Tag: Ethnic Cleansing - Page 26 - International Solidarity Movement

Olive harvest and Colonialism in expansion in Kafr ad Dik

12th November 2016 | International Solidarity Movement, Huwwara team | Kafr Qalil, occupied Palestine

For the past six days, international activists joined a Palestinian farmer, Fares Deek, in the harvest of his olives outside Kafr ad Dik village, located inside Salfit governate. For the past 16 years, the area has been a target of expanding illegal Israeli settlements.

Fares field is today surrounded at the north, east and west sides by Lashem settlement, started in 2010, with 700 units inhabited and another large number under construction.

Military check-point at the metal road gate

“They surrounded all my land and cut my road coming to my land. When they finish, I think I cannot come to my land.” Fares explained about the situation he is living in.

Fares reported that until now, Israelies, have stolen 700 dunums to build Lashem, leaving seven families that own fields in the same hill, without their land, only to establish this illegal settlement.

“They stole all my neighbors lands from the north and the east. In the future maybe in the south, maybe me.”

Eight months ago, bulldozers destroyed the agriculture road that used to lead up to Fares field.

Lashem has also cut him off the road to another field he owns, now on the north of Lashem illegal colony.

It used to take Fares 5 minutes to drive from Kafr ad Dik to the land, but to reach it now he has to cross a valley, after driving through Der Ballut and Rafat villages, then he needs to climb for half an hour to the top of the mountain where the field is. The last time he visited that field for the harvest was in 2013. The time and the money needed makes it hardly worth the out-put anymore.

Fare’s mother watching the destruction of her land

Two other settlements, Pedu’el to the south and Ale Zahav, behind Lashem, to the east complete to enclose his field. Just like Lashem, the illegal colony of Pedu’el, is also being expanded. Also to the north of Kafr ad Dik, the village Fares lives in, the new illegal settlement of “Sahar” is being formed on top of the mountain that Palestinians know as, Daher Subeh.

The area is being advertised as a quiet, peaceful place for Israelis to move to, according to Fares Deek.

“Israeli wants to encourage people to live here. As living cost is less, all the water you want is available, good for factories and no taxes!

maybe in the future in Salfit area all the mountains will become settlements.”

Bulldozer working in Pedu’el illegal settlement

“They work quickly, building new units, they look carefully at Salfit area. Compare Jerusalem area and Salfit area, they are doing the same.”

During the first day of the harvest, many settler colonists showed up at Fares field. Some of the colonists where openly carrying firearms and monitored the family while picking their olives.

“I have a bad feel about zionism. About anyone who came to take your land, to take your freedom, and take your hope. How would anyone in the world feel if he had to go through all this?

What that can make people feel? A bad feeling”

There is a well in Fares land that he used to use for drinking water, but 6 years ago after settlerers started to throw down big rocks and to take baths inside it, he couldn’t use it any more.

Dust is being spread from the bulldozers working on Lashem, causing damages for the olive trees.

Bulldozer working at the edge of Farres land at the place where they cut his agricultural road.

“All the years the harvest suffers because of the dust. The olive trees cannot breath good air because of the dust. They are between life and death.”

As we drove with the family towards the field the second morning harvesting, the Israeli army had put up a check-point at a metal road gate in the exit of Kafr ad Dik. The team was stopped for a total of 28 minutes by the four soldiers that were operating this checkpoint. Even though Fares said that he was going to pick his olives, the soldiers demanded to check IDs and kept asking questions.

When we finally got told to leave, Fares said that this was a common occurrence.

“They are doing this only to stress the people.”

This road gate was closed for 5 years between 2000 and 2005, forcing the people of Kafr al Dik to take an alternative route in order to exit the village, Fares explained.

Fares also reported that he has frequent visits from the Israeli forces while working in his field. He explained that there is a military tower in Pedu’el and sometimes the army will arrive very quickly after he enters the field.

