Palestine:

Israel’s
human rights
disgrace
Report of study tour undertaken by
Hon Sandra Kanck MLC
Australian Democrats
South Australian Parliament

11th - 24th January, 2007

 CONTENTS
Foreword

1.0 Israel and Palestine – the geography

2.0 Israel and Palestine – some history and the law

3.0 Movement restrictions

3.1 Checkpoints and Roadblocks
3.2 The wall
3.3 Permits

4.0 Human rights abuses

4.1 House demolitions
4.2 Arbitrary arrest
4.3 Detention without charge or trial
4.4 Racism

5.0 Discrimination and inequalities

5.1 Non-recognised villages
5.2 Water
5.3 Education
5.4 Health and health service
5.5 Housing

6.0 Destruction of means of financial independence

6.1 Expropriation of Palestinian land
6.2 ‘Settlements’
6.3 The right to earn a living

7.0 Provocation
71. Religious provocation
7.2 Rewriting of history
7.3 ‘Settler’ violence

8.0 Prospects for peace

8.1 Fatah and Hamas
8.2 Non-violence
8.3 The two-state solution
8.2 Right of return
8.3 “Oasis of Peace” – a possible model for the future

9.0 Conclusions and recommendations

Appendix 1: Itinerary

Appendix 2: Details of groups/people we met

Appendix 3: List of some sponsors of the groups we met

 Palestine: Israel’s human rights disgrace

FOREWORD

Essentially in support of the United States, and following the attacks in that
country on 11th September 2001 by members of Al Qaeda, a majority of
members of the South Australian parliament passed terrorism laws in December
2005. I was not one of that majority.

Such legislation, with its potential for abuse, is ultimately a band-aid measure,
and fails to address the causes of terrorism. Indeed no attempt appears to have
been made by the Australian government to address such causes.

The suppression by Israel of the people of Palestine, suppression strongly backed

by the United States, is often cited as a root cause of the terrorism.

For example the “Free Muslims” website, while criticising militant Muslims for
using this as an excuse, observes: “The issue of Palestine and the perceived
suffering of the Palestinians is the single most important issue that unites the
entire Muslim and Arab world. No issue evokes the passion of Muslims and Arabs
as much as the Palestinian-Israeli conflict. The Palestinian-Israeli conflict is so
important to Arabs and Muslims that every terrorist group from Morocco to
Indonesia that seeks legitimacy and a following, places the “liberation” of
Palestine at the forefront of their agenda. For example, recall that Saddam
Hussein responded to the world’s request that he leave Kuwait by insisting that
Israel first evacuate the West Bank and Gaza. Osama Bin Laden also invoked the
Palestinian issue to justify 9-11. Iran has made the Palestinian issue its most
important foreign policy priority since the Islamic Revolution of 1979. HAMAS,
Hezbollah and Islamic Jihad justify the murder of innocent Jews by adopting the
Palestinian cause.”

I was brought up as a Christian, and like many of my generation, was imbued

with the idea that the Jews were God’s chosen people. As a teenager, at the
time of the Six Day War in 1967, I was essentially “barracking” for the Israelis for
that exact reason. Thereafter, apart from hearing the occasional news item
about instability in the region, Palestine was not in my consciousness.

But my awareness changed, and I began asking questions about what was
happening there. And I was shocked to find out the history, and in particular
about the decision of a majority of the world’s developed countries to simply
impose a Jewish state on top of the people of Palestine.
The more I read and heard – about both the history and the current practices -
the more amazed I was that the world was knowingly allowing the continuing
perpetration of injustice.

In January 2007, I was one of 14 members of the Australian Friends of Palestine

Association who visited Palestine and Israel to examine the situation at first-
hand. I was shocked and deeply moved by what I saw and I want the world to
know what is happening to the Palestinians.

I am amazed that so many world powers turn a blind eye to the institutionalized
stealing of land by Israelis and the human rights abuses perpetrated by them
against the Palestinians.

The treatment of the Jews in Europe in the first half of the twentieth century,
culminating in the genocide perpetrated by Germany, led to the formulation of
the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. It is ironic to the most extraordinary
degree that those abused people and their descendants have in turn
systematically broken the majority of the tenets of that Charter in their quest to,
at best, marginalise and, at worst, destroy the people of Palestine.

For that reason, at various points in this report I have included quotes from that
Declaration and also from the UN Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, to
contrast Israel’s obligations against their practice.

The importance of language in the occupation and hostilities should not be

underestimated.

The colonisation of Palestine by the Turks and the British in the 20th century
continues to be practised by modern day Israelis using the more benign terms
‘settlements’ and ‘settlers’. For that reason I prefer to call them colonies and
colonisers, and wherever the terms ‘settlement’ and ‘settlers’ appear in this
report they will always be in quotation marks.

From time to time in the report I place ‘Israel’ in quotation marks for good
reason, and that is the uncertainty of the borders of that entity as they steal land
away from the Palestinian people.

This report is a summary of information provided to us through the meetings we

had, and, for the most part, I write in the first person to indicate my personal
opinion or interpretation.

The organisation of content in the report has been somewhat difficult – for
instance why did I not include the “right to earn a living” under the heading of
“Human Rights Abuses”? Simply, because so much of what is being perpetrated
by the Israelis are human rights abuses.
The title of this report is very deliberately chosen as a consequence of my
experiences and observations in Palestine: it reflects what is truly happening.

Whilst what we saw amply demonstrates apartheid and human rights abuses by
Israel, I do not wish this report to be used by anyone as a means of inciting
racial hatred against Jews. Many people of the Jewish faith do not support this
system and I salute the many Israelis who are working to expose and change it.

For that reason – except where I am directly quoting someone else - I have very
deliberately used the terms Palestine/Palestinians and Israel/Israelis, rather than
the more generic terms of Arab or Jew.

I thank the organisers of Australian Friends of Palestine for instigating this trip,
and I hope they will be able to keep undertaking such trips on a regular basis so
that others can see it all for themselves.

The logistics of our tour had been organised by the Holy Land Trust,
www.holylandtrust.org and I applaud their work in exposing tourists to the
reality of the daily lives of Palestinians.

Cover photo: Taken at a checkpoint on Palestinian land, in the depths of winter,

the first poppies – a symbol of hope – shine through and contrast with the razor
wire placed by the Israelis.
1.0 ISRAEL AND PALESTINE – THE GEOGRAPHY
Given that this area is related to so much unrest in the world, it is a shock to
discover how small is the combined land area of Palestine and Israel. It
stretches from the north to the south a distance of 420 km and from east to
west it varies from 10 to 110 km.

Geologically, almost the entire landscape is limestone, and this plays an essential
role as building material.

The soil is fertile, with Palestinians having traditionally cultivated cereal grains,
olives, citrus fruits, figs, bananas, almonds, dates, etc. The closeness to the
coast and freshwater lakes of so many villages saw fish as an important source
of protein.

There are no natural sources of oil or gas, and fuels must be imported.

With the Mediterranean as its western boundary, from the north and moving in a
clockwise direction, the surrounding countries are Lebanon, Syria, Jordan and
Egpyt, all Arab countries.

And herein lies the problem for Israel – so much of the Israeli population has
migrated from Europe and, to a lesser extent, the United States. While invoking
claims of historical occupation of this land, the Israelis do not acknowledge the
Arabic heritage they must have if their claim is valid. Rather, they see these
surrounding countries, and the Palestinians they subjugate, as the enemy.

Father Elias Chacour observed to us: “Israel must see itself as the 21st state of
the middle-east, rather than the 51st state of the US. There is a need to accept
that we are different but complimentary.”
2.0 ISRAEL AND PALESTINE – SOME HISTORY AND THE LAW
Preamble to the Universal Declaration of Human Rights: … disregard and
contempt for human rights have resulted in barbarous acts which have
outraged the conscience of mankind, and the advent of a world in which
human beings shall enjoy freedom of speech and belief and freedom from
fear and want has been proclaimed as the highest aspiration of the common
people.

Israel is a nation based on the ethnic cleansing of the Palestinian people backed
up by its own version of apartheid. It is not the apartheid of South Africa. At
least there, the white South Africans did not have separate and better roads to
travel on where blacks could not.

The history of Palestine in the 20th century and its status in the 21st century is
one based on colonisation – first by the Ottoman and then by the British
Empires.

This was followed by ethnic cleansing of the Palestinian people by Israel – chiefly
in 1948, but both before and since - leading to the current human rights abuses
and apartheid now being practised.

Like the British doctrine of “terra nullius” in regard to Australia, the establishment
of the state of Israel was based on a lie that Palestine did not exist. From that,
all of the other injustices flow.

In 1947, the United Nations’ plan for Israel gave the Jewish people 53% of the
land which was historically Palestine. By the end of the Six Day War,
Palestinians were left with just 22% of their land.

History shows that, following the ethnic cleansing of Palestine by Israelis in 1948,
80% of Palestinians fled from their land to bordering countries. Since that time
Israel has resisted a right of re-entry. The small remainder of Palestinians who
somehow managed to survive within the borders of “Israel” and who registered
to do so, were granted Israeli citizenship which has passed on to their
descendants.

However, they are not equal citizens. Instead they are specifically classified as
“Israeli Arabs”. Israelis refer to the Palestinians using the generic term “Arab” as
a way of continuing to ignore the rights of Palestine.

This inequality is demonstrated in the cases of married couples where one is an

“Israeli Arab” and the other a Palestinian. Israeli now prevents them living as a
couple in Israel, and there are difficulties associated with them living in the
Occupied Territories. This was cited again and again as we met and spoke with
Palestinians, and it is a very sore point indeed.
Protection of civilians is the major need. Protection is the cornerstone of the
Geneva Convention, but Israel is ignoring it. In terms of international law, the
Geneva Convention deals with military occupation but not modern colonialism.

One legal system is applied to the Israelis – civil law – and the other to the
Palestinians – military law. This is clearly an apartheid system.

Israel claims it has no army, just the Israeli Defence Forces (IDF) to “defend”
themselves. However, there is an increasing number of ‘settlers’ holding high
positions in the IDF, which, given the colonizing behaviour of the ‘settlers’ and
their record of violence and intimidation against Palestinians, is a cause for great
concern.

