Back to Tulkarem!

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Hi everybody

"Elliot" here. I am de-lighted to say we are in Tulkarem. Humd'Allah (thanks to God) It is great to be back. Before I get typing, I just wanna thank people for the messages of support and concern, and to say cheers everyone who reads- we've got nearly 400 hits, which is very exciting.

In depth geopolitical analysis:

I’ve decided to be lazy and not commentate massively on “the situation” in Lebanon or Gaza. It’s not like anyone can be waiting for that scoop. Also, my Google Alerts have helpfully furnished me with a link that amore-or-less articulates my thoughts with much more authority than I could:

http://ips-dc.org/comment/bennis/tp43GazaLebanon.htm

So that’s the humanitarian crisis cheerfully hyperlinked away…

Leaving Jayyus

We had a great few days in Jayyus, the village between the cities of Qalqilya and Tulkarem. I can’t update on Bajis, the man who was arrested- no-one has been able to get any more information about him from Israel’s District Coordination Office (DCO). He was just taken in the night. I was mistaken before; he wasn’t recently married, but got engaged one month ago. Now his fiancé could go years without seeing him. We visited his family- not the immediate household, but in the next house. Y’know what villages are like- this one basically has five families. They told us how the army surrounded the houses in the night, and inspected IDs until they found Bajis’s.

They were quite unruffled by the arrest- many of the men sitting with us had been imprisoned before. There are dozens of arrests yearly for heinous offences such as flying a Palestinian flag on a car and looking shifty. Given what I know, if I were a resident of Jayyus, having reached 22 years without being arrested, I think I’d be too scared to leave my house.

Jubara checkpoint- fun for all the family

We have made the journey from Jayyus to Tulkarem twice in the last few days. To get into the city from the South it is necessary to pass through Jubara checkpoint. This is a place I have spent many an hour in previous years, doing “checkpoint watch;” trying by my presence to alleviate the conditions for the Palestinians passing through. The checkpoints are a nuisance -young men with M16s… in fact now I’m a venerable 22 I’ll say it- boys with M16s are the least suitable people for the task imaginable. In fact the’re more than a nuisance- they’re notorious for arbitrary closure and random cruelty: students prevented from reaching college; the ill denied passage to hospital, people beaten and arrested, pregnant women miscarrying.

It’s not arrogance to say our presence on checkpoint watch can change these things; the Israeli Defence Force (whatever the morality of individual soldiers) is a racist army, and by carrying British passports, and by being white; by taking photographs and making phone-calls (or just miming emphatically), the behaviour of soldiers might be better.

Our first transit through the checkpoint was painstaking. Three young soldiers shouted at the queues of Palestinians to get in line. One in particular had a bit of a chip on his soldier. He shouted constantly. Pointing his gun, he made two Palestinian men pick up boulders to mark where he wanted people to line up. When people approached he made them lift up their clothes, and applauded when they span round for him. This could be justified as a search for bombers, except that he only did it when he felt like it. I timed them- the quickest they managed was 90 seconds between people- the longest was over ten minutes. We were there for about an hour and a half. The next day we came through in a car and we weren’t checked once. Different day, different soldiers. Jemima and I have said that we might do checkpoint watch here if we are not working on a tough day at Jubara.

Our first evening in Tulkarem we went to a soiree for another random group of internationals from The World Churches. They were changing shifts in effect- one group has been here for 3 months and is now leaving, to be replaced. So we met a random assortment of Brits Swedes and South Africans. They have been doing a sort of checkpoint watch themselves, over a sustained period. They are essentially passive; they document what’s happening and then report back in their home countries, trying to maximize media attention. This is excellent work (though fans of quantum physics, of which I know there are many, will know that you cannot observe something without changing it), differing from ISM because they do not intercede for Palestinians.

TULKAREM

We have also met a chap called Sameer from Amnesty International’s Palestinian section, which some of you will know is of special interest to Jemima and me. We spoke with him for an afternoon, exchanging notes over Booza (ice-cream). AI:Palestine is working on two main areas: Human Rights Education- for children and for adults, and the Stop Violence Against Women Campaign. I fink we’ll keep in contact with him!

Anyway, we are safely ensconced with the Society of Social Work Committees now in Tulkarem now. These are the hepcats we raised money for in Britain. (We locked ourselves in a cage for 24 hours as a sponsored thingy. The cage was nearly tipped over by drunken Aberystwyth students, but we were brought free wine and pizza, so the ordeal was tempered overall.) We raised over 800 pounds- the figure is a much more impressive 6,400 in Shekels.

