Just Another Palestinian Gandhi in Prison

Israeli-American activist, Joseph Dana, has a good article up at Huffington Post. Dana follows the case of Adeeb Abu Rahma, a Palestinian nonviolence organizer in the West Bank village of Bil'in. Abeed Abu Rahma has already served one year in prison for allegedly telling other protesters to throw stones. There was no evidence provided to justify this claim. Abu Rahma has already served his year in prison but remains in jail as a prosecutor argued, after the fact, that his sentence was too lenient. Abu Rahma remains in prison. I encourage you to read Dana's full post, as it highlights the racist and kafkaesque policies that Israeli implements against Palestinians living in the occupied territories.

Commentators of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict often complain that there has not yet been a legitimate Palestinian Gandhi or Martin Luther King Jr. to emerge from within Palestinian civil society. The reality is that there are many Palestinians engaged in popular unarmed resistance to the Israeli occupation, preferring organized demonstrations in the West Bank to suicide bombs in Tel Aviv. Common people like Adeeb Abu Rahma could become the non-violent leader everyone claims to be waiting for. However, the Israeli government seems to recognize how much damage such a figure could do to their international image and to the occupation they will defend at any cost. And so hundreds of Palestinian Gandhis are brought before draconian Israeli military tribunals each year, only to face long sentences that nearly ensure that the world will never learn their names.

Israeli Border Police destroys vegetable fields

We got called out to the Baqa'a Valley, a fertile valley on the east side of Hebron. The Baqa'a lies close to the Israeli settlements, Kiryat Arba and Givat Harsina, and thus the Baqa'a faces numerous problems from the Israeli occupation forces. I won't give a full blow-by-blow-blogosphere-style rundown because I spent lots of time working on a press release, photos and videos, and I think that suffices.

But I will say that it was utter chaos, which the video demonstrates. We arrived and the hillside was on fire from a stray tear gas canister, fired by the Israeli Border Police. Young men were running around like crazy trying to save crops and trees, but the nearest well was quite a distance away. Below us there was a huge group of soldiers who were in a circle talking with 3-4 Israeli settlers. There were 20-30 workers in the fields pulling out piping out of the ground. There were Palestinians picking up rocks and yelling at us, thinking that we were settlers who had come back to the scene of the fire. Then we had young Palestinian kids offering us tea. Then once we thought we had sorted out the first incident, in which workers and border police destroyed a few fields and then left, we heard tear gas canisters and sound bombs exploding a half of kilometer from us. So we ran through the vineyards (do you call them that if the grapes aren't used for wine?) to see what was happening. We stepped out of the orchard and immediately got hit with a semi-dispersed cloud of tear gas.

So, I think you get the idea. It was chaos and we were trying to sort of what was happening, while still remaining appalled that these people's fields had been destroyed, while trying to ask the police why they were doing this, while we tried to document. This is the occupation. It's just absolutely crazy, in the sick, twisted, evil kind of way.

Here's the video, followed by the release:

For Immediate Release

Al Khalil/Hebron: Israeli Border Police Destroy Vegetable Fields in Al Baqa'a Valley

July 7, 2010

Photos from the incident are available here:

Israeli border police destroyed several Palestinian fields in Al Baqa'a Valley just east of Hebron on July 6, 2010, directly impacting the livelihood of more than one hundred Palestinians.

Landowners said that Israeli border police and the Israeli District Coordinating Office (DCO),

responsible for the coordination of Palestinian civilian affairs in Area C, began implementing the destruction at around 8:30am. Israeli authorities, with the assistance of hired labor, damaged fields of vegetables and destroyed the irrigation systems of those fields.

When international peace activists from Christian Peacemaker Teams arrived in the area at 11:30am, about 20 workers hired by the Israeli border police and DCO had cut and disposed of

the irrigation pipes laid in two fields. The fields each measured 10 dunams (approximately 40 acres) and included tomatoes, eggplant, cauliflower, and beans. In addition to dismantling the irrigation pipes, the workers also cut the twines that were holding up each tomato plant. A matriarch of the family, Aratiki Karim, said, "These tomatoes are for the kids, for the babies, to feed the kids and to sell them to buy other food for the kids." The Palestinian farmers had planted the tomato plants nearly three months ago and the tomatoes were only 20 days from being ready for market.

The border police, DCO, and hired laborers then moved to another field further along Route 60 in the Al Baqa'a Valley to perform the same procedure. The border police blocked the junction between the residential zone and the nearby fields, shooting tear gas and sound bombs to prevent Palestinians from going to the area where the hired workers were removing more irrigation pipes. Several women and children suffered from tear gas inhalation and required hospitalization.

