Does Santa Get Through the Checkpoint?
Hello everyone, and happy holidays to you all,
I am in Jerusalem right now, taking a very needed few days off to relax and kick this nasty cold I have been dragging around with me for the past week, as well as take a break from the many demonstrations, actions, and other things going on here, (which never seem to stop!).
Last week I joined the village of Bil'in in one of the most ingenious demos ever. With the Wall cutting off 60% of the village's agricultural land, the area to the west of the wall has already been gobbled up immediately by new settlement construction, but with one catch; none of the settlements (all of which are illegal under international law) have any permits and are thus even illegal under Israeli law. So, on 12.21.05, the village decided to put up a caravan for a joint struggle for peace; it was a great way to celebrate my birthday, and the rest is history! For more info, go here (and yes, I was inside the caravan on the 21st through the morning of the 22nd)
Bil’in Residents Set Up Outpost West of Separation Fence
Ha’aretz Daily
Meron Rappoport
December 21, 2005
http://www.haaretzdaily.com/hasen/spages/660894.html
Some photos:
http://news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/051221/481/jrl12812211532
http://news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/051221/481/jrl13612211703
http://news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/051221/481/jrl13212211533
http://news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/051221/photos_wl_afp/05122
1162549_tntufgz8_photo2
http://www.palsolidarity.org/main/2005/12/24/the-tent-of-defiance/
http://www.palsolidarity.org/main/2005/12/22/legal-palestinian-%e2
%80%9coutpost%e2%80%9d-removed-immediately-hundreds-of-illegal-
israeli-settlements-remai/
I went to Nablus right after that, to partake in the replanting of olive trees in villages where nearby settlers had destroyed hundreds of trees in the past weeks. But, before that, we had another situation to deal with. Somewhere on the road to Nablus, we got a call and were alerted to the possibility that the IOF had occupied a flat in Nablus and was detaining an unknown number of people there. Why they were doing it, I have no idea but I do know that such actions are a flagrant violation of human rights standards and an example of collective punishment. So when we arrived, off we went to the flat, and after about an hour of knocking on the door and bothering the soldiers, they were evacuated by an assortment of trucks, humvees and more soldiers. About 12 heavily armed soldiers had been holding 20 Palestinians captive in their home from 5AM until they left at about 8:30 PM. Most of the Palestinians were children, including a one week old baby. Luckily, they and their property were relatively unharmed, and they were very happy to see the soldiers leave.
So, it is no understatement that I am very lucky to be in one piece, and not beaten or arrested by the Israeli military on this Christmas day. Unfortunately, many others do not share such luck
(one example, just read the Gideon Levy article about the man from Bethlehem who was kicked to death by his donkey after the Border Police tied his hand to it's tail and frightened it http://www.iht.com/getina/files/298303.html).
Now, I am certainly going to write in some more detail at some point about those experiences, but right now I would like to write about something a bit more mundane, yet just as important; my traveling on Christmas eve from Nablus to Jerusalem.
After the apartment situation, I was going to be doing the olive tree replanting, but I was just too tired, so I slept in. The next day rain cancelled the second day of planting, and with rain likely for the next day at least, it seemed wise for me to leave Nablus, go to Jerusalem, and spend Christmas relaxing there (I was also planning on being there anyway the night of the 25th for my friend Hisham's birthday party!).
But first, I had some people to see, namely the family I had picked olives with in the nearby village of Roujeeb and I was in Nablus with two friends, Johann and Aaron. Aaron was intent on getting to Bethlehem for the evening, so he opted out of coming with us, and left for the Huwarra checkpoint close to one in the afternoon. Johann and I got picked up by Walid, one of the brothers in the family, and spent a fabulous 3 hours or more at his home in Roujeeb with his family and his brother Sami (Sami's wife Ghadeer, who wrote an amazing note to my mother couldn't make it due to the rain, unfortunately). We sat inside the house beside a brazier full of charcoal to keep us warm (and heat up bread, of course!). We ate olives, cheese, hummus, and olive oil and zaatar, along with an endless supply of sweet tea. It was great to catch up with them, the family was so kind to the group of us that picked olives with them, and feeling well fed and taken care of, we set out for Huwarra checkpoint at about 4 PM or so.
