Occupation and abuse

In the domestic violence movement, we talk about the cycle of abuse often, because it describes the often-predictable way that violence occurs in a relationship. There are a few stages. First, tension builds and it is clear that violence will happen soon, and perhaps any little thing can set it off. Then there is the violence or more obvious abuse. This could take many forms, like hitting and punching, verbal insults, public outbursts and humiliation, or maybe periods full of restrictions on mobility or isolation. Afterwards there is the "honeymoon period", when the abuser tries to play off the violence by apologies or explanations, or making promises (whether they are kept or not). Then tension builds again and they cycle starts over. These periods can last for long or short times, depending on the circumstances. The main point here is that interpersonal violence and abuse is not about random acts, but is a complicated scheme and a cycle. It's also important to remember that there is no excuse for this behavior - abusers make a choice to do these things and they don't happen by accident or coincidence.

I'm not trying to say the occupation and Israel's state violence against Palestinians work the same way as domestic violence. They are both separate things and very different. But since I've been here a few things have been happening that keep directing my mind towards cycles of abuse. First is that I can't help but to see every single person I meet as a survivor. Here, just about everyone has a story of violence, and living under military occupation certainly has its psychological effects. I am drawn to the work that I do in domestic violence because I admire other survivors and their strength. They are my biggest inspiration. I couldn't name it until I had been here for a week, but I'm finding that I feel the same way about Palestinians - comforted and inspired by their strength and ability to live on, and feeling the warmth and understanding that comes when survivors meet and gather. It's powerful.

Second, I can't stop noticing parts of Israel's complicated master plans that Jeff Halper of the Israeli Committee Against House Demolitions calls the "matrix of control", and thinking to myself "that's what abusers do". This matrix is a way to see how all the layers of the occupation work together (physical control, bureaucracy, and violence). The problem can't be defined as just the wall, just the violence of soldiers, just the settlements, or just the checkpoints and roadblocks. Instead, these tools work together in order to control every aspect of Palestinian daily life - jobs, education, health, economy, resources, mobility, psychology... everything at once. And in these master plans, I feel that some major themes in abusive relationships are also here. For example, humiliation - trying to break someone's spirit or pride by subjecting them to searches at checkpoints, or destroying someone's ability to support their family. Isolation - ruining support networks by separating families, friends and neighbors with barriers like the wall. Changing rules - not knowing the right or wrong way to go about anything because someone else is always making and changing the rules on you, depending on how they feel that day. And threats of violence - whether someone has been killed, injured, tortured, their home has been demolished, or they just know someone this has happened to, the message here is that anyone could be next, for little or no reason.

These tools are not all used by just the government, just the military, or just the settlers. Much of it is subtle. In the US we hear random short bites on the news about violence on the situation here, and we sometimes think about those incidents only in the context of themselves. I've been thinking about how the policies and actions of the Israeli government work in conjunction with the media and their worldwide public relations campaign in a way that muddles our understanding of what is happening here, or attempts to justify certain events. In this way we are encouraged to focus our attention where they want us to, and not see the whole picture - the whole matrix - as one master plan. But this is also part of the plan! The key here is that, like in interpersonal relationships, these events are never random, and we have to look at the whole cycle to understand it. All abusers make choices and know exactly what it is they are trying to do. This includes occupiers and colonizers.

The other day we talked with a woman, who told us how therapy is taboo and hard to find here, but she took advantage of it though when she was living in the US for a while. I can't imagine what it would be like not being able to let out that frustration and pain in some productive way. When people tell me their stories one after another, I imagine walking around in a land where everyone has Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) and little outlets. This is probably why the youth organizations I've visited have seemed so precious and crucial. The singing, dancing and drama groups allow youth a place to vent their emotions, and I imagine it feels powerful and relieving in the way that survivor support groups do back home.

People often ask survivors why they don't just leave abusive relationships. The answer is never as easy as the question sounds, and it always shows a real lack of understanding of how abuse works. There are many factors involved and, as we can see through the cycle of abuse and matrix of control, there are always plans in place to keep people exactly where they are. Imagine asking a Palestinian resident of the West Bank or Gaza Strip "why don't you just move somewhere else?" After listening to the emotional and often poetic ways that people talk about their land, their families, their struggles, their desires to live on, I can't imagine how awful that would feel. The solution isn't as easy as giving up some land and transferring some settlers around in hope of curbing violence. It's not about Palestinians giving in and accepting whatever measly portions Israel offers. I believe the solution is to interrupt the whole cycle and dismantle and stop the abusers entirely.

