Project photography: Oren Ziv / Activestills

This was supposed to be a four part mini-project for the week of Passover. However, as work progressed, interview followed interview, and the tours along the wall’s route unraveled new stories, and as the gap between the magnitude of the project and the lack of in-depth writing about it in mainstream media became clear – the series grew longer, only to reach its end now.

But before we conclude, some recent important developments must be shared. In the first and eleventh chapters, I mentioned the massive gaps in the wall: dozens of unbuilt miles of the route in the eastern part of Gush Etzion and the Adumim plains near Jerusalem. About four years ago, the state stopped construction in these parts due to the pause in hostilities, insufficient funds, and a fear that U.S. pressure and High Court intervention would make it harder to complete the approved route which effectively annexes huge swaths of Palestinian West Bank lands.

This pause in construction is now coming to an end. A recent statement made in court by the head of the wall project, Colonel Ofer Hindi, indicates that Israel is getting ready to resume construction in these two parts. The statement was confirmed this week by the Ministry of Defense in reply to an inquiry by +972. The confirmation stated that the ministry is currently “conducting evaluations and examining beginning construction of the Gush Etzion route, pending judicial approval. The route in the Adumim plains will be reevaluated over the course of 2013.”

This is big news. Alongside the resumption of deliberation of two petitions pending in the High Court, this could also prompt a revival of the popular Palestinian struggle in the villages south of Bethlehem, possible resistance by settlers in the Gush area, and perhaps even a renewed international interest in the route deemed illegal by the International Court of Justice. In fact, Hindi’s statement has already led foreign diplomats stationed in Tel Aviv who read this series to invite me to share thoughts on the renewed construction for a report to their government.

And two more short updates: in a discussion on the wall’s effects on natural surroundings, I mentioned attempts made by the village of Battir to gain World Heritage Site status from UNESCO in order to stop the wall. Apparently due to internal conflicts within the Palestinian delegation, the UNESCO annual convention has since decided to recognize another local site, the Church of the Nativity and its surroundings, leaving Battir’s ancient terraces in harm’s way.

Discussing the misfortunes brought upon the village of Walajah, I wrote that the wall is planned to surround it in all directions. In recent weeks, however, villagers received a new map of the route, which indicates a possible opening in the wall to the southwest. Activists mention that there are not yet any guarantees for this, and that even if this part is left open, the village would still lose most of its lands and be detached from the urban center of Bethlehem and the rest of the West Bank. “Our most minimal demand is to maintain free passage to Beit Jala,” tells me Sheerin al Araj, a prominent activist in the village. “This we have not yet accomplished.”

The new route around Walajah. Open to the southwest (The Civil Administration)

The wall and the occupation

Throughout this series I tried to focus on the wall itself and its implications, without broadening the argument to the entire system of occupation and settlement. But as I move toward the end, it is crucial to remember how the wall is but one piece in the puzzle of the military regime ruling over the lives of millions, with its two separate legal systems, its home demolitions, its siege on Gaza, and much more. As Haaretz’s Amira Hass always reminds readers, the story of the wall cannot be detached from the permit system put in place in 1991, which has since continuously expanded in extreme ways.

“Many people, including judges we face in court, don’t understand the meaning of occupation’s bureaucracy,” says attorney Shira Hertzanu from Yadin Elam’s law firm, which deals with countless cases revolving around the seam zone on behalf of Hamoked. “Take farmers who want to reach their lands beyond the fence: they might not get an answer for their request for months, then not get it in writing, and procedures keep changing and growing harder all the time. Even when someone is summoned for a hearing at the DCO [District Coordination Office], they might find themselves waiting for hours only to be informed that the officer in charge just isn’t around.

“So people despair. Farmers give up on their trees. People living in the seam zone loose touch with life in the West Bank and consider leaving home and crossing to the ‘Palestinian’ side of the wall. The wall is still new, in many parts less than ten years old, but it’s frightening to see the process of annexation happening in front of your eyes.”

Women on their way to Jerusalem from Ramallah on Ramadan (Oren Ziv / Activestills)

This rationale of the permit system does not only apply to the seam zone, and ones much like it can also be found in the Jordan Valley, and the “special security zones” around South Hebron Hills settlements, and with time in more and more locations across the West Bank. “The notion that a Palestinian would need a permit to get to his land started with agricultural areas that got stuck behind settlement fences, widened dramatically with the wall, and the most recent development is how this is reasoning is duplicated to areas where there is no fence at all,” says attorney Michael Sfard, who is representing villagers from Beit Furik in a petition against the state’s decision to seal off parts of their land in order to protect the settlement of Itamar and its illegal satellite settlements.

