Ramallah Street Hockey League

In the parking lot next to the building of the Representative Office of Canada to the Palestinian Authority, the Ramallah street hockey league meets every week to play. Their custom nets were even welded by a CBC cameraman based in Ramallah which makes playing in the league probably the most Canadian thing one can do in the West Bank. Anyone of any skill level is welcome to play. Next week there will be a tournament as part of the Taybeh Oktoberfest bringing beer and hockey together in the small christian village of Taybeh a few minutes outside of Ramallah.

Pal flag tape

Yanoun

Yanoun is a small farming village south of Nablus located in Area C of the West Bank which is under full Israeli military control. The village is comprised of upper and lower Yanoun and is quietly nestled between rocky hills amongst olive groves and cacti.  Israel maintains full administrative and military control of Area C and thus decides to whom it awards building rights to. Yanoun has been prohibited from building any new structures by the Israeli government which concurrently helps establish and expand a nearby Israeli settler outpost. This restrictive building policy has contributed to the decline of Yanoun's population which currently stands at 70 people. In addition, the people of Yanoun have been victims of violent settler attacks over the years often under the watch of the Israeli army. These types of attacks are commonplace in many Palestinian villages near settlements and Yanoun is no exception. Attacks range from harassment (settlers bathing their dogs in the village's drinking water well) to violent attacks involving arson, stone throwing or killing sheep by driving into them (click here for a full report on settler violence in the West Bank).  Such regular attacks have prompted the creation of the of the EAPPI which serves to act as a deterrent for settler violence by maintaining a visible international presence in some of the villages all year. We were asked to stay at the EAPPI house in Yanoun for 24 hours to cover during a changeover of volunteers. Our tasks were to take 2 walks a day between upper and lower Yanoun and to alert the town's mayor immediately if any incidents occurred. 

Settlement

Spotlight from the settlement  at night

The settlement can be seen on the hill overlooking Yanoun and for the most part was very quiet during the day. It seemed to comprise only of a few trailers, a military watchtower and a water tower. Israeli military personal passed through the village and a construction vehicle operated on the settlement during the day. The night we spent there was cool and peaceful, however a powerful and blinding surveillance spotlight directed onto the village throughout the night from the settlement was a constant reminder of the strange and disturbing nature of the situation the village is faced with.

Yanoun children pose with their rabbit

Road between Upper and Lower Yanoun

Logistics board in EAPPI house with names of various villages

Dima Bawab at Al-Najaf University

On Sunday september 18th, Dima Bawab, a palestinian woman raised in Amman, Jordan gave a short concert in the Auditorium of Al-Najaf University. Wearing traditional palestinian dress, she performed  various western classical opera songs. Here are some pictures of the performances from that night.

Opening band playing various Fairouz songs.

Dima's accompanying pianist

The Situation in Nablus is... (part 2)

Tire fires in the center of Nablus near the old city.

Spend any time speaking to local business owners in Nablus and they will very quickly talk about the economic problems in the West Bank. In the last few years, prices have gone up and wages have remained stagnant. This has led to protests often directed at the Palestinian Authority and prime minister Salam Fayyad who has in turn offered to reduce taxes and subsidize certain fuel prices.

There is nothing normal or natural about the Palestinian economy and as Amira Hass points out, violence directed at the PA because of the economy if often misguided because in the end the West Bank’s economy is controlled and shaped by the Israeli Occupation. She mentions the Paris Protocol, which was signed as a precondition to the Oslo accords. This agreement prevents the Palestinians Territories from importing any goods directly and contributes to maintaining the price of certain commodities to almost the same price as those in Israel (despite the average salary in the West Bank being roughly a quarter of that of Israel). Hass also highlights some basic inequalities that cripple the economy of the Occupied Territories such as:

 - Israel is preventing Gaza from exporting agricultural and industrial products.

- Israel is exploiting to the fullest the natural resources of the West Bank: water, quarries, mining in the Dead Sea, agricultural land, industrial zones, tourism and hiking sites.

- Israel conducts unfair competition with Palestinian products: subsidized water for Israeli farmers, including those in the settlements, compared to a minimal allocation of drinking water to the Palestinians. When drinking water in Hebron and Bethlehem is supplied to homes once a month, it’s no wonder that the vegetable fields are parched. ‏(“Do you know how much a kilo of tomatoes costs? Eight shekels,” demonstrators in Hebron told me, as though they were talking about meat. “Do you know that we’ve stopped growing cauliflower?” said a farmer in Halhoul, angrily noting the Israeli cauliflower in the stall.‏)

Demonstrations have taken place all over the West Bank with the most violent ones in Hebron and Nablus. The crowd in Nablus was mostly young Palestinian men. Shopkeepers I spoke to will often mention the youth when discussing the economic problems. How long will they tolerate a system that offers them no bright future?

 Palestinian security forces in Nablus

Palestinian security forces in Nablus

The Situation in Nablus is…

While planning one’s first trip to the West Bank, it is hard to get a firm idea of what to expect. Recent published accounts by travelers refused entry and sent back also add to the unease of any person wanting to visit. Traveling to here can take on a strange and sometimes frightening form even after the plane has landed in Ben Gurion airport. Most westerners who want to volunteer or even visit the West Bank are often advised by experienced travelers to lie to customs officers and tell them that they simply want to visit the Holy Land. Any travelers in the West Bank who had planned to come before their departure will often share their stories of how they made sure to highlight their tenuous Christian links or beliefs or how they made sure not to pack any “political’ books and wiped their laptops of any mention of Palestinians. I personally spent 5 hours in the waiting room at customs and was even threatened with jail time by an Israeli security official if I didn’t cooperate. This sort of situation is enough to make any person’s imagination and level of paranoia reach new heights.

The truth is, everyone who can visit should visit Palestine. Not everyone can: if you are from a muslim or arab background and are not ‘westernised’ or affluent looking enough for the border agent’s taste, you probably will be turned back. If you are a Palestinian with a foreign passport, your chances of entry will be dictated by many factors often out of your control. Israel reserves the right to deny anyone access to the country and does not need to provide justification. When it comes to entering the West Bank itself, individuals with Israeli passports (either Arabs or Jews) are not allowed to enter areas under the Palestinian Authority’s control (known as Zone A). This creates a surreal world with different types of restrictions of access based on ethnic origins. The absurdity that foreigners are the ones with the most freedom of movement across all the areas and zones and lines is one that is not lost on many.

The last email I received from my contact in Palestine began with: “The situation in Nablus now is very calm and life is as usual.” This person was right. Once one finally gets here, Nablus seems peaceful and life looks quite normal. This is a far cry from what the average western traveler with no personal experience visiting might expect. Here are some scenes of lovely Nablus from the past week: