Tag: As Sawiya

Village in Focus: As Sawiya

25th January 2015 | International Solidarity Movement, Nablus Team | As Sawiya, Occupied Palestine

On January 24th, 2015, ISM activists visited As Sawiya, a Palestinian village located near Salfit. The village is home to around 3,500 people. Seven mountains surround the village; much of the land is occupied by three illegal Israeli settlements – Eli, Rechelim, and Ma´ale Levona. As Sawiya suffers many injustices under Israeli occupation, including military and settler violence against the village’s residents, lands, homes, and schools.

Construction of the illegal settlement of Eli began in 1982. Since settlement construction began, the village of As Sawiya has been subject to constant settler violence and expansion. During the olive harvest of 2005, Israeli settlers attacked farmers, leaving three Palestinians injured. Israeli settlers also stole a resident´s horse. As a result of this constant settler violence, Palestinians have been unable to consistently plant or harvest their fields. The Israeli military has used this disuse to justify declaring many of the fields ¨unoccupied,¨ using this twisted logic to rationalise their confiscation for further settlement expansion. Approximately 1,500 dunams of land has been confiscated from the village for nearby settlements. In addition to intimidation and confiscation, village residents are robbed of their village spring, trees, and other agricultural resources by settlers.

DSC08288 (800x600) — Nearby settlement as seen from the Palestinian village of As Sawiya – photo by ISM

The children of As Sawiya have experienced extreme violence at the hands of the occupation forces and Israeli settlers. Villagers described how the children are facing increased military presence and settler violence at As Sawiya’s local school. Israeli settlers have instigated many violent incidents. Accusing children of throwing stones at them, Israeli settlers attacked children and called in the Israeli army, who then threw stun grenades directly into groups of children around the school. There have been recent incidents in which over 60 Israeli soldiers surrounded the school.

The villagers of As Sawiya have attempted to provide protection for their young by constructing a high wall around the school. This has had the unfortunate side effect of isolating the students from the view outside their windows and inhibiting what was once easy street access to the building. This restricted access also makes students outside more vulnerable to attacks, as it limits their entry points into the building. In 2010, Israeli settlers set fire to the secondary girls’ school in the village, causing severe damage to both the building and local Palestinian girls’ education.

DSC08294 (800x600) — The gate of the village school – photo by ISM

The village of As Sawiya has sought to build a bus station in recent years, but have faced many difficulties. Located in Area C of the West Bank and therefore under Israeli civilian and military control, all construction requires Israeli approval, which is nearly impossible to obtain. Numerous requests by the village have been rejected, declared “illegal¨ because of ¨security reasons,¨ according to Israeli military authorities.

Palestinian school set on fire

21st September 2013 | International Solidarity Movement, Nablus team |As-Sawia, Occupied Palestine

On the evening of the 10th September, unknown assailants broke into the As-Sawia Secondary School, forced open the door and set the school on fire. Bedouins living close to the school saw the fire and alerted the fire brigade. By the time it was put out, the principal’s office and teachers’ rooms were completely burned.

“We lost six computers, four printers, all the teachers’ books and materials, but most of all, the administrative documents and files of the students and about the school situation over the past years. The whole damage is around 140,000 shekels,” the principle Adnan Hussein told ISM. The school was closed for three days after the arson attack.

As in many schools in the occupied West Bank, the students and staff of As-Sawia Secondary School suffer from constant settler and military harassment. Three days before the arson, armed settlers who called themselves “security” from one of the nearby hilltop illegal settlements stood at the school gates. When the principal spoke to them, they claimed that children threw stones at the settler cars on their way to school.

The school is located by Road 90, which was paved in 1944 and runs across the West Bank. The road is used by Palestinians and by illegal settlers. The children have to walk alongside it to get to school in the mornings and to go home after school.

“Our school is suffering both for the settlers and the army,” explained Hussein. “We constantly have the army at our gates, checking ID’s and bothering children”

On the 3 September, armed settlers stopped in a car marked as the illegal settlement Eli’s “security” at the gate of the school. One of the settlers came out of the car, jumped over the fence and started following some of the children, who have finished their classes and were leaving for home. The principle approached the settler and told him that he is not allowed in the school with weapons, and the settler responded that he was looking for a child who threw stones and shouted at the settler car earlier.

After agreeing to move outside the school gate at the head teacher’s insistence, the settler with the machine gun was joined by another settler and they insisted that the boy in the red T-shirt was brought to them. They also wanted the head teacher’s mobile phone number so that they could call him in the future.

“I had a bad feeling that something horrible will happen and that they will start shooting,” related Hussien. “I left some teachers with the settlers and with other teachers went to escort children through another gate and send them home, when three soldiers appeared. I went to speak to them. I told them that they cannot be in school with their weapons and in their uniforms but they insisted that they wanted to speak to a boy in the red T-shirt for 10 minutes.”

