The Jerusalemites Campaign strongly condemns Israel’s recent change in its issuing of Jerusalem IDs, which now include expiration dates.
Since the beginning of July, Jerusalem residents who have gone to the Ministry of Interior to receive new IDs have obtained ones valid for only 10 years. Prior to this, IDs had no explicit expiration date.
The implications of this policy change are significant. Once implemented collectively, all Palestinian Jerusalemites who hold permanent residency status will be obligated to go to the Ministry of Interior to renew their IDs upon such expiration. It can be expected, then, that they will be subjected to the MOI’s Center of Life policy, which requires Palestinians through an exhaustive list of documents to prove Jerusalem as their continuous, uninterrupted center of life. Those who are unable to meet the Ministry’s excessive list of demands will render themselves at threat of having their IDs revoked and, accordingly, their rights to live in Jerusalem stripped.
Until now, many Jerusalemites avoid any reason to go to the MOI for fear of the Center of Life policy; it has been reported that even those who have never lived outside of the city have previously failed to satisfy the Ministry’s expectations on this measure. If Jerusalemites lose their residency status and are without nationality elsewhere, they become part of the city’s growing stateless population.
This policy exists in stark contrast to that applied to Israelis, who are permitted to hold dual-nationality with another state and whose citizenships have no expiration date. Jerusalemites, despite having been born in the city, remain at constant threat of losing their right to live within its borders; Jews around the world – some of whom have never previously been to Israel – are, to the contrary, encouraged by the occupying state to claim aliyah and migrate to Israel.
The Jerusalemites Campaign views this policy change as a further step in Israel’s effort to Judaize the city of Jerusalem. Residency revocation has remained an ongoing method of forced displacement since 1967, and serves to establish and preserve the city’s demographic balance, reinforcing its aim of an “absolute Jewish majority,” as articulated within the Municipality’s master plan. The change is particularly noteworthy as it coincides with Israel’s agreement to return to US-sponsored peace negotiations, of which Jerusalem remains a final-status issue.
24th July 2013 | International Solidarity Movement, Team Nablus | Duma, Occupied Palestine
The International Solidarity Movement had a conversation with Wael Dawabsheh, a clinical psychologist with the Torture Rehabilitation Centre in the West Bank. He told us about his work with torture victims.
Wael Dawabsheh, clinical psychologist for the TRC
International Solidarity Movement (ISM): What is the Torture Rehabilitation Centre and what work do you do?
Wael Dawabsheh (WD): Our centre started working in the West Bank in 1999, continued through the intifada in 2002 and until now. We are a group of psychiatrists, social workers and psychologists. We work with arrestees, people who have been in Israeli prisons and people who have been exposed to torture, as well as their families. We also work with injured people and the families of martyrs.
We have two programs – outreach and in-office, meaning some of the people we work with come to our offices whilst we see others in their own homes. We work in many places in the West Bank, from the north to the south including Jenin, Nablus, Hebron, Ramallah and around Jerusalem.
Our centre works with people because they have been exposed to torture in many different ways. I think our centre was the first working with the people of the West Bank who have suffered torture. We try to visit every case, but because of the large area and large number of people who have been in Israeli prisons it is just not possible to cover all. Because of this, we have to priorities the most difficult cases and those who are suffering the most.
We have a relationship with the Ministry of Prisoners and Ministry of Health and they sometimes refer to us these most difficult cases. We work with children’s groups and adults groups, both for women and men, but most of our work is with individuals. We also have a community awareness unit, who do workshops around the villages and in refugee camps. We explain our work in these workshops and then afterwards we start to work with anyone who has experienced the issues that we speak about and who need help.
ISM: What are the most common methods of torture used by Israel on Palestinians?
WD: The types of torture used by the Israelis are both physical and psychological. I think the main method of torture the Israelis use at the moment is solitary confinement of prisoners in a small dark dirty room for many days or weeks. During this time the guards and soldiers continually shout abuse and bad words at them. In the beginning when they first arrest them they tie or handcuff their hands and cover their faces with dirty sacks or blindfolds. This creates very bad psychological effects.
Another method of torture currently used we call shabih in Arabic. They tie the prisoners with their hands behind their backs and put them on a very small chair – if they move at all in any direction they will fall down. They put people in this position for many hours.
Another method also forces people to endure very uncomfortable conditions for a long time, but in another way – they keep the prisoner standing for a long time in the sun or in the rain, depending on the season. After that, they increase the effect by using the same conditions in the rooms – if it is hot, they open it to the heat, or to the cold in the winter.
Many, many methods are used by the Israelis to torture Palestinians – they don’t allow for prisoners to see their lawyers, or their families for many weeks or months. Some prisoners don’t see their families for years. The food is very dirty and very bad, especially at the start of the arrest because they put all the youth in very small rooms and they can’t cook their own food. Instead, it is brought to them and it is not good or healthy. The prisoners also don’t have a bathroom in this small room – they have to use something else, like a bucket instead. They also don’t allow them to take a shower for many days and even when they do it is only for a couple of minutes, without privacy because there is no door to the shower stall.
I think these are the main methods – in the past they used shaking, grabbing the prisoner’s neck or head and shaking it – this is very dangerous, one person died after being tortured in this way I think. After that, the Israelis stopped using this method as much – not completely, they continue to do this sometimes. Another issue is that people are suffering from many diseases which are not treated in prison – if they take them to the doctor it is only when they are very ill. I don’t know the number of prisoners who have died in Israeli prisons because they were not treated for their diseases.
