Millions of tourists come to the West Bank every year, but Israel decides who can visit, and only a small fraction of the tourists ever stay in Palestinian hotels and guesthouses or use Palestinian guides. We visit a Palestinian guesthouse in Sebastia and hear how the owner, Ahmad, manages to remain optimistic.

The media tends to stereotype the Mizrahi residents of south Tel Aviv as angry xenophobes whose problems will be solved with the deportation of African asylum seekers from their neighborhoods. But the truth is far more complicated.

Palestinian residents of the Jordan Valley share their personal experiences of what life under occupation has meant for them. The second of two parts.

Fatimah Yousuf Massaeed talks about the difficulties of being a student in the Jordan Valley, where internet access is spotty and the roads difficult to travel in the winter. She has a degree in law and Islamic law from the Open University and dreams of being a judge.

Mahmood Massaeed describes about how the lack of building permits makes it impossible to build a soccer field in his village, dashing his and his friends’ dreams of becoming professional soccer players.

Rushdi Habib wants to send his children to study at universities, but he can’t afford not to have them working alongside him in the fields.

Abd el-Salam Beni Odeh talks about the day his house was demolished; he was on his way back from school when he saw the ruins. A high school student now, he says he wants to work as a human rights advocate.

Palestinian residents of the Jordan Valley share their personal experiences of what life under occupation has meant for them. The first of two parts.

Iman Abusrur explains how even a simple injury like a broken leg can get complicated when the nearest clinic is 45 kilometers away on rough roads:

Khulusi Haj Muhammed visits his devastated family home every day. He can’t get a permit to fix the roof that collapsed. He longs for peace, to live his remaining years with dignity:

Ahmed Ghawanmeh talks about on the difference between his village, Jiftlik, and the neighboring Israeli settlements, and the sense of humiliation and oppression that comes from living in the shadow of the occupation:

Khaled Handomh explains about what happens when a resident of al-Jiftlik wants to turn on an air-conditioner in the summer, or when a woman in labor has to pass through the checkpoint to get to the hospital:

Mattan Helman was supposed to serve in the Nahal Brigrade in the occupied territories. Instead, he will refuse to enlist as a conscientious objector, a decision that will land him in jail.

A joint trip by Israeli Jews and internally displaced Palestinians to the village of Mi’ar, which was destroyed and depopulated during the 1948 War, brings up the ghosts of the past.

Ofir Averbukh has served more than 150 days in Israeli military prison for his refusal to be conscripted into the army. In the following interview, Ofir explains why he is only going public about his refusal now, and why Israeli youth should view choosing to be conscripted, not just refusing, as a decision of significant moral weight.

Another soldier who was present told Social TV: “I was in the operations room. They remember this incident but they said that the army erased all the videos connected to the incident, and that we should not talk about it.”

Some of the soldiers wrote down their testimonies in a notebook, which include descriptions of Israeli soldiers hitting asylum seekers with sticks as the latter were trying to climb over the border fence. Later, they were told to tie them up and send them back to Egypt. The soldiers then reported to Egyptian security forces that the asylum seekers had never crossed the border. According to the testimonies, after rumors began spreading among the soldiers, the battalion commander informed his soldiers that the IDF top brass was taking care of the issue.

Despite the army’s attempts to whitewash the incident, even the Defense Ministry itself admitted that it had indeed taken place and that it contradicted its official procedures.

According to international law, it is forbidden to send a person back to a country if his/her life is in danger. In 2011, the state announced that it would cease sending back asylum seekers that had just crossed the border from Egypt. The High Court ruled that should the state seek to return someone, it must do so in accordance with international standards.

In their struggle to combat the state’s attempt draft them into the army, ultra-Orthodox Israelis have faced unremitting police brutality. Now they are teaming up with left-wing and human rights activists to put a stop to the violence.

It isn’t every day that you can see art exhibitions in a hummus shop, a mosque, a car garage. The Mediterranean Biennale aspires to take art out of the confines of the museum and to display works by artists from Israel, Palestine, the Middle East and Europe in unexpected, everyday locations.

Whenever members of the Israeli government make outrageous statements or accusations against the Arab or Palestinian population, they are rarely challenged by the press that broadcasts those allegations into homes. The  Knesset, Israel’s parliament, recently held a conference on the media’s role in perpetuating incitement against Arabs in the country.

In the last episode, Rami Younis explored how the Green Line has been effectively erased from the Israeli education system and what that means for the next generation of Israelis. Now he sets out to hear what the Green Lines means for Palestinians.

The Green Line, the boundary between Israel and the Palestinian territories recognized by most of the world, has been all but erased by the Israeli education system. Rami Younis, also of +972 Magazine, talks to educators about how it happened, and what it means.