The IDF interprets and enforces military law –– there are almost 2200 military
orders, each one with the status of legislative law. The unfair laws are
interpreted by unfair judges.

When detainees face court, it is a military court with a military judge, a military
secretary, a military translator if needed, and a military prosecutor, all assigned
by thesame military commander from the same division.
(In the light of the processes Australians have noted in
regard to David Hicks, one wonders whether the Israelis
have taught the US or vice-versa.)

In theory, military laws are published (theoretically in

three languages, including Hebrew), but in the breach
knowledge of the laws is gained either via the media or
when someone is arrested. At the time of our meeting
with representatives of Al Haq, two weeks earlier they
had become aware of a military order which had been in
place for 50 days.

Visually, there is no substantive difference between the

IDF and police. Their uniforms were a different colour,
their Hummers were a different colour, but both groups
hefted machine guns during the course of their duties,
and both groups were represented on the streets by
unseemly young people who ought not to be expected at
18 years of age to be the deliverers of death.

Israel applies and observes laws as it suits them. We

were shown an Israeli-owned chemical and pesticides
plant at Tulkarem which is having health impacts on
local residents. But by locating in the West Bank, Israeli
environmental law no longer applies to the operators.
3.0 MOVEMENT RESTRICTIONS
Article 13 (1) of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights: Everyone has
the right to freedom of movement and residence within the borders of each
State.
Article 12 (1) of the UN Covenant on Civil and Political Rights: Everyone
lawfully within the territory of a State shall, within that territory, have the
right to liberty of movement and freedom to choose his own residence.

The movement of
Palestinians is restricted in
their passage to and from
Israeli territories and
within their own lands by
checkpoints, roadblocks,
fences and gates, the
apartheid wall and the
permit system.

The restriction of
movement reduces access
to education, health,
employment and social
facilities. It effectively is
paralysing civil life in the
West Bank and Gaza.

Roads connect all Israeli settlements in the West Bank so that Israelis do not
have to go through Palestinian villages. They are called “bypass” roads for that
reason. It is no wonder that so many Israelis have so little knowledge of what
their own government and its soldiers (their own children) are doing.

Eight of the twelve routes into Jerusalem are out of bounds for Palestinians.
Some Palestinians have to leave home as early as 2.30 a.m. in order to get
through the lineup at checkpoints and get to work on time.

Route 90, which is a major north-south route through Israel and Palestine, is out
of bounds to Palestinians. Despite the fact that many villages are on one side
and their farming land is on the other side, the Israelis have prevented those
effected Palestinians from even crossing the road. Up to 80% of Palestinians in
the Jericho region are impacted. Provided they can get through the checkpoints
using alternative routes, getting the 75km distance to the markets with their
goods takes farmers all day. If they miss the checkpoint opening at 4 p.m. they
will have to wait through to the next day.
The combination of checkpoints, roadblocks etc has added enormously to transit
times for Palestinians.

Figures provided to us about increases in travelling time for Palestinians include:

 Tulkarem to Nablus – no more than ½ hour in 2000, at least one hour
now;
 Tulkarem to Ramallah –90 minutes in 2000, now 165 minutes;
 Beit Ur to Ramallah – 10 minutes in 2000, now 45 minutes;
 Qatana to Ramallah – 15 minutes in 2000, one to 1½ hours now;
 Bir Naballah to Jerusalem – seven minutes in 2000, one hour now;

One Palestinian shop-owner I met in Jerusalem had lived with his wife in their
own beautiful home in Ramallah. Total travel time was 7-8 minutes to get to the
business in Jerusalem but, following the construction of assorted barriers, that
increased to up to three hours each way. The consequence was he and his wife
had to walk away from their house in Ramallah.

3.1 Checkpoints and roadblocks

After arrival at Tel Aviv,
the first obvious Israel
military presence I
encountered in Palestine
was the checkpoint entry
to Bethlehem. Although I
knew of the existence of
the checkpoints, I had
anticipated only that
checks would occur when
leaving Palestinian
territory to travel into
Israel. I had not
expected that checks would occur on the way into the ‘occupied territories’ as
the Israelis call them.

However, during the ensuing twelve days I became familiar with the process at
all checkpoints.

These checks usually consist of two stops. The first is at a guard house where
an Israeli soldier records basic information provided on demand about where the
travellers are from. When signalled from the next guard house, the vehicle is
permitted to move forward. This in itself is not predictable as the soldiers might
decide to stop and chat amongst themselves, and the driver simply has to wait
until given that permission – this might take 30 seconds or 30 minutes.

However, once this second step has been accomplished the soldier(s) on duty
may or may not request identification, may or may not order people to go
through the checkpoint on foot, and may or may not inspect the vehicle and its
contents.

The argument that this is done for security purposes is exposed for the lie it is by
its very randomness. At the time of our visit, the most recent successful suicide
bomber had passed through a checkpoint.

The falsehood of the security claim is further reinforced by the fact that most
checkpoints are actually inside the West Bank. Only 20% are a point of entry
from the occupied territories to Israel.

It is clear that the

chief purpose is to
intimidate and
reinforce a message
to the Palestinians of
subjugation by a
foreign power. The
randomness itself
creates uncertainty:
its unpredictability
and the arbitrary
implementation of
military law at the
whim of an individual
soldier can and does lead to tempers being lost, and occasional incidents at
checkpoints.

We experienced this unpredictability at first hand: on one occasion when we

reached the second guardhouse the soldier smiled at us as he entered the bus,
asked how we were, then wished us a good day and departed!

At the same checkpoint on a different day, the soldier on duty did not even have
the courtesy to shut the bus door after inspecting our passports!

On other occasions we waved our passports in the air, and on further occasions
the passports were all collected and taken away for inspection. This included the
movement permits of the bus-driver, our guide and the Operations Co-ordinator
of the Travel and Encounter section of the Holy Land Trust, Mr Ra’fat Shomali.
He had not been outside the ‘occupied territories’ for three years, but
accompanied us to northern Israel in order to see parts of the country that we
had asked be included in our itinerary, but of which he had limited knowledge.

He had applied for, and been granted, a three day permit that allowed him to
make this trip. On the third day, with his permit due to expire at midnight, we
arrived at the Jbarah checkpoint and handed over our passports and permits.
The permit was quite clear with its restrictions i.e. he was not to drive a vehicle
in Israel, nor to visit one specified location, restrictions which he had observed.
However, when he handed over the permit for inspection, the soldiers ruled that,
while the rest of us could travel through the checkpoint he had to get off the
bus. The reason given was that “everyone knows” that those on permits cannot
pass through this particular checkpoint.

We were told that the only checkpoint Ra’fat could pass through was at Ertah,
but George, our tour-guide, pointed out that the Ertah checkpoint was closed on
this particular day because it was the Sabbath. Ra’fat asked if the permit could
be extended to account for this, but this would have required contact with a
superior officer, and as it was the Sabbath the soldiers were not prepared to
disturb him. Catch 22!

Although we argued strongly with the soldiers about their interpretation, pointing
out the only two restrictions on the permit, no argument was accepted.

Had we left Ra’fat at the checkpoint (which was never a consideration by us), he
would have faced the real possibility that he would not be able to get back into
Palestine by the time of expiry of the permit, thus placing him in danger of
arbitrary detention.

After almost 35 minutes of initial waiting (all car boots and interiors were being
checked this time) followed by 15 minutes
of unsuccessful negotiation, we gave up,
deciding instead to turn the bus around and
go through back-roads to get to Bethlehem,
a journey which took an hour and a
quarter. We had been approximately 20
minutes drive away from Bethlehem, our
returning point!

Although frustrating, it was also

enlightening to experience what so many
Palestinians experience on a daily basis.

On an earlier occasion, when we departed

Bethlehem, Ra’fat was ordered to get out of
the bus and walk through the pedestrian
checkpoint, while the rest of us on the bus
were waved through. In solidarity with
him, we left the bus and joined him. Again,
an enlightening though not pleasant
experience.
 Walking through the area
was akin to being an
animal in a cage. The
Israeli soldiers are invisible
behind darkened glass,
barking out their orders
via a loud-speaker system.
The long-suffering
Palestinian residents took
it all in their stride, while
some in our group were
visibly upset by the verbal
abuse.

In addition to the
permanent checkpoints
there are ‘flying’ checkpoints, and at least 50 of these are set up every week in
the West Bank.

The delays at checkpoints impact in many ways.

Last year the Tulkarem Football Club, although winning a position in the football
finals, and on their way to play, were held up indefinitely at a checkpoint, thus
preventing them from playing - a bitter blow which can only have served to
heighten tensions.

Between 2000 and 2006, 69 Palestinian women gave birth at Israeli checkpoints,
while 34 had miscarriages. According to the United Nations, “35 newborn babies
had died at checkpoints as their mothers did not receive the urgent care required
by their condition and five women lost their lives while giving birth. In addition,
six pregnant women had been injured at checkpoints as a result of beating,
shooting, and use of toxic gas”.

Five birthing mothers dead, and 35 newborn babies dead at checkpoints – this is
surely a not so subtle continuation of the ethnic cleansing which began in the
early 1940s.

We were told of a family where, despite the elderly father being ill, members
were unable to get a pemit which would have allowed them to be together at
Christmas. When he died shortly after, his Bethlehem-based sister spent a whole
day getting a permit to allow her to attend her father’s funeral in Ramallah.

We were mightily impressed by the work of Machsom Watch, a group of around

400 Israeli women who are opposed to the Israeli occupation of the West Bank
and strongly supportive of human rights.
 In groups of two to
six, they daily visit
approximately 30
checkpoints in
Jerusalem, Hebron
and Jenin, on either
a morning or
afternoon “shift”.

They arrive in cars

that display a
Machsom Watch flag,
and, clearly
identified, they stand
at the checkpoint,
observe, take notes
and publish reports
on their website: www.machsomwatch.org. Where it is possible, they will make
contact with commanding officers when there are problems that might be
resolvable as a consequence of their intervention.