ISM: As you said, the Israelis use both physical and psychological torture. Is there a difference in the methods of torture that are used between time in interrogation and in jail?
WD: The first weeks are the most dangerous and difficult for the prisoners because the methods of torture are used more. They use methods that I mentioned before, generally putting prisoners in a small isolation room – which we call zenzana in Arabic – because they want information from them. After this time, maybe two months or a little less, they send them to another prison, with a larger group of prisoners. After that there is less physical torture.
Israeli soldiers posing for a photo with a female Palestinian arrestee blindfolded and handcuffed
However, not being permitted to see their families, not being allowed access to a doctor and not being allowed to have things that they need can also be considered torture. Everyone has heard about the Palestinian hunger strikers – some prisoners have stopped eating for weeks or many months because they need something from the Israelis which they are not permitted.
ISM: What types of trauma do people that you treat suffer with?
WD: Most suffer from Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD), especially women and those younger than eighteen. Some people also suffer from depression and a small number of others have schizophrenia. There are also some cases of Obsessive Compulsive Disorder (OCD) and some have epilepsy, because during the torture they have been hit in the head or the Israelis have used very noisy music during their time in prison.
The majority of the people that we work with experience PTSD or depression; we generally work with them for three or four months, in about twelve sessions – or more depending on the level of suffering. We work together as a team – psychiatrists, psychologists and social workers. We give medication to some people if necessary; the psychiatrists see these cases and prescribe the appropriate medicines. But this is a minority and they generally take medication for a short time – maybe a course for three months or six months.
ISM: How do people who need your help know about the TRC?
WD: Some of our cases know about our centre through the media outreach we used to do. Every week we had a small feature on television or radio, so one of us would be on this and speak about our work. Sometimes we would speak to our cases on the phone on the program so people could hear how it was effective. However, due to a lack of funding we had to stop this recently. For the last nine years or so we had a newsletter every month about our work. This contains news about our centre and the stories of some cases, with their photos if they give permission for them to be included.
We also do workshops in the villages – for example, I would go to visit a village like Burin and speak to the cultural centre there or the municipality or any other society. We tell them that we will come soon to do a workshop with people who have been in prison or have been injured by the soldiers. So then we come and speak about our work in the workshop and talk to the people – afterwards, people ask many questions about how we can help them and we give them our address and phone number.
After that, some cases come to the centre, or some prefer to continue with the outreach program in their homes. Some people prefer us to visit them at home because they don’t like people to know that they are seeing us in the centre. Some youth also have a problem to move from their homes to the centre, especially when the checkpoints are difficult – there is a danger that they may be arrested again.
The children that we work with we often treat with group therapy – last week we finished summer camps in Jenin for our cases. This year though, because we have problems with funds, we could only have a small summer camp. These children are mostly suffering from PTSD mostly – generally this is because their fathers are in Israeli jails and the trauma is caused by the deprivation and the prison visits every two or three months.
From four in the morning they take buses to inside Israel, in the south in the Naqab prison or Bir Saba, or far in the north – it’s a long way and it’s very difficult for them. They tell some stories, about the checkpoints, about the cages in the prison. When they see their fathers, there is a wall between them, they can speak only by telephone. For years they weren’t able to hug their fathers or shake hands with them, it’s forbidden. I think for children under five, it is allowed for them to see their father without a wall every three or four months. These children suffer from many problems, such as bad dreams.
A prisoner talking to his daughter by phone and separated by a glass wall
ISM: Do you also work with children who have been arrested and interrogated and experienced torture themselves?
WD: Yes, but this year and for the last couple of years this has not been such a large number. However, this does depend on the area; for example in and around Jerusalem and in Hebron, there are many child arrests because there are a high number of Israeli soldiers there. So, from time to time we do work with many children who are arrested there.
In 2012, we worked with small groups of children from the Nablus area. Most were about sixteen or seventeen years old. They stayed in prison for about six or seven months. Some of them, we work with them for two months and the Israelis arrested them again.
We work with cases of children who were arrested when they were sixteen and when they’re freed they are twenty-five, twenty-six, having spent six or seven years in prison. But now, the number is not large. I think, now there are around two hundred and thirty-six children arrested in Israeli prison.
ISM: Can you tell us about the state of Palestinian prisoners in general?
WD: Every month we have some visits to Palestinian prisoners or we see in the news about the prisoners. Three or four years ago, there were over ten thousand Palestinian prisoners in Israeli jails. Now there are five thousand, including two hundred and thirty-six children and twenty-three or twenty-four women. About one hundred and twelve prisoners have been in prison since before the Oslo Agreements of 1993.
Now I heard in the news that during Ramadan they will release forty of them because the Palestinian Authority said that they won’t negotiate unless Israel stops building settlements and releases these prisoners. They have been in jail for over twenty years, since before the Oslo Agreements. This is very bad for our Palestinian presidents because in the past they must release them in the time. Before 1993, there was no relationship between Israel and Palestine and there was no Palestinian Authority. When the Oslo Agreements were made the Israelis should have released all Palestinian prisoners but, as you know, after that, years and years passed and after 2000 the intifada started and everything was stopped.
ISM: On the TRC website, you say that you want to eliminate the culture of impunity felt by perpetrators of torture, how do you do this and what obstacles do you face in doing so?
