Visiting Khallet ad-Dab'ea:
This handsome plaque thanks a number of donors for their aid.
You'd have thought it's a great thing that Belgium, Ireland, Sweden... would all be standing in solidarity with indigenous peoples under threat of forced displacement, right? I ought to be happy, right?
Well, I think we should be hanging our heads in shame!
So it was a quiet morning in Tuwani, and a Belgian journalist came to visit. Getting Palestinan stories published is an arduous task for independent writers and filmmakers, but the activists in Tuwani are always generous with their time and energy. When I was offered a seat on the improvised tour, I immediately squeezed into the car.
We headed up to Khallet ad-Dab'ea, so into the active firing zone and to a village slated for demolition.
When you hear "firing zone" that sounds frighteningly dramatic. On the terrain, you realise how artificial this line on a map actually is. People live inside the firing zone, as they always have,
shepherds and their flocks move in an out of the zone, kids live in the firing zone, and walk every day to a school outside of the firing zone.
The thing that does strike you, once you leave Tuwani, is the presence of solar panels and water tanks. Palestinians living inside the zone are not allowed access to water or electricity
networks. (Zionist settlements and outposts inside the zone are not at risk of demolition and are on the grid, of course!)
The first farm we visited had been subject to destruction several times. The family living there has rebuilt again and again, but the attacks are getting more determined and frequent and they are
looking at a different solution, so they welcomed us, and gave us coffee... in a cave. These are farmers who use tractors, electricity from solar panels, refrigerators, mobile phones and tablets.
However, they are now refurbishing the caves that previous generations had used, as shelter from the assaults of the army of occupation.
Resistance in firing zone 918.
The pile of rubble in the middle is a mosque, destroyed 3 times and rebuilt every time.
The cistern and water tanks are vital,
as the occupation does not allow water to be piped to the Palestinian villages.
A little further, and we arrived in Khallet ad-Dab'ea, which is a focal point of settler and army attacks in the area. As a result, resistance coalesces here, and there is a rough construction which functions as a shared space for activists of all stripes. With a concrete floor, and tin roofing it is regularly used as a dormitory by people trying prevent demolitions, it served us as a conference room. Our journalist was given the background to the current struggle and we discussed geopolitics and, notably, the money flow to the settlements from Zionist charities, many of which are in the US.
On leaving, I happened on the plaque. On this building. To be honest, I don't know how much money was given, or for what purpose. I don't think it matters.
We (Europe and the UK) are arming and training the Israeli army which attacks the civilian populations in the areas it has occupied. Our freedom of speech to criticise this support is crushed (I'm thinking of the British anti-boycott law which has just been passed, and the measures taken by various French authorities to prevent discussion of Palestine.... etc ).
So what is the use of this ridiculous plaque, stuck on a shoddy building in the middle of a zone where war crimes are committed on a regular basis and ethnic cleansing is bombing people "back to the stone age"?
Shame on us.
My video is pretty pathetic too, but you get the idea!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=URCjy0OYH8k (select cookies at the foot of this page to play the embedded video)
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