Huwarra checkpoint is the main checkpoint to the south of Nablus, and probably one of the worst ones that I have experienced in Palestine. Every time I pass through, people are being humiliated in many ways; screamed at, beaten, detained, forced to wait for no reason, arrested, you name it. Somedays it is open, some days closed, some days women can get out, some days not, and if you are from one of the refugee camps, you might as well forget about being able to get through Huwarra, even on a good day.
So, approaching the checkpoint sometime around 4PM, Johann and I saw just what I feared; the checkpoint was crammed with people, all of them crushed in a mass of people trying not to get wet in what was a day of constant rain and bitter cold weather, as well as suffering the beatings and abuse of the soldiers manning the checkpoint. Having been stuck there before in a similar yet less intense version of this situation for at least an hour (but in good weather), I decided that we should just use our privilege as foreigners and just walk through the checkpoint. I had never done this at Huwarra, or any checkpoint, for that matter, but with the weather nasty and the checkpoint even nastier, I just had to do it. So we walked confidently (and inside quite guiltily) past the hundreds of Palestinians, who had been waiting there for hours, and flashed our passports to the soldiers there. They waved us on, but then changed their minds and said to check in with the officer at the end of the checkpoint. We went to him and he asked us the usual bullshit questions;
Q; "did you get special permission to be in Nablus?"
A; sir, we were let through the checkpoint when we arrived (and there is no need for special permission, its BS)
Q; "where did you stay? A hotel?"
A; Yes, at the Yasmeen hotel
Q; "Is it a five star hotel?"
A; Sir, I have no idea how many stars it has, it is a good hotel (But Balata Refugee camp, where we actually stayed, is far better!)
And such like that; stupid questions asked by young boys with guns that have a slightly hard time mustering up the kind of racism and nastiness that comes easily when questioning Palestinians. So, after a very poor search of our bags, we passed through Huwarra. Just before leaving, I stopped when I saw that 3 or 4 young male Palestinians were being detained in a small area of the checkpoint. I turned around and asked the soldier that had just let us pass and asked him "How long have those boys been there? Why are they there?" The soldier said to me "They hit a soldier," and made a motion like a slap.
This just made me so angry inside I can't tell you. Myself and every other person I know that went through that checkpoint that day saw soldiers hitting and beating Palestinians, and of course, I've seen it many other times as well; activist friends of mine have been arrested for beating a police officer, which are just plain lies told by the police (even the Israeli judge in one case stated that he was "outraged" by the behavior of the police). It seems a logical axiom that if one is charged by the Israeli military for beating a soldier, that means a soldier assaulted you.
"They hit a soldier," he said. So, in response to the officer, I mustered as much sarcasm as I could manage without screaming, and said "Well, that's too bad," and walked away (for more descriptions of what checkpoints are like, I highly recommend an article by Gideon Levy, Gideon Levy: Theater of the Absurd http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/658494.html) And so I left, angry, guilty, just plain revolted at the injustice and brutality of it all. If this was my daily life, what would I do withall these emotions? How would I survive?
Next was to arrange a ride to Ramallah, the next large city before crossing into Jerusalem. What followed was a crazed and dysfunctional process of getting either a taxi for the two of us or waiting until enough people trickle through the checkpoint to fill up a shared taxi. Unfortunately, the shared taxi was asking far too much while a special taxi would be cheaper. So, I persuaded a Palestinian girl to come with us in the taxi, which she was reluctant to do, because what followed was a near fist fight between the two drivers and their fellow driver friends. You see, if I pulled all 3 of us out of the van, he would be screwed and have to wait another hour longer to fill up his van, and these guys do have to work together every day. So, they worked things out and we ended up in the van anyway, but for a better price; ahh, how I like happy endings.