WD: We write reports on our cases and tell people how much the Palestinians are suffering because of their treatment in Israeli prisons. In the past we used to send them to many lawyers in the West Bank who we had relationships with.
Some cases we turn into case studies, along with photos of the prisoners. We translate this into English and put the information on the website, as well as taking the case studies to conferences around the world, in Europe, Australia, South America and Africa. We also sent many of the studies to the UN, and other centres from around the world have come here to visit the cases and have done interviews with them.
We have taken four or five cases to the Israeli courts, taking all the papers and reports and show that these people were suffering because of being in Israeli prisons. We testify as psychologists, social workers or psychiatrists, saying that we treated this person in our centre and have a report saying that he is suffering from “1, 2, 3”. So this is what we can do about fighting impunity in the courts. The process of the court cases that we are working is still ongoing – they didn’t finish until now.
But the main thing is to do case studies about the people we work with and send them to the media, conferences and provide them to the groups that come to visit. The main project with this was with the UN, in 2002. However, now, we have some difficulties in our centre so we had to stop many of these projects. At the moment we only treat people, because for the last two or three years we have been only seven or eight social workers and psychologists so we cannot cover all the areas and visit all these people. We need a big team for that.
ISM: And why is it so important that there is not impunity for torture?
WD: It is forbidden to torture any person around the world so we need to show the world that the Israeli “democratic state” uses torture on Palestinians in their prisons, because they regularly present the Palestinians as terrorists in the media. But now the world knows that we are under the Israeli occupation and we must show that our people are tortured by the Israelis.
ISM: Do many torture victims file complaints in the Israeli legal system?
WD: Most of them don’t go to the Israeli court; only a small number go through this process. Some of them have reports from Israeli hospitals saying that were tortured. But people are only referred to Israeli hospitals if the torture has been particularly bad, from the first hours of the arrest.
I work with four or five youth who have epilepsy because the Israelis hit them in the head with guns or against the wall. One boy was beaten with a stick in the head when they arrested him at a checkpoint. He lost consciousness and fell down on the floor. He wasn’t treated well in prison – they didn’t give him any medicine and when he left prison, he suffered from epilepsy every three weeks, because he has a trauma. So in our centre we gave him medicine for epilepsy. But the majority of these cases are suffering until now, because we cannot completely cure epilepsy.
One of my cases used the Israeli reports from when he was in prison and went to court four years ago. They took him to an Israeli hospital to check him for two three days and he had a new report. When he went back home the Israelis called him and said to him “we will give you 200,000 shekels if you stop the court process” but he refused. After that they came and arrested him again. They brought him to Huwwara camp for hours and they tried to scare him saying “we will put you in prison again” “we will kill you” “you will die”. But he continued his case until now, it is not finished. Some of the cases take years in court.
ISM: Do you think the main reason Israel uses torture is to get information from the arrestees?
WD: I think the torture is not only used for information. It is also to punish people, to destroy their personality and resistance and to punish their family. Some people don’t do anything and they still imprison them. In Arabic we call this idari, meaning a sentence without time restrictions. In English I think it’s called administrative detention. Some people go to court and they give him six years and then they will be free. But other people, they put them in prison three months and three months, six months – because they claim that they are dangerous. So, some of them spend years in Israeli prisons without going to the court because they can put anyone in prison without trial.
ISM: Sometimes do people make false confessions if they are tortured, giving invented information just to make the torture stop?
WD: Some of them say things that they haven’t done, especially children. They scare them in prison because it is the first time for them and they are young, they don’t have previous experience. The Israelis punish them or say “we will bring your family to the prison”, “we will damage your family house” so they are scared and will admit to something that they didn’t do. But the majority are strong when they face torture, but all of us are human.
ISM: There is a recent case of five boys in Hares who admitted under torture to throwing stones at a settler car. Afterwards in the court, they retracted these statements (take action for the Hares boys here). Do these kind of cases happen regularly?
WD: This happens. They say in the court that they didn’t do it, and that they only admitted to it before because they were under torture. I heard similar stories in the Hebron area, with a child who was seventeen. There was an Israeli car accident and the driver died in the car. The Israeli authorities said that children threw stones, so he died because of the stones. I read in the news that they wanted to give the boy 25 years in prison because he killed a person, but in the court the Palestinian lawyer said that if this did happen, when he threw the stone he didn’t mean to kill, it was an accident.
We have many difficult and dangerous stories. Some people spend many years in prison without having done anything. During 2001, 2002 and 2003 the situation was very bad and inside Israel everyday many people were killed; some people went to Israel and put bombs on the buses. During that time, in the Israeli court they gave all prisoners many years in prison, Maybe they did something which should have had a one year or two years sentence, but the judge gave them ten years. Some cases in Burin, their families told me about these cases and they are still in prison, for twelve or thirteen years.
ISM: As a clinical psychologist, why did you choose to work with torture survivors?
WD: I am one of the people who was exposed to torture. When I finished High School in 1992, I wanted to continue studying in Russia as a dentist but the Israeli authorities wouldn’t allow me to cross the border. They sent me back and said to me “you must go to the Israeli army tomorrow”. I went to the crossing every day for a month and every day they put us in a camp and took our IDs from the morning until 4pm – and at the end they always said “come back tomorrow”.
