Last week, this commercial for Israeli cell company cellcom started making the rounds of the blogosphere, with everyone having their two cents to put in about it. Basically the consensus among Palestinians and left-wing Israelis was that the commercial attempted to make light of the occupation and the security wall.
This week, residents of the beleaguered village of Bil'in, about which I have written before, decided to film a response to the commercial to show the world what such a situation is like in reality.
According to this article in Ynet today, Saudi Arabia has announced a plan to build a fence along 5,000 miles of The Kingdom's borders. Five thousand miles. That's 2,000 miles longer than the width of the United States. That's 1,000 miles longer than a trip from Seattle to Bogata would be.
The winning bid for the project was made by European Aeronautic Defense and Space Company (EADS) and is reported to be worth $3.5 billion.
Those Saudis are like Michael Jackson: they have so much money it has caused them to lose their minds. It's like they heard China did it and thought it might be cool. But when you have that much money, everybody is afraid to talk sense to you. Like, "Um, Your Highness, China built that wall before airplanes and missiles were invented. There's stuff that can go over walls now."
A note on stone throwing. My sentiments might be as unpopular to Israelis as they are to Palestinians. But the potential to offend someone when discussing this conflict is limitless.
The latest news about the ill-fated village of Nil'in in the West Bank is about Ahmed Mousa, a 10 year old who was shot in the head by an Israeli soldier. When I originally read about this event, it was from the left-wing Israeli media, which basically expresses sorrow about the boy but also reminds us that he was throwing stones. Then they add a mention of an IDF soldier who was hit in the eye with a rock.
Non-Israeli media makes no mention of stone throwing, or any reason at all for the soldiers' actions.
I was not there and therefore cannot comment on the exact causes of this event, but I can comment on the phenomenon of stone throwing. Every day, and especially after protests, teenage boys throw stones at Israeli soldiers. They are filled with adolescent rage and frustration and their browbeaten parents can neither control them nor offer them a feasible alternative.
So they throw rocks.
Sometimes these rocks fall far from their intended targets and the effort goes ignored. Sometimes the rocks hit the soldiers, and there is retaliation. We must not forget that both the stone throwers and the soldiers are acting in response to the same emotions. They are limited by the same level of brain development.
My sentiment is: those who live in glass houses shouldn't throw stones.
But this sentiment is directed not at those who literally throw the stones but the puppeteers behind them: the international media.
It is no accident that every time a Palestinian suffers unduly, an outsider with big opinions is there to publicize it. Each protest in the West Bank villages of Nil'in and Bil'in ends with Palestinian teenagers throwing stones. And this often leads to injuries, sometimes fatal ones. But the international activists who organize these protests make no effort to stop the stone throwing. They stand by with their cameras, waiting for someone to get hurt so they can reinforce the image of the Palestinian as Victim.
The internationals who, with the best intentions, insert themselves into this conflict are as integral to the problem as the stone throwers and the IDF. They form a triangle that continuously feed the roles of victim, conquerer, and hungry audience. It's a gladiator show.
Without the violence, would anyone be watching?
With nobody watching, would there still be violence?
Many argue that these kids throw stones because it is the only option left to them. But what if it is just the only option anybody told them about? If it is considered fair by anti-Israelis to abduct IDF soldiers to leverage for ransom, why not to shoot teenage stone throwers? The abducted soldiers were combatants, legal targets, but they did not volunteer for service. The stone throwers, then, are also combatants, who by virtue of their perceived lack of options, didn't volunteer either.
The differences between them are weak. Take an IDF soldier, subtract four years and a uniform, and you get a kid with a rock.
Everyone who profits from this conflict, from the Canadian construction firms building settlements to the mainstream media, are doing so at the expense of the region's children.
In a previous post I wrote about the case of Lieutenant Colonel Omri Fruberg, who was accused of ordering an IDF soldier under his command to open fire on a handcuffed and blindfolded Palestinian prisoner.
In more recent news reports Fruberg is referred to as Bruberg, perhaps in a correction of an earlier mistake.
The IDF's first response to the accusation was:
Lieutenant Colonel Omri was unaware of the incident and that the door of his patrol vehicle blocked his line of vision.
But then they reviewed the video footage of the event and figured out nobody would fall for that crap.
Then they launched an investigation, during which Bruberg took a polygraph at a private institute. The test confirmed he did not give the order to fire. But then he took another polygraph under military supervision, and this time he failed.
Bruberg said he told the soldier only to shake his rifle to frighten the Palestinian, according to a military investigation.
This guy is dumber than a box of rocks. He, and whoever is letting him talk, keeps forgetting that there is a video of this. Why would shaking the rifle scare the prisoner? He was blindfolded.
And furthermore...really??? You thought it would scare him because...people normally shake their rifle before firing it?