Badran Mohammed Jabber, looking out onto his destroyed fields uttered in exasperation, "I have spent 43 years under the Israeli reign of terror. I have lived my life in fear, I never know what the Israelis will do tomorrow. They have destroyed my land, they have destroyed my life, these fields are my life."

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This is not the first time Israeli authorities have destroyed crops and irrigation equipment in the Al Baqa'a Valley. See the following links for further reading on demolitions in the Baqa'a Valley:

• *"Whose water is it anyway?" (CPT piece)
• * "This Used to be Paradise" (CPT piece)
• *"Fight for survival in the West Bank" (Excellent Al Jazeera piece)

Keep working, but make yourself invisible.

Racism. It's not just racism against Arabs, but it's racism writ large that is oozing from the pores of the Israeli state.

I have come to see more and more that trying to maintain the 'Jewish' character of the state of Israel can only lead to racism. By definition, if you aren't a Jew, you don't belong in the 'Jewish' state of Israel. Foreign laborers are seeing the effects of this Zionist idealogy, which permeates the government, courts, and seemingly much of the public. The NY Times reports:

At least 250,000 foreign laborers, about half of them illegal, are living in the country, according to the Israeli government. They include Chinese construction workers, Filipino home health care aides and Thai farmhands, as well as other Asians, and Africans and Eastern Europeans, working as maids, cooks and nannies.

Prime Minister Netanyahu made his position as clear as crystal:

We have created a Jewish and democratic nation, and we cannot let it turn into a nation of foreign workers,” Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said at a conference of the Israel Manufacturers Association in January.

Israel is trying to have it's cake and eat it too. It's something I saw clearly living in San Diego, near the US-Mexico border. Israel and California want the laborers (they need the laborers), but they refuse to treat the workers like human beings. They need the laborers to be front and center in the labor force, but then want them to exist on the periphery when it comes to society at large. Being invisible would be most preferable.

...right-wing politicians have heightened accusations that foreign workers are stealing Israeli jobs and threatening the nation’s Jewish character, an assertion many on the left dismiss.

“Saying foreign workers are diluting the Jewish state is racism,” said Nitzan Horowitz, a member of the Israeli Parliament and a critic of the foreign-worker policy. “On one hand, Israel is bringing them here and making money off their backs, and on other they face all sorts of harassment.”

Women resist occupation and preserve cultural heritage

I have been working in Hebron for the last 2 weeks (waiting for our staffing conditions to improve so I can head down to the south Hebron hills) and have spent a lot of time drinking tea with these women in their Old City shop. This is women's resistance: women working to feed their families, supporting Palestinian cultural heritage, and also resisting the colonialist Judaization of their city.

Independence Day? Independence for whom?

I missed the whole July 4th event. I usually look forward to July 4th, not because of the meaning of the day, but because of the BBQs and fireworks. But I also dread July 4th because I usually get sick to my stomach in church on July 4th (and it actually fell on a Sunday this year ) because of songs like, "And I'm proud to be an American, where at least I know I'm free, and I won't forget the men who died, who gave that right to me." Rather than take the emotional energy to tell you why this song makes me physically ill, and to explain why I have unfavorable opinions towards "Independence Day," I will post from Alex Kane's blog, because it really sums up the way I feel on July 4th:

The Fourth of July always brings out in me conflicted feelings. On the one hand, I would love nothing more than to celebrate the United States of America, to be able to carelessly sing the praises of this country. Most Americans are able to do this because they are ignorant of this country’s foreign policy, or just don’t give a damn. I’m sure it feels good.

But for myself, and for many other Americans on the left, this day is a sad reminder that the flag we all celebrate and turn into a sacred cow is also the representation of occupation, murder, theft and death for millions of people around the world.

So on this Fourth of July, I will think of the people of Iraq, Afghanistan and Palestine, suffering under the boot of American occupation (or in the case of Palestine, American-funded occupation).

I will leave you with an excerpt from this eloquent speech by Frederick Douglas, still, unfortunately, highly relevant and applicable today, but just with different actors:

What, to the American slave, is your 4th of July? I answer; a day that reveals to him, more than all other days in the year, the gross injustice and cruelty to which he is the constant victim. To him, your celebration is a sham; your boasted liberty, an unholy license; your national greatness, swelling vanity; your sound of rejoicing are empty and heartless; your denunciation of tyrants brass fronted impudence; your shout of liberty and equality, hollow mockery; your prayers and hymns, your sermons and thanks-givings, with all your religious parade and solemnity, are to him, mere bombast, fraud, deception, impiety, and hypocrisy — a thin veil to cover up crimes which would disgrace a nation of savages. There is not a nation on the earth guilty of practices more shocking and bloody than are the people of the United States, at this very hour.

