Summer Team 05 Report from Palestine

Summer Team 05 Report from Palestine

THE EFFECT OF HOME DEMOLITIONS
by Sr. Liz, MPT team member
June 2005

Earlier in the day our team had visited the El Salam neighborhood located near the Egyptian border. Hundreds of Palestinian homes in El Salam were destroyed by the Israeli military from 2002 to August 2004.

El Salam is the neighborhood where Rachel Corrie was crushed to death by an Israeli bulldozer as she tried to appeal to the driver to stop the home demolitions. This happened on 16 March 2003.

(Significantly, from 2002 to 2004 thousands of Palestinian homes were destroyed in the many border neighborhoods of Rafah. For internet information and maps, go to Human Rights Watch-Rafah and select "Razing Rafah")

Our team had heard that over 1000 Rafah families were still homeless due to the Israeli home demolitions. Today we received a more precise figure from one of the men who is working on behalf of the homeless. He told us that, "2700 Rafah families remain homeless due to Israeli home demolitions."

Today we also visited one of the homeless families of Rafah. In this family there are seven children and mother and father. The family's home was demolished in 2002 and the home they were renting was destroyed in 2004. This family is living in one room. The father of the family said,

"We did not move to the border, the border moved to us. First the Israeli demolished the homes that were 50 meters from the border; then 100 meters; then 200 meters; then 300 meters. Our family owned the land that our home was built on and we had all the necessary paperwork. But our home was destroyed and the land was seized by the Israeli army."

When Sr. Karen asked this father what he wanted to say to the people of the United States, the father replied:

"We are a Palestinian family. I don't want to talk to the government of the United States; I want to talk to the USA families. You have children and we have children. There are mothers and fathers in your families and in our families too. You love your children as we do. You want to provide for your families and we do too. Please try to understand the reality of what has happened here. Don't believe the misinformation. Something awful happened here. We are homeless. Our homes are destroyed and our land is taken."