The last time I went, I was asked “where are you going?”, “why are you going to study there?” and many other questions. After I answered, they said “it is forbidden for you to go out but if you help us, we will allow you to go”. I refused and instead, I stayed here and studied to be a psychologist at An Najjah University in Nablus.
While I was at university I was arrested by the Israelis twice, once for six months and then again for two months. It was the same thing for all of us, we were told “you have done something in the university, in the political movements”. When I finished my studies, I got a one-year diploma here in Palestine and after that I started working in the TRC from 2003. I’ve been working here for 10 years.
ISM: Do you see differences in the regions of the West Bank regarding the use of torture?
WD: There are no differences, we see the same cases all over. But it depends on the situation in the area – for example, during the intifada Nablus and the north were very bad, so in Nablus, Jenin and Tulkarem, we had a large number of prisoners, whereas from Ramallah there were not so many. In Hebron and in the Jerusalem area, many are under eighteen or they were in the prison under eighteen.
Abu Karam Maswathi, blindfolded and hadcuffed with his son in Hebron (Photo by ISM)
However, I think in all places the methods of torture are the same – often the Israelis pressure them to be a spy and work for them. They especially use the children for this, they scare them, or maybe they say to them “we will help you, we will give you money”. They don’t necessarily ask them directly to be a spy, instead they just say “tell us who throws stones, how many people are in the area and what are they doing”. Some of the prisoners become spies because of this.
I went to Gaza last year – it was my first time there. We have a relationship with a rehabilitation centre there so we went to speak to the people. In Gaza, they give people permission to come to the West Bank to go to the hospital or to go to Israel, but at the checkpoint, they don’t allow people to actually leave even though they have permission. Instead they try to make them be spies, saying “we will give you a permit to go to the hospital if you help us”. We have many cases like this.
ISM: We know that Israel has signed treaties that ban the practice of torture including the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and the UN Convention against Torture, do you have a message for the Israeli authorities about this?
WD: I would say to Israel, if you are talking about democracy and human rights, you must tell the government to stop all methods of torture against us. The world knows that you have occupied us and one day you will be held accountable in a court. The court could be Israeli, Palestinian or European and you will be punished for your use of torture against us.
As Israeli or Jewish people, you suffered from torture sixty years ago or more; if in the past you were the victims how can you now be the perpetrators? Why? You occupied our land and anyone under occupation has the right to fight. If you believe in peace you have to leave our land and be our neighbours.
ISM: Do you want to add anything else?
WD: Being in Palestine you can see everything that is going on around, how we live but in the past our life was even more difficult. Today is comparatively okay, now you can move from place to place but in the past that was very difficult – there were always many checkpoints.
But Palestinians are still forbidden to go to Jerusalem, it is surrounded by the wall. During Ramadan they are allowing some people to go on Fridays – women are permitted at any age but men can go only if they are over the age of forty. Eight years ago, before they started to build the wall, you could move freely to any place. Now they don’t allow anyone to go to Jerusalem. Many young people have never visited Jerusalem, nor do they know about Haifa or Jaffa. In the past every week or month we used to go to Jerusalem with our fathers or friends, as we now go to Ramallah or Nablus. But now it is closed.
They speak about freedom but that’s only for the media. Go to Qalandiya and you will see how they treat people at the checkpoint. But I believe that this wall and the occupation must end and the Israelis know that. They know that their state is for some time but not for ever.
We have workshops in Jerusalem and Haifa with Israelis social workers called Physician for Human rights and we speak about many things. Some of them say “yes, we must leave from West Bank and Gaza and be neighbours” but they don’t do anything against their government.
17th July 2013 | International Solidarity Movement, Ramallah Team | Nabi Saleh, Occupied Palestine
Update 21th July: Mahmoud Tamimi was released from hospital and needs to stay at home to complete his recovery.
Update 19th July:Mahmoud Tamimi is still recovering at the hospital. The injury in his leg is still open due to artery bleeding and will require stitches today.
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On Tuesday, clashes between residents of Nabi Saleh and Israeli forces resulted in one boy injured with a rubber coated steel bullet in the leg and a man injured with live ammunition, also in the leg. The latter underwent surgery and is still recovering at Ramallah hospital.
Mahmoud Tamimi being carried away after he was shot (Photo by Tamimi Press)
Yesterday in the evening, just before Iftar (breaking of the fast), confrontations between Israeli forces and Palestinian youths from Nabi Saleh erupted. Israeli forces shot tear gas canisters, rubber coated steel bullets and live ammunition at villagers, resulting in two people injured.
Mahmoud Tamimi, 22 years old, was shot with a live ammunition bullet in the leg when he was trying to help Mohammad Tamimi, 10 years old, who had been shot with a rubber coated steel bullet in the leg while standing on the hill side where the confrontations were taking place.
After he was shot, Israeli soldiers prevented villagers from aiding Mahmoud and evacuating him to hospital. Bilal Tamimi, a villager who went to the scene to document what was happening, was beaten up and had his camera broken by Israeli soldiers.
Mohammad and Mahmoud were eventually taken to Ramallah hospital. Mahmoud underwent surgery and is still at the hospital while Mohammad was released yesterday and is currently recovering at home.