For more information on the "matrix of control" check out this and this.

Traveling notes

This morning in the taxi from Huwwara checkpoint (outside Nablus) to Qalandia checkpoint (outside Ramallah) we drove through about 4 "flying" checkpoints. This is when soldiers set up shop pretty much by parking a jeep in the street, and check IDs whenever they feel like it. They guy sitting next to me is a hospital librarian in the United Arab Emirates and we talked a lot about Nablus, Boston, health services, and why I was there. After Qalandia I got into a van (vehicles aren't allowed to travel through the checkpoints, you have to get out at them and get in another one on the other side. From Nablus to Al Quds this morning, I took 4 different vehicles). At a small checkpoint outside a settlement, a soldier much younger than me sauntered s-l-o-w-l-y over to the van, and took the IDs of everyone except myself. They rarely care about my passport in shared vehicles, although walking through checkpoints I always get asked what I'm doing there. There was a dispute over someone's ID or permit and he had to leave the van. The soldier then put everyone's IDs in some shack on the road and just started hanging out with the other soldiers, laughing and drinking water. We were parked on the side of the road for about 15 minutes, just waiting. It was clear that everyone was agitated but used to this kind of treatment. Finally, another soldier s-l-o-w-l-y sauntered back over to the van with the ID cards and we were cleared to go. Her fatigues were falling down so much I thought she might trip on them and fall onto the heavy M-16 slung over her small shoulders. I wonder if the young soldiers think this kind of treatment is funny and they are just trying to amuse themselves while they would rather be at the beach.

We met an international activist with an Israeli ID card last week who was arrested on her way to a demonstration against the wall. Soldiers told her it is illegal for internationals to be in "Area A", the small amount of land still mostly under control by the Palestinian Authority. This is a lie, but it seems this is increasingly an excuse by the army to keep internationals out of the West Bank. At some checkpoints I have been questioned and my bag searched, and at others I've walked right through. I generally answer their questions so vaguely that I'm not actually answering them. If pressed, I make up a lie. Overall, I am treated many times better than Palestinians are on their own land. With a US passport I am not subject to hours of intimidating questions or strip searched. Imagine being strip searched on your way to work, or never knowing each morning whether you will get to work that day or not - whether the roads or checkpoints will close that day. I have never felt so radically privileged in terms of simple acts of movement before.

Celebrating a prison sentence and Israel as the abusive partner

Tonight we ate chocolate to celebrate, because Mahmoud (age 13), was only sentenced for 1 year in prison. Today my host and her mother, Fayrouz and Laila*, traveled to Jenin to go to his court hearing. He has been charged with something absurd about going to a checkpoint in the mountains and trying to kill soldiers. Something that if anyone actually believed, they would never sentence him to just one year. Fayrouz feels that if he was older he'd be in prison for 20 years, because they tend to sentence older boys for much longer. So the decision today was good news for the family, though it's so surreal for me to celebrate a 1 year prison sentence!

I wandered around Nablus today with S, a fellow Bostonian, since we both had little to do at the organizations we're working with. I came home with watermelon hoping the sentencing news was good, and everyone was napping. Fayrouz called it the longest day in her life. On the way to Jenin the soldiers singled her out (a lot of resistance has come out of Balata Camp, and residents are often punished for it whenever they travel) and made her stand in the sun for 1 hour. It was incredibly hot outside. They let her stand in the shade for 5 minutes, but then ordered her back into the sun while they asked ridiculous questions that were already answered by looking at her ID card. They mostly wanted to know her brothers' names and ages. She told me she talked and laughed with 2 others who were waiting as well, because she didn't want the soldiers to know she was annoyed and that they had won. Still, when she finally made it to the court she told her mother the soldiers were taking her away and only sent her there to say goodbye. When her mother cried she announced that she was only joking. People have interesting (and amazing) sense of humors here.