Their objectives are:

 Protest about the very existence of checkpoints that do not permit the
regular life of Palestinians in the Occupied Territories
 Documentation of conduct at checkpoints, and observation of behaviour of
the security forces – IDF soldiers, Border Police and Israel Police
 Protection of the human rights of residents of the West Bank who are
trying to pass the checkpoints, and assistance for them where needed to
the extent possible.

Their belief is “that quiet but assertive presence of women at the checkpoints
can complement and even replace the military dialogue prevailing in Israeli
Society”. When they are present, it is clear that Palestinians have shorter waits
getting through the checkpoints. They now spend more than $70,000 per
annum for travel to and from checkpoints.

Another group involved in monitoring the checkpoints is EAPPI, the Ecumenical

Accompaniment Program in Palestine and Israel, an outreach of the World
Council of Churches.

Roadblocks range from simple dirt mounds dumped across roads to substantial
concrete emplacements. In the West Bank alone there are more than 540 road
blocks.

These can appear overnight as earth-mounds, and it is best to assume that the
IDF has placed them and not take any action to remove them, because removal
of them incurs its own retributive action from Israel. We were told of a group of
three young men who were arrested for doing this, and consequently spending
three, six and nine months respectively in administrative detention.

3.2 The wall

Tzipi Lizni, Israeli Minister for ‘Justice’: One does not have to be a genius to
see that the fence will have implications for the future border.

The apartheid wall being constructed by the Israelis is something to behold. It is

three times as long as the Berlin Wall (now 750km) and up to twice the height.
It varies, but in some places reaches more than a metre in thickness. Sometimes
it is a fence, but usually too high to climb, with razor wire atop, or electrified.

The idea of the wall emerged when Ehud Barak was Prime Minister, but
construction started under Ariel Sharon, and is basically following the Sharon
plan. Now, Ehud Olmert says it is “the new course of the permanent border”.

Jimmy Johnson from the Israeli Committee Against House Demolitions (ICAHD)
says the wall does not address motive so it can never address the issue of
Palestinian violence. As a security measure it is ineffective as six of the last
seven Palestinian suicide bombers were intercepted beyond the wall.

Walls up to 38 km long prevent farmers from going across the road from their
homes to their fields. Farmers wanting to get through the gates in the wall (they
are opened, for example, three times a day for 15 minutes) have to apply for a
permit to access their lands, and the granting of such permits is arbitrary. So
too is the opening of the gates, despite advertised schedules. It appears that in
most cases they are opened for less than 50% of the advertised times.

Although we did not visit

Qalqylia, it was cited by
numerous people as an
example of the worst
excesses of the Israelis.
The wall now surrounds
the city, with only one exit
controlled by the Israelis.
The population has
dropped from 60,000 to
30,000 since the wall’s
construction. This is the
impact wherever the wall
is constructed – it is
turning villages into ghost
towns.
In July ’04 a unanimous decision of all 15 judges of the International Court of
Justice determined that the construction of the wall inside the borders of the
West Bank is illegal, that you cannot build your wall on another person’s land.
Israel thumbed its nose at the decision. Since then, further construction has
occurred.

The legal obligation of other states in response to that judgement ought to be to

not help maintain it, to indicate they do not recognise its status. But Israel is not
an upholder of international law.

One of the impacts of the wall has been

the financial devaluing of Palestinian
property. The home of our tour guide
had dropped in value by 75% since the
construction of the wall, the upshot being
that if he was forced to now sell the
house he would not get a return that
would allow him to repay his debt to the
bank.

Half of the 15,000 children living in Ar-

Ram are cut off from their schools by the
wall. The consequence is that 42% of
children and 42% of teachers have been
absent at least once because of the
barrier presented by the wall.

Peace groups and individuals from all

over the world paint murals of protest on
the wall wherever it is erected. A website
worth viewing to find out about Israel’s
plans for wall construction and activism
against it is www.stopthewall.org.
The wall stirs deep emotions
3.3 Permits
There are many ways in which Israelis control the movement (and lives) of
Palestinians.

Cars with green licence number-plates are prevented from travelling into
Jerusalem.

There is a new law banning Israelis from having Palestinian passengers in their
cars on specified roads. As was said to us, change that to ‘white’ and ‘black’ and
we would have a situation of black people being unable to travel in cars on
whites-only roads – a situation that did not ever arise in the worst times of South
Africa’s apartheid.

Except for ‘Israeli Arabs’, most Palestinians are prevented from going into ‘Israel’.
So when Palestinians subject to Israeli search and arrest raids are incarcerated in
Israeli prisons, their families cannot visit them.

Palestinians from Gaza who visit the West Bank cannot even stay overnight in
what is their own country.

In the Hebron Governate, the ‘bypass’ roads allocated for exclusive Israeli use
effectively divide the land into six. On either side of the road is a 150m buffer,
and Palestinians are prevented from entering these buffer zones.

Where the apartheid wall separates farmers from their lands, they must seek
permits to allow them to travel from one side of their own land to the other. We
were told of a farmer who got a permit that allowed him to cross to harvest the
olives from his trees. However, his permit did not allow him any other access to
the trees for the rest of the year. This meant he was unable to prune the trees,
an important part of keeping them fruiting properly.

A Palestinian man I met in

Jerusalem told me of the
difficulties he was facing,
because of the permit
system. He had been
married for five years, yet
his parents-in-law had
never been able to visit
their house and see their
daughter. If they were to
come to Jerusalem and
their daughter dared to
offer to pick them up, she
and they could be
imprisoned.
With a young daughter already, his wife was expecting twins in April, but was
experiencing some complications, including bleeding, so she was having to spend
all her time in bed. The man was having to do all other housework, including
preparation of the morning and evening meals, and leave food prepared for
daytime eating for his wife and pre-schooler before going to work.

He had applied to the authorities to allow his mother-in-law to come to stay at

the house until the babies were born. The response of the authorities was a no,
with the advice that he could look after her. This he is doing, but at a financial
cost to the business, as the only way he can do it is to arrive late to his business
in the morning and leave early each day, which impacts on his income and
financial capacity to support a wife and what he hopes will be three children.
4.0 HUMAN RIGHTS ABUSES
Preamble to the Universal Declaration of Human Rights: … it is essential, if
man is not to be compelled to have recourse, as a last resort, to rebellion
against tyranny and oppression, that human rights should be protected by
the rule of law.

The use of the term ‘apartheid’ is not new in relation to the system imposed on
the people of Palestine. However, the release of his book “Palestine: Peace Not
Apartheid” by former US President, Jimmy Carter, at the time of our visit, has
highlighted the term (and enraged many Israelis).

He describes what is happening as “a system of apartheid, with two peoples

occupying the same land but completely separated from each other, with Israelis
totally dominant and suppressing violence by depriving Palestinians of their basic
human rights”. The Israeli Committee Against House Demolitions also calls what
is happening apartheid.

It is demonstrated in the control by Israel of the movement and passage of

Palestinians. Such control is exercised by checkpoints, road-blocks and the
apartheid wall and reinforced by random acts of terrorism by Israeli soldiers,
violations of human rights, assorted discriminatory laws and practices,
institutionalised inequalities and continued provocation and abuse.

It was amazing to see so many vehicles travelling throughout Israel with logos
on their vehicles identifying the many aid agencies that work with the Palestinian
people. Do the Israelis understand that this is an indication that something has
gone seriously wrong on their watch?

There are, for instance, 14 UN agencies working in the occupied territories, but
there is no capacity building occurring, just crisis intervention.

Surely Israeli citizens are, at the very least, embarrassed by a publication (from
the Arab Association of Human Rights) entitled “Annual Review of Human Rights
Violations of the Arab Palestinian Minority in Israel 2005”? This was the second
annual review, and no doubt a third one must be in the making. That any
‘advanced’ country could think it is acceptable that human rights abuses are so
frequent and so obvious they can be quantified in an annual report defies
rational thinking.

Just one of these abuses on its own might not be insurmountable, but when
combined with others, the situation occasionally reaches a breaking point. There
could be good argument made that this is the design and the purpose because
any expression of the frustration and anger that must result provides justification
to Israel to place still further restrictions on the basis of their need for “security”.
4.1 House demolitions
The UN Declaration of Human Rights lists housing as a basic human right, but it
is not one accorded to the Palestinian people by the Israeli occupying forces.

In the first instance, a Palestinian cannot build a house unless the land has been
re-surveyed (see 6.1, “Expropriation of Palestinian Land”). If that hurdle is
passed, the next one is infrastructure – if that is lacking the house cannot be
built.

But, assuming that hurdle is met, the next is to produce title-deeds showing that
the land belonged to the family during the British and Turkish occupations.
Many Palestinians are unable to do this as their ancestors, despite (and because
of) the land belonging to them for generations, did not take that administrative
step.

But for those who have passed the first three, the next hurdle, given the income
levels of many Palestinians is prohibitive – the outlay of $22,000 for a building
permit.

This effectively means that many Palestinians cannot build a home, leaving them
with little choice but to break the law in the process of constructing their homes.
What sort of a law is this?

It is a law however that validates the IDF razing the homes that have been
“illegally” constructed. To rub salt into the wounds, the Palestinians are then
charged for the cost of demolition!

But more houses are built

each year than able to be
demolished because of
limitations on the
demolitions budget.

18,000 houses have been

demolished since this
practice was implemented
and the Minister for the
Interior recently
announced plans for the
demolition of another
42,000 homes.

In the past there have been instances in which houses have been deliberately
collapsed with a Palestinian person(s) still in it – this is the least common form of
demolition. There is also “punitive” demolition, which occurs because the house
belongs to someone who has an association with a person who has been classed
as a terrorist by the IDF (this policy has basically been halted as it resulted in
recriminations against Israelis).

Another basis for demolition occurs when the military demands it on the basis of
“security” (e.g. 256 houses were demolished in the Jenin refugee camp to make
a pathway to ensure easier IDF access).

In Jerusalem alone, at the time we were there, more than 3500 Palestinian home
owners had been given demolition orders.