But while we were haggling and trying not to see any blood shed over 20 shekels, we had a surprise; who shows up, but Aaron! He had arrived at Huwarra at 1PM, and did not pass through until 4PM!!!!! Even he had tried to use his passport to get ahead of the line, but to no avail; they told him to wait his turn, and that he did. Needless to say, he was happy to see us, and iI could not imagine what I would be like mentally after 4 hours of being crushed in a sea of people, in that weather, while watching soldiers beat and abuse people the whole time.
Aaron joined us in the shared taxi, but our travels had not ended yet! Off we went from Huwarra in the pouring rain and thick fog, which did slow traffic from its usual somewhat too fast driving pace, but as a lovely christmas present to Palestine, the IOF had a few more hurdles to get past. Usually, the next manned checkpoint is at Zaatara, not too far down the road from Huwarra. But on this day, there was an impromptu "flying" checkpoint, as they are called, both before and after the Zaatara checkpoint. It usually consists of an army jeep/truck blocking the road with soldiers out waving people to stop or keep going. Sometimes taxis alert each other ahead of time and they can be avoided, sometimes not. So, before getting to Ramallah we had to show out IDs and be assessed by soldiers at checkpoints three times. Each time is much like the other, the humiliating experience of being treated like possible criminal just for traveling in Palestine. And as awful as all these experiences were for me yesterday, it is nothing compared to what a Palestinian has to go through. My time here has given me the barest, most basic taste of what it is like, but I would never claim to 'know'; in the end, I am a foreigner, and eventually, I will leave Palestine with my all powerful passport and white male privilege intact.
And then to Ramallah we arrived. After a walk in the rain, we got our things organized for the next leg of the journey, the crossing at Qalandia checkpoint into the 'Greater' Jerusalem area which the Apartheid Wall is annexing to Israel as we speak. As I described in previous posts, Qalandia Checkpoint has always been another one of those nasty, abusive and in the past, makeshift checkpoints, and with the construction of the Apartheid Wall, Qalandia has gotten out of control; blocks of cement, railing, piles of gravel and dirt, fencing, razor wire, sniper towers, and plenty of subversive graffiti, of course. Right next to this of course, is the most surreal thing; where there was once a hill, the hill is no more, and a brand spanking new, shiny and gleaming terminal-like building has been constructed, along with a parking lot and a large sign with a picture of a flower, next to which is written in three languages "The Hope of Us All." Myself and other activists who have seen this feel that it is only a matter of time until "Arbeit Macht Frei" or "Despair all ye who enter here" are spray-painted in its place.
This is the new, improved Qalandia terminal, paid for by US tax dollars, of course, and it is a cruel joke. I don't know which is worse, walking through a random assortment of concrete and steel while soldiers point guns treat you like dirt, or a spotless post-post-modern cross between an airport terminal and a sanatorium, with soldiers sitting behind bullet proof glass and yelling commands through a machine while they sit comfortably, as if you are some infected microbe that they dare not be in the same room with. The walls are complete with screens that say "welcome" and other signs saying "please keep the terminal clean," and "enjoy your stay." Who was it that designed such a cruel joke? This checkpoint is miles past the 1967 green line, well into Palestinian land, and no one has any possibility of 'enjoying their stay' while they are being humiliated, whether up front or by remote control. After getting my passport back from a smug, smirking soldier behind glass, I turned, grabbed my bag and muttered 'motherfucker;" a Palestinian ahead of me looked at me and said "you are right," and walked away.
So, do you think that that is it? Nope, one more checkpoint, a quick stop while taking a bus to Jerusalem. Everyone on the bus has it down, lifts up their IDs, the border policeman comes in, looks at them, and then waves us on (on a good day of course). It was close to 9PM when we got to the hostel, a journey of 60 kilometers took about 5 hours (for Aaron, 9 hours) and we had to pass through 6 checkpoints in the process.
And people ask when will peace come to the Holy Land? God only knows, when people are forced to live like this.