The village of Nabi Saleh has been demonstrating against the theft of their natural spring and the occupation since December 2009. Israeli forces violently suppress the weekly Friday protests by shooting tear gas canisters, skunk water, sound bombs, rubber coated steel bullets and even live ammunition at protesters. Two people have been killed, Mustafa and Rushdi Tamimi, and many others severely injured. Bassem Tamimi, Mohammad’s father, has spent 17 months in Israeli jails, merely for being a prominent activist at the protests. Nariman Tamimi, his wife and Mohammad’s mother, was arrested at a demonstration on the 28th of June. She spent three days in jail and was accused of entering a closed military zone. Nariman is currently on partial house arrest on Fridays and has the next military court hearing in September.
Israeli soldiers preventing people from aiding Mahmoud Tamimi after he was shot (Photo by Tamimi Press)Mahmoud Tamimi receiving medical aid before being evacuated by ambulance (Photo by Tamimi Press)
18th June 2013 | International Solidarity Movement | Haifa
Ilan Pappé is an Israeli academic and activist. He is currently a professor at the University of Exeter (UK) and is well known for being one of the Israeli “new historians” – re-writing the Zionist narrative of the Palestinian Israeli situation. He has publicly spoken out against Israel’s policies of ethnic cleansing of Palestine and condemned the Israeli occupation and apartheid regime. He has also supported the Boycott, Divestments and Sanctions (BDS) campaign, calling for the international community to take action against Israel’s Zionist policies.
Activists from the International Solidarity Movement had the opportunity to talk to Professor Pappé about the ethnic cleansing of Palestine, Israeli politics and society and the role of the international community and solidarity activists in Palestine, resulting in a three part series of interviews which will be released on the ISM website in the coming weeks.
This is the final section; the role international community and solidarity activism in Palestine. Find part one on the ethnic cleansing of Palestine here and part two on Israeli society and politics here.
International Solidarity Movement: If, as you said in the previous interview (Israeli politics & society), support from the European Union (EU) and the USA is not going to stop, what could the international community do or what should change in order to force Israel to implement and respect international standards?
Ilan Pappé: We need a European spring. In the sense that we all know that if the European political leaders would only reflect what the European people want, the policy of European countries would be much tougher on Israel. Today, governments do not reflect what the people want or think. So the question is how do we transfer the pro-Palestinian sentiments of the people of Europe to the governments of Europe. By the way, this situation is the same in the USA.
I don’t think that Americans are more pro-Palestinian than Europeans, but they are starting to have enough of Israel and they would like the USA to concentrate on their own growing internal issues. But again, political leaders do not represent this wish. We had the same problem in South Africa; it took 21 years for the first European civil act against South African apartheid, which came in the form of economic sanctions. So it’s a very long process. What the international community must do is find ways of convincing their political leaders that it is both ethically and politically better to adopt a much tougher policy against the illegal Israeli occupation. The EU is a good example here because they have strong connections and relations with Israel, they essentially treat them like a member of the EU. When the boycott campaign started, it was the EU who first tried to get Israel to act in a different manner. That was just a small beginning, there is still a lot to be done, but for me, this is the right direction: a process from below towards the political elites.
ISM: There are many European politicians that would like Israel to be a member of the EU. Do you think this is possible, and if so, what will that lead to?
IP: Maybe is a good idea because then Israel would need to change its entire governmental policy, which is currently violating many EU laws. On the other hand, that could be a problem because it may just lead the different governments of the EU to accept Israel’s cruelty and violations. I still think that the best strategy is to explain to these pro-Israel politicians that history will judge them really badly because of their positions. The problem is that politicians don’t have the tendency to look beyond tomorrow. The only way is to explain to them that when this situation changes (in our case, when the occupation ends and when Palestine will be free), they will be on the wrong side in the history books, because they were the politicians that were supporting a state of apartheid.
It is similar for those politicians who were supporting Benito Mussolini. If politicians feel comfortable with being on the wrong side, that’s okay. But if they want to be portrayed in the history books as people who were working for peace and justice, they need to change their positions and friendships before it is too late. Israel has been kept alive because it serves a lot of strategic and military functions for the West, not because of its morality. Reality isn’t how the Christian Zionists see the world; thinking that Israel should be supported because it represents some kind of moral value. This kind of support has been overcome today, and this is also thanks to the work of the BDS campaign, it is one of the few victories we had.
ISM: In which way is international solidarity useful? What is or what should be the role of international activists in Palestine?
IP: I think that international aid, which is a bit different from solidarity movements, is often problematic. On one hand, it allows the Palestinians some level of existence, but on the other it kind of pays for the occupation and for Israel’s mistakes and violations. But the International Solidarity Movement is different: it is not about money but about people coming to help other people. As long as this injustice is happening, I think it is really important that ISM keep coming. All international activists that come to Palestine should be VIP’s. I mean they should Visit, they should Inform and they should Protest. ISM is doing all these three together, but maybe sometimes one less than another, because of particular circumstances or because of the lack of resources, and this is a pity. I think it’s essential to do them all together.
I think that ISM’s main role is to be the ISM’ers of the outside world. I once visited the Basque country, and I noticed that there was a distance between ISM and the boycott movement there, which is a shame because they should definitely work together. What ISM sees in Palestine is the result of the BDS movement’s work outside Palestine, and it works. It is not only about solidarity on the ground, which is very important, but also solidarity from outside.
You cannot replace the liberation movement – the Palestinians have to liberate themselves, nobody can help them with that, not even I, but we can and we must show solidarity with their liberation. This solidarity can be shown on the ground, but mostly by acting in the country that activists come from. It is about finding the right balance. I remember one of the first ISM groups that came to Jenin, after the terrible massacre of 2002. The fact that somebody came, was interested and sympathetic and supportive, meant a lot to the people.
