This was authored during my internship with the Palestine Israel Journal. Details of which can be found here. All views are my own.

So are you pro-Israel or pro-Palestinian? I think that question still
carries a lot of resonance in western countries and I’m sure you’ve
been asked it once or twice before. After all, we are led to believe
that this is a conflict of two sides: one agressive in trying to
exist, the other defiant in its right to resist. However, as I’ve
delved deeper into the history of the conflict and witnessed its
present day manifestations, I see such a conception as wholly
redundant. I accept that countries should be allowed employ measures
to keep their citizens safe, but the steps employed by Israel go far
beyond a collective ‘security interest’. They are instead a package
designed to exercise a complete stranglehold over Palestinian life and
ensure the viability of the prophesised ‘Eretz Yisrael’ – a destiny
all too undermined by an Arab inconvenience.

The West Bank is the battle ground for such pursuit and home to a
policy of oppression that no amount of Intifadas could justify. It is
here that I have spent my time trying to understand the reality on the
ground.

On Sunday, I paid my first visit to Bethlehem to see the the famous
Seperation wall / Security barrier (depending on whose circles you
move in). The commonly known ‘Apartheid Wall’ is a towering grey
monstorisity that is as much a physical as a psychological prison for
the Palestinian people. The wall was proposed in 2005 to stop
Palestinian terrorists from gaining entry to Israel. However, it also
serves as a thinly veiled land grab with the route the wall takes
cutting massively into land promised for a future Palestinian state.
It conveniently loops around to protect illegal Jewish settlements,
carves up indigenous communities, prevents access to land,
and annihilates local economies. It’s worthy of note that the whole
endeavour is completely illegal (The international court of Justice
has ruled it in contravention of Internationan law – a decision that
Israel casually ignored..), and is the source of much human suffering.
The humilating check point routine is one such example that those
lucky enough to gain access have to endure. It’s not uncommon for
Jerusalem workers to wait for up to two hours each morning and
evening to be given clearance by the same border guards that see them
every single day – and probably know of the slim possibility of them
having converted to Islamic Jihad between hours of Monday evening and
Tuesday morning.

 

But there have also been more sinister cases: including stories of women having to give birth in ambulances at checkpoints because the soldiers won’t let them pass; or tales of
checkpoint discrimination that is rife on long days in the sweltering heat. There have been numerous documented incidences of games that teenage soldiers have played to pass the day; including denying whole lines of people entry unless two Palestinian men kiss, or the degrading story of two border guards who randomly detained any male with gel in his hair. However isolated or speculative these incidences may be, the very enterprise of treating every Palestinian as a daily threat is an exercise that abrogates even the most basic civil rights.

Despite these injustices, a unique sense of hope permeates the
landscape. This was particularly present during my visit to the
Dhaisheh refugee camp (containing up 60,000 people, many who were
expelled by the Israeli’s in 1948 and have never been allowed back -
they literally have keys to front doors that don’t exist anymore).
When I arrived and spent some time with the kids, they had no desire
to dwell on their life under the shadow of occupation and instead
just wanted to play soccer with the foreigner and listen to my Ipod.
The Irish are really loved out here: partly because of our own history
of oppression, but mostly because of the amount of aid that we have given
them and number of peacekeeping troops we have provided to the United
Nations mission in Lebanon. 47 Irish soldiers have given their lives
in the pursuit of stability and whether people are aware of this personal
sacrifice there remains an unspoken warmth toward a country that has
given so much without a shred of selfish interest.

The hardships of the Palestinian people are borne out contextually, so
I was keen to visit as many West Bank communities as possible. Today I
went with an American friend to the Village of Bil’in in the outskirts
of Ramallah to observe a protest against the security
barrier. Not only have the residents had to live under the shadow of a
rapidly expanding Jewish settlement, they now face collapse after the
newly erected security fence prevented access to 2/3rds of their olive
plantations. Bil’in is a microchasm for the discrimination
palestinians face on a daily basis and because of this, it has come to
be a symbol of Palestinian resistance. Every friday after muslim
prayer, villagers and international activists walk from the main
square toward the IDF who stand behind a fortress of razor wire. The
IDF have a reputation for ruthlessness when dealing with
demonstrations – At last week’s protest in the neighbouring village of
Ni’lin, they used live ammunition to disperse the crowd (an 11 year
old boy was shot in the head and killed) and at his funeral three days
ago another child was shot (this time with a rubber
bullet) and is now paralysed. Suffice to say I was a little
apprehensive but nothing prepared me for what was to come next.