Volunteers in the Ecumenical Accompaniment Program in Palestine and Israel are

sometimes called on to
intervene when a house is
scheduled to be
demolished, although they
are not allowed to place
themselves in front of
bulldozers. A volunteer
told of her experience two
days earlier, when ICAHD
contacted them about a
family (wife, husband,
grandmother and five
children) who had
received four hours notice
that their home of six
years was to be demolished. The reason? It stood in the way of construction of
the apartheid wall.

Twenty-five people turned up at the site, with an Al-Jazeera reporter in tow.

Their subsequent negotiation with the soldiers and 13 other Israeli support
personnel revealed the lack of an appropriate written order. This bought time for
the family, but it also has given an opportunity for ICAHD to seek further delays
and for the family to have adequate time to remove their possessions. Without
this intervention, the home, with all its contents would have been demolished.

4.2 Arbitrary arrest

Article 9 of the UN Declaration of Human Rights: No one shall be subjected
to arbitrary arrest, detention or exile.

At the time of our visit there had been a serious increase in ‘search and arrest’
raids by the IDF, with some places experiencing this on a nightly basis. Around
100 search and arrests are made in the West Bank each week, resulting in more
than 36,500 detentions per annum.
Palestinians can be arrested for belonging to a political party - any kind of
association is illegal, including student or professional associations, with a
potential prison term of up to 20 years.

All political symbols are illegal, as are all political materials. For instance,
possession of a book containing a list and the text of all the UN’s decisions about
Palestine – even if it had no commentary - would be illegal, and it would be
illegal to print, distribute, sell or read such a publication!

Waving a Palestinian flag could see a jail term imposed of seven years.

A Palestinian police officer can be arrested for possession of a gun!

Some schools have military attaches, and students as young as 13 are being
arrested by them.

Construction of the apartheid wall began in the Bethlehem area in 2000. In the
ensuing six years, more than 400 minors were arrested – some for playing
football on land where the wall was designated – and more than 70 children
were injured.

4.3 Detention without charge or trial

Article 9 (2) of the UN Covenant on Civil and Political Rights: Anyone who is
arrested shall be informed, at the time of their arrest, of the reasons for
his arrest and shall be promptly informed of any charges against him

Since 1967 over 700,000 Palestinians have been arrested or detained out of a
population of 3.8 million. Forty percent of male Palestinians have been
imprisoned at least once. Approximately 10,500 were being detained at the time
of our visit, including 360 minors, and 780 were being held under administrative
detention. Such incarceration can be routinely extended six months at a time,
with the longest period of time for any prisoner in this category being eight
years.

When initially arrested a person can be held for up to eight days without charge,
and this can be extended to 180 days for the purposes of interrogation.

While in detention, visits from family can, and frequently are, refused. Isolation
and torture are not unknown.

Al Haq observed to us that this detention is not about crime, but about targetting
and wearing down a population so that they question whether resistance to the
Israeli occupation is worth it.
There have been 169 deaths in custody since 1969, i.e. 4 deaths p.a. However
these are only the official figures and it may be higher. Many emerge from
imprisonment emotionally and mentally scarred.

4.4 Racism
Article 2 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights: Everyone is entitled
to all the rights and freedoms set forth in this Declaration, without
distinction of any kind, such as race, colour, sex, language, religion, political
or other opinion, national or social origin, property, birth or other status.

In relation to the Palestinian people,

Israel fails on all but 1 or 2 of the
above.

As a “race”, Israel is not one. The

discrimination I heard about and
observed while I was there was often
based on the physical appearance of
people. In the study tour group with
which I was travelling, those who
were held up by the IDF when
entering the country, despite having
Australian passports, were those of a
semitic appearance.

It might sound counter-intuitive, but

with so many Israelis having
migrated from Europe, a large
proportion have quite fair skin, and I
observed Israelis being blatantly anti-
semitic towards Palestinians.
5.0 DISCRIMINATION AND INEQUALITIES
Article 25(1) of the UN Declaration of Human Rights: Everyone has the right
to a standard of living adequate for the health and well-being of himself and
of his family, including food, clothing, housing and medical care and
necessary social services …

Clause 25 of the UN Habitat Agenda: Equitable human settlements are those

in which all people … have equal access to housing, infrastructure, health
services, adequate food and water, education and open spaces

According to the Arab Association for Human Rights, there are four basic types of
discrimination being visited on Palestinians:
 legal discrimination, where privilege is given only to those of Jewish origin
e.g. the right of return;
 covert discrimination where criteria are set which clearly will not be able to be
met by a Palestinian e.g. the requirement to have done Israeli military
service;
 institutional discrimination e.g. when a decision is left to the absolute
discretion of the relevant Minister;
 the discrimination of institutional racism e.g. Palestinian homes being
destroyed while Israeli homes are being built.

Access to infrastructure is considered an essential requirement of a civilised

society, yet in 2006, the Israelis destroyed $46m worth of infrastructure in Gaza
alone! Land was levelled, bridges taken out, water infrastructure incapacitated,
and homes destroyed.

Some of the bombing was pinpoint.

Photos of an electricity sub-station
show the six transformers destroyed
and the rest left standing. With no
electricity, water cannot be pumped
into towns and villages, nor can
sewage be pumped away. Apart
from the problem of the resultant
water shortage, diarrhoea rates
went up because of the sanitation
problem.

The Palestinian population is

growing at a faster rate than the
Israeli population, and, at current
fertility rates, Bethlehem will have
the same (extreme) population
density as the Gaza strip in just ten
years because the Israelis prevent any outward expansion of Palestinian villages,
towns or cities.

In Jerusalem, Palestinians make up 35% of the population and pay 33% of the
tax base, which sounds very fair until one becomes aware that the Palestinians
receive only 11% of the services. This results in poor quality roads, limited
sewerage and no rubbish collection in some areas.

Their contribution to taxation revenue is all the more astounding given that 60%
of Jerusalem Palestinians live below the poverty line.

Despite the imbedded inequality, Palestinians have no choice but to pay up, as
provision of movement permits is dependent on the payment of taxes.

Inequalities exist in access to land. ‘Arab Israelis’ make up 20% of the Israeli
population, yet they own just 2.5% of the land.

5.1 Non-recognised villages

In 1965, Israeli law determined that there were 123 Arab communities, with very
tight boundaries: no new community has since been approved, despite an
eightfold increase in the Palestinian population.

We visited the Palestinian village of Ain Hod, as distinct from the Israeli village of
Ein Hod at the base of the hill, appropriated by the Israelis from the original
Palestinians. The Israelis, through their terrorism following the declaration of the
State of Israel in 1948, had forced the villagers to flee to refugee camps. The
villagers were told in 1951 that they could not return, as that land had been
declared ‘agricultural land’ or a ‘military zone’, and homes were bulldozed to
make way for a road that was never built.

The existence of the village is not recognised by Israeli municipal authorities, and
the consequence is that they are entitled to no infrastructure, be it water,
electricity, roads or schools.

The cows and the goats belonging to Israelis have water, but the people of Ain
Hod and other unrecognised villages do not, despite having to pay tax. Similarly,
as we travelled through Israeli territory we saw intensive farming with electricity
available to the sheds where cows were being fed, yet that same electricity is
denied to thousands of Palestinians.

The ‘settlement’ of Ein Hod is provided with all infrastructure and facilities, but
none are provided to the village of Ain Hod.

In 2006 the Israeli authorities advised that Ain Hod would be recognized, but
only the existing houses would be allowed, and it will be confined to the
boundaries set by Israel. Nevertheless, they are leading the charge for the many
unrecognised villages, and now even have a representative on the municipal
council.

More than 100,000 Palestinians live in these unrecognised villages.

5.2 Water
Ariel Sharon: People generally regard June 5 1967 as the day the Six Day
war began. That is the official date. But, in reality, it started two-and-a-half
years earlier, on the day Israel decided to act against the diversion of the
Jordan. While the border disputes between Syria and ourselves were of
great significance, the matter of water diversion was a stark issue of life
and death.

Israel extracts 85% of the water from the West Bank aquifers. The city of
Bethlehem sits on an aquifer that also supplies Jerusalem, but the residents are
not allowed to access that water. Rather, it is provided back to them at a cost
eight times that of an Israeli resident in Jerusalem.

The route of the wall is such that Palestinian wells fall outside this new
boundary. The wall in the north-west of the West Bank now cuts Palestinians off
from their water supply.

Water is managed by the military. Palestinians are not permitted by the Israelis
to build water infrastructure so the installation of rainwater tanks is illegal.

We were told by a representative of the Palestinian Hydrological Group that

water is both a political and a human rights issue, with Palestinians being entitled
to just one-third the amount of water that an Israeli is allowed.

A large protest held in Jerusalem in 1993 about unrecognised villages resulted in

some of them gaining a right to water, provided the villagers paid all costs of the
pipes and their installation.

Thirty percent of Palestinians have no water supply, 8% manage to have running

water for two hours per day, while another 18% have pipes but with no water in
them. In addition the Palestinians pay, on average, four times as much for the
same amount of water.

But, not content with that, Israeli ‘settlers’ have even poisoned some of the wells
that Palestinians have accessed.

The drinking water in Gaza is unfit even for agriculture! Salinity and nitrate
levels, and on all other counts the water does not meet WHO standards. That
water is being charged at the rate of $1.10 per cubic metre.
Israel takes 75% (200,000 cubic metres per day) of the water from the Jordan
River, the levels of which are dropping rapidly, with water being denied to
Palestinian farmers. The Dead Sea, into which the Jordan flows, is now
effectively two separate lakes because of the declining water levels.

I ask myself how is it that “security” is used by the Israelis as justification for
restricting access to water by Palestinians.

5.3 Education
Article 26(2) of the UN Declaration of Human Rights: Education shall be
directed to the full development of the human personality and to the
strengthening of respect for human rights and fundamental freedoms.

Palestinians recognise the importance of education, and the people of Kusser

Yassif were extraordinarily proud of their academic record, telling us that they do
better than Israelis in that region.

In the town of Ibillin, Father Elias Chacour was responsible for building a school
– against Israeli wishes and despite the legal attempts to have it bulldozed –
which now caters for 4500 students, 60% of whom are Muslims.

These successes are achieved in the face of great difficulties in providing that
education.