S and I talked over tea after wandering around the center of Nablus and the Old City for hours. We are both involved in domestic violence work and discussed some of the similarities we have sensed between living under occupation and being in abusive relationships. I'm going to write more about this for a more formal reportback, but I'm glad I got to talk with him about it because I've been thinking it for over a week. Even though these situations are very different, I think the effects of not being in control of much of your own life are sometimes the same. Many of the major cycles and themes are here: isolation, humiliation, rules that change on you all the time, the threat of violence, etc. I'm going to make it a priority to discuss and write about this more, and survivors of abuse and violence in general. I think the "matrix of control" over Palestine and the "wheel of violence" we use to discuss the cycle of abuse can be looked at side by side and maybe correlating ideas about violence and survivors in general can be drawn. Yeah? No?

Also, I met this photographer yesterday, who's teaching photography to youth at the Medical Relief Center. Check out his photos - they're really powerful.

* Visit www.balatacamp.net and scroll down to the short video called "Our Sons". Laila is featured in it, talking soon after Mahmoud's arrest.

Learning about Nablus, the Medical Relief Committee, and the boy refugee

I have to admit, my first day or two in Nablus felt a little isolating. The language barrier kept me from conversations with the exception of one person, who is awesome but just can't fulfill my need for processing. But now I've spent 2 days at the youth center of the Medical Relief Committee, and today another group member from Boston arrived in the city for a few days. Fayrouz and I walked through the Old City with him and went to the most amazing spice shop in the world, where we hung out for a while and breathed in the smells, and then ate de-li-cious knafe. It was good to see more of the city, since this family rarely ever leaves the house at night, and now I feel a little less alone. There are a lot of possibilities here and tomorrow I'm going to wander around and buy lots and lots of food for the house while my hosts are in court in Jenin, supporting one of their sons in prison as he is sentenced for false charges.

The MRC is a really wonderful organization to hang around. Yesterday I met with three people who told me about the group and it's projects, and drank tons of tea. Not only do they run the ambulance service and medical response, but they are showing me a rural clinic this weekend that they set up for people who can't make it through the checkpoints to the city for medicine, and they have this radically holistic view about health issues under the occupation. During the beginning of the last intifada they had so many young volunteers who they taught first aid and other health-related things to. They ended up creating a center for the volunteers and it eventually turned into a broader center for youth in the community, and they now run a few summer camps as well. They teach english, photography, computers, dance, singing, equality between genders, and more. The idea behind it is that civic activities will help the youth deal with the hardships and violence of daily life, as there is little to offer in the way of psychological services, and that they will influence a new generation of leaders.

I read a quote in their annual report from one of the volunteer doctors. She wrote that a baby was brought into a clinic dehydrated, malnurished, and died from diarrhea. She said it took her 3 day to fill out the death certificate because her boss wanted her to write the baby died from those causes, but she knew the baby died from so much more - little access to education because of restricted travel by the army, inability to get to doctors on the other side of guarded checkpoints, poverty and little resources, and cultural norms that kept a woman from leaving the village alone to get help. She said that it was all of these things that really caused the baby to die. This is why the MRC exists and does the work that they do, with such a broad scope. I think this example is the heart of their analysis, and I'm learning a lot from them. I hope I can do some work at home to benefit them financially. They refuse aid from the US because they would have to signs contracts with strict rules about supporting terrorism. While the MRC absolutely denounces all forms of terrorism, they feel that the civic work they do is the way to stop it, not pulling precious NGO funds away and giving it to "security" budgets. In this way they are powerful leaders in their communities, because their principles are a model that other community orgs follow, and focus on their own self-determination and important work rather than let the US tell them how to work. They get a lot of donations from Europe. I really respect this and am in awe of this amazing operation they've pulled together out of so little.

Now everyone in the house is crowded around the book I bought today of Handala cartoons by Naji Al-Ali, and reading them to each other out loud. I can't understand the text, but the pictures pretty much speak for themselves.


Graffiti of Handala outside Balata Refugee Camp

Catching up in Nablus

My 18-year old host, Fayrouz, is sleeping on the couch next to me as her mother cooks dinner. I want to take a nap too, but I haven't been writing much and am really afraid of forgetting anything I don't record. I'm in Balata Refugee Camp in Nablus, after a week of traveling to many cities and villages in the West Bank and yesterday finally splitting with the group. The 6 of us are all now in different places in order to work and live in solidarity for two weeks. Tomorrow I will start working with the Union of Palestinian Medical Relief Committees, most likely shadowing them to learn about their work. Today I went to a demonstration at Huwwara checkpoint which included Palestinian women holding framed photos of their imprisoned family members, a lot of ambulance service people, and internationals who sat on the street in front of the army for a while.