“Now the state tells the court that permits can be arranged to enter the zone whenever farmers wish, but knowing the seam way of thinking I’m positive that after the petition is over and done with we’ll hear the army say ‘there’s no reason to farm the land during winter’ or something, and people will lose touch with their land. This is how Israel divides and rules Palestinians and creates apartheid through legal and physical means.”

As recently mentioned here in a different context, and as Noam Sheizaf excellently put it, all these tools of oppression will go on serving Israel for as long as the status quo remains its most rational choice. As long as Palestinian popular resistance and international pressure don’t grow significantly, Israel will not be the one to voluntarily end the stagnation in negotiations, and peace initiatives such as the Arab League’s will remain unanswered. Until such a time of change, the occupation and apartheid are here to stay. And so is The Wall.

Here to stay. The wall around Jerusalem (Oren Ziv / Activestills)

The fate of walls and empires

The story sounds so odd that it might actually be true: Scattered reports by activists in Jayous, a single line in a Wikipedia page, and several long posts in a site that went offline sometime after work on this series started all claim that the Scottish town of Falkirk has signed a twinning contract with the Palestinian village of Jayous. A short Youtube clip confirms that even if this initiative is not given official status, there are surely some town people pushing for it.

The reasoning for this move was offered in the now-unavailable site and can still be seen in the clip. Falkirk sits on the old route of the Antonine Wall, built by the Romans to safeguard their northern border in the British Isle. The wall and all its fortifications lasted just twenty years before the empire retreated to its previous more southern border.

The people of Falkirk and Jayous thought that there would be a legitimate symbolism in linking their histories, and thus somehow encouraging the Palestinian village’s popular struggle against the wall built on their lands. The link was also meant as a reminder of the temporary nature of all walls and empires. It is with this reminder to all of us as well that I wish to end.

All things must pass. The Antonine Wall in Falkirk (Kim Traynor)

——

The Wall Project could not have been made possible were it not for the assistance of countless dedicated Palestinian and Israeli activists, extremely patient interviewees, the support of the +972 editors, and of course – my good friend and excellent photographer Oren Ziv of the Activestills collective. All of these I wish to thank deeply.

——

Previous chapters in this series:

Part 1: The great Israeli project
Part 2: Wall and Peace
Part 3: An acre here and an acre there
Part 4: Trapped on the wrong side
Part 5: A new way of resistance
Part 6: What has the struggle achieved?
Part 7: A village turned prison
Part 8: A working class under siege
Part 9: Dividing land – water, fauna, flora
Part 10: My encounters with the wall in space
Part 11: Security for Israel?

And the supplement podcast: +972 bloggers explore Israeli walls and borders

Project photography: Oren Ziv / Activestills

The first and most obvious answer to this is simple: in many places, villages involved in the uprising were able to change the route of the wall and gain part of their land back, either due to the security apparatus’ decision or due to a court ruling. But when one asks prominent Palestinian activists what they think they achieved, one finds that their answers to be much more principled.

Some mention the creation of an unarmed alternative to the entire Palestinian struggle, and others stress the importance of links between Israelis and Palestinians forged in struggle and shaking the core of the political separation the wall meant to create. Some also speak of the international sympathy the demonstrations have earned for the Palestinian cause. Although those demonstrations have been going on for a decade – none of the activists ponder switching to armed resistance.

Farmers overlooking construction work in Wadi a-Rasha (Activestills)

‘Showing the world that we are not the terrorists – but the victims of terror’

“Ever since our struggle started, the army’s response was brutal: many sheep and chickens died from tear gas shot into court yards, people were injured and arrested, the price was too high – and so I decided to stop demonstrating,” says Sharif Khaled, one of the prominent activists in the Jayous protest. That protest lasted from September 2002 until 2004, and was revived for a brief period in 2008, when Israel moved the fence, retuning part but not all of the village’s lands. “Demonstrations were, first and foremost, a tool to give voice to people’s feelings. They also got us in touch with Israeli and foreign activists, but the army ignored us altogether – which is why we couldn’t go on.

“However, I still think that it was and is the best way of sending Israel a message. Thanks to our demonstrations, even though they’re finished, we still meet Israelis, we can go to court with more support and we get interviewed by journalists all over the world just like you. All these things too are non-violent resistance, and they too help send our message forth.”

