An Holy Week of Extremes in Tuwani

I reached Tuwani on Monday of Holy Week for a "normal" day of accompanying the Palestinian shepherds in a place where they had recently been attacked and beaten by Israeli settlers. It went without incident.

On Tuesday we woke up to learn that during the night Israeli settlers had come down and spread poison on Palestinian land. The poison consisted of barley kernels boiled in rat poison. We later had it analyzed and learned that this particular poison kills instantly if over 300 grams is consumed; but in any amount will stay in the system of the animal for a long time and will be toxic to anything that eats it, even if the contaminated animal shows no symptoms.

The poison was and is everywhere: In little piles under the shrubs that the sheep eat; under rocks; spread thinly all through the grass. We started notifying the press and the Israeli authorities immediately, and on Wednesday, after we got some latex gloves, we started cleaning it up. By Wednesday morning at 5:00 a.m. one sheep was dead. By Wednesday afternoon three sheep were dead and 13 sick. Two gazelles were found dead, along with a variety of rodents and snakes. I have seen the gazelles run wild in this land, and they are an endangered species. This area is also full of storks--you cannot believe how beautiful they are! By Saturday there were four dead gazelles found and I also saw a dead black snake--a big one.

We spent Thursday cleaning it up and talking to press. It became a big story in Israel, because this of course could affect wildlife all over the area, not just South Hebron Hills. To clean it up, we had to pick up the barley kernels one at a time off the ground. It is tedious and time-consuming, and we may never get it all. The Israel Park Service was helping on Thursday and Friday.

On Thursday the Israeli authorities came to see the poisoned places: police, army, civil administration (the branch of the army responsible for governance), etc. We were accompanying the Palestinian landowners as they showed the authorities all the poisoned places, because Palestinians are used to being abused by Israeli authorities and they feel safer when we are with them. Anyway, I was walking through the hills when I ran into three young settler men who said they were helping with the clean-up.

They were from a nearby settlement (Suseya), not the one next to Tuwani (Ma'on). They heard about the poison and wanted to help clean it up, because, although they agree that all the land belongs to the Jews, they do not believe that poisoning it is the way to claim it. They also talked about the fact that Jews have all the power in Palestine and they intend to keep it that way.

On Friday morning (yes, Good Friday) we got a call from the nearby town called Kirmil. Five Israeli settlers with machine guns were at the local swimming pool threatening Palestinian children. This was my Way of the Cross for the day. We left to walk up there, and the villagers met us with a car at the road block (constructed by the Israeli army) which prevents free access between the towns.

We got about three-quarters of the way there and met the settlers on the dirt road leading to the pool. They were five young men about college-age. They looked like they could be nice young men, except for the M-16s they carried. We got out of the car to talk with them, asked them what they were doing and why they were there. They didn't really answer, and when I pulled out a camera they turned around and began walking in the direction of Tuwani.

We followed them on foot, because there were a lot of Palestinians farming and grazing along that road. When the five young men reached the paved settler road (off-limits to Palestinians) a car was waiting for them and they drove off in the direction of the settlement. Why did they walk through Palestinian villages and farmland with machine guns and threaten children? I do not know. To me it looked like a display of power.

On Holy Saturday the excitement really started. We had made plans with Ta'ayush, an Israeli-Palestinian human rights group that we work with closely, to bring a larger group of people to Tuwani to clean up the poison. They brought maybe 25 or 30 people.

That morning, because there were so many Israelis and internationals present, the shepherds from Tuwani and a nearby village, Um-Fagara, decided to graze their sheep in a place called Khoruba, on a hillside across from the place where much of the poison was placed. Khoruba is an abandoned Palestinian village, but the land still belongs to those who abandoned it. It was abandoned about 4 years ago as a result of settler harrassment and violence.

The village is also located inside something called a Military Fire Zone. A Military Fire Zone is a way for the State of Israel to legally confiscate land from Palestinians. They claim they need it for military purposes and then no-one can go there. There are, however, still Palestinians living inside this Zone, and the army does not fire anything in there. We clarified with the civil administration what this means. They said that the only people allowed inside the Zone are the people who live there, but that the Palestinian landowners can graze their sheep there on Fridays and Saturdays. Remember that we are talking about a Saturday.