Bruberg must have also assumed that the prisoner had his ears plugged as well because that's the only way he wouldn't have heard "Shake your rifle to scare him."
UPDATE: I have now uncovered all sorts of things the Israeli media is not reporting.
First of all, the prisoner who was shot, Ashraf Abu-Rahma, is well-known by the IDF and is considered to be the "Palestinian Che Guevarra" because of his frequent but non-violent resistance to Israeli activity in the West Bank.
Ashraf has been shot multiple times and arrested three times before this incident, which could, in part, explain his obvious lack of surprise at being shot this time. In an interview with IPS, he explained that he doesn't understand Hebrew very well and therefore could not confirm or deny that Bruberg gave the order to fire. However, he did recognize the word for rubber bullet, gumi. It was a rubber coated steel bullet that he was shot with.
Ashraf has gained his reputation for nonviolent resistance by doing things like camping out in homes that were set to be demolished or halting settlement construction by climbing onto the cranes themselves.
Another aspect of this story that nobody is reporting on is the actual situation of the IDF soldiers. For example, even though the media is not reporting his age, it is likely that Lieutenant Colonel Bruberg is between 22 and 25 years old. This is an advanced age for a soldier in his position but incredibly young for a soldier of this rank in any other army. Most active-duty IDF soldiers, especially those in direct contact with Palestinians, are between 18 and 22 years old.
They are dealing with complicated situations where they must often choose between their own life and the life of a stranger. A common example of this concept is the image of a dark figure approaching a guard tower at night. The figure holds what could be a stick or could be a gun. The soldier yells "stop!" but the figure continues to advance. This dark presence could be an adult militant, intent to kill. Or it could be a child.
These soldiers make the choice whether or not to fire before Americans of the same age are even allowed to drink alcohol. They do not have the life experience to act with wisdom and there is nobody supervising them.
For those of you who have been following my coverage of The Wall this new development will be interesting.
Residents of the West Bank village of Bil'in protest the separation fence that divides their land every Friday. Back in September of 2007, the Israeli Supreme Court ruled that the route of the wall was illegal and that 1,700 meters of it should be removed. This ruling has yet to be followed.
Part of the delay has been caused by expansion of the Modi'in Ilit settlement nearby. The Supreme Court also ruled it is illegal to plan the route of the separation barrier based on constructions that do not yet exist, so it is believed by activists involved that Israeli officials are waiting until the settlement expansion is complete to draw up the new plans for the wall.
Possibly due to the continuing violence and unrest in Bil'in and similar villages, Israeli officials drew up a preliminary plan for the alternate route. However, Bili'n local council head Ahmed Issa Abdallah Yassin says this new route will only return 10% of the farmland taken from the village.
Yassin says this plan is only a delay tactic:
Yassin said that in the meantime, the state is allowing building developers to create facts on the ground and that in another two months time, "they will be able to debate new security stipulations that will be influenced by building projects which will by then be complete, leaving them "no choice" but to rework the fence with these developments in mind."
UPDATE: In addition to rejecting the proposed route change, Bil'in is suing the Canadian firms that are building in the Modi'in settlement. Haaretz says:
The village claims the companies have been building in Israel's largest settlement, Upper Modiin, in violation of international law. The construction is taking place on land seized from Bili'in after Israel captured the West Bank in the 1967 Six-Day War, according to the suit. Among other things, the claim cites the Fourth Geneva Convention, which forbids an occupying power from transferring its own civilians into occupied territory.
Bil'in's attorney, Michael Sfard, says this is the first suit of its kind and calls for the halt of settlement construction and the removal of 30 buildings the company previously built.
“The Internationals,” we were called. A strange amalgamation of foreigners who arrived on one of the hottest days of the year, so far, to protest the existence of the wall at Bil’in, in the West Bank. We were German, American, French, English, Irish, and Canadian. Our presence did two things: we provided cover for the Palestinian protesters, and we drew the attention of the media. The presence of the media offered additional protection to the protesters, although the filming of the soldiers does not always stop violent attacks.
This protest occurs every Friday in Bil’in. At last week’s protest, local Ibrahim Bornat was shot in the thigh. Video of this event can be seen here. Ibrahim’s brother Rani was also shot by an Israeli sniper at another protest eight years ago, and remains paralyzed from the neck down.
Before the protest began, the Internationals were given a short speech about what to expect and how to stay safe. We were advised that the IDF first uses sound grenades, then tear gas, then rubber bullets, and finally, live fire. The most severe of these counter measures are reserved for those who throw stones, so we were advised not to stand between stone throwers and the IDF. We were also asked not to throw stones ourselves because the non-Palestinians in charge of our group strictly believed in non-violent protest. However, it was acknowledged that several young Palestinians stay after the Internationals have gone to throw stones at the soldiers.
Most of these counter measures are employed to keep people away from the fence and the 50 feet and five layers of barbed wire that separate the Israeli military from the unarmed protesters.