Women at the front line of an anti-wall protest (Activestills)

“The idea of accepting and camping with Israeli and internationals in 2003, the peak of the second intifada, was very challenging, yet it is a great story of success, based on mutual respect and understanding of the needs of each side,” adds Raad Amer, one of the founders of the Mes’ha protest tent in 2003. “You can add to that the gaining of international attention at the time of war in Iraq, the support of the International Court of Justice and the achievement of promoting non-violence against the occupation.”

Um-Hassan Bierjieh (Haggai Matar)

In the village of Ma’asara, residents have been protesting against the wall every week for more than five years now. In the beginning, demonstrations mainly included women carrying out direct actions such as stopping bulldozers, but over time construction of the fence in this region has stopped, and demonstrations now focus mainly on long tri-lingual speeches directed both at activists and at the soldiers present. Organizers here are extremely committed to non-violence, and stones are not thrown at the soldiers even if they attack the demonstrators.

“The thing we cherish most about the struggle is the chance to make our voices heard in the world, and stressing that we are not the terrorists – but rather the victims of terror,” says Um-Hassan Beirjieh, one of the leading female activists in the village. “After five years of demonstrations, we see the growing support we gain in the world, and see how time after time the Israeli army is presented as the one creating the violence – not us. This is a message we shall keep on sending out through our demonstration as long as there are settlers on our land, preventing us from forming an independent state.”

Football over the Bil’in fence

Of all the villages that have taken up the call against the wall, one has gained international fame and today symbolizes the popular struggle more than any other: the village of Bil’in. What makes Bil’in so central to the struggle? It may be its commitment, with over seven years of weekly demonstrations, or perhaps the award-winning film made about it – “Bil’in Habibti” (Bil’in My Love), or the two relatives who were killed by the army while non-violently demonstrating )Bassem and Jawaher Abu-Rahme) and maybe it’s the unmatched creativity used in protest throughout the years.

A short list of Bil’in’s unique measures of struggle must include attempts to play football with soldiers across the fence during the world cup games as a mock response to a commercial by Israeli cellular company Cellcom; Avatar-style costumes to link the struggle to the popular film (see above clip); locking activists in cages attached to the ground where bulldozers work; kite contests; building a massive model of a ship after the flotilla; going on a night march with candles in response to army night raids; hosting a Holocaust survivor playing the piano on the route of the wall; holding a yearly convention on non-violence, and hosting many internationally known figures, including  Desmond Tutu and Jimmy Carter of the ”The Elders,” and others. Demonstrations in Bil’in take place weekly to this day, even after the court returned some of Bil’in’s lands.

It should be pointed out, however, that as opposed to Ma’asara, most demonstrations in Bil’in end with stones being hurled at soldiers, after the latter attack the non-violent demonstration with tear gas. As was recently proven in court, when Palestinians avoid throwing stones, undercover Israeli security forces throw stones at soldiers themselves.

Mohammad Khatib, Bil’in (Haggai Matar)

“There are many reasons that keep us going,” says Muhammed Khatib, one of the heads of the local popular committee. “It’s the victories we had that brought us hope, the support we get in the village, the cooperation with Israelis and internationals, and the effect we had on the entire Palestinian struggle which is now adapting to our strategy.

“Another reason is that Bil’in is now a national symbol that needs maintaining. But the struggle mainly goes on because we have not yet reached our goals: not only is there land on the other side of the wall, but also the army does not allow us to build anything on the lands we got back and anything built gets immediately demolished. So it’s a struggle against the occupation as a whole – and the occupation is far from being over.”

“Our dream is that one day we can create a park on these lands, which will hold an academic center for non-violent struggle and peace studies, and which will also be a nice place for families to vacation with beautiful scenery and animals all around. We’re hopeful that we can have our own free state, and that our children will not live the life that we have so far lived under occupation. Is this not reason enough to continue?”

A display of weapons used against demonstrations in Bil’in (Haggai Matar)

Previous chapters in this series:

Part 1: The great Israeli project
Part 2: Wall and Peace
Part 3: An acre here and an acre there
Part 4: Trapped on the wrong side
Part 5: A new way of resistance

Next:

Part 7: A village turned prison

Project photography: Oren Ziv / Activestills

I guess it’s no coincidence that whenever I think of the beginning of the popular struggle against the wall I think of Gil Na’amati. The story of Na’amati, who was just out of the army after three years of serving as a combatant when he was shot in the knee by soldiers while trying to break open a gate in the fence in December 2003, was what drew my attention to the struggle. I was still in prison at the time, for my own refusal to enlist, and it was this story that led me to start reading about the new struggle I was missing on the outside.