In the village of Kusser Yassif, we visited the Greek Orthodox Church, where we
were shown a completed school building which is unused after a number of
years, because the Israeli government will not give approval for it to be opened.
This is not uncommon, despite a shortage of 6000 classrooms across Palestine.
The official reason given is usually that the construction is not good enough,
although clearly this is not the case.

Israel allocates $1100 p.a. per Israeli student compared to $190 for a Palestinian
student. The outcome is not at all surprising: 58% of Israeli students complete
secondary education as compared to only 38% of Palestinian students.

31% of Israeli students go on to university study, compared with 13.4% of

Palestinian students.

We visited Al Quds
University, which the
Israelis are
attempting to strangle
by wall construction
and checkpoint
placement, plus other
administrative measures. The University was inside Jerusalem’s municipal
boundaries until the construction of the wall. Now it is in the West Bank.

Financing of the university is unpredictable. The European Union had been

providing up to 75% of the funding, but this was scaled back with the creation of
the Palestinian Authority (PA). The Gulf States had also provided funds, but that
stopped at the beginning of the Gulf War. In 94/95, Israel gave money to the
PA and the university was told to ask them for the money. For various reasons,
that was not made available. The University has instead had to borrow money.

Students attending Israeli universities have access to a student loans scheme,

payable after graduation once earning income, but students attending Al Quds
have to pay upfront. The five major Israeli universities receive 70% taxpayer
funding. Nothing is available for the Palestinian students at Al Quds.

The consequence is that an Israeli student studying at a Hebrew university is

likely to be paying less than a Palestinian student at Al Quds, despite the poverty
statistics showing that the Palestinians will generally be much less well off to
begin with.

Completing a degree can be problematic, given the hurdles placed by the

Israelis. One of the academics told us that, prior to the wall construction, he had
a four minute drive from his home in Jerusalem to get to the university (which
was in Jerusalem). It now takes 35 minutes.

Flying checkpoints are a

major problem especially
those located close to the
university. Girls wearing
hijabs have particularly
been targeted by the
Israelis on the pretext
that they could be
suicide bombers. And,
since the second intifada,
there are more girls
wearing hijabs: one of
the consequences of the persecution has been more women becoming devout
Muslims.

Because of delays at the principal checkpoint, students are often late for classes,
and completion of courses becomes problematic. During the intifada, when
students had important exams to attend, they scaled the nearby hills in order to
get to the university on time, and soldiers used tear gas on the students.
 The University has had to
schedule extra classes,
extend the length of time
to complete subjects, and
reschedule exams as a
consequence of the
checkpoint delays.

The Israeli authorities

have been trying, through
administrative means to
close the university down,
and the university has had
to resort to threats and
court action. This has
been going on for almost seven years.

In the Tulkarem area, during the second intifada, the Israelis killed all the
animals in an agricultural college.

5.4 Health and Health Services

When it comes to health, the Palestinians receive a raw deal.

The infant mortality rate amongst Palestinians is 8.4 deaths per 1000, whilst
amongst Israelis it is 4. The survival rate for women diagnosed with breast
cancer is 64.4% for Palestinian women, while for Israeli women it is 72.8%.

At a pesticides factory in Tulkarem, when a west wind blows –which directs

fumes to Israel – production stops. But when an easterly wind blows – which
means the fumes are directed towards Palestinian villages – production
continues. Not surprisingly, there has been an increase in respiratory and skin
diseases in Tulkarem.

Palestinians have difficulty accessing health services because of Israel’s

restrictions in funding to the Palestinians, so seriously ill people attempt to
access Israel’s health services. This will, for instance, require a permit to visit a
hospital. The decision-making has resulted in decisions such as a child with
leukemia having to attend a hospital without his/her parents, or for parents to be
able to take the child but have limitations placed on their ability to stay with the
child.

In Nazareth, hospitals are struggling for funds, relying on donations and

volunteers. A Swiss company recently donated money for a new building, but
the Israeli government is charging 17% VAT on the donation, an amount that
this struggling health system is unable to afford. Despite negotiations, the Israeli
authorities are refusing to budge.
The mental health of Palestinians must be placed under severe strain.
Palestinian children develop with violence all around them. Some find their
homes invaded by Israeli soldiers, with parents or siblings taken away or even
shot in their sight. Others live in areas where settlers stone their houses.

In the last 7 years, 900 Palestinian children have been killed by Israeli troops and
16,000 injured, 750 of those being left permanently disabled.

During the first Intifada, Israeli soldiers shot at the upper storeys of homes in the
Aida Refugee Camp. Every family was directly impacted by having a family
member killed, injured or arrested during that time!

As recently as last December in the Aida Refugee Camp two children playing on
the roof of their home were shot at. All of these children are fearful of sleeping
in the upper rooms of their homes because of the possibility of such terror. We
were told of children wetting their beds at 12 years of age as a result of what is
clearly Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder.

As an example of what that sort of brutalising does, during the second Intifada,
Israeli soldiers shot and killed a mother in front of her five children, who were
told by the soldiers this was done because their mother was a terrorist. Those
children do not see a future for themselves in which they grow to be adults.

160 NGOs are providing primary health care services to Palestinians. Because of
increasing poverty, food aid is currently ten times what it was in 2000. But
Israel appears to not be able to see that something shameful is happening.

5.5 Housing
Nazareth, which is part ‘Israel’ is surrounded by Israeli townships, and the
Palestinians who live there are prevented from expanding their boundaries.

In Palestine, the wall prevents any outward expansion of population, but then
the Israelis will not give permits to continue any upward expansion of the
existing buildings of the Palestinians.

We did not visit Tulkarem, but were told that the refugee camp has 16,000
people living in one square kilometre. This increasing population density in all
areas of Palestine was an issue brought to our attention throughout our trip. It
is a situation that can only get worse.

More than 520 Palestinians villages were first depopulated then destroyed in
1948 in what Palestinians call ‘Al Naqba’ – the disaster. The following website
provides a clear picture of how widespread that form of ethnic cleansing was:
http://www.alnakba.org/villages/villages.htm. Numerous refugee camps sprang
up in response to that eviction process.
In close proximity to the city of Bethlehem are three refugee camps comprising
of people from 30 villages. The refugee camps which were established by
human rights agencies in 1948 were originally tents, but with the persistent
refusal over time by Israeli authorities to allow Palestinians to move back to their
homes, basic huts were built to replace them. Now, more than 50 years on with
no foreseeable prospect of returning to their homes (should they exist) and land,
houses have been built in their place.

The Aida refugee camp,

which we visited,
houses 4500 people
(2000 of them children)
with origins in 27
different villages; it
covers an area of 6000
sq metres, with a
population density of
1.5 square metres per
person.

A month before we
arrived, soldiers shot
two children playing on
the roof of their home.
A week before our visit, 10 children
were arrested. This is part of a
pattern. During the second intifada,
23 residents were killed by Israelis
and many were arrested, including
children. The trauma of 1948
continues.

Last year the apartheid wall was

completed in this area, with the wall
now abutting and going through
part of the camp. It was callously
routed through the middle of a
centuries-old olive grove, with the
trees being yanked out of the
ground, and then routed so as to
cut off the very limited open space
that had been used by the children
for recreation.
From “Letter Without Borders – To Whom Could Have Been My Friend”
(written by a 14 year old girl from the Aida Camp): How could you live here
in your Settlement, which was small, and then expanded without limits to eat
my camp’s playing grounds. You see, my friends and I used to play in what
used to be our park until you came here. It used to be our breathing space,
our playing ground, our woods, our fresh air. You see, you have stolen my
right to sit underneath my olive, almond and apricot trees. You have stolen
my right to just listen to the sounds of the leaves in the wind and the singing
of free birds.
6.0 DESTRUCTION OF MEANS OF FINANCIAL INDEPENDENCE
Clause 25 of the UN Habitat Agenda: … (equitable) human settlements
provide equal opportunity for productive and freely chosen livelihood; equal
access to economic resources, ,,, the ownership of land and other property …

Since 2000, poverty in the occupied territories has increased from 30 to 70% of
the Palestinian population (78% in Gaza, which we did not visit).

That poverty was exemplified during our visit to Hebron, where we saw young
boys pushing and shoving to ensure they did not miss out on the free soup on
which so many families have become dependent.

In 2000, 80 kg of ingredients were used per day to make up the soup. Now, at
the beginning of 2007, it is more than 500 kg.

Olives are an important part of the Palestinian economy and farmers’ livelihood,
but Israelis remove them for reason of “security”. Even if that reason is valid,
there is no doubt that the removal is usually punitive – a way for ‘settlers’ to
exert control over Palestinian land. Near Tulkarem, just before the fruit was
about to be picked, 3000 olive trees were set alight, and the Israeli authorities
prevented the fire service from going out to extinguish the blaze.
In other examples, ‘settlers’ have physically set upon Palestinians about to pick
their olives and have succeeded in preventing the harvesting.

6.1 Expropriation of Palestinian land

Article 17(2) of the UN Declaration of Human Rights: No one shall be
arbitrarily deprived of his property.

Land is the central issue for Palestinians. More than 400 Palestinian villages
were destroyed within a short space of time following the declaration of the state
of Israel in 1948. In 1950, the Absentee Property Law was passed, declaring
that any land vacated by Palestinians in the process of fleeing the Israeli military
incursions was abandoned, and therefore the property of Israel. Unsurprisingly,
many Palestinian families continue to argue in court that the land is theirs.

The construction of the apartheid wall has separated many farmers from their
land, and under old Ottoman law, if the land has not been farmed for three
years, Israel claims it as theirs. Only about 40% of farmers who have sought
them have been granted the permits that will allow them to cross through the
wall to farm their own land which has been alienated.

Because the wall is being built inside the Green Line (the 1967 borders) there is
land between the Green Line and the wall that the Israelis now treat as their
own. This is a very clever way of illegally annexing land – now around 10% of
the West Bank.

One of the ways Israelis steal Palestinian land is to simply declare it as belonging
to Israel. When this occurs, effected Palestinians have 45 days to present
themselves to a military tribunal with proof of ownership. For many Palestinians
this is simply not possible. For a start, after the 1967 war, Israel stopped
Palestinians from registering land ownership.