“They tell me I have to have a permit to bring people here. I tell them that this is my land I’ll bring people here anytime I want. Sometimes they tell me you have to go back before the sunset. This makes me afraid about the future, about the land, what will happen in the future. I’m not having big problem now, but they will finish the units and come to live here in Lashem, they will tell me “you have no permit to come here”. Maybe they will put gates, fences. That is the future”

Also he thinks that Lashem will be finished in one to two years and that he is not sure if he will be able to harvest the olives next year.

“I’m afraid about the future, about the situation in Palestine, about Salfit, about my village. Israel is building more and more units in all settlements and started to build three new settlements since 2010 till now. That means cut more and more land, making new streets. Where is the solutions if they build more and more? The idea of a Palestinian state will die. And the pressure on Palestinians is always more. That is very bad”

“I want to tell people that we suffer and I invite people to visit Palestine to see with their own eyes to know who has the right to live here. I want to encourage Palestinian people to stay in the land as well.”

Olive harvest in Kafr Qalil and protective presence

2nd November 2016 | International Solidarity Movement, Huwwara team | Kafr Qalil, occupied Palestine

On 31st October international activists joined a Palestinian farmer and his family in Kafr Qalil to pick their olives. There was no interruption during the harvest this day, but there was a strong sense of pressure that is always present for Palestinians living under Israel’s illegal military occupation. The land that was worked on is between the illegal Israeli settlement Bracha and the road that leads up to the settlement. The family has been attacked and physically assaulted by settler colonists from Bracha in the past.

The main road to Nablus in-between the two Israeli apartheid roads. The road in the foreground leads to Bracha illegal settlement and the road seen above the main road leads to Elon Moreh settler colony.

The farmer reported that he was only given 6 days of permission by Israel to finish harvesting his own land, but said that he would need at least 20 days to be able to pick the olives from all of the around 300 trees that he owns.

Farmers in the village of Kafr Qalil have been targeted in settler attacks over several years. There have been various reports of settler colonists stealing crops, farming equipment, animals and throwing rocks at the Palestinian families as they harvest. Israeli forces have also repeatedly stopped farmers from reaching their land.

Teargas canister found leaving the olive fields after the day’s harvest.

The village has also lost land to the illegal settlement Bracha and its outpost, both of which are built on land that belongs to Kafr Qalil and the nearby Palestinian village of Burin.

In May 2013 Israel issued a military order that confiscated a further 3.55 dunums of land that belongs to Kafr Qalil in addition to the many dunums stolen over the years to establish and spread the illegal settlements in the area as well as to be used by the Israeli forces.

Furthermore, Israel has confiscated land from Kafr Qalil to construct two bypass roads. One road links the illegal Bracha settlement with the nearby Huwwara military checkpoint and the other road provides exclusive access for settler colonists between the same checkpoint and another illegal Israeli colony, Elon Moreh. These roads can only be used by Israelis and Palestinians are forbidden from driving on them. The Israeli bypass roads are one example of the apartheid-like system Palestinians are forced to live with under Israel’s illegal military occupation.

Palestinian woman arrested in Al-Khalil accused of carrying a knife

2nd November 2016 | International Solidarity Movement, al-Khalil team | Hebron, occupied Palestine

A Palestinian female was arrested on the 1st of November near Qeitun checkpoint accused of carrying a knife. Eyewitnesses described her being ordered to kneel on the ground, open her dress and loosen her hijab in public, before being handcuffed and escorted behind the gate at Qeitun checkpoint. However, none present saw any sign of the knife she was accused of carrying.   The Palestinian woman was initially attended to by around seven armed soldiers, who were joined shortly afterwards by two jeeps each carrying several more, including female officers who presumably conducted a more vigorous physical search. Internationals present were forced back and ordered not to photograph or film the ensuing incident.