I guess it’s no coincidence, as even after having been involved in joint activism against the occupation before prison – something of the racism of Israeli political discourse stayed within me too. Like the demonstrators who yelled at the soldiers “don’t shoot – we’re Israelis,” like the soldiers themselves who usually use less violence towards Israelis and white solidarity activists, like the local media which is more easily shocked when a Jew is hurt during a demonstration (especially a former combatant and son of the head of a regional council in the western Negev like Na’amati) – so was my attention drawn to the story of a young person, of my people, who was shot by one of my peers, more than it was by the stories of Palestinians killed in nonviolent demonstrations. But the struggle, in fact, had started long before Na’amati was shot.

(The shooting of Gil Na’amati, broken down and narrated)

‘There was no plan – people just went to protect their trees’

In fact, the whole struggle began quite spontaneously. The year 2002 was the bloodiest of the second intifada, with 47 suicide attacks killing 225 Israelis, and 989 Palestinian casualties (421 of them did not take part in hostilities, according to B’Tselem). In September alone, eight Israelis were killed in three suicide attacks (one them in central Tel Aviv), and 51 Palestinians were killed by Israeli forces, 19 of them non-combatants. As mentioned in the first chapter of this series, suicide attacks were what led to the beginning of the construction of the wall in April of 2002, while political pressures and Israeli expansionist aspirations drew the route of the wall so that it would run through the heart of the West Bank and de facto annex large tracks of land.

It was in this deadly month of September that bulldozers arrived in Jayous. The original route in this area would later engulf most of the village’s agricultural lands, also leaving one house on the wrong side of the fence. The villagers, whose income depended on agriculture, saw the bulldozers and ran to their groves to protect their tress. They stopped construction work, hugged the trees, got beaten and dispersed, some were arrested – yet the next day they came out again. Almost two years after Israel crushed the popular demonstrations at the dawn of the second intifada and Palestinians turned to arms – nonviolent popular resistance was making its initial comeback.

“We didn’t have a plan – people just saw the trees being shaved down and ran to protect them,” says Sharif Khaled, a farmer and leader of the Jayous actions. “There were men and women, people from all families and parties, and we went to stay on our land. It took several weeks before we were joined by Israelis and the ISM [International Solidarity Movement], and started holding meetings before demonstrations in order to plan better. We were also joined by people from neighboring villages, and that’s how the concept began to spread.”

And spread it did. Similar demonstrations started taking place in other locations along the route of the wall, and as 2003 began, a central struggle tent was erected in the village of Mes’ha. Raad Amer was just 23 when he helped erect the tent in the path of the wall, and started organizing multi-lingual workshops on nonviolence and demonstrations in the same spirit. The tent stood for four months near the settlement of Elkana, founded in 1977, and was de-facto annexed by the wall. Eventually the tent was demolished by the army.

Women’s demonstrations in Ni’lin (Activestills)

“The primary and only tool for that struggle was nonviolent protest in all forms,” says Amer, who now lives with his wife in the United States. “People maintained a presence in the camp 24/7, protests where people marched through the village toward the confiscated lands and direct action against the wall like the one in which Gil Na’amati was shot – all these are diverse nonviolent tools of resistance.”

Spreading out

Over the years the popular demonstrations spread further, and as suicide attacks subsided, it became the central and leading tool in the Palestinian struggle for independence. Demonstrations started in Bidu, Budrus, Beit Likiya, Qafin, Azun, Bil’in, Nil’in, Beit Sira, Walaje, Beit Jala, Ertas, Ma’asara, Wad-Rachal, Beit Umar and many other villages – some of them still active to this day. Gradually, villages not directly affected by the wall started using the same tools in their own struggles against settlements and land grabs, and some of these – like Nabi Saleh and Qadum – are also still very active in their resistance.

With time, the struggle became partly institutionalized with popular committees operating in each of the uprising villages and determining the local demands and tactics. In most (if not all) villages the main demand is that Israel move the wall to its internationally recognized border, alongside calls to dismantle settlements and end the occupation in full.