But the real stumbling block is the requirement to produce title deeds going back
to Ottoman rule. Living on a land that had been subjugated and/or colonised for
centuries, few Palestinians had registered their land ownership (see also 4.1
“House Demolitions” in this report). So, under military law, the land is forfeited.
Even where Palestinians are in the fortunate position of being able to provide the
paper trail, the Israelis make life as difficult as possible for them.

Once confiscated, that land can be used only for the benefit of “the Jewish
people”.
We visited the farm of a Palestinian family, the Nassars, who had been able to
produce the title deeds but who were subject to continuing harrassment by
Israeli authorities and attacks from nearby ‘settlers’.

In 1991 the Israelis declared the land to be Israeli State Land. But the family
purchased and registered the land in 1916, and family members had lived in
caves on the property. Indeed, one family member had lived in the same cave
as his father, until his father’s death in 1987. The family has continued to live
and work on their land to this day.

The military court was surprised to find that this land was not going to be ceded
to them easily. The court adjourned.

The Nassar family then received a letter from the military court demanding the
land be re-surveyed, which they did at a cost of $15,000 (US). In lodging this
new paperwork they also had to comply with a requirement of providing
signatures from all neighbours to verify that they knew the land to belong to the
Nassars.

The signatures were not enough for the military court, and they demanded that
they be able to see these people to witness for the court that they knew the
Nassars and their property. The Nassars organised for these people to be at his
property at a certain date and time, but the authorities failed to attend, leaving
these people waiting around for five hours.

The next step by the Israelis was to advise the family of their refusal to
recognise the validity of the work conducted by their Palestinian surveyor. The
land was again surveyed, this time with an agreed Israeli surveyor which all up
cost the family $70,000 (US), but at least it was recognised this time by the
colonists.

Sometime in this process, the

Israelis advised that they
would not accept the family’s
West Bank-based lawyer, so
they had to find and brief a
Jerusalem-based one.

In 2002, the Israelis

attempted to bulldoze a road
through the property, but
court action prevented that
from happening. Not content
with that, they placed a
roadblock on the only road
entering the property. The
personalization of the action is perfectly obvious as the only destination of the
road was into the Nassar property.

In 2005, bulldozers came in to remove the olive trees on the property and a
curfew was placed on the family, but they sought and were granted an
injunction. Nevertheless, the “settlers” came in of their own accord and cut
down 250 olive trees.

As mentioned elsewhere in
the report, construction is
prevented on Palestinian
property if infrastructure is
not available, but a
Palestinian is not allowed
to provide that
infrastructure for himself.
The Nassars have been
fined substantially for
putting in their own power
supply, for directing the
water running off a patio
into an underground tank,
and for erecting a tent on
the property.

When the Nassars appear in court, the lawyers argue that the case is
complicated, and set out to confuse details in order to convince the judge to
dismiss the family’s rights.

After 13 years of appearances before the Military Court, the Israelis claimed that
the Nassars did not have enough proof of ownership. This is despite registration
papers from the Ottoman period, from the period of English mandate, from the
Jordanians and even from Israel post-1967, plus the continuous use of the land
throughout that time.

The Nassars have now taken their case to Israel’s High Court. To date, this
unjust move by Israel against the Nassar family has cost them more than
$120,000 (US).

This standoff continues because this property is an island in a sea of Israeli

colonies, and is a barrier to contiguous colonisation.

Nevertheless, the Nassar family remains optimistic and they say that the sun of
justice will shine again.
They have established a project on the property, called the Tent of Nations, and
people come from different cultures, religions and backgrounds to spend time
together and establish bridges of understanding, reconciliation and peace.
Information about the Tent of Nations and the Nassar family’s struggle against
Israeli injustice can be found at www.tentofnations.org .

6.2 “Settlements”
Former US President, Jimmy Carter: We all know that Israel must have a
comprehensive and lasting peace, and this dream could have been realized if
Israel had complied with the Camp David Accords and refrained from
colonizing the West Bank …

Ariel Sharon urged Israelis to take over the hilltops before “losing them to
Palestinians in negotiations” – as if they were their’s to begin with – and they
complied.

The Israelis argue their

need to take over land for
‘settlements’ because of a
shortage of land, yet, as
we travelled northwards
towards the Lebanese
border, we drove
kilometre after kilometre
through flat, well-watered
land that could obviously
have been used for urban
development.

Their colonies are located over or close to the best water sources of the
Palestinians.

Most people living in settlements do not see themselves as “settlers”: they do

not have an ideological commitment to this colonisation process. In many cases
they are offered lower tax rates and other incentives to move in, which is
particularly attractive to young people.

As part of the Oslo agreement, Israel agreed to no further expansion of the

‘settlements’. Instead they have doubled them, and it is clear that the intention
is to start ‘joining the dots’.

Our group visited the Efrat “settlement”, a sight for sore eyes after the poverty
of so many Palestinian towns and villages. Two of us, including myself, chose
not to attend a presentation from two of the colonists. Instead I walked around
Efrat and inspected the comparitive opulence: houses with yards, each home
with a car and room to
park it, water electricity
and gas all connected to
the homes, large rubbish
bins with recycling
opportunities every 300
metres, a playground, a
skate ramp, an
impressive assortment of
educational institutions
and a modern shopping
centre which included a
pharmacy.

George, our tour guide,

who accompanied the
group to the
presentation, found the
usual lies, propaganda
and justifications too
much to take and had to
walk out after the first 10
minutes.

Members of our group

reported that the two
presenters were
originally from the United
States, and they had
migrated in order to exercise their “biblical right to the land”. They claimed that
Palestinians had never lived on the land on which Efrat is located, and had made
claims to the land only after 1948. (One would have to ask who planted the
adjacent olive groves then.)
They advocated that the
Palestinian problem should be
solved by Egypt allocating one
percent of their total land mass
to which all Palestinians could
move!

It was only afterwards that the

group found out that, out of
the funds pooled by the group
to meet general expenses for
the trip, this had cost $100 (US) for the privilege of hearing nothing new, and
not even a glass of water was provided during that hour.
It was interesting to read in
literature provided to us by one of
the groups we met, how ‘settlers’
from Efrat had stoned a bus
carrying Palestinians only a few
months before we visited that
particular colony.

6.3 The right to earn a living

Article 1 (2) of the UN
International Covenant on Civil
and Political Rights: All peoples
may, for their own ends, freely
dispose of their natural wealth
and resources without prejudice
to any obligations arising out of
international economic co-
operation, based upon the
principle of mutual benefit and
international law. In no case may a
people be deprived of its own
means of subsistence.

The Israelis have ways of closing

down businesses, thereby removing
the livelihoods of the proprietors.

In Hebron, 400 stalls have been

compulsorily closed under military
law. In addition, once the Israelis
declare an area to be a military
zone, the shop owners are
prohibited from even getting to their
shops. So more than 800
businesses have closed – and
livelihoods destroyed - by Israeli
decree. In Al Suq, only 10% of the
businesses are now open.

Only 28.2% of the residents of Gaza

are employed. Gaza’s economy is being strangled because Israel prevents any
export of goods. There is only one transport exit from Gaza, and it is controlled
by the IDF. In 2006 it was open just 40% of the time. There is a pedestrian
exit at Rafa on the Egyptian border: that too is controlled by the IDF.

The Palestinian economy is strangled by Israel’s closure of Ramallah’s airstrip

and Gaza’s port. Israel has agreed in principle that Palestine can build a seaport,
but they will not guarantee that they will not bomb it!

300,000 olive trees have

so far been cut down to
make way for the
construction of the wall.
Others are cut down
because Israelis say
someone could hide
behind them.
Additionally, the
encroachment of
“settlements”, the wall
construction and the
permit system, have
progressively put more
and more trees out of
reach of cultivation. The loss of these trees has meant a loss in economic terms
of millions of dollars for the Palestinians.

The unemployment rate of Palestinians is more than three times that of Israelis.
By taking land and livelihood from farmers, they become unskilled labour, and
are the first to lose jobs.

Israeli settlers undertake guerilla actions against Palestinians to wreck their crops
e.g by letting pigs loose in a ripening field of corn. Even if some of the crop was
found to be at all salvageable, from an Islamic perspective it would not be
marketable because the whole field would be deemed to have been
contaminated.

Bassam, the leader of our tour group and a Palestinian by birth, migrated to
Australia because of the discrimination he experienced in attempting to get a job
appropriate to educational qualifications. He was prevented by a simple Israeli
ruse, which is to state in the job advertisements that the successful applicant
must have military experience. As Palestinians do not serve in the military, this
device ensures they are excluded from much professional employment, despite
highly appropriate qualifications.
Questions arise also about the suitability of the employment that does exist, with
86,000 Palestinians employed in their own security industry. It might be seen
that it is in their interests for some form of hostilities to continue (even if it is
between Hamas and Fatah) so that their jobs remain.
7.0 PROVOCATION
There are certain actions
taken by the Israelis that
can only be described as
provocation – although of
course, all of the foregoing
qualify for that description.
There are actions taken by
Israeli authorities that do
not qualify for the
description of human
rights abuses, yet they are
clearly designed to
undermine the psyche and
resistance of the
Palestinian people.

Laws have been passed which prevent a spouse who comes from the West Bank
having any permanent living status if they marry someone who lives in ‘Israel’.

The people of Gaza were subjected last year to 15,000 shellings by the Israelis.
What sort of wearing away of the soul must that cause?

As required of them under the disengagement plan, Israel removed itself from
it’s on-the-ground presence in Gaza. What they were not required to do was
destroy more than 2000 Palestinian homes as they departed. How provocative is
that?

For up-to-date information on Israel’s provocation in all its forms I recommend

regular checking of www.pnn.ps and www.imemc.org .

7.1 Religious
provocation
Jews and Muslims claim a
common heritage in their
patriarch Abraham, so it is
understandable that both
groups would have an
interest in the Ibrahimi
Mosque in Hebron.
Unfortunately, rather than
share and respect, the
Israelis have a strong
military presence nearby,
and Muslims have to pass
through Israeli security
points in order to make their religious observance, sometimes being forced to
wait for hours to enter the mosque.