My best wishes to you all,
I am in Jerusalem right now, taking a very needed few days off to relax and kick this nasty cold I have been dragging around with me for the past week, as well as take a break from the many demonstrations, actions, and other things going on here, (which never seem to stop!).
Last week I joined the village of Bil'in in one of the most ingenious demos ever. With the Wall cutting off 60% of the village's agricultural land, the area to the west of the wall has already been gobbled up immediately by new settlement construction, but with one catch; none of the settlements (all of which are illegal under international law) have any permits and are thus even illegal under Israeli law. So, on 12.21.05, the village decided to put up a caravan for a joint struggle for peace; it was a great way to celebrate my birthday, and the rest is history! For more info, go here (and yes, I was inside the caravan on the 21st through the morning of the 22nd)
Bil’in Residents Set Up Outpost West of Separation Fence
Ha’aretz Daily
Meron Rappoport
December 21, 2005
http://www.haaretzdaily.com/hasen/spages/660894.html
Some photos:
http://news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/051221/481/jrl12812211532
http://news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/051221/481/jrl13612211703
http://news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/051221/481/jrl13212211533
http://news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/051221/photos_wl_afp/05122
1162549_tntufgz8_photo2
http://www.palsolidarity.org/main/2005/12/24/the-tent-of-defiance/
http://www.palsolidarity.org/main/2005/12/22/legal-palestinian-%e2
%80%9coutpost%e2%80%9d-removed-immediately-hundreds-of-illegal-
israeli-settlements-remai/
I went to Nablus right after that, to partake in the replanting of olive trees in villages where nearby settlers had destroyed hundreds of trees in the past weeks. But, before that, we had another situation to deal with. Somewhere on the road to Nablus, we got a call and were alerted to the possibility that the IOF had occupied a flat in Nablus and was detaining an unknown number of people there. Why they were doing it, I have no idea but I do know that such actions are a flagrant violation of human rights standards and an example of collective punishment. So when we arrived, off we went to the flat, and after about an hour of knocking on the door and bothering the soldiers, they were evacuated by an assortment of trucks, humvees and more soldiers. About 12 heavily armed soldiers had been holding 20 Palestinians captive in their home from 5AM until they left at about 8:30 PM. Most of the Palestinians were children, including a one week old baby. Luckily, they and their property were relatively unharmed, and they were very happy to see the soldiers leave.
So, it is no understatement that I am very lucky to be in one piece, and not beaten or arrested by the Israeli military on this Christmas day. Unfortunately, many others do not share such luck
(one example, just read the Gideon Levy article about the man from Bethlehem who was kicked to death by his donkey after the Border Police tied his hand to it's tail and frightened it http://www.iht.com/getina/files/298303.html).
Now, I am certainly going to write in some more detail at some point about those experiences, but right now I would like to write about something a bit more mundane, yet just as important; my traveling on Christmas eve from Nablus to Jerusalem.
After the apartment situation, I was going to be doing the olive tree replanting, but I was just too tired, so I slept in. The next day rain cancelled the second day of planting, and with rain likely for the next day at least, it seemed wise for me to leave Nablus, go to Jerusalem, and spend Christmas relaxing there (I was also planning on being there anyway the night of the 25th for my friend Hisham's birthday party!).
But first, I had some people to see, namely the family I had picked olives with in the nearby village of Roujeeb and I was in Nablus with two friends, Johann and Aaron. Aaron was intent on getting to Bethlehem for the evening, so he opted out of coming with us, and left for the Huwarra checkpoint close to one in the afternoon. Johann and I got picked up by Walid, one of the brothers in the family, and spent a fabulous 3 hours or more at his home in Roujeeb with his family and his brother Sami (Sami's wife Ghadeer, who wrote an amazing note to my mother couldn't make it due to the rain, unfortunately). We sat inside the house beside a brazier full of charcoal to keep us warm (and heat up bread, of course!). We ate olives, cheese, hummus, and olive oil and zaatar, along with an endless supply of sweet tea. It was great to catch up with them, the family was so kind to the group of us that picked olives with them, and feeling well fed and taken care of, we set out for Huwarra checkpoint at about 4 PM or so.