We had just arrived at the fence and started to watch the villagers
chanting slogans at the soldiers when a riot truck came screaming
down the road to confront us. Everyone thought this was a water cannon
but what was pumped all over the crowd was actually a chemical agent known as skunk. Everyone raced away from the fence and proceeded to
collapse and puke due to the unbearable smell. It was then that they
decided to fire volleys of tear gas at different sections. I’ve never
seen anything like it and still can’t describe the feeling at the time
and the physical effect it had on me for the rest of the day – All I
can hope is that my pictures and videos can do justice to the chaos
that ensued. This is the first time such a tactic has ever been used
by both the Israeli army and in conventional crowd control, and is currently
breaking news as I write this blog.

It’s now 11 hours later and I still don’t know what to think. To be honest I’m more bemused that they could do such a thing than angry that they actually did it. I spent most of the rest of the day joking about it with friends because it seems so bizzarre as to be untrue.

But the reality is that it did happen and all I can intelligently say
at this point is that represents dehumanisation at its worst, and also
brings the idea of shitting all over the Palestinians to a whole new
level.

Could you imagine what how we’d feel if the British used a chemical agent to disperse peaceful Irish protestors in the North? What’s most
worrying is not the levels that the IDF can stoop to, it’s the fact
that I can count of my right hand how many governments will openly
criticise this act, even when it was committed on their own citizens
abroad.

Pro or anti Israel? It doesn’t matter, they’re a law onto themselves.

This was authored during my internship with the Palestine Israel Journal. All views are my own.

The Jerusalem Experience: Fighting for Survival

Most folks I meet are sick of people like me. Sick of the middle-class westerners who arrives on their doorstep thinking they’ve got it all figured out. People who know the price of everything but the value of nothing. We know what equality and freedom look like and when we witness its absence, we are quick to roll out the Apartheid accusations. We know of the concept of proportional response and when we witness its blatant disregard, we are quick to label them barabaric. We can’t understand how Israel doesn’t see their relationship with the Palestinians as we do, as that of the Siamese twins whose individual survival is dependent on the other. We can’t understand how Israel pursues its freedom by trying to rid itself of the face of the other, instead of realising that they can only ever be truly independent and legitimate once the Palestinians are truly independent and legitimate too.

This is the very progressivism that a weary people hear all too often. We tell them that all they have to do is to honour a full right of return, dismantle all settlements, return to the 1967 green line, and give them East Jerusalem as their capital, and lasting peace will be reciprocated. Of course, these are all difficult concessions but unless they are honoured they will simply remain flashpoints for the very resentment that breeds another generation of freedom fighters.

And they say bullshit. Even if they gave them everything they ever wanted and more, there would still remain a toxic element that sees their very presence as the ultimate insult. Far from creating a safe and secure Israel, all they are doing is creating a viable enemy on their doorstep. Just as the town of Sderot has become the landing zone for Qassam Rocket attacks from a ‘free’ Gaza, so will West Jerusalem experience the same house warming present from the newly liberated West Bank – a land where destructive ideology will finally have room to flourish. Many Israelis will say that even though both parties are to blame, the fundamental difference lies in how far each would go if given the opportunity. If the Syrian, Lebanese, Egyptian, Saudi, and Jordanian armies were to disband tomorrow morning, do you really think Israel would use it as an opportunity to extend total dominance over the region? Now turn the tables and imagine if the IDF and America took even a three day hiatus. How do you think Arab nations would respond to such opportunism? More than likely there would be blood flowing in the streets of Tel Aviv with the idea of being driven into the sea becomes an all too fearful reality.