We can see how much effort the Israelis are putting into preventing you from coming here, and I think that’s a good indication – proof that you are doing something right. I would be worried if tomorrow Israel said all ISMers are welcome – that would mean you’re not doing something right.
Protest against the construction of the wall in Al Walaja
ISM: What about the BDS campaign, do you think that an academic and cultural boycott could be an effective instrument against the Israeli occupation?
IP: I was always a great supporter of the BDS movement. As it did in South Africa, it will also play an important role in changing the reality on the ground here. But it is a long process and we need to be patient.
In the case of Israel, the academic and cultural boycott is particularly important, because Israel sees itself as a European and democratic country in the middle of the Arab world. ‘European’ not because of the economic relations it has with Europe, or because it sells tomatoes in Holland – among others it also has strong economic relations with China, Russia and Africa – but because it is part of the European cultural and academic elite. If European academic and cultural institutions say that they do not want to work with Israeli institutions because of Israel’s behaviour, I think it would send a very strong message.
The cultural and academic boycott (unlike the economic one, which only affects the occupied territories) makes a huge and direct impact on Israeli society, and it is only when that happens that Israelis will talk about what is happening in Palestine. For example, the only time that the Israeli press – and sometimes international media as well – talks about the occupation is when someone like Stephen Hawking says he is going to boycott an event organized by Israeli personalities. Before the spread of the boycott movement, it was only when there were bomb attacks in Israel that Israelis remembered that there is an occupation. Now this issue is brought up more regularly, when a famous pop group or author refuses to come, or when an important university in the USA says that they do not want to work with Israeli universities. This type of boycott is really important, and it is the main thing that the international community can do.
Pro-Palestinian activists hold a boycott protest during a football match between Scotland and Israel
International solidarity movements sometimes think that they should have an opinion regarding, for example, the one-state or two-state solutions, but this is actually not their business. It is up to the Palestinians and Israelis to decide how they are going to live. What international movements can do is to create the conditions for a reasonable dialogue. But we need to end the occupation before starting to speak about peace. The Israeli trick has for many years been to try to convince the world that peace will end the occupation. But we know that actually this goes the other way around: we end the occupation and then we will start to talk about peace. I think that ISM, the BDS movement and the Palestinian solidarity movements are all grassroots organizations that do not accept the Israeli diktat “Peace will end the occupation”. These organizations are not part of the peace talks but instead they work on ending the occupation and the apartheid.
ISM: What would you say to people that believe that cultural and sport events should not be politicized?
IP: Well, it was very effective in the case of South Africa. In fact white South Africans only began to think about apartheid when the big sports teams of South Africa were not invited to international sporting events. Moreover, I think that sport is political. For example, Israel is going to host the UEFA Under-21 football tournament, and the Palestinian football team has not been invited. Palestinian players from Gaza will not even be able to go to Israel and see the tournament. Sport is political if it is not free for everyone to participate.
Academia as well is clearly political. Israeli academics, when they are abroad, think they are Israel’s ambassadors. Synagogues abroad see themselves as Israel’s embassies. When Israeli academics see themselves as ambassadors, and represent something that most decent people abroad will see as unacceptable, then people have the right to show their rejection.
And nobody tells these people that they represent Israel, they say it themselves. There was a big debate in the Basque country about the Israeli singer Noah – whether people should boycott her concert or not. People went to her website and saw she had written that she represents Israel on her tour. So she wasn’t coming just as a singer, but as a representative of Israel. We are in 2013 and if you say that, it means you represent what Israel represents, and what Israel is doing today. Therefore you are a legitimate target of the boycott.
This is the last of a three part interview series: Ilan Pappé in conversation with the International Solidarity Movement.
11th July 2013 | International Solidarity Movement | Haifa
Ilan Pappé is an Israeli academic and activist. He is currently a professor at the University of Exeter (UK) and is well known for being one of the Israeli “new historians” – re-writing the Zionist narrative of the Palestinian Israeli situation. He has publicly spoken out against Israel’s policies of ethnic cleansing of Palestine and condemned the Israeli occupation and apartheid regime. He has also supported the Boycott, Divestments and Sanctions (BDS) campaign, calling for the international community to take action against Israel’s Zionist policies.
Activists from the International Solidarity Movement had the opportunity to talk to Professor Pappé about the ethnic cleansing of Palestine, Israeli politics and society and the role of the international community and solidarity activists in Palestine, resulting in a three part series of interviews which will be released on the ISM website in the coming weeks.
This is the second section; Israeli politics and society. Find part one on the ethnic cleansing of Palestine here.
International Solidarity Movement: We were following the last Israeli elections and we were surprised to see that there was no actual talk about Palestine, it was all basically about internal issues. Then after the elections, Netanyahu commented about extending the settlements. What do you think about this?
Ilan Pappé: Your observation is correct. Israeli voters think that the problem of the West Bank has been solved, so they think there is no need to either talk about it, or come up with solutions. You propose a solution as an idea for an election only if you think there is a problem, which they think is not the case here. They think that what we have is good for Palestinians and good for Israelis. They think that the world is stupidly trying to create a problem that is not there, and is trying to be involved where there is no need to be. They think that even if there are still missiles coming from Gaza, Israel has a strong army that will answer back. So, if you speak with Israelis in the subway, they will tell you that there is not a problem between Israel and Palestine.