It all went as planned. We marched to the wall together, some marching up front to see “the action,” some staying in the back to be safer. When we reached the first layer of the fence, we stopped. Most people had stopped much farther back than this and only a small mixed cluster of Palestinians and Internationals came all the way to the edge. The media took their position on the top of the hill. The protesters chanted and banged rocks against the fence. An ear-piercing squeal was emitted from the IDF that lasted about ten minutes. Some people plugged their ears, some kept banging rocks on the fence.
After this, the first of the sound grenades was launched. They caused only a small boom, comparable to the missiles that fell on Ziqim, but without the explosion. By this time the protesters had opened two of the gates leading to the Israeli side but had not crossed over. They were still 50 feet from the closest Israeli and less than ten from where they’d started. But this was far enough for the IDF. They began, as we were warned, to launch tear gas canisters, which landed unpredictably throughout the landscape. Sometimes only one or two at a time. Sometimes they came down in thick volleys, their smoke trails in the air looking like dancers perfectly in tune to each other.
Everyone tried to avoid the gas clouds as best as they could, except the most die-hard protesters, who stayed behind in the thickest smoke, perhaps immune to its potency after so long.
We retreated slowly, only going far enough to be out of smoke range. But then they would fire more tear gas and we would be pushed still farther away.
After almost everyone had begun the trek back to the village, we stragglers noticed a few fires burning in the olive grove closer to the wall. Someone yelled, “Help me! Help me put them out!” But the IDF was firing tear gas heavily into the area on fire, which made it difficult to get close enough to put the fire out. Not that we had any realistic way of doing this.
We pushed slowly toward the fire anyway, and the soldiers on the other side of the fence yelled in Hebrew, “If you come any closer to the fence, we’ll shoot.” One man yelled back in English, “We’re not! We’re trying to put out the fire!” and followed with a string of obscenities in Arabic. But at that point we couldn’t turn back anyway. The IDF had begun to drop tear gas behind us. We were completely surrounded by white clouds of gas and the gray smoke from the fire was actually a welcome contrast to the stinging of the tear gas.
The fire had a woody smell, like a fireplace, because the olive trees were burning. Somewhere in the distance another fire was burning, this one with thick, black smoke. Nobody knew where or why.
I was one of the last to reach the crest of the hill, over which I could not see the wall anymore. I left behind me only the teenage boys who halfheartedly threw stones and yelled their anger to soldiers who did not respond.
Two days later, as I reflect on this event, I think what was the result? It’s possible that the media presence prevented violence this time, but what about next time? The residents of Bil’in and similar villages live with this every day. They struggle to maintain dignity in the face of near total domination.
The action of the Israeli Army against the whole of Palestinian Society betrays their rhetoric about security as the purpose of their occupation and instead shines light on what seems to be their true aim; the slow removal of the Palestinian people from their land by any means possible. This includes terrorizing the population through forced transfers, economic starvation, house demolitions, unwarranted arrests, and unchecked killing of the civilian population. This ethnic cleansing is cemented as a reality through the Israeli policies of land confiscation, settlement expansion, and the control of water resources which are the true aims of the Apartheid wall and system of occupation.
I am finally reading the last chapter of The Lemon Tree by Sandy Tolan. An incredibly well researched and historically accurate account of the history of Arab-Israeli conflict.
This chapter is about the security wall constructed by Israel beginning in 2002. The wall is electrified in some places and covers over 400 miles, cutting off some parts of the West Bank from others. According to Tolan's research, Israel declared, '"The sole purpose of the fence is to provide security' in response to 'the horrific wave of terrorism emanating from the West Bank.'" Presidential candidate John Kerry called it, "a legitimate act of self defense." Palestinians call it apartheid. They accuse Israel of using the opportunity to get more land, since the wall does not follow the Green Line of 1967.
It think it's both. And I'll tell you why.
It is the best way Israel could think of to stop the horrendous acts of terrorism that were (and are) killing civilians on buses and planes, in shops, and walking the street. It was the most human and non-violent way to deal directly with the terrorism.
The reason the security fence will not work is that terrorism is not the problem but the symptom of the problem. Building the security fence is like giving aspirin to someone with a broken leg.
Terrorism is a symptom of prolonged and insoluble anguish. Of helplessness and anger. Just like early Jewish militias Irgun and The Stern Gang, Palestinian terrorists are responding to their belief that there is no other way to be listened to and respected. And Israel proves over and over that they are right.
Until Israel learns to deal with their neighbors with respect and compassion, terrorism will continue, no matter what walls they build.
In 2004, the UN's International Court of Justice declared the wall unlawful. Israel responded by saying, "If there were no terror, there would be no fence."
And as the chicken-or-egg question rages on, I must look outside the box and think, well they both exist now so what difference does it make who started it?