So the shepherds decided to test this with this big group present, to see what would really happen. The reason is that if Palestinians abandon their land, then legally Israel can seize it after three years, so they have to keep using the land if they are to retain ownership. After about an hour of grazing, some settlers came down from Ma'on and saw what was happening and called the army and police. The police arrested one Palestinian and a scuffle broke out between a soldier and another Palestinian, resulting in a face injury to the Palestinian. I was not there when this happened--I arrived about 2 minutes after--so I did not see who did what to whom.

The army declared that all the shepherds were detained and would be arrested for grazing their sheep in the Military Fire Zone. They were waiting for reinforcements. I called the civil adminstration and they confirmed that the shepherds had the right to graze on Fridays and Saturdays, and said they would send a jeep. We waited awhile and finally they came and released all the shepherds. But they forced them off of the hillside and into the valley below.

The valley, which also sits in the Military Fire Zone, had been planted with corn by the settlers. So the Palestinians were forced by the army to graze their sheep in a settler field! Note that the settlers are permitted to plant corn in the Military Fire Zone, in land that belongs to Palestinians, but the Palestinians cannot use their own land.

By this time it was afternoon and the second incident of the day happened. While the sheep were grazing the the cornfield we all again started cleaning up the poison from the opposite hillside. I received a call from a colleague who was walking back to the village, who told me to look up at the settlement. I saw a line of settlers, about 30 or more, coming out of the settlement all dressed in white. They were lining up on the road that the Palestinian children from the nearby village, Tuba, use to get home from school.

The army and police were preparing to escort the settlers along the road, and then they all started moving toward Tuwani, where I knew that the Tuba kids were waiting with two people from Operation Dove (OD) for their military escort home. So we all got up and quickly headed toward Tuwani to head them off. We walked very quickly and got there first. Me and two OD people sat down in the middle of the road to try and block the settlers from passing into the village and toward the place where 13 children were waiting to go home. There were a few Ta'ayush people standing behind us as well, but we were in front, sitting down.

The settlers kept coming toward us, but then the army stood between us and them, and then the police pulled a car up and blocked the settlers, eventually diverting them back toward the settlement. After that, I walked a little way (maybe 10 or 15 feet) toward the settler line in order to see that they did not return to the village by another route. I was still very far from them, but had a view of where they were going. Suddenly, out of nowhere, an Israeli soldier came up behind me and pushed me down the hill. No explanation. He did not even ask me to move first. I asked him why he did it, and he refused to answer. Lucky for me, I was not injured.

The children from Tuba were still waiting to go home. So Saber, the mayor of Tuwani, lined them up and began walking them himself; three OD people and me went with him. The army is supposed to provide the escort, but they had not shown up, and instead were escorting settlers. When the army saw that we were going, they sent a jeep to go with us. As we walked, we could see settlers in the trees with their dogs, following us the whole way. At one point one came out and got into an argument in Hebrew with the soldier. The soldier prevented him from coming near us or the children.

When we got the the edge of the settlement, the soldiers left us and we walked the kids all the way home. This is not usually necessary, but things seemed particularly dangerous, so we felt we should. We held their hands the whole way. Then we had tea in the cave of Omar, one of the fathers. Then we had to take the long way home from Tuba (2 hours over rocky hills) in order to avoid the settlement, because it was too dangerous for us to walk there without a military escort.

I was supposed to leave Tuwani Saturday afternoon, but one of the villagers told us he was afraid that settlers would come to the village in the middle of the night, so we kept some extra people there and I stayed. Nothing happened, and I came back yesterday afternoon and was able to go to Easter Mass at 5:00. Today we learned that the settlers put out more poison, this time in the direction of Tuba.

Palm Sunday in Jerusalem

On Palm Sunday the CPT teams accompanied a peaceful procession of Palestinians from Bethlehem to Jerusalem. It went really well in the sense that it stayed peaceful and prayerful. Most of the CPTers stayed at the front of the procession to try and prevent any clashes, but there were none.

We got to the checkpoint between Bethlehem and Jerusalem and the army stopped us. We sat down in the middle of the road for about an hour. There were about 150 people at that point, because many Palestinians left the procession, wanting to avoid clashes with the army. When the army said we had to move or they would force us off the road, the Palestinian leadership read a statement and then we peacefully left.