Huwarra checkpoint is the main checkpoint to the south of Nablus, and probably one of the worst ones that I have experienced in Palestine. Every time I pass through, people are being humiliated in many ways; screamed at, beaten, detained, forced to wait for no reason, arrested, you name it. Somedays it is open, some days closed, some days women can get out, some days not, and if you are from one of the refugee camps, you might as well forget about being able to get through Huwarra, even on a good day.
So, approaching the checkpoint sometime around 4PM, Johann and I saw just what I feared; the checkpoint was crammed with people, all of them crushed in a mass of people trying not to get wet in what was a day of constant rain and bitter cold weather, as well as suffering the beatings and abuse of the soldiers manning the checkpoint. Having been stuck there before in a similar yet less intense version of this situation for at least an hour (but in good weather), I decided that we should just use our privilege as foreigners and just walk through the checkpoint. I had never done this at Huwarra, or any checkpoint, for that matter, but with the weather nasty and the checkpoint even nastier, I just had to do it. So we walked confidently (and inside quite guiltily) past the hundreds of Palestinians, who had been waiting there for hours, and flashed our passports to the soldiers there. They waved us on, but then changed their minds and said to check in with the officer at the end of the checkpoint. We went to him and he asked us the usual bullshit questions;
Q; "did you get special permission to be in Nablus?"
A; sir, we were let through the checkpoint when we arrived (and there is no need for special permission, its BS)
Q; "where did you stay? A hotel?"
A; Yes, at the Yasmeen hotel
Q; "Is it a five star hotel?"
A; Sir, I have no idea how many stars it has, it is a good hotel (But Balata Refugee camp, where we actually stayed, is far better!)
And such like that; stupid questions asked by young boys with guns that have a slightly hard time mustering up the kind of racism and nastiness that comes easily when questioning Palestinians. So, after a very poor search of our bags, we passed through Huwarra. Just before leaving, I stopped when I saw that 3 or 4 young male Palestinians were being detained in a small area of the checkpoint. I turned around and asked the soldier that had just let us pass and asked him "How long have those boys been there? Why are they there?" The soldier said to me "They hit a soldier," and made a motion like a slap.
This just made me so angry inside I can't tell you. Myself and every other person I know that went through that checkpoint that day saw soldiers hitting and beating Palestinians, and of course, I've seen it many other times as well; activist friends of mine have been arrested for beating a police officer, which are just plain lies told by the police (even the Israeli judge in one case stated that he was "outraged" by the behavior of the police). It seems a logical axiom that if one is charged by the Israeli military for beating a soldier, that means a soldier assaulted you.
"They hit a soldier," he said. So, in response to the officer, I mustered as much sarcasm as I could manage without screaming, and said "Well, that's too bad," and walked away (for more descriptions of what checkpoints are like, I highly recommend an article by Gideon Levy, Gideon Levy: Theater of the Absurd http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/658494.html) And so I left, angry, guilty, just plain revolted at the injustice and brutality of it all. If this was my daily life, what would I do withall these emotions? How would I survive?
Next was to arrange a ride to Ramallah, the next large city before crossing into Jerusalem. What followed was a crazed and dysfunctional process of getting either a taxi for the two of us or waiting until enough people trickle through the checkpoint to fill up a shared taxi. Unfortunately, the shared taxi was asking far too much while a special taxi would be cheaper. So, I persuaded a Palestinian girl to come with us in the taxi, which she was reluctant to do, because what followed was a near fist fight between the two drivers and their fellow driver friends. You see, if I pulled all 3 of us out of the van, he would be screwed and have to wait another hour longer to fill up his van, and these guys do have to work together every day. So, they worked things out and we ended up in the van anyway, but for a better price; ahh, how I like happy endings.