Her four children, aged 10, 8, 4 and 1, lingered ominously at the checkpoint gate, hoping to see their mother emerge unscathed. Unfortunately this was not to be as she was later walked to the nearby police station were she may be detained indefinitely. As explanation for her arrest and the time frame of her detention, an Israeli officer claimed, “we are not above the law”, implying that they would conduct themselves in a lawful manner whilst carrying out their investigation against her.

Arrested womans children wait at the checkpoint gate hoping to see their mother return

Such statements as this offer little comfort to her children or the Palestinian residents of Hebron, who are far too aware of Israeli policy against Palestinian arrestees and the stark double standard between the laws that exist for Palestinians and the laws that exist for Israelis. Putting to one side the humiliating way in which this woman was treated and the total disregard for cultural sensitivities as regards the removal of her hijab in public (in which concealment of a knife is almost inconceivable), in the eyes of the law, Palestinians’ rights are hugely diminished relative to the Israeli settlers that occupy the same space. In fact, they are subject to two entirely different legal systems.

Palestinians arrested in the West Bank area are, after intensive interrogation, sentenced and trialled in Israeli military courts. However, an Israeli arrested for an identical offense, within the same jurisdiction, is sentenced and trialled in Israeli civil courts. The differences between military and civil law are vast and are designed to legitimize discriminatory and oppressive policies implemented against Palestinians in the name of maintaining Israeli “security”. In 2010 it was revealed that a whopping 97.4% of Palestinians trialled in Israeli military courts are convicted of the crimes of which they are accused. Bearing the brunt of this prejudiced system are Palestinian youths, who, under military law, can be detained initially for up to 6 months for otherwise minor offenses. The most common of these is stone throwing, which carries with it a potential 20 years in prison. Any West Bank Palestinian, under the military law, is immediately presumed guilty – unless he or she can manage to prove otherwise – whereas at the same time settlers from the illegal settlements in the West Bank are presumed innocent until proven otherwise.

The only distinction between these two peoples is ethnicity. Therefore, differential treatment of Palestinians by law enforcement and judicial systems is fundamentally racist. These are facts from which Israel cannot escape, and for which the international community must hold Israel to account.

Imprisoned life: the feeling of a ‘closed military zone’

30th October 2016 | International Solidarity Movement, al-Khalil team | Hebron, occupied Palestine

‘Closed military zone’ – a sterile term for an act of deliberate apartheid policies and dehumanisation with the clear and deliberate target of forcibly displacing Palestinian civilians: women, children, elderly, anyone that is Palestinian, from the Tel Rumeida and Shuhada Street neighborhood with the deliberate aim of connecting the illegal Israeli settlements in the heart of the city of occupied al-Khalil. A connection of illegal settlements: ‘sterile’, ethnically cleansed of any Palestinian presence.

‘Closed military zone’ – such an objective term for obliterating human rights and even a sense of security and justice for Palestinians – in ambitions to in the end, finally, obliterate the people as well.

‘Closed military zone’, a sterile and objective term, that is hard, if not impossible to grapple. A term, just like ethnic cleansing and genocide that seems very far away, and hard to get the gist of, the feeling, what it means to struggle with it every day. Day in and day out, no escape.

‘Closed military zone’ (cmz) means degradation, dehumanization. Every Palestinian is made a number, stripped of their humanity, at the endless checkpoints, only numbers will pass.

‘Closed military zone’ is the denial of friends and families to visit relatives and friends, as humans aren’t allowed in the cmz by the Israeli forces, only the few ‘registered’ and listed- yet still human – Palestinians will pass – if a soldier, emboldened with impunity and the privilege to act on their own whim, allows them to.

‘Closed military zone’ is the all-to-familiar humiliation at the checkpoint, the yelling, having to empty your handbag, all your grocery-shopping. To put it in plain sight, on a table, for the soldiers behind the bullet proof glass to stare and gaze, to crack jokes and laugh. It’s being forced to lift up your shirt, undershirt, trouser-legs and take off your shoes, after passing a metal detector twice. The soldier enyojing the spectacle laughing with his comrade.