The principal and staff stood between the soldiers and settlers and the pupils to protect them while they were leaving the school. By this time worried parents were at the gate and they took the children away.

Throughout 2013, the army entered the As-Sawiya 51 times and children and the staff had to put up with teargas, sound bombs and arrests of pupils.

Hussein explained, “It is a constant worry that the settlers and the army will come. It is hard enough to control 350 teenagers even in the countries where there is no occupation. It is not easy and we do what we can to try to do our best keep the education for our children going. We have no problem with Jewish people and I can say that many of them are nice and honest, but settlers are generally dangerous people. I know that people should be able to choose where they live, but that does not include taking someone else’s land without permission.”

17 years old arrested at school in Al Sawiya

5th March 2014 | International Solidarity Movement, Team Nablus | Al Sawiya, Occupied Palestine

On Monday March 3^rd, in the early afternoon, Obada Muhammad Saleh, a 17 years old Palestinian was arrested by the Israeli Forces in his school in Al Sawiya.

Four youth detained by the checkpoint ( Photo via ISM archives)

Around 1pm last Monday, was school children were leaving Al Sawiya’s school, ten Israeli soldiers invaded the school’s courtyard and threw stun grenades and tear gas grenades at the children in order to arrest Obada Muhammad Saleh, who was quietly walking out of his class. Soldiers blindfolded and handcuffed him in the back, before bringing the teenager to their jeep. Teachers who were trying to protect Obada were verbally assaulted by Israeli soldiers on the scene. The young 17 year old is now facing charges of “stone throwing.”

It is not the first time a minor gets arrested in Al Sawiya school located next to road 60, in Area C. Out of 413 students coming there from Al Sawiya, Al Lubban and ‘Ammuriya, twenty got arrested in the last 3 years. Out of necessity, teachers need to walk the kids to school everyday due to the constant presence of the army around the school.

Settlers steal olives in As Sawiaya

4th November 2013 | International Solidarity Movement, Nablus Team | As Sawiaya, Occupied Palestine

The villagers of As Sawiaya had gained permission to pick their olives, for just 3 days in the year the Israel army was allowing them to visit their land. These three days were overshadowed by the harassment and attacks from settlers from the illegal Israel settlement of Eli. Since these attacks happen on a regular basis, the farmers asked International activists to attend the olive harvest as a protective presence.

Activists accompanied farmers up to the groves closest to the settlement, which lies on top of the hll. On their arrival they discovered, that the trees were bare for all the olives had been stolen. A private security guard from the settlement, told activists that the permission was only for the Palestinian farmers and that the army was already contacted to ask them to leave. Indeed soldiers arrived but made no attempt to evict the internationals.

Farmers who tried to get to the fields closest to the settlement were prevented from doing so by the Israeli Army.

Activists were able to assist with the olive harvest in groves further from the settlement where the crop had not been stolen

Sawiya night attack by settlers sees property damaged and graves vandalized

15th May 2013 | International Solidarity Movement, As Sawiya, Occupied Palestine

By ISM Nablus

In the early hours of Monday morning, a group of Zionist settlers from the Eli and Rechalim colonies attacked the Palestinian village of As Sawiah, east of Salfit.

The two graves spraypainted, including a Star of David, a Jewish symbol co-opted by the Zionist movement (Photo by ISM)

At about 3am, As Sawiah’s residents were sleeping as settlers attacked, first targeting a garden shop that had trees snapped and pots and plants thrown. The settlers continued to damage property letting down tires of two tractors and a car with spikes. The vehicles are essential to Palestinian farmers for their work and livelihood. Settlers continued in their attack by vandalising two graves near a family home, where they graffitied ‘Revenge for Arabs’ in Hebrew.

These attacks show the constant threat that settlers pose to the indigenous inhabitants to Palestine, where the attacks are often violent and deadly. When faced with attacks on property with varying degrees, the Palestinian people have no legal recourse or protection from the occupying forces. Eli, founded in 1984 and now spread over nine hilltops, has even contravened Israeli planning guidelines in its quest for growth; as well as stealing even more privately-owned Palestinian land this year from neighbouring Qaryut and all in direct – and defiant – contravention of the Fourth Geneva Convention and several UN Security Council resolutions specifically on Israeli settler-colonial activity. Rechalim, meanwhile, has in recent years stolen land from the villages of Yatma and As Sawiya.

Plant pots were smashed too along with the trees that were snapped (Photo by ISM)

What land remains for As Sawiya's villagers cannot even be worked on without gross hindrance (Photo by ISM) — What land remains for As Sawiya’s villagers cannot even be worked on without gross hindrance (Photo by ISM)

The settlers handiwork leaves not just a need for repairs, but also a sense of insecurity (Photo by ISM)

Puncture marks left by the spikes, time lost for this farmer not depicted (Photo by ISM)