The only thing that makes Israelis think about Palestine is when the boycott campaign is successful, like what happened recently with Stephen Hawking. Do you know what the problem is? 95% of Israelis don’t even want to go to the West Bank, so they don’t know what is really happening. Or they know what is happening only from their children who are serving as soldiers. But their children don’t tell them about the checkpoints, the arrests from homes and all the other awful things. Israelis could know if they wanted to – they have the internet – but they don’t want to. For example in Tivon, my neighbourhood, everybody votes for the left, but if you ask them if they have ever seen a checkpoint or the apartheid wall, or if any one of them wants to go to the West Bank and see what the soldiers and settlers are doing, they will say no. They’ll tell you that’s not their problem. They have other problems – standard of living, house prices, the new car, the education of their children etc.
ISM: Yair Lapid, the head of the Ministry of Finance of the new coalition government, stated on 20th May that Israel is not going to stop the colonization of the West Bank or end subsidies for illegal settlers, which in fact will not only continue but increase. Do you think that any switch of parties in power could truly make an impact on this situation?
Halamish settlement, built on Nabi Saleh’s land (Photo by ISM)
IP: No. We haven’t had any party or leader different from the others, including Rabin, who became a hero after he was shot. Israelis like Lapid are always busy implementing policies so that the land has no Palestinians – so in this sense Lapid is just continuing what everyone before him was doing. The problem they have is not technical – they know how to do it, they have a script. They do not build new settlements, but they allow the natural growth of the current settlements, while Palestinians are not allowed natural growth. Then they say they’re not building a new settlement, but need to build a new neighbourhood because the settlement population has grown. So you can see from this that they do not have any technical problem, it’s more that they maintain this funny dialogue with the world: “You know that we are colonizing, you know that we are ethnically cleansing the Palestinians, you know that we are keeping them in prison, but still we are playing this game where we are speaking about a peace process.”
The only problem that Israel has – although within 10 years I unfortunately don’t believe it will be a problem anymore, unless we change something – is that they still think that what they’re doing will never be accepted by the world, so they think they need to find a new language for what they’re doing. But practically on the ground I don’t think there has been one day since 1967 that something was not built by the Israelis in the West Bank, whether it’s a house or a flat or a road or a balcony, it goes on and it will continue.
Israel knows that the EU and the USA will not stop supporting them, and they’re right. So they will talk about stopping colonization, but they will not actually stop it. This is something to worry about because that’s the reality. Lapid comes from the new generation of politicians and I think that when you are new in politics you say a bit more openly what you are doing. Then, like Silvio Berlusconi, when you have another term, you stop saying what you are actually doing. So, if Lapid were to become Prime Minister, he would stop saying what he’s doing, he’d say, “we are not building, we are just fabricating.”
Today, there is no hope for a change from within the Israeli political system. This system is just going to get more and more right wing, and less and less willing to change Israel’s unilateral policies.
ISM: There is this new far-right party “The Jewish Home” that just entered the government following the recent elections, with leader Naftali Bennet, who became Minister of Religious Services and Industry, Trade and Labour. What kind of change will that bring?
IP: He is a very clever man, he comes from a settlement, and his main agenda is to strengthen the connection between the settlements and Israel. This was not openly his agenda during the elections. At that time he was talking to young Israelis in Tel Aviv about how nice it is to be Israeli, and saying that he would bring back pride in being Israeli – and it actually worked, they liked him. It was all about this idea of the ‘great nation’. And he added Judaism to this – saying it is not just good to be Israeli, but to be a Jewish Israeli. He is young, he was in the army, he was a military hero and a successful businessman. But he is not so different from Lapid, they live the same way – “it doesn’t matter whether you are from a settlement or from Tel Aviv, we are all from Israel”.
ISM: Do you think that the settlers will have more impact on Israeli politics because of Bennet’s success?
IP: Yes, I think so, but this is not so important. It doesn’t matter if you are from a settlement or from Tel Aviv, or if you are on the right or on the left. The basic Israeli ideology – Zionism – is the problem. I think that as long as Zionism is regarded as an ideal concept, the same policies will continue. If Israel has a more right-wing government – for example Netanyahu’s government compared to the Barak government – then the differences are small. You just have a few more checkpoints and a bit more brutality. But I think in the end it’s really just the same. What matters is not the government of Israel, but how much the Palestinians are willing to accept. If they are willing to accept the current reality, then Israel will allow them to work within Israel, remove some of the checkpoints, give them some more autonomy. But the moment Palestinians show some form of resistance, Israel is going to repress them brutally. Everything is about how much Palestinians accept the Israeli diktat.
ISM: You previously said that there is no more hope for a change at the political level in Israel. But on the other side, in what way do you view today’s Israeli citizens’ commitment against the occupation? How important is it that the present and future Israeli society challenges this form of colonization?
IP: I think that the forces that oppose the occupation are very small, but there have been two positive developments. First of all, the rejection of the occupation is growing and secondly, it is led by the new generation, not like before. This is an essential element. But, pressure from the international community and the Palestinian resistance will be the main factors that will bring down the occupation. One day, when we will need to rebuild a new society, it will be much better to know that there were many Jewish people who were fighting against the occupation. When the occupation ends and takes its apartheid with it, I am sure that a lot of Jewish people will say that they were against it, like the white South Africans said at the end of their apartheid system, but everybody knows that it was not the case during that period. It is good to see that this wave is growing every day. Nonetheless, a lot of Israelis, they still don’t know that there is a military occupation! For the future it is essential that this view changes, and it is changing.