‘Closed military zone’ is the wait, the endless wait, when soldiers at the checkpoint turn up the music, so they can’t hear you asking to open the gate at the checkpoint for you. The endless wait, when you ask them to open, the soldier looks at you, and with impunity just goes back to playing on his phone, pretending not to have noticed your presence, with a smirk on his face. The endless wait, when a ‘busy’ soldier is reading, talking to someone on the phone, watching a movie, playing an ego-shooter, or simply decides to not allow you to pass.

‘Closed military zone’ is the obvious and deliberate instrument for the humiliation and dehumanization of a whole people. The Palestinian people. Humans. Humans denied basic human rights, treated like prisoners in their own homes, simply because they’re Palestinian. Because they don’t move out of the way for a racist, zionist, apartheid venture of an ethnically cleansed strip of illegal settlements.

Last but not least, the ‘closed military zone’ can only succeed, if the world turns a blind eye, if the injustice perpetrated by the Israeli forces is allowed to prevail, if the dehumanization of a people with the aim of their obliteration is silently accepted by the international community, by a country, and by an individual.

‘Closed military zone’ means ethnic cleansing of humans not spoken against, dehumanization not spoken against, the forcible transfer of humans not spoken against; even the idea of a human being behind the term of ‘Palestinian’ being denied, the existence of Palestinian human beings denied, their existence destroyed.

Imprisoned lives: closed military zone in occupied al-Khalil (Hebron)

30th October 2016 | International Solidarity Movement, al-Khalil team | Hebron, occupied Palestine

It’s like living in a prison. That’s how residents describe what Israeli forces are doing to their lives in the Tel Rumeida neighborhood and Shuhada Street in occupied al-Khalil (Hebron). The area was first declared a ‘closed military zone’ on 30th October 2015 – solely and deliberately affecting the Palestinian residents. One year of collective punishment, open discrimination, racism, apartheid policies and rampant attempts at ethnic cleansing in this area, commonplace tactics of an illegal occupying force in an obvious attempt to rid the area of any Palestinian presence and instead, create a continous ‘sterile’ strip of illegal settlements.

The ‘closed military zone’ has several times been extended within this year of collective punishment of the Palestinian population, adding even more areas and ‘re-inforcing’ and creating more checkpoints, exclusively for the Palestinian civilian population. Only the Palestinian civilian residents, who must register to pass through a checkpoint to gain access to their family home, have been degraded to a mere number on a list by the Israeli forces. Only ‘registered’ residents are allowed to reach their homes. The lists of Palestinian residents have been changed repeatedly lately, arbitrarily dropping various names from the list. Apparently registering with the occupying force as a resident in one’s own home just once often isn’t sufficient. This dehumanization of the Palestinian civilians who at the checkpoint are reduced to a number, is a deliberate tactic to create a forcible environment directly furthering ethnic cleansing. For some time Palestinian residents were assigned numbers that were marked on their IDs, completely ridding these civilians of their human aspect, instead making them a mere number on a list. Now, with those numbers temporarily not in use, Palestinians are reffered to by their ID-number. The Palestinian civilian trying to live in their own home is just that for the Israeli forces, a number, void of any humanity.

During the Jewish holiday of Sukkot, Israeli forces basically declared a curfew on the whole area, closing Shuhada checkpoint, denying Palestinians passage while allowing exclusive access tor settlers at the same time. The prison this area is becoming for the Palestinian civilian population is further exacerbated by the fact that, if there’s a large number of Israeli forces or settlers from the nearby illegal settlements on the street, leaving the house is not an option. One year of collective punishment – a sad anniversary that proves that the Israeli state does not need to fear an outcry by the international community when implementing their racist, apartheid measures, ethnically cleansing an entire neighborhood. During a year in which the residents have not been allowed to receive visitors like family or friends, workers of any sort have been denied entry and even medical personnel will be turned away at the checkpoint.