Women at the demonstration with photos of their imprisoned family members.

I really want to write about every single Palestinian I met over the last week and every single place I visited or slept. I can't do this before dinner, but some stick out in my head more than others: Abu Samir, the 70-year old man who spent the day pushing concrete mix up a hill because the Israeli army doesn't allow him to use a car, and his daughters who run to school every day to avoid being hit by the rocks of the settler children across the street (sometimes they get hit). Ziad, the guy with an amazing sense of humor who gave us a tour of Saffouriah, the destroyed village his family is from and is not allowed to visit, while Israelis played around in the spring like it was always there for them. The youth of Ta'awon who asked us challenging questions in the hope that we will go home and change their situation. Munira, the poet who sang and recited her writings to us while offering J and I more food and hospitality than she was probably economically able to. And another Munira, in the village of Mas'ha, who's home we were barred from entering by the army, who have enclosed her home with the aparthied wall into an open-air prison and continually deny her family guests.

Some things have surprised me and some aren't surprising at all. Knowing that the international community has allowed the wall to be built is painful, especially once standing under it and listening to people explain how it seperates them from family, jobs, schools, water, olive groves, farmland, etc. The US media focuses on painting Palestinians as terrorists while ignoring the violence and human rights abuses of the army and many settlers, that are very apparent here. Living far away from Palestine makes it easy to read or think once in a while about certain issues of the occupation, but being here forces you to examine all the tools of the occupiers at the same time, all the time, understanding how they work together to control and isolate every aspect of daily Palestinian life into an apharteid system that is humiliating, violent and sad. We all allow these illegal and unjust things to happen, just by ignoring or not resisting them. I have a lot of work to do when I come back home. It's sort of overwhelming, but I'm looking forward to it because inshallah, when I return here again I hope to see change.

Daily life in Palestine

Marhaba (hello) friends,
I've felt so busy during this past week that I'm not sure where to start writing about all we've done and all that I've learned. I feel like I've gone through nearly all possible emotions since I've been here: sadness, anger, confusion, hope, happiness, warmth. The hospitality of the Palestinian people - who's daily lives include unnecessary violence and control on behalf of Israeli soldiers and settlers - have taught me a lot about struggle and survival.

There are many people I've met who I will never forget and who have taught me what it is to be Palestinian in just one short meeting. Munira, a resident of Beit Jala and a poet who works with a youth drama group, hosted myself and another B2P delegate in her 500-year-old home for one night. I think we all cried a little as she sang a song she wrote and read us her poetry. I will not forget what she told me about the pain of not being connected with her land - when she visits friends in other countries she cries for the first few days because she misses Palestine so much. She pointed to her arm and told us "If you cut me open you would see that Palestine is in every single piece of my blood". She has little, and still is the most gracious and hospitable host I've ever met in my life.

We also met Abu Samir, a 70-year-old man who had spent the day pushing thousands of pounds of cement mix up a hill to his house in Tel Romeida. This is because he needs a new solution to the wire fence that protects his house from racist settlers who live across the street, and have been cutting the fence apart. The Israeli Army does not allow him to bring the materials up the hill in a car, and coolly stands by watching this man and young boys make trip after trip. In his house over tea we learned that he is a very calm and peaceful man - he even invited a solider in to have tea with us. Of course they never come because they spend their time harassing his guests and do not take seriously his family's complaints of violence by the settlers. Two young girls in the house told us stories of being hit by rocks thrown by the settler children, and one of them was picked up and carried away once as some kind of joke. Abu Samir's family does not leave like their other neighbors have, because this IS their home, although it means facing daily violence.

