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Return to Wadi
an Nis
Friday morning, May 18th, we
learned that an Israeli soldier had shot and killed a Palestinian man in Beit
Fajar, a village near Bethlehem. We also heard of deaths due to continued
Palestinian factional fighting in Gaza as well as killings by Israeli soldiers.
With this sad news in our hearts we returned to Wadi an Nis where we had been
two weeks ago for a demonstration.
Living and working here one is constantly confronted with the incongruity, the
absurdity of the occupation. The occupiers behave as if they have a right to
occupy. The Palestinian people have to continually respond to the occupation,
but they never accept it. A similar metaphor might be having a thief enter your
house at night, steal your most valuable possessions which support your
livelihood, frighten your family with possible death, and then ask you to
prepare tea and cookies to share with him. Drinking tea with you, this thief
expects you to respect him and consider him an honorable and good person. The
person being robbed knows this is an absurdity. This is the incongruity of life
in Palestine today.
Wadi an Nis is in an area southwest of Bethlehem near the large illegal Israeli
settlement of Efrat and other small settlements. We met at the house of Abu
Elias, a farmer who died of a heart attach three days after he received Israeli
orders for the confiscation of a huge part of his land for illegal Israeli
settlements. One of the organizers from the local organizing committee explained
the reason for today’s demonstration. A road is being built through the farmer’s
property, cutting him off from much of his land. There will be one gate he might
be permitted to use at times  to
enter his remaining property.
As the protestors
gathered, Israeli army jeeps continued arriving at the site until there were
more than 10 jeeps with many heavily armed soldiers, as well as blue-uniformed
military police. The protestors intended to protest the Apartheid Wall and the
ongoing confiscation of Palestinian land by marching on the road which connected
nearby illegal Israeli settlements, but the military were there to prevent any
protest on the road. Palestinians could usually use the road, but the army
wanted to prevent any protest.
The protest began with a
welcoming in Arabic and English, reminding all present of the Apartheid Wall
that continued the confiscation of Palestinian land. The recent anniversary of
the end of the 1948 War reminded us of the complicity of the international
community in the partition of Palestine, and the continued ignoring and neglect
of the legitimate rights of the Palestinian people.
This was followed by the call
to Friday prayer with the Muslims facing east and others too praying in their
own way for peace and
justice here in this part of the world.
Then the protestors advanced to
the farmer’s gate to march on the road, but soldiers blocked the gate and would
allow no passage. There was some pushing and shoving which caused some of the
soldiers and others to fall down.
One man was injured slightly
on his head. Demonstrators cried, “Shame,” and sat on the ground. In the final
pushing and shoving, the
military police roughly grabbed two young Israeli demonstrators and arrested
them. One might say that the military did not act brutally, but their very
presence, with heavy arms and blocking a farmer’s gate, is violent and illegal.
A decision was made by the
local committee that since we could not go through the gate as planned, we would
go to the wall, the site of the illegal construction of the road through the
farmer’s property. We walked to the place we had been two weeks ago, aware that
much road work had been completed since then.
T he
soldiers drove to the area in their
jeeps and they formed a
phalanx on the dirt
road in front of us. When
we met face to face, the soldiers, in a surprisingly conciliatory way, walked
backward as we walked forward
toward them for a short
distance. The absurdity of this must be noted. The seemingly conciliatory action
of the soldiers was in fact a form of violence. The occupying Israeli army,
heavily armed among unarmed Palestinians, is violence. This type of
conciliation by an occupier
who has the brute strength to do as it chooses simply enforces the occupation.
It is disrespectful and mocks the suffering of the Palestinians
We sat down in front of the soldiers and Palestinians spoke to them, telling
them that this was a peaceful demonstration, that Palestinians had come in peace
to tell them they wanted to keep their land to live on, a simple human request.
One Palestinian asked for the commander, saying he wanted to tell the commander
why he was there. When no military person responded, the Palestinian said, “What
is this? An army with no commander?” We all chuckled and even the soldiers were
amused.
Another Palestinian man said,
“You soldiers come here armed with automatic weapons. We have no weapons. I have
only my cigarette lighter, no arms. And really I do not have cigarettes either.
I am out of cigarettes.” Everyone enjoyed this, including the soldiers.
Then the Palestinian continued to question the soldiers as to why they came with
arms and why they continued to take the land. In time the Palestinian organizer
announced that they had delivered their message and the demonstration was over.
He said that we would all leave together peacefully, which we did.
Reflecting back on this, we
know that the Palestinians must express their resistance to land confiscations
for illegal Israeli settlements. Illegal settlements ring this area. Bethlehem
is being encircled and choked by them. The organizer said that they had to
resist in order to tell their children that they did not just accept the
violence against them.
This was an extremely
peaceful demonstration on the part of the Palestinians. The response of the
Israeli soldiers was perhaps not overtly violent, but they are an occupying army
which enforces a very violent and brutal occupation. The words of the
Palestinians were spoken directly to the soldiers in a peaceful way, trying to
appeal to their humanity. We hope their hearts were touched. The nonviolence of
the Palestinians was an example for the world to emulate.
It is springtime in this beautiful land and one is awed by the natural beauty of
the hillsides. But it is a spring time of sadness with so much oppression, so
much inhumanity. How we wish for peace and justice in Palestine and Israel.
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