Bil’in, October 2005 (Activestills)

The pattern of action varied from one place to another and from time to time, some focusing on direct action, some on slogans and dialogue with soldiers, and some on creative protest using music, theater, costumes and more. Almost all invited Israelis and foreigners to join the struggle, either as a safety tool, by forcing soldiers to be less violent; as a political statement of joint resistance and belief in equality and peace; or as a mixture of both. Most Israelis in the weekly demonstrations are activists in Anarchists Against the Wall (like myself), but others join as well. In some villages, the first phase of demonstrations, shared by all, is utterly nonviolent, making way for a second phase of stone-throwing by local youth (usually after the army attacks) and in some, the nonviolent approach lasts until the end.

But whatever the tactics, the army always responds with varying degrees of violence, having killed a total of 21 demonstrators (10 of them minors) in  demonstrations against the wall, and 275 in all popular demonstrations (figures taken from Jonathan Pollak, spokesperson of the Popular Resistance Coordination Committee). Hundreds have been severely injured, hundreds arrested, trees have been burned and farm animals killed by tear gas.

Tear gas in Bil’in’s sky (Activestills)

As for the other side – over the years, one soldier lost an eye after being hit by a stone, and others were less severely injured. Another effect demonstrations had on the army is a financial one: according to one army officer, who testified in the trial of a Bil’in activist, over the period between August 2008 and December 2009, the army spent NIS 6.5 million on weapons against demonstrators in Bil’in and Ni’lin alone, an extra NIS 423 thousand on repairing damages caused to the fence in these villages and NIS 8.5 million on building a second wall to protect the fence in Nil’in. Multiply that by a decade of protest in tens of villages – and you’ll get an astounding figure.

And yet, after 10 years of demonstrations, casualties, injuries, arrests and trials, pain and joy and one wall still standing – what did the popular, joint and unarmed struggle against the wall actually achieve? This we shall see in the next chapter.

Tearing down the fence in a direct action (Activestills)

Previous chapters in this series:

Part 1: The great Israeli project
Part 2: Wall and Peace
Part 3: An acre here and an acre there
Part 4: Trapped on the wrong side

Project photography: Oren Ziv / Activestills

Theoretically, Dharifa Sharreb should be pleased. When the fence was built in Jayous in 2003, Sharreb’s home was the only one on its western side, and it became completely isolated from the rest of the village. Soldiers would open the two gates in the two fences near the house three times a day, not always at the same hours, and each time for no more than two minutes. If you missed the opening, you’d have to wait for the next round. Sharreb’s children were always late for school, and every visit to the grocery – or even the hospital – cost Sharreb hours of waiting by the gate.

So one may well argue that the relocation of the fence in 2008 should have benefited  Sharreb. After a long struggle, which involved mass demonstrations and a High Court petition, the state agreed to move the fence westward, returning to the villagers hundreds of acres of land, as well as reuniting Sharreb with the village. The High Court approved the new route, which still kept many lands on the “Israeli” side, taking the state’s word that gates would allow farmers free access to their trees.

Outside the court, however, reality looks different. Sharreb’s family, for example, has now been cut off from its lands and is yet to obtain the permits required to cross the fence. Muhamad Abdel-Latif, a neighbor, says that five out of his eight acres of land are on the wrong side of the fence, that permits are hard to come by for his entire family, and that the soldiers never show up at the fixed hours. Sitting in front of Sharreb’s house, overlooking the scarred land on the right where the fence used to run, and the new frightening fence on the left, I ask whether the two have considered turning to human rights NGOs for legal advice. They both sigh, their expressions tell the tale of people weary from fighting.

“There used to be demonstrations here, and people would come to help us out, but that’s all over now – and even if people were to come, I don’t think it would do any good,” says Sharreb. “They say that one day Plato went to look for justice,” says Abdel-Latif. “He went to the king, and could not find it. He went to the judges and the rich men, and could not find it. Only when he visited the poorest and lowliest of men did he find justice. The same goes for us – we will never find justice with those in power”.

(Sharreb in a 2005 B’Tselem video)

The army agronomist will decide

As described in the first chapter of this series, the route of the wall has been redrawn time and time again, and currently leaves 8.5 percent of West Bank territory west of the barrier. Aside from certain Palestinian urban areas described in chapter two, most of the land is either taken by settlements or, for the most part, by Palestinian agricultural lands, farmed by villagers who live on the eastern side of the wall.

These wide stretches of land, dubbed “the seam zone”, are governed by a strict system of permits. As no other barrier stands between them and Israel’s proper borders, Palestinians are required to hold permits and go through security checks in order to enter them, while Israelis are totally free to move about. Naturally – these permits are not easy to gain. As with other sorts of permits, here too the Shin Bet uses people’s needs as leverage to recruit informants. In many villages people complain that only one family member received a permit, and that this is not enough to work the entire land. Villagers in Jayous joke about a family who got a single permit for a person long deceased, who is still registered in Israeli books as the owner of the family property.