But the real contempt, the real provocation, lies in the absolute disregard for the
Islamic traditions. The Israeli soldiers assert a right to enter that mosque as
determined by military parameters and refuse to take off their boots, as part of
normal religious observance requirements for all who enter the mosque.

The presence of Israeli police on the forecourt of the Al Aqsa Mosque can be
viewed only as provocation by Palestinian Muslims.

7.2 Rewriting of history

The rewriting of history has taken many forms, for instance, the argument that
the Palestinians who left their homes in and around 1948 did so of their own
volition. Another is that there were no massacres, when history shows that
there were 20-30 of them between 1947 and 1949, with thousands murdered.

We visited the Bir’am National Park, the site of archaeological ruins that justify
that Israeli classification, yet there is no acknowledgement of the existence of
more contemporary ruins.
These are the ruins of the village of Bir’m, razed by the Israeli Army in 1952.
That deliberate failure to acknowledge this war crime rewrites history, and adds
insult to the ethnic cleansing which took place in that region.
7.3 ‘Settler’ violence
One of the methods used to force Palestinians to flee from their homes is for
Israeli authorities to turn a blind eye to violence perpetrated by ‘settlers’.

We were told of children not being able to attend school because of the fear of
being attacked by settlers on their way to and from school. This form of violence
is directed not only at children, and the number of physical attacks against
Palestinians in the streets has been steadily increasing over the past seven
years.

In Hebron – not even part of ‘Israel’ – 400 ‘settlers’ have moved in. They do not
even necessarily live in Hebron, other than on weekends. Yet there are more
than a thousand soldiers to protect them. Surely the solution is for the ‘settlers’
to move back out! They have no right to be there under any of the international
agreements Israel has signed.

These are the ideological ‘settlers’ and they are prepared to dehumanise the
Palestinians in order to take over their property and land.
Above some of the remaining market stalls
in the old city that still dare to open, the
‘settlers’ have taken over the first storey of
the buildings. As part of a campaign of
intimidation, they began throwing all sorts of
objects, including their garbage, onto the
Palestinians. The Hebron Rehabilitation
Committee (HRC) has placed netting and
wire above the markets to stop this cowardly
behaviour of these most rude, arrogant and
provocative colonisers.

One resident had the experience of the

settlers initially throwing rocks at his house
and family, so the HRC placed netting over
the front of the house to prevent this. That
was not enough to stop these pigs of
people, and they resorted instead to
throwing liquid which could get through the
nets: when they started throwing urine and
acid, the family finally fled the house. The
Israelis then came in and bulldozed it.

In the case of a health

clinic in Hebron, the
‘settlers’ invaded it, threw
out all the contents, then
set fire to the building.

In some cases, the

soldiers will assist the
‘settlers’ by helping them
to break down gates to
get in.

EAPPI will accompany

children to school when
there have been incidents
of ‘settlers’ stoning
children.

In the case of the village of Yenoon, near Nablus, the whole village left during
the second intifada because of settler violence, including the poisoning of their
water.
8.0 PROSPECTS FOR PEACE
From an ICAHD brochure: …an expanding Jewish state in the middle of a
country already inhabited by another people poses fundamental problems of
coexistence, human and civil rights, self-determination and justice.

It was not
surprising to hear
that there is a
growing
hopelessness in
the Palestinian
community
because of the
continuing
incursions into the
rights and
freedoms of the
Palestinian people,
and there is a fear
of an impending
third Intifada.

Yet on the other

hand there were a surprising number of Palestinians expressing optimism about
prospects for peace and achieving an independent Palestinian state.

We also heard from Israelis of the deep pessimism and fear of their people.
Many hold a view that the Muslims hate them and will always hate them, so
there is little recourse for them but to hunker down with measures to increase
their security.

We visited Palestine in the

midst of a considerable
amount of movement on
the Palestine “question”:
 On the day I arrived,
the first Arab (as the
Israelis prefer to call
him) in 60 years who
was not a Druze was
appointed to the
Ministry in the Israeli
Government;
 12 months after the
election of a Hamas
 Government to rule Palestine, talks were renewed with the purpose of
forming a unity government for the Palestinians comprised of both Hamas
and Fatah;
 The strike by the Palestinian public service was called off; and
 US Secretary of State, Condoleeza Rice, made a surprise visit to meet with
Israel’s Prime Minister.

A comment was made to us that Israel is not a western democracy, because

Zionism is a tradition arising out of an earlier European tribal-based nationalism.
It is a concept based on exclusivity, rather than participation. What impact
recognition of this would have on any peace negotiations is unknown to me, but
it is an observation worth recording.

As Jimmy Johnson from ICAHD told us, knowing that more Palestinians have
been killed than Israelis does not assist in reaching peace. Rather, with Israel
being the fourth strongest defence force in the world, the question should be
posed as to who bears the brunt of the responsibility for bringing about peace.
Israel needs to see itself as the power it is instead of painting itself as a victim.

Meanwhile Ehud Olmert’s talk is about prolonging interim arrangements, which

can only put off any implementation of a solution. The current government
appears to be unwilling or unable to bring about peace.

Dr Mustafa Barghouti told us that the situation in the past 15 years has
worsened, that rather than the implementation of a comprehensive solution, the
approach now is to do everything on an interim basis.

Israel is now advocating an “interim state”, which can only mean more delays,
the encroachment of more ‘settlements’, a state without Jerusalem as its capital,
and a state without borders.
With the Palestinian population growing to equal Israel’s - 5.3 million each – the
pressure is on Israel to reach a peaceful solution. They are at the crossroads:
whether they recognise it or understand the implications is impossible to tell.

8.1 Fatah and Hamas

At the time of our visit, talks had just re-commenced to establish a Palestinian
unity government.

Concern was expressed to us about the danger of and damage being done by
factional infighting between Hamas and Fatah, particularly as part of the Israeli
strategy is to divide and conquer. The Israeli strategy is to pressure the
Palestinians, not so they burst, but enough so that they turn their anger inwards,
and they appeared to be succeeding.

At the time of our visit, Israel was financially starving the Palestinian Authority
(and thereby all the public servants employed by the PA) because Israel would
not accept the legitimate election of a Hamas government. That non-acceptance
was based on Hamas’ historical refusal to ‘recognise’ Israel.

There remains emotional loyalty to Fatah because of Arafat, because of his high
profile role in reunifying Palestinians, but by January 2006 the felt the Fatah
leadership had failed them, and voted instead for Hamas. A number of
Palestinians we met levelled criticism at Fatah for its refusal to negotiate with
Hamas, and the fact that Fatah has failed to look inwards at the election result.

That failure was demonstrated on a

number of occasions with comments
made by senior people who clearly were
members or sympathisers of Fatah. For
instance:
- Hamas does not recognise the charter
of the UN
- The attitude of Hamas has given Israel
the pretext to act as it has done.

Hamas supporters expressed dismay at

the Israeli response to their party’s
electoral success, given that Israelis had
previously elected criminals like Sharon or
Rabin to lead them.
It was suggested to us that the biggest
enemy of democracy in Palestine is the
political patronage system which exists in
both Fatah and Hamas.
The western world’s response to the election of Hammas in the Palestinian
elections of January 2006 was completely wrong. Here was the opportunity for
the west to open a dialogue with the political wing of Islam, but instead they
chose to isolate Hamas and the Palestinians.

An increasing number of Palestinian Christians are leaving the country. For

instance, in Bethlehem, prior to the second intifada, the population ratio was
60% Christian and 40% Muslim. This has now reversed. It was suggested to us
that the Christian population has acted as a mediating effect on Hamas/Fatah
tensions, and the reduction of that population will result in more clashes between
those two main political groupings.

8.2 Non-violence
Since the first Intifada, Palestinians have begun adopting the techniques of non-
violent action. There has been an increase in armed provocation by Israel, so
more training is needed for non-violence. The Holy Land Trust conducted 50
training camps in non-violent action in 2006.

Surrendering is not a choice for the Palestinians: it would be national suicide and
would see the end of the existence of Palestine.

The response of the Palestinians to the Israelis is always reactionary. With non-
violence the plan is to provoke and put the Israelis in the position of reacting.
But they will need to be able to predict the form of that reaction and have an
appropriate non-violent response.

With the optimism that a Palestinian nation can and will be created, there is also
a recognition that the biggest threat may not be ending the occupation but what
happens after. East Timor is testimony to that.

Humanitarian assistance can slow down the deterioration of Palestine, but the
solution must be political.

Websites worth visiting in regard to non-violent action for Palestinians include

www.holylandtrust.org and www.pcr.ps.

8.3 Comments from Father Chacour

So much wisdom was spoken by Father Elias Chacour that I include some of his
comments under the one heading, rather than sprinkle them throughout the
report, unattributed. These are expanded from my notes taken when our group
met with him, and I place them in quotation marks as I believe they accurately
reflect what he said.
“The world has forgotten, or has chosen to forget, that Jews and Arabs lived
together, suffered together and fought together for many years.

“In 1948, Israel was created on a

large portion of Palestinian land. The
Palestinian people of Galilee were
happy, but then they were scattered,
thrown into the diaspora. They
became refugees in Arab countries,
not integrated there, and unhappy.
The whole world is shaking with
terror and violence as a consequence.

“Other Palestinians fled to Gaza as

refugees in their own land. A
population of 40-50,000 people has
swollen beyond its means to 1.2
million.

“A third group managed to stay in

and around towns, and were able to
become Israeli citizens. They now
number 1.1 million.

“A fourth group comprises those who

are migrating. Emmigration is the
enemy of Palestine.

“The problem is not a racial or a religious problem – there never was any real
enmity between Jews and Christians in Palestine. They shared the good times
and the bad times, and all suffered under the Ottomans.

“But Palestinians became the ‘Jews’ of the Jews, paying with their jobs, their
dignity and their lives. They have been used by the west to salve their
consciences over what they allowed to happen to the Jews in the lead up to
World War II. The Palestinians are paying the bill.