Israeli activists protesting the Gaza massacre in 2008-2009 (Photo by Activestills)
ISM: Young Israeli people often feel criticized when they travel abroad. Do you think that this criticism has an impact or influence on Israeli society?
IP: Yes, I think it’s good to criticize young Israelis abroad. Some of them have actually changed because of that, no doubt about it. There’s a wonderful YouTube clip which shows what happens to young Israelis abroad. The Israeli military used to show this clip about young Israelis going abroad, to India. It was a clip especially against the refuseniks – people who refuse to serve in the army. In the clip they’re all sitting with young nice Indian girls, then some young Europeans come along and ask the Israelis what they did in the army. One speaks about the time he was a commander and about how cool it was to be in the army, and the Europeans look at him amazed, like he’s a hero. Meanwhile, the refusenik seems ashamed, looking down, without saying anything, basically really uncomfortable because he didn’t serve in the army. So this Israeli anti-apartheid organization made a counter-video, with the same setting, but instead of being soldiers they were Israeli activists, and the ashamed person was the one who served in the army, he was the one feeling really uncomfortable.
Now in 2013, some young people do not buy the whole story of anti-Semitism. They meet people abroad of the same age who know about the occupation, and where older people might just say that the people are neo-Nazis or something, young people are more likely to see the difference between being against the occupation and being anti-Semitic. This is an important new development, which I have seen with my own eyes.
ISM: What are the long term effects, social and psychological, on Israeli youth because of military conscription?
IP: Military conscription frames your mind. It makes you see human beings through a rifle and therefore you dehumanize them. It makes you very insensitive to suffering of others and at the same time makes you very racist. It also makes you limited in the way you can think about new options in life, because power obscures your mind. In any kind of situation you will think that the only way out from a state of affairs is the use of force. This has very negative effects on Israeli youth and it is clearly just part of the heavy indoctrination they face throughout life.
Young Israelis do not often speak about the psychological problems that come afterwards. I went to the psychiatric department in Israel and the vast majority of people are young Israelis who served in the army. This is a secret in Israel, nobody talks about it. Two days ago a young boy who just finished his military service went into a bank that refused to give him a loan. He ended up shooting four people to death. This is just one example of the impact and effects of military conscription and militarization on the Israeli society.
ISM: How does it feel to live in Israel and at the same time be against the state? What are the consequences?
IP: It’s a fact that there are not many cases like mine and I pay a price for my position. So far, people like me pay a price not in the sense that the government is chasing them, it is different from other countries. Israel is such a racist state that it won’t do that to Jewish people. What they do instead, is to encourage society to punish you. The fact that I had to leave Haifa University is the result of this. They aim at the place where you work. For example, we had 4 brave former pilots that refused to serve in occupied Palestine because of what Israel was doing there – they were forced to leave their jobs outside of the military.
So, the public sphere or even your family or your friends make you pay a price, because you are considered a traitor. The reward you get is that you feel better about yourself and when you go abroad, people respect you. This, I hope, will encourage people to pay the price. If the Palestinians did what some Israelis are doing, they would just find themselves in jail. The Jewish people will maybe lose their job, be insulted, be hated by their neighbours, students. It is a long but really important process.
ISM: Howdid they kick you out from Haifa University?
IP: What they did is something called a special university court. They wanted to judge me as a traitor and kick me out of the university. This resulted in an international outrage because luckily, I was already well known at this time in the academic world, so they couldn’t go through the court process. What they did instead was to make it impossible for me to teach: they stopped my teaching allowances, they persecuted my PhD students, they gave me small classes, they told everyone at the university not to sit with me, not to speak to me. It was the director who gave the “orders”. He told to the other teachers that they would put their own career at risk if they violated these rules. They never formally fired me but I decided that that was enough, so I left.
Today there are many similar cases throughout Israel but speaking out against Israeli policies as an academic has now become more difficult than before, since in 2012 a new law was passed in the Knesset. This law says that if you are an Israeli academic and you support openly the academic boycott of Israel or you speak against Israel’s policies and actions, they have to fire you or you could even be arrested. After all, a large number of Israeli academics against the occupation created the “Israeli Academic Committee for Boycott”. These people are suffering and will never be able to become professors or further their academic careers – but more importantly I think that they feel better than the others. After this draconian law was passed, even more people decided to speak openly against the Israeli occupation or apartheid and for now, nobody has actually been arrested. How can Israel speak about democracy when our supposed freedom of speech is being violated so clearly.
This is the second of a three part interview series: Ilan Pappé in conversation with the International Solidarity Movement. Look out for the final part on the role of the international community and solidarity activism next week.
The implications of this policy change are significant. Once implemented collectively, all Palestinian Jerusalemites who hold permanent residency status will be obligated to go to the Ministry of Interior to renew their IDs upon such expiration. It can be expected, then, that they will be subjected to the MOI’s Center of Life policy, which requires Palestinians through an exhaustive list of documents to prove Jerusalem as their continuous, uninterrupted center of life. Those who are unable to meet the Ministry’s excessive list of demands will render themselves at threat of having their IDs revoked and, accordingly, their rights to live in Jerusalem stripped.