Here is the statement:"We in the Bethlehem community have come to you today with a message on behalf of our people. We represent the family members and friends who are imprisoned by these concrete walls and wire fences that now create the Bethlehem open-air prison. You, like the prison guards, control our freedom and ability to live as human beings with dignity in this holy land.

Our strong delegation of civilians comes to you without weapons but with great strength and commitment to deliver this message of peace. In the name of security, you do not permit us to travel to work, to school and to worship in our holy sites in the city of Jerusalem. Your government deprives us each day of the basic human right to self-determination. Each day you keep us from being with our families at weddings, funerals, graduations, birthdays, and religious holidays...

Each day as you come to our city, you serve the system of violence that keeps our people imprisoned and without the ability to live the life of a normal human being. With your guns, tanks, and insults, you teach our children to hate. However, we believe each of you has the power and choice to choose a different ending to this story. We appeal to your conscience and humanity as individuals and as soldiers who may feel there is no way out of this system. Put your guns away, and join us in the fight for peace and freedom."

I was proud to stand behind it.

Settler Violence and Jerusalem Roadblocks

The Hebron settlers seem to be getting scarier and scarier. I was walking with a few others along a road that leads from the settlements to the Tomb of the Patriarchs, and the soldiers at one of the checkpoints stopped us, saying that we could go no farther, because the road is not safe for anyone who is not Jewish. It was interesting to hear that from an Israeli soldier.

We had a meeting with someone from the Hebron government who told us about settlers from Kiryat Arba (the largest settlement in Hebron) confiscating some Palestinian land and building a path from the settlement to Worshipper's Way. Worshipper's Way is the ancient path that leads to the Tomb of the Patriarchs. The story is that it was the path that Abraham walked. We went to inspect, and found the story to be true. The Hebron official checked with all the Israeli occupation authorities and confirmed that the settlers do not have any legal claim to the land.

Tomorrow some Palestinian Christian groups in Bethlehem are planning a march from Bethlehem to Jerusalem for Palm Sunday, complete with donkeys. The procession will challenge the Israeli military checkpoint that divides Bethlehem from Jerusalem and makes it impossible for Palestinians to get from one city to the other. CPT is one of the sponsors of this action and we will all be there. I am looking forward to Mass at the Church of the Nativity, which stands over the spot where it is believed that Jesus was born.

For me the march has great symbolic significance: the Palestinian followers of Jesus today cannot travel from Bethlehem to Jerusalem. Also, Jesus' own procession into Jerusalem had political as well as religious significance. He knew that if he went to Jerusalem he would likely be killed by the Romans, but he went anyway because he knew it was part of a mission much larger than his own life. I feel there is a parallel when we go to Tuwani: We know there is a high risk that Israeli settlers will attack us again, but we go anyway, sacrificing our safety for a cause much larger than ourselves.

There were three separate incidents with settlers in Tuwani this week. First 12 settlers came out of the outpost, one with a gun, and went after Palestinians farming and grazing. Rocks were thrown, but the army got there quickly and they left. A little later about 100 settlers came out of the settlement and occupied a hillside belonging to Palestinians. Then 50-60 Palestinians came out and stationed themselves on an opposite hill. The CPT and Operation Dove folks stationed themselves between the two groups, along with a large contingent of Israeli police and soldiers. There was a 2-hour standoff, until a high-ranking Israeli officer got them to disperse. CPTers spent their time trying to keep people from throwing rocks at each other. Some of the Israeli settlers are armed, but the Palestinians are not. Then the settlers started walking back to the settlement, when they turned off the road and occupied another Palestinian's grazing land, chasing his sheep away.

There is a nonviolent revolution with sheep happening in Tuwani right now, which is why the settlers are getting so concerned. With our accompaniment, shepherds are starting to band together to go in large groups to grazing land they have not been to for many years due to settler harassment. They are reclaiming land previously confiscated by the settlements, emboldened by our presence. This is important, because when the lines get drawn for the Palestinian and Israeli states, they are most likely going to use the de facto boundaries drawn as a result of settler violence and harrassment. Both sides, I suspect, are fully aware of this.

Who Is In Charge?

