Hello friends and family! I love and miss you all. I will try to keep my updates as brief and interesting as possible. I will also trying to not assume that anyone knows too much about Palestine and the situation here, but if I write something that you do not understand please write back and ask me. Lastly, I am writing about my experiences and opinions but I do not pretend to be an expert. If you believe something I write is incorrect or if you disagree with something that I say I would love it if you would email me back so we can talk about it (or we can talk in person when I get back to the states).
The first few days of my trip I spent helping to chaperone a trip called Birthright Replugged. We took about 20 kids from the Jenin refugee camp to Jerusalem, Haifa, and to the villages their families are from, which were taken over by Israelis in 1948. Just the fact that we were taking the kids on this trip is amazing. Palestinians are not allowed to travel freely when they pass the age of 15, which means that their families cannot take them to these places. Some had been to Ramallah and Jerusalem, but few had been inside of what was declared the state of Israel in 1948.
When we arrived at the camp the kids had been waiting excitedly for over an hour. A few hours after we had settled into the camp and gotten to know the kids a little, we heard people firing guns into the air. Car tires screeched into the parking lot of the house we were in and Mohammed, the leader of the youth program, came running into the building. Mohammed told us that a man had just opened fire at the check point which we needed to go through to leave Jenin and that the shooter was dead and the checkpoint was now closed. It began to look like our trip would not happen and there would be 20 very disappointed kids.
Checkpoints are run by the Israeli Defense Force (IDF) in order to limit the movement of Palestinians. They are located within the West Bank, which is supposed to be Palestinian territory but is currently occupied by Israel. In order to pass through checkpoints a person must wait in line and show identification to the Israeli soldiers. The soldiers then arbitrarily decide whether or not the person can pass through. Some checkpoints are in permanent locations, other checkpoints are known as flying checkpoints and can be set up anywhere. Checkpoints make it very hard for Palestinians to get around for work, school or any other reason and they can make a journey which is only a few miles take hours. They can also be closed without warning or reason.
We went to bed Saturday night unsure about the future of Birthright Replugged. The next morning we started out in three separate vans hoping for the best. We passed through one flying checkpoint and soon approached the permanent checkpoint near Jenin. There was a long line of cars waiting and I crossed my fingers that we would make it through. When we finally got to the front of the line Dunya, one of the leaders of our trip