This isn’t a simple case of post-holocaust fear mongering, for they are surronded by enough present day examples. They look to the north at a Hizzbullah who fire rockets blindly onto the suburbs of Haifa with only one intention in mind: Destroy as many Israelis as possible. They remember what it was like to wake up and wonder whether it would be their bus that would be blown up during the Second Intifada. They wonder why they should ever make peace with a people who only fire and hope, making no effort to discriminate between soldiers and civilians or adults and children. So when Ahmajinejad proclaimed at a rally in Tehran: “We ask the West to remove what they created sixty years ago and if they do not listen to our recommendations, then the Palestinian nation and other nations will eventually do this for them,” Israelis tend to take him seriously – and so they should.

So what to do when only supreme vigilance guarntees your survival? Do you maintain the status-quo even though it’s a defacto policy of oppression? Many say that if it is has to be a trade off between their diminished livelihoods and our survival then so be it, one is far more important in the hierarchy of needs. So While 80% of Israelis (and the rest of the world) agree with dismantling the settlements, it is worth remembering they are actually a cornerstone to their survival. They give Israel an opportunity to monitor villages and towns from a panoramic height while preventing their sprawl into conurbations – the logic is clear, keep them small and in bird’s eye view, and you diminish the threat. Now why would anyone relinquish such an ability? Oh, because it’s morally injust and a source of resentment. But the reality is that Israel need not worry about how the Palestinians feel. They only have to concern themselves with preventing the ability to communicate such feelings. And when your are the dominant power, that is easily achievable; from covering protestors in shit, to targeted assasinations. As for morality, it seems to go out the window when you percieve yourself as being backed into a corner..

But apart from the unexpected positive implications, the nuance continues, with Israelis having almost as much to fear from their absence as their presence. Imagine when the times comes to honour a meaningul peace agreement and actually evacuate the settlements. Many of the people who reside there are those who have freely opted to live in a war zone surronded by a majority that hate them. They risk the very concept of a good life for a higher purpose, to fufill their Torah obligations and inhabit the lands of Eretz Yisrael. Consider also that most are legally armed with assault rifles and enough ammunition to keep surronding Arabs at bay. Do you think they will go quietly into the night? Imagine the scenario of teenage conscripted soldiers having to take hill top positions and remove their own people from a land promisd to them by god. Imagine them having to kill and be killed by their own people?? And even if they succeed despite the bloodshed, where will these settlers be relocated? And what is stopping them from launching their own terror campaign against a nation state that has lost all credibility in their zealous eyes? When people envisage peace deals, I wonder do they imagine a tomorrow more sinister than today, where one brand of fundamentalism replaces the other.

And this is why they look upon the outsiders with contempt. Because we can never appreciate the complexities that passions bring to the fray, nor the nature of the enemy they have to deal with. For the enemy they face is not a conventional one (although they have faced those on five occasions), it is one that moves within the people, acts through them, and remains inseprable in identity. I have berated Israelis on their laissez faire attitude toward collateral damage, but when your left in a a catch 22 situation between taking the ‘strategic asset’ and risking the possibility of civilian casualties, or, letting him off to strike another day, what do you do? It’s also worth remembering that this isn’t a situation that Israel invites. By and large, Hamas and Hizzbullah will fire their rockets from civilian populated areas, effectively using their communities as human shields (I must note that there have been many allegations that Israel employed a similar tactic during the 2003 incursion into Jenin).

Instead, Israel says that rather than the world criticising them for their use of asymmetric warfare, why not ask what you would do as a commander with a mandate to protect your people when faced with this situation? Why don’t you criticise the Arab communities for allowing a situation where their own people put their own people in such grave danger. The 2006 Lebanese war was lost in the media and not out on the battle field for this precise reason. Israel was forced to desimate much of southern lebanon becuase Hizbullah militants used to fire their rockets into Israel from apartment buildings in the region. What are you to do when left in that situation? Do you just stand back and let your country be exposed to a volley of rockets? Israel opted to strike back, but found their hands soon tied by international condemnation. It seems that it is difficult to play by the rules when the opposition greets them with as much contempt as they do you.

So where to from here? It all depends on which you value more: a manageable paradigm of perpetual conflict, or an insecure climate of justice? It worries me that Israel will continue to opt for the former, because when it comes to future options, there is only one reality they have ever known.