But while we were haggling and trying not to see any blood shed over 20 shekels, we had a surprise; who shows up, but Aaron! He had arrived at Huwarra at 1PM, and did not pass through until 4PM!!!!! Even he had tried to use his passport to get ahead of the line, but to no avail; they told him to wait his turn, and that he did. Needless to say, he was happy to see us, and iI could not imagine what I would be like mentally after 4 hours of being crushed in a sea of people, in that weather, while watching soldiers beat and abuse people the whole time.
Aaron joined us in the shared taxi, but our travels had not ended yet! Off we went from Huwarra in the pouring rain and thick fog, which did slow traffic from its usual somewhat too fast driving pace, but as a lovely christmas present to Palestine, the IOF had a few more hurdles to get past. Usually, the next manned checkpoint is at Zaatara, not too far down the road from Huwarra. But on this day, there was an impromptu "flying" checkpoint, as they are called, both before and after the Zaatara checkpoint. It usually consists of an army jeep/truck blocking the road with soldiers out waving people to stop or keep going. Sometimes taxis alert each other ahead of time and they can be avoided, sometimes not. So, before getting to Ramallah we had to show out IDs and be assessed by soldiers at checkpoints three times. Each time is much like the other, the humiliating experience of being treated like possible criminal just for traveling in Palestine. And as awful as all these experiences were for me yesterday, it is nothing compared to what a Palestinian has to go through. My time here has given me the barest, most basic taste of what it is like, but I would never claim to 'know'; in the end, I am a foreigner, and eventually, I will leave Palestine with my all powerful passport and white male privilege intact.
And then to Ramallah we arrived. After a walk in the rain, we got our things organized for the next leg of the journey, the crossing at Qalandia checkpoint into the 'Greater' Jerusalem area which the Apartheid Wall is annexing to Israel as we speak. As I described in previous posts, Qalandia Checkpoint has always been another one of those nasty, abusive and in the past, makeshift checkpoints, and with the construction of the Apartheid Wall, Qalandia has gotten out of control; blocks of cement, railing, piles of gravel and dirt, fencing, razor wire, sniper towers, and plenty of subversive graffiti, of course. Right next to this of course, is the most surreal thing; where there was once a hill, the hill is no more, and a brand spanking new, shiny and gleaming terminal-like building has been constructed, along with a parking lot and a large sign with a picture of a flower, next to which is written in three languages "The Hope of Us All." Myself and other activists who have seen this feel that it is only a matter of time until "Arbeit Macht Frei" or "Despair all ye who enter here" are spray-painted in its place.
This is the new, improved Qalandia terminal, paid for by US tax dollars, of course, and it is a cruel joke. I don't know which is worse, walking through a random assortment of concrete and steel while soldiers point guns treat you like dirt, or a spotless post-post-modern cross between an airport terminal and a sanatorium, with soldiers sitting behind bullet proof glass and yelling commands through a machine while they sit comfortably, as if you are some infected microbe that they dare not be in the same room with. The walls are complete with screens that say "welcome" and other signs saying "please keep the terminal clean," and "enjoy your stay." Who was it that designed such a cruel joke? This checkpoint is miles past the 1967 green line, well into Palestinian land, and no one has any possibility of 'enjoying their stay' while they are being humiliated, whether up front or by remote control. After getting my passport back from a smug, smirking soldier behind glass, I turned, grabbed my bag and muttered 'motherfucker;" a Palestinian ahead of me looked at me and said "you are right," and walked away.
So, do you think that that is it? Nope, one more checkpoint, a quick stop while taking a bus to Jerusalem. Everyone on the bus has it down, lifts up their IDs, the border policeman comes in, looks at them, and then waves us on (on a good day of course). It was close to 9PM when we got to the hostel, a journey of 60 kilometers took about 5 hours (for Aaron, 9 hours) and we had to pass through 6 checkpoints in the process.
And people ask when will peace come to the Holy Land? God only knows, when people are forced to live like this.
My best wishes to you all,
posted by Jontheantizionistjew at 10:34 AM
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