Trees on sale near the wall in Qalandia (Oren Ziv / Activestills)

“This is life in the shadow of the wall, with a constant regression in permit standards,” says attorney Michael Sfard, co-author of “Khoma U’Mekhdal” – “The Wall of Folly”, who represented many villages in High Court petitions against the route running through their lands. “From very early on the army said that the wall is just there to filter those who have a legitimate interest in the seam zone from those who don’t. The promise was that life would go on just the same as it was for anyone who proves he has good reason to cross the wall.

“Now, with the fence already erected, the story no longer in headlines, the court is less interested and the farmers’ problems more minute – we suddenly hear a new discourse. Now the army says ‘what we meant is that people with an interest can pass when we say it’s relevant.’ This leads to cheapness in the permit system. Suddenly they tell you, based on an expert opinion by an army agronomist, just how many days you need to work your land. Say you have 0.25 acres of olives – you’ll get three days of plowing and ten for harvest each year. And that will be it.“

After the ‘Tsumud’

“A 10-year perspective reveals changes in the West Bank, which run deeper than the single farmer and his olive tree,” explains B’Tselem spokesperson Sarit Michaeli. “Over the course of time the removal of farmers from agricultural lands changes the pattern of land usage. For example this can take the shape of abandoning the growing of fruits and vegetables, which require much attention. Jayous and its surrounding area are important to Palestinian vegetable markets, and their absence exacts a heavy price on the economy. Even the very resilient olive trees give less fruit when left unattended for too long.

“There are also smaller cumulative effects, like the whole question of recreation, as a family picnic on the land is central to Palestinian country life, and of course the army doesn’t consider this a permit-worthy cause. And what about fires, and theft? The average Israeli doesn’t think of the farmers standing by the fence, seeing his lot burning, denied help by the Israeli fire brigade, and waiting for soldiers to open the gate for the Palestinian fire fighters.“

A tree in Bil’in burning after tear gas was fired in the area (Haggai Matar)

Stories of fire and theft are a recurrent theme in interviews with Palestinian farmers. Sometimes it is damage caused by settlers, or organized theft, while fires break out either for no apparent reason, or due to extensive use of tear gas and flares by the IDF while repressing demonstrations. I myself have see several demonstrations that stopped for the benefit of extinguishing burning trees, while soldiers kept on shooting at the villagers.

“Even if you’ve done everything right – got the permit, reached the gate at the right time – the soldier might still find a reason why not to let you through,” concludes Michaeli. “At the end of the day you’re holding a piece of paper, and he – a gun. The system is stronger. So people desert their lands, maybe transfer the rights to others who have permits – which is not as profitable, and find another way to support their families. Not everybody has the strength to fight for every acre with Tsumud” (the Palestinian term denoting persistence in holding onto the land – H.M).

“If you ask me where this is headed the answer is the old and horrible notion of ‘as much land as possible, as few Palestinians as possible,’” adds attorney Sfard. “The seam zone is the Israeli consensus’ expansion zone, planned for settlement by everybody from the Avoda (Labor) rightward. So they decide to keep the seam zone ‘sterile’, allowing the occasional harvest, but in the long run their plan works. The permit system creates a wilderness, and we all know that in this country a wilderness never stays just that. It turns into settlements”.

Meanwhile, on the other side of the wall

About two months ago I took a group of pre-draft teenagers on a short tour of the western side of the wall near Bil’in. As always, I was shocked to see just how much the settlement built on the village lands is expanding. Although the land belongs to Bil’in, and although the High Court ruled

The settlement on Bil’in lands and the wall (Haggai Matar)

that the state lied when stating the route in this area is meant only for security, while it was actually planned for settlement expansion, although part of the land was returned to Bil’in, and although the neighborhood is built without even the most basic construction permits (a matter of ongoing criminal investigation) – construction still goes on. And why? Because the High Court also ruled that if a neighborhood so large had already been built, with so many people living there, it mustn’t be dismantled. It is the whole story, in a nutshell: an annexing route, a wall, farmers who can’t cross and a whole new settlement on their land.

And yet there are those who suffer from the wall even more than the villagers who are losing their land. Thousands of Palestinians are stuck in the seam zone, on the “wrong” side of the wall. The next chapter will be devoted to them.

Read the first part of the series here, and the second here.