“Of course the Jews deserve to have a land, a home, and a homeland. These
are god-given rights for every human being. But not if it turns Palestinians into
refugees in their own country, to turn them into undeserving people, to force
them into terrorism.

“The Jews say ‘we lived here 2000 years ago and we are coming back home’.
We welcome you back, but we want to be partners in our land.
“By fighting non-existent terrorism, the Jews have created it. If you are afraid of
Nazism, it will take over your heart.

“We should be asking why someone would become a suicide bomber. Why
would someone choose to destroy and not create life?

“Where is the hidden machine of terror? What creates a deranged society? Why
did Australia stray from being a peace-loving country?

“Get your hands dirty for justice. We must do all we can to re-generate hope, to
build up goals for life.

“Don’t turn the other cheek – instead tell that man that what he is doing is
destroying his own dignity.

“Israel needs a man of courage to lead it, one who believes in the rule of law.
Both the Jews and the Palestinians are now too deeply handicapped to solve the
problems.

“I am a beggar, begging for friendship, and I beg you to continue providing

friendship to the Jews. We do not need friendship that is one-sided; the person
who provides such friendship becomes an enemy. It is more difficult to provide
a common friendship.”

Father Chacour established a school in the town of Ibillin, which now has 4500
children attending, with 60% of the students being Moslems, who he says “were
born in the image and likeness of God.

“This is not compassion, not condescension, not charity. Without them, I will be
meaningless. They are needed and loveable. What we have in common is far
more than we have in difference.”

8.4 The two-state solution

In the light of the recent escalation of violence and human rights abuses by
Israelis is the “two-state solution” now viable?

The 1967 borders were what was accepted as part of the two-state solution. Yet
there has been full US recognition of the current route of the wall, and full US
recognition of Israel’s major colonies in the West Bank, which means there is no
chance of a return to the 1967 borders.

As Saeb Oreikat, the Chief Palestinian Negotiator, pointed out to us, he

negotiates with no army, no navy or no airforce to back him. But as he said, the
Palestinians are here to stay. Israel (and its United States backers) do not seem
to realise that.
While being signatories to numerous peace “processes”, Israel has failed to
honour the Olso Accords (1993), the Paris Protocol on Economic Relations
(1994), Oslo II (1995), the Protocol Concerning the Redeployment in Hebron
(1997), Wye River Memorandum (1998), Camp David Summit (2000), Taba
(2001), and the Road Map to Peace (2002).

Questions arise about the good faith of the Israelis coming out of the first Oslo
process. No actions were taken, not even decisions made to lift their siege of
Gaza and the West Bank. To the contrary, over time, and particularly since the
election of a Hamas Government in January 2006, the siege has tightened.

All these actions are undermining the viability of a separate Palestinian state.

One of the problems I see is that Israel and the United States have recognised
the PLO, but not the Palestinian state.

The world accepts Israel’s “right to exist” but ignores their blatant abuse of
human rights. The world cannot pick or choose who represents Palestinian
society. Israel blames Europe for ignoring the plight of the Jews in World War
II, but now the world ignores the plight of the Palestinians.

One of the suggestions made to us about the implementation of the two-state

solution is that Palestine will have to receive monetary compensation for the land
taken over by Israeli “settlers”.

But given the land encroachments, the two-state solution may not be possible.

8.5 Right of return

Article 13 (2) of the UN Declaration of Human Rights: Everyone has the
right to leave any country, including his own, and to return to his country.
Article 12 (4) of the UN Covenant on Civil and Political Rights: No one shall
be arbitrarily deprived of the right to enter his own country.

Palestinians continue to be angered by the hypocritical stance of the Israelis in

regard to the “right of return”. That right is enshrined for Israelis to the extent
that any Jewish person, whether or not they ever lived there, can ‘return’. But
Palestinians are refused that right, even for those who were born there.

There are 4,500,000 Palestinians scattered around the world. Israel is very
worried at the prospect that some of them might want to return. The population
of Palestinians is growing at a faster rater than Israel’s, despite the ethnic
cleansing, so a right of return would see a population imbalance from the Israeli
perspective.

Even within Israel/Palestine, there are quarter of a million displaced Palestinians

who are prevented from returning to their places of birth by the “Absentee
Property Law”.

Yet the United Nations in its

Declaration 194 (11) verified
the UN Charter with this
specific reference for Israel
to observe when it resolved
that “the refugees wishing
to return to their homes and
live at peace with their
neighbours should be
permitted to do so at the
earliest practicable date,
and that compensation
should be paid for the
property of those choosing
not to return and for loss of
or damage to property
which, under principles of
international law or in
equity, should be made
good by the Governments or
authorities responsible”.

8.6 “Oasis of Peace”: a possible model for the future

Known in Arabic as “Wahat-al-Salam” and in Hebrew as “Neve Shalom”, this
commune is a model of what can be achieved with Israelis and Palestinians living
co-operatively together.
An Italian Jew, Bruno Hussar (who converted to Christianity and later became a
Dominican monk), was responsible for its establishment. His perception was that
so often there is no interaction between Palestinians and Israelis, and he wanted
to create the opportunity for this to occur. Thus was born the concept of the
“Oasis”, with the first people moving in to build in 1978. Now, 56 families – 23
Palestinian and 23 Israelis – all Israeli citizens, live side by side on this property.

With any increase in housing numbers, numeric equality of the two cultures is to
be maintained. If an Israeli family moves out, their house can be purchased only
by another Israeli family moving in, and similarly for the Palestinians.

The children attend school on site, with additional children from outlying areas
able to attend to a maximum of 250 children at the present time, and both
languages are spoken and learnt. A certain amount of screening for suitability
has to occur, given the multicultural arrangements.

The Mayor of the “Oasis”,

Rayek Rizek (who
describes himself on his
business card as “Mayor
Beyond Excuses”) said that
the experience of living
and learning there is far
more shocking for the
Israelis than the
Palestinians, as the
Palestinians have been
forced to develop a greater
awareness of the Israelis
to begin with. In the
normal course of Israeli
society there is usually no
need for Israelis to learn
the Arab language,
although many Palestinians have learnt Hebrew out of necessity.

He observed that, in order to live together, the two cultures have to move
beyond arguments about who was there first, and to recognise that they all
belong to the land.

Creative tensions exist. For instance, it is highly unlikely that Palestinians would
want to celebrate Israel’s Independence Day, or that the Palestinians will want to
remember the 1948 massacres of Palestinians. It is not a perfect peace, but all
residents recognise that none of them is responsible for what happened in 1948.
The experience of sharing cultures and learning each other’s history has had
ramifications. To date three Israeli children have refused to do military service
as a consequence of this shared upbringing.

“There are a thousand excuses to take revenge,” said the Mayor, but in choosing
to live together in this way, the residents of the ‘Oasis’ are able to move beyond
that.
9.0 CONCLUSIONS AND RECOMMENDATIONS
When I told people I was making this trip, many – including me – thought there
might be some danger associated with it. However, the worst thing I
experienced was frustration and some anger. We did not go to Gaza, and there
would be places one might not go at night, but I would regard the biggest threat
as coming from the Israelis.

In my view, we are diminished as human beings if we see injustice such as this

and do nothing to right it.

‘Security’ cannot be achieved through the creation of insecurity. Insecurity can

only create fear, and randomly reinforced fear creates terrorism. Why is it that
Israel refuses to acknowledge the basic reactions of human beings? My view is
that it suits them to ignore it.

There are two damaged groups in this: the Palestinians, after decades of
occupation, degradation and terrorism and the Israelis who compel military
service for all young adults and thus brutalise their own youth.

I find it difficult to reconcile the devout

religious views of so many Israelis with
what are known as the Ten
Commandments or the Decalogue. The
imperatives “Thou shalt not kill”, “Thou
shalt not steal” and “Thou shalt not
covet … anything that is thy
neighbour’s” continue to be part of
Hebrew teaching and their religious
belief system. And yet, Israel is
consciously and provocatively doing the
opposite.

Politicians around the world should be

doing all they can to assist Palestinian
MPs to fulfil their role.

As a number of Palestinians advised us,

what is needed urgently is an
international conference, possibly under
the auspices of the United Nations. My
personal view is that such a conference
will need to be conducted without the
presence of the United States of
America. The Oslo Agreement was
achieved, I suspect, principally because the US was not involved.
As we were reminded, you cannot rely on the US to seek peace: they were the
last nation to come in behind the creation of an independent and democratic
South Africa. Considering that 40% of the US foreign aid budget goes to Israel,
this is all but a given.

Israel will use whatever tactics it can to prevent a satisfactory resolution of the
situation. There is no political will on behalf of the Israeli government to do
anything.

By stealth, Israel continues to practise the ethnic cleansing that it began more
overtly in 1940s. By denying an economic future to Palestinians, and by creating
fear and terror amongst them, Israel is succeeding in encouraging many
Palestinians to leave the country. This is creating a Palestinian brain drain.

We were asked to get a message out to boycott Israeli and support Palestinian
products.

There is a need to implement the many UN resolutions passed in relation to

Israel and Palestine.

The international community must create an awareness of the Palestinian cause.

The pressure has to come from the international community to force Israel to
make the changes.

Visit and see for yourself

I totally recommend to anyone who has a concern for human rights, and a
determination to resolve the root problems of terrorism, to visit and see for
yourself.

There are numerous organisations that welcome volunteers and place interns.

The International Solidarity Movement is encouraging more international activists

to come to Palestine to provide protection for the local peace activists.

The Holy Land Trust organises travel and encounter programs and home stays:
www.holylandtrust.org. The “Summer Encounter”, in which visitors stay for
between one and three months, averages 60 people per annum, but they are
hoping to increase this to 100 this year.

The Ecumenical Accompaniment Program in Palestine and Israel, www.eappi.org,

an outreach of the World Council of Churches, accepts volunteers for 3 month
stays, accompanying Palestinians in their daily lives and providing a limited form
of protection by their presence. The program is based on non-violence
(including assisting other Israeli peace activists) and ending the Occupation.
Christianity is not a pre-requisite.
Those who undertake a placement with such organizations should be aware that
they are likely to be subjected to an extended interrogation by Israeli authorities
when they leave the country.