Two days ago, in the village of Mas'ha, we attempted to visit a family whose house is enclosed by the wall, in what is basically an open-air prison. Soldiers, who claimed the area a "closed military zone", told us we could not enter the gate. The wall was to be built on the other side of the house, but settlers protested and now it divides the family from both the nearby settlement and from their own village. We walked through the gate anyway, because we have a right to be there and the family has a right to have guests. One soldier pointed his gun at us so we would stop. After arguing for a while, we walked back out with Munira, the woman who lives there, and sat on the road to talk. Our inability to visit her house is typical, as the soldiers often block the family from receiving guests. This irrational behavior is indicative of what it means to give guns and power and control to young soldiers who have been brought up seeing Palestinians as less than them. Harassment and humiliation like this unfortunately appears in most stories that I am hearing and I wonder whether this behavior would be tolerated at home. Munira sat calmly and quietly on the side of the road telling us her story. She appeared both tired and strong at the same time.

No matter how many sides or interpretations there are for this conflict, no amount of real or perceived fear can justify the devastation that happens to the lives of Palestinians daily. The wall, which Israel refers to as a "security fence", is in fact a tool of apartheid. It has never been clearer to me that it has nothing to do with security and everything to do with isolation and control. Day by day the wall is constructed to stretch over the land, dividing and conquering, and looking like a large snaking scar. In the process, homes are demolished, land is stolen, the economy suffers, and people are killed. Still, this scar does not heal any of the pain that the occupation has caused.

Everywhere we walk we are warmly greeted and welcomed, and challenged as internationals to do everything we can to stop this pain. Another group member talked about how powerful this is, considering that Palestinians tell us their brutal stories, host and feed us, and teach us about their lives, all because there is just a HOPE and a CHANCE that we can and will do something about it. I don't doubt our commitments and promises, but I do hope that Palestine solidarity work will grow within the international community, and my own communities back home, and we will continue to take seriously our roles in what is clearly apartheid and absolutely unjust.

From an email to friends today...

The group had all arrived by Sunday night to a Palestinian-run hostel in the Moslem Quarter in the Old City of Al Quds (Jerusalem). On Monday we started on an incredibly busy itinerary. I can't believe the amount of things we have done, people we met and places we traveled to in just the last 2 days. We're exhausted, physically and emotionally.

First we went on a tour with a guide from the Israeli Committee Against Home Demolitions (ICAHD). We rode through Anata and Abu Dis, by the Ma'ale Adummin settlement (one of the largest in this area) and to see the Apartheid Wall which Israel so casually calls a "security fence". It has recently been decided by the Israeli government that Anata will be
closed out of Jerusalem by the wall, meaning 55,000 Palestinians with Jerusalem ID cards will be walled out and most likely unable to travel through checkpoints without special permits issued by Israel.

We met Salim, a man who's house has been demolished 4 times over 7 years by Israel. The situation here is that after Jerusalem was annexed by Israel, building permits were no longer allowed. When houses are demolished to make room for settlements and the wall, the people who
lived there are forced to rebuild illegally (if at all), and houses built without permits are subject to demolition as well. Salim's house was rebuilt the last time into a peace center with the help of ICHAD.

Ma'ale Adummin looks like a resort compared to the small vulernable homes in Anata. In the Roadmap to Peace, agreed upon about 2 years ago by both Israel and the Palestinian Authority, no new buildings were to be constructed on Palestinian land. Still, some of the settlements we have seen are under construction to expand. This settlement currently houses 31,000, and plans to expand to 55-70,000.

In Abu Dis we met Salah, who's brothers and father lived together in houses as neighbors for years and years. The wall which has been constructed in Abu Dis and divides residents from their jobs and schools is scheduled to be completed in September. Salah is unsure what this will mean for his family, but he is already separated from relatives. He spoke to us in front of a hotel that was owned and operated by his family, and has since been taken and occasionally used by Israelis for interrogation. A road leading to a future settlement cuts through what was once his backyard and guest rooms in the hotel.

I want to write more about this public relations campaign of the Israeli government, and the spins that contort the truth, but I have to run and watch a movie then head to Al-Khalil (Hebron). I haven't even gotten a chance to tell you what we did yesterday in Bethlehem and the Dheisheh Refugee Camp, and the wonderful woman who's Beit Jala home I stayed in last night. But I do want everyone to know the biggest lesson I've learned so far: being here, it has never been more clear that the actions of the Israeli gov't have nothing to do with security as they say. The wall, the home demolitions, the ID cards, the separate license plates, the checkpoints, everything. This is about aparthied and it's really important to keep using that language so people will understand.