NY Times reporter evaluates the Times' coverage of Israel/Palestine

Below is a post from FAIR (Fairness and Accuracy in Reporting), about a former NY Times reporter who worked from Gaza. She is a Palestinian journalist and recently resigned from the Times, as the only NY Times journalist embedded in Gaza.

I post this for a couple of reasons:

• Arab voices are not in Western media. Arab American opinions are absent from newspaper op-ed pages all across the United States. So it's important to hear what it's like for a Palestinian to work for an American newspaper, and to ask ourselves, why is an Arab-American perspective forbidden?
• I posted a bit about the Ethan Bronner controversy a while back. To recap, Bronner is the NY Times middle east bureau chief, and news reports leaked that his son was serving in the Israeli military. There was a printed debate in the Times, with some editors calling for his resignation, and some supporting his position as bureau chief, despite his son's involvement. The controversy died down and Bronner stayed in his post. This affected the below-mentioned NY Times Gaza correspondent, who ended up resigning as a result.
• The NY Times is read by many Americans (at least those I know) as their "go-to" international news source. If it's not in the Times, it didn't happen (I don't mean to sound condescending. I spend too many hours per day trying to read news, it's a lot of freaking work). I hope El-Khodary's below evaluation of the NY Times reporting of the Israel/Palestine situation encourages readers of this blog to read additional news sources for your international news, especially news about Israel/Palestine.

Here's the post from FAIR:

Taghreed El-Khodary, formerly the New York Times correspondent in Gaza, spoke recently at an event organized by the Palestine Center (6/23/10). She shared some interesting observations--the first being that her revelation that she left Gaza after the controversy erupted over Jerusalem bureau chief Ethan Bronner's son joining the Israeli Defense Forces:

I'm sorry that I left Gaza, but my bureau chief's son joined the Israeli army and I felt like it's not wise of me. I don't want to risk losing my sources that I have been establishing for many, many years. It's a very sensitive issue, as you all know; not only that, but it's also risky, and you have many small groups who would like revenge and I can be a great person to get a hold of. It's very sensitive, and I was really disappointed that they took this decision, but they understand why I left.

Elsewhere she indicates that Israeli restrictions on Palestinian journalists posed other difficulties:

Imagine you are a Gazan journalist and you are just based in Gaza and you cannot see the other story that is the West Bank. And of course the Israelis don't let someone like me, who worked for the New York Times, [to] even work. They gave me a hard time and that's also another challenge. Being a Palestinian journalist, even if you work for Reuters or AP or the New York Times, Israel will never give you access to the West Bank or to Israel.

She also discussed the need for a certain type of "balance" in every story out of Gaza:

The issue is even if you write a feature, if you write anything; you need the Israeli narrative in the story. You need to balance and that's why you need the space. That's the story here. You have to be politically correct. You have to have the Israeli narrative, even if you are working in a feature. So that's how it goes, and I think you need to understand also how the Israelis are looking at things. What's disturbing here is watching your TV. I cannot watch CNN domestic. They treat me like a stupid person, like a stupid audience. I really stopped watching it, because it's so different from the CNN International. I'm here and I'm really not watching your Fox [News] or your CNN. It's scary.

When asked to evaluate the Times' reporting on Israel/Palestine, she does not exactly give a ringing endorsement:

I think the New York Times is doing a good job, if I compare it to others--if you want me to compare it to CNN or Fox. I'm sorry, but when it comes to European media, it's completely different, I would say.

NY Times covers south Hebron hills and also CPT

I was tipped off that Nicholas Kristof, a prominent columnist for the NY Times, coming to the south Hebron hills (h/t Kelly). His tweet read, "Off to spend the day reporting in southern Hebron hills..." A short Twitter exchange then ensued between he and I:

-Me: hey I work in the South Hebron Hills, in At-Tuwani, with Christian Peacemaker Teams. I happen to be in Hebron today. I hope you get to see At-Tuwani, Susiya, Tuba (a bit out there), Um Al Kheir, and other places.

-Kristoff: Missed you in So Hebron Hills. Heard about CPT volunteers beaten by settlers while escorting Palestinian kids to school.

-Me: true story. The Pal kids get chased and sometimes beaten as well. Powerful example of NV resistance: walking to school each day

I also sent a message requesting his reflections on his visit to the area, on the chance that he didn't write a column about the south Hebron hills. But sure enough, on June 30th, the NY Times ran a column about the south Hebron hills. Coincidence or not, Kristoff ended up visiting Um al-Kheir, Tuba, and (possibly) At-Tuwani. The highlight is Krstoff saying that the occupation is morally repugnant, and the most important thing to remember about the occupation, is that it's wrong.

Note: Additionally, this is the first English-language international coverage of the settler attack that took place on June 12th, which sent a 19 year old pregnant woman to the hospital.