We’re living in the Society’s office building, which is a 100 year-old house on the edge of the Refugee Camp. It’s small, but it has thick walls to keep it cool, which is pretty essential. The refugee camp of Tulkarem is not a tents and latrines affair, on account of it being fifty years old. It is in effect the poorest area of the city- the place where unemployment is highest, and living hardest. The place where the soldiers come nightly, though there has not been a major invasion for 3 months. Many people have made pleasant homes here. Our friend Selma spent yesterday flitting about the camp interviewing and taking notes to publish stories in America.

When we arrived in Tulkarem we bumped into an ISM delegation on a “solidarity visit” to Tulkarem- including our friends Michael and Sharp Cheddar, which was nice.

Again we are the beneficiaries of Palestinian hospitality beyond all possible expectation. It's starting to be a worry whether we can honour all the dinner engagements.

And today (yesterday now actrually- I'm behind with the bloggery) we spent our time painting the faces of kids in the summer camp run by the society. Such fun, though these are HYPER kids! They are children who have lost family members through Israeli action. And there are a lot of them. It’s run totally by volunteers on a shoe string. It was an honour to be there. I spoke to an inspector of summer camps, who told me that there are maybe 1,000 camps in Palestine, but this one is particularly difficult because all the children have been directly affected by the occupation. We are working with them for another few days, at least.

The society basically tries to help everyone with their individual problems. They send people to hospital abroad, they organize camps, bring classes, they facilitate free medical provision, language teaching, provide for orphans, facilitate counseling, bring artists and musicians. The whole thing operates though a huge network of volunteers.

These days they are under even more pressure, however, because of the international sanctions against Palestine since the election.

There director is a truly amazing man called Shareef. He grew up in the Refugee Camp. To know him is to know Tulkarem- as he walks through town everyone greets him warmly. Some he has helped before, some he is helping now, some he will help in the future. In true Arab style he is frequently invited to join people for Kaewa (coffee here is triple expresso strength and slightly spiced) even though he hates the stuff! We sat with him last night as he showed us photographs and spoke about the different stories- those he helped, those he couldn’t help… this is a man who cares deeply. I am glad we are bringing funds for his society- it seems timely, and I am honouring a promise.

Helping out in the camp is gratifying- and the children seem to enjoy it, but I think this more for us than for them, although the volunteers at the camp are forever telling us how happy the kids are to have us there.

Last night we sat in on a counselling sessions for 3 kids- 2 boys and a girl- who are still traumatised by their memories of the 2002 army invasion of the refugee camp. These sessions are facilitated free by the society for many kids. One boy told us how he was the only survivor from a group of 5 children shot dead in the street, including his older brother. His father is in prison, which means his mother works to provide for him. He now seldom leaves the house and cries himself to sleep. He has been spotted carrying a knife and has thrown stones at Israeli armoured vehicles. Basically he's pretty messed up. It made me wonder at the long term consequences of Israeli bombing and shelling in Gaza. We didn't know what to say- we'd brought some cheap toys and bric-a-brac, including smiley-face stickers, but they were farcical in the face of such a story.

You gotta laugh...

There is, apparently, a saying that translates "Palestinians don't know how to laugh," and you can understand why.

However, yesterday evening we were invited to the house of a lovely family in the camp. The father's name is Khaled. Every one of his siblings and his father are in prison- pretty depressing, except that he guffawed and belly laughed his way through the conversation. "The soldiers obvioulsy don't like me," he said.

His wife told me how her father had an Israeli bomb explode on the back of his car, but he was so deaf that he simply carried on driving oblivious; and when an Israeli tank pulled up outside their house, they simply carried on drinking tea six feet away, hidden by the trees in their garden.

Anyway, Jemima’s criticising me for writing “an essay,” so I’ll leave this for now.

Ma’salama

(“My salami,” as pronounced by me)

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Photos

Jubara: queue of men
They've been made to line up separately from the women. Most have to do this daily.

Jubara checkpoint
I took this surreptiously while miming an engrossing conversation on my phone.

Outside the Society
The Society of Social Works Committees, to be precise. My old friend Abed is the silver-haired chap.

Shareef enjoys an agilla
Or not as it happens- he was coughing and spuluttering moments after this picture.

Shebab
Some of the children at the camp. I think they have enough energy between them to light up the city grid.

Jemima enjoying the agilla
Having never smoked before, she can now take a 30 second drag... more or less.

Jemima with camp children
They follow her around a lot. Holding hands wityh her is a extra special priviledge.

Shareef and family
This was taken near Shareef's new house, which he cannot afford to finish building because his PA salary is discontinued until sanctions end.