Tuwani is like one big camping trip. This time I brought some of my camping equipment and was much happier for it. I was also happy to have serious rain gear, even though it covered me from head to foot in army green and the villagers kept saying that I looked like a soldier.

Our main mission in Tuwani at this point is accompanying the shepherds as they try to reclaim grazing land that settlers kicked them off of years ago. Thanks to our presence they are now going to places that they have been afraid to go to for several years, even though the land belongs to them. We have almost daily encounters with soldiers and settler security, but this week there were no dangerous encounters with settlers.

There was this week a settler attack against Palestinian shepherds in the adjacent village of Jawaia, across the road from Tuwani. We were not accompanying them, but were called to wait with them until the police came (after over an hour). One woman had a serious punture wound on her forehead and another a fractured hand. They believe that the reason they were attacked is that no internationals were accomanying them, and they will call us from now on when they want to graze there. Their land is located right across the road from the Maon settlement.

We had a few other bizarre incidents as well. Basically, any time the Palestinian shepherds want to graze anywhere near the settlement or settlement outposts, settler security comes and calls the army and the army asks them to move. We ask for the orders and the map which closes the areas legally, but there rarely is one. We are there because it makes the shepherds feel safer when we deal with these authorities.

It seems clear to me, and several soldiers have confirmed this, that the Israeli army is taking their orders from the settlement. When we talk to settler security, they make it clear that they think that all the land belongs to the Jews and the Palestinians have no rights to it. I'm guessing that if peace becomes more of a reality, these settlers will step up their violence, as they become afraid that the settlements and outposts will be dismantled.

Palestinian Land and the Law

Welcome to my first letter from Hebron! The roads from Jerusalem to Hebron were open when I came in. The next day, Saturday, everything was closed up and the service taxi had to drive through a field to get us out to Jerusalem. There was also an ID check on the road and a new checkpoint coming out of Hebron. This because of a suicide bombing in Tel Aviv on Friday.

Anyway, the interesting thing is that by Sunday, when I returned, everything had opened up again. This is way different from last fall, when they closed up the entire West Bank for three months after the bombing in Beer Sheva.

Monday I went to Tuwani. You will recall that Tuwani is the small village that we work in and the location of the settler attack against me and Chris last fall. I felt I needed to go there right away because I will be coordinating the project while I am here and I wanted to get a feel for what is going on. I was able to see the nearly-completed medical clinic which happened as a direct result of the attack. I also saw 15 children being escorted by the Israeli army to school past the settlement. It is up from 5 to 15 kids, now that there is less danger to the children. This is also a direct result of the attack.

One of the more exciting things for me is to see the Israeli army protecting Palestinians when their mandate in the occupied territories all along was to protect the settlers, not the Palestinians. What has happened is extraordinary.

Now the main work in Tuwani is escorting shepherds while they try to graze their sheep. Grazing happens in this season, when the ground is wet and green. During the rest of the year sheep are fed barley and other stored-up grains. Anyway, much of the land is located near the settlements, so even though it is owned by Palestinians, the settlers try to chase them off. This is because if they can keep the Palestinians off their land for long enough, the settlers think they can claim it for themselves. They have done this repeatedly and successfully over the years as a way to expand their settlements. The difference is that now there is international accompaniment, so the shepherds are emboldened to stand their ground against the settlers.

Many of you already know that there was a settler attack against us two weeks ago (the week before I got here) while my colleagues were accompanying the shepherds. One of the Italians was hosptialized with a broken jaw. The mask fell off of one of the attackers, so we have pictures, and he was arrested and there was already a preliminary hearing. This, of course, would never have happened if a Palestinian was injured.

We continue to escort the shepherds and there are clashes nearly every day. We joke that yesterday was a quiet day because all that happened is that some settlers with guns chased the shepherds off their land. However, since the attack two weeks ago, the army has established some kind of a base in the trees across from the settlement and now arrives fairly quickly when there is any kind of encounter or clash.

The shepherds have filed a case in the Israeli courts to retain claim to their land. The soldiers, who have seen the deeds, believe that the Palestinians will win their case. It is just a matter of how long it takes. However, we don't think winning a court case will keep the settlers from acting violently. They act violently in Pa;estinian villages all over the Weet Bank, no matter what Israeli law says.