The Two Sides of a Barbed-Wire Fence

By NICHOLAS D. KRISTOF

KARMEL, West Bank

The Israeli occupation of the West Bank is widely acknowledged to be unsustainable and costly to the country’s image. But one more blunt truth must be acknowledged: the occupation is morally repugnant.

On one side of a barbed-wire fence here in the southern Hebron hills is the Bedouin village of Umm al-Kheir, where Palestinians live in ramshackle tents and huts. They aren’t allowed to connect to the electrical grid, and Israel won’t permit them to build homes, barns for their animals or even toilets. When the villagers build permanent structures, the Israeli authorities come and demolish them, according to villagers and Israeli human rights organizations.

On the other side of the barbed wire is the Jewish settlement of Karmel, a lovely green oasis that looks like an American suburb. It has lush gardens, kids riding bikes and air-conditioned homes. It also has a gleaming, electrified poultry barn that it runs as a business.

Elad Orian, an Israeli human rights activist, nodded toward the poultry barn and noted: “Those chickens get more electricity and water than all the Palestinians around here.”

It’s fair to acknowledge that there are double standards in the Middle East, with particular scrutiny on Israeli abuses. After all, the biggest theft of Arab land in the Middle East has nothing to do with Palestinians: It is Morocco’s robbery of the resource-rich Western Sahara from the people who live there.

None of that changes the ugly truth that our ally, Israel, is using American military support to maintain an occupation that is both oppressive and unjust. Israel has eased checkpoints this year — a real improvement in quality of life — but the system is intrinsically malignant.

B’Tselem, an Israeli human rights organization that I’ve long admired, took me to the southern Hebron hills to see the particularly serious inequities Palestinians face here. Apparently because it covets this area for settlement expansion, Israel has concocted a series of feeble excuses to drive out Palestinians from villages here or make their lives so wretched that they leave on their own.

“It’s an ongoing attempt by the authorities to push people out,” said Sarit Michaeli, a B’Tselem spokeswoman.

In the village of Tuba, some Palestinian farmers live in caves off the grid because permanent structures are destroyed for want of building permits that are never granted. The farmers seethe as they struggle to collect rainwater while a nearby settlement, Maon, luxuriates in water piped in by the Israeli authorities.

“They plant trees and gardens and have plenty of water,” complained Ibrahim Jundiya, who raises sheep and camels in Tuba. “And we don’t even have enough to drink. Even though we were here before them.”

Mr. Jundiya said that when rainwater runs out, his family must buy tankers of water at a price of $11 per cubic meter. That’s at least four times what many Israelis and settlers pay.

Violent clashes with Israeli settlers add to the burden. In Tuba, Palestinian children walking to elementary school have sometimes been attacked by Israeli settlers. To protect the children, foreign volunteers from Christian Peacemaker Teams and Operation Dove began escorting the children in the 2004-05 school year — and then settlers beat the volunteers with chains and clubs, according to human rights reports and a news account from the time.

Attacks on foreign volunteers get more attention than attacks on Palestinians, so the Israeli Army then began to escort the Palestinian children of Tuba to and from elementary school. But the soldiers don’t always show up, the children say, and then the kids take an hour and a half roundabout path to school to avoid going near the settlers.

For their part, settlers complain about violence by Palestinians, and it’s true that there were several incidents in this area between 1998 and 2002 in which settlers were killed. Partly because of rock-throwing clashes between Arabs and Israelis, the Israeli Army often keeps Palestinians well away from Israeli settlements — even if Palestinian farmers then cannot farm their own land.

Meanwhile, the settlements continue to grow, seemingly inexorably — and that may be the most odious aspect of the occupation.

In other respects, some progress is evident. Mr. Orian’s Israeli aid group — Community, Energy and Technology in the Middle East — has installed windmills and solar panels to provide a bit of electricity for Palestinians kept off the grid. And attacks from settlers have dropped significantly, in part because B’Tselem has equipped many Palestinian families with video cameras to document and deter assaults.

Still, a pregnant 19-year-old Palestinian woman in the village of At-Tuwani was hospitalized this month after an attack by settlers.

Israel has a point when it argues that relinquishing the West Bank would raise real security concerns. But we must not lose sight of the most basic fact about the occupation: It’s wrong.

I am very pleased they were able to speak with Ibrahim Jundiyye from Tuba (pictured above), a wonderful man, who has lived through a lot in Tuba, but continues to farm and shepherd under the threat of settler attacks and harassment by the Israeli military. We are hoping to get the article translated into Arabic so that the families who were interviewed can read it.

Hey world, remember, all of the reasons, strategies, and purposes for the occupation of the West Bank and the blockade of Gaza have varying degrees of legitimacy according to who you ask. But no one, not even the NY Times, can legitimately get around the fact that the occupation is morally repugnant, and that it's wrong.