With the Christian Peacemaker Team in Hebron, Part II

from: Tony Davies

1 November 2002

This morning we joined CPTers walking round town. Curfew was being observed in the centre, but further out to the north many people were out and even taxis were running. We asked some boys about curfew. They said they were breaking it because they were so fed up with being indoors. It is Friday, so there is no school today. It is so wrong that the Palestinians in Hebron are having to remain indoors.

Shops were open by the hospital so we bought some food. Someone had been out earlier and had not found anywhere open. This is the only government hospital for 160,000 people living in Hebron. There are only 23 medical beds, and 40 surgical beds. There are also two private hospitals but they are beyond the means of most people, though they are able to deal with injuries inflicted by the soldiers and settlers as the costs are covered by the Palestinian Authority.

On our way back to the flats we stopped at a road block where 15 men were being detained. Most had been apprehended by soldiers because they were breaking the curfew by going to the mosque for prayers as it is Friday [Photo 2]. We arrived at 11 am. Some of the men had been there since 8 am. One of the men wanted to urinate and it was quite clear to the soldiers what he wanted but they would not let him until one of us asked the soldiers. Two lads of about 20 were separated from the others and made to stay in a makeshift cage. They were told that they would be kept for some time.

An old man going to the mosque said: "We don't know what the Jews want." I can tell him what Prime Minister Sharon and the Zionists want: they want all Arabs out of Israel and Palestine, if not by fleeing the country, then by death. This is quite clear from the way the Palestinians are being treated. Life is made as difficult for them as the Israeli government and military can make it. Opportunities for employment and commerce are being severely restricted. Food production is progressively reduced by illegal seizure of land on which settlements are built. These are towns where Israelis and Jewish immigrants live in subsidized housing. Large swathes of good agricultural land surrounding the settlements are also taken from the Palestinians whose families have tended it, in many cases, for hundreds of years. Attempts to continue cultivating such land are prevented by attacks on unarmed Palestinians by armed settlers. This year's olive harvest, which is now finishing, has been interfered with widely throughout the Occupied Territories and many thousands of olive trees cultivated by Palestinians have been cut down or dug up. In some places settlers have been picking Palestinians' olives, stealing them before the owners came to harvest them.

The Israelis have seized much of the water supply of the Occupied Territories. There is a continuing programme of demolition of Palestinian homes. Movement of Palestinians and their produce between the Occupied Territories and Israel, and within the territories, is severely impeded by road blocks where people may be held up for many hours, and where, in addition to being held up, goods and produce may have to be taken off one vehicle and manhandled onto another. The delays involved severely limit Palestinian commerce and frequently make the movement of perishable food impossible. Poverty and malnutrition are the inevitable and intended outcomes of these policies.

At road block check points, arbitrary delays are humiliatingly inflicted on all Palestinians, including the young, the old and the infirm. Women about to give birth, and severely ill people in ambulances, may be held up without compassion. Readily avoidable deaths result. Daily there is wanton, often deliberate, killing and wounding of Palestinian civilians of all ages. Thus the Israeli Occupation Forces violate international law and are continuously committing crimes against humanity. Their humiliation and terrorization of the Palestinian population causes psychological as well as physical damage. How can a people who two generations ago suffered so terribly at the hands of the Germans now treat the Palestinian Arabs in such similar racist and sadistic ways?

We wanted to go back to the flat as arrangements had been made for us to meet someone whose house has been demolished. We asked the lads being held by the soldiers whether they thought they would be alright. They said that if we left they would be beaten. They just stated it, not asking us to stay. They are tough. I expect they have been detained more often than they can count since they were about 14 and have probably been beaten a number of times. The detainees were eventually given back their ID cards and let go a few at a time, after being held for up to six hours. The men told us that this sort of thing happens every day.

Atta and his family We walked out of Hebron the way we entered the town yesterday and continued until we reached the house of Atta Jaber, his third house in fact. Above the threshold is an inscription in Arabic saying: "God is the only owner of the land, and this house is full of love."

The extended family, consisting of 24'nuclear' families, have lived on this land for 400 years, and have title to it from the days of the Ottoman Empire. In August 1998, six homes were demolished, including that of Atta and his family [Photo 3]. 45 members of the extended family assembled to resist the bulldozing of Atta's house. 21 of the 45 were injured by soldiers. A woman soldier beat a two-year-old baby. Atta held out his youngest child to one of the soldiers and said: "If you take my land and destroy my house you will need to look after my child because I will not be able to do so." He was then taken to court, charged with attacking a soldier with his child! He showed us pictures of himself in court to which he was taken in handcuffs and shackled by the ankles. He had a good Israeli lawyer and was acquitted.

He started building another house a few yards from the destroyed one. This partly- constructed second house was bulldozed in September 1998. He then went to court and got permission to build the third house, the one to which we were invited this afternoon. He showed us the legal documents authorising the building. It is likely that he got these only because the Israeli Committee Against House Demolitions took up his case and the CPTers campaigned on his behalf. An Israeli woman had a six foot high poster made showing Atta's face above a caption in Hebrew saying: "Atta from Hebron is against house demolitions and land confiscation." This was put up in 60 bus stations. None of the posters was removed or defaced.

After demolition of the second house the family was in tents for 5 weeks. Atta then started building the present house. He and a labourer were the only people allowed on the property until the house was finished. He had to meet friends in his father's house.

After the house was built it was occupied by settlers, who did a lot of damage including making large holes in some of the walls. They put mattresses and pictures in the basement and set them on fire. Soldiers also occupied the house and messed the place up. He showed us a big black mark on the kitchen wall against which they had made a fire.

He told us that 60 settlers attacked an adjacent house with stones. When a boy retaliated by throwing a stone at the settlers he was shot, the bullet passing through his arm and abdomen. Fortunately he recovered from his injuries. He took the settler who shot him to court. The settler claimed he shot the boy in self defence, and was acquitted.

Atta was allowed to retain only about an acre of land of the hundred or so he inherited from his father and grandfather. Part of this has been confiscated (ie stolen) for the building of a road outside an Israeli settlement. On a number of occasions settlers have thrown stones at him and the people working with him on his land just below the road.

I hear on the news that Human Rights Watch has issued a strong condemnation of suicide bombing. They are right to do so but I hope they will also condemn the human rights abuses which the Palestinians are suffering at the hands of the Israeli military and settlers every day.