many, like Abdallah’s children, have also seen soldiers beat someone up during a raid.
“Eid is not Eid”
Three of Adeeb's children: Ahmad (10), Batoul (4) and Falasteen (8)
Five months before Abdallah was taken from his home, his cousin Adeeb Abu Rahma was arrested in a demonstration in Bil’in. His wife has only been allowed to visit him once at Ofer Military Prison where both Adeeb and Abdallah are held. Adeeb’s daughter Radja (20) has not been able to see him at all, due to what Israel calls “security reasons”. This Eid is not the same as before for the family consisting of Adeeb’s wife and 9 children, aged from 4 to 20. Radja says, “This Eid there is not happiness like there used to be in this family. In Eid our family used to be together, visiting and having guests. Our father is not here, and we all miss him. Eid is not Eid without him.”
After Adeeb’ arrest, the family hoped he would be released shortly. However, after weeks and then months of waiting, the Israeli Military Court sentenced him to 1 year, and his family hoped that they would see him soon since he had almost served his sentence. But the military prosecution appealed and now Adeeb is to be released the 12th December. Exactly 1.5 years will have passed since Radja saw her father the last time.
Struggling financially
The financial situation has been hard the last 1.5 years. There is no big brother to help support the family financially. The eldest son Mohammed is 16 years old and still in school. Two daughters are in university, and are now struggling to pay the fees. The family’s income is from their small market, but their household is suffering from the absence of Adeeb’s income as a taxi driver. Umm Mohammed is also alone in her responsibility to raise the children; though they are all helping out as best they can, most of the children are not old enough to have responsibility. She misses her husband, and has been present in every court hearing so that at least she can see Adeeb. But she has not been allowed to talk to him except for the one time she was allowed to visit. Radja explains how Batoul (4) reacted when she visited her father in prison: “She did not understand why he could not be home. At home she cried and was constantly nervous. She asked: Why did they take him? When she saw him in prison she was in shock, she would not speak. After a while, when she realized that he is not coming home, she started to talk. But what can we answer to her question? It’s clear that they took him and still are keeping him because they are afraid of the success of the non-violent demonstrations. It scares them that through the demonstrations the world can see what Israel is doing to us, so they fabricate evidence against the leaders and put them in prison. All Batoul knows is that her father is taken away from her and she does not understand why.”
Success in spite of suffering
Both Adeeb and Abdallah’s families are obviously strong, though given no choice but to manage without their husband and father. They have been waiting in uncertainty for months before the trials, and suffering severe disappointment since the appeal, which deprived the children of their fathers for another half a year. Adeeb Abu Rahma was in July sentenced to 1 year for “encouraging violence”, and another 6 months may be added on Thursday when the state prosecution appeals his sentence. Abdallah Abu Rahma was, according to the first court decision, supposed to be released this week, but his release is now postponed. Despite the frustrations and constant ache, both Adeeb’s and Abdallah’s families express hope because they know why they were arrested. Majida says:
“My husband was visible. He went to every demonstration, and spoke up against the Wall and the settlement. In spite of our suffering, and his son now growing up without knowing his father, we know that his actions were successful. Israel was so threatened by the demonstrations that they had to remove strong characters like my husband and Adeeb.”
Background
Abdallah Abu Rahmah
Abdallah Abu Rahmah has been a member of the Bil’in Popular Committee Against the Wall and Settlements since its conception in 2004.
At 2am on 10 December 2009 (international Human Rights Day), exactly one year after Abdallah Abu Rahma received the Carl Von Ossietzky Medal from the International League for Human Rights, nine military vehicles surrounded his home in Ramallah. Israeli soldiers broke the door down, extracted Abdallah from his bed, blindfolded him and took him into custody.
After being convicted in September of incitement and organizing illegal marches, on October 12th, Abdallah Abu Rahmah was sentenced to 12 months imprisonment plus 6 months suspended sentence for 3 years and a fine of 5,000 NIS.
Following Abu Rahma’s convicition, the European Union put out a statement condemning the Persecution of Abu Rahmah. Representatives of all EU member states declared that they consider the route of the separation wall built on Palestinian land to be illegal, and that, as Abu Rahmah was “a human rights defender” participating in peaceful protests against this wall, they are concerned about his sentence of 12 months in prison by an Israeli military court.
The military prosecution against Abdallah Abu Rahmah will be petitioning to extend his detention on Thursday, November 18th, the day of his scheduled release.
Adeeb Abu Rahmah
Adeeb Abu Rahmah, a leading activist in the Popular Committee Against the Wall and Settlements, was arrested at 1:30pm on 10 July 2009 while taking part in the weekly demonstration against the wall in Bil’in.
He was sentenced to 12 months in prison for crimes of “incitement” (urging the villagers to come to the weekly protests), but the military prosecution appealed his sentence so he is still in prison after 15 months, pending the decision about the prosecution’s appeal.
Adeeb’s case relied on the forced confessions of four Bil’in youth – 14, 15 and 16 years old – arrested during a night raid by Israeli soldiers and forced to state that Adeeb told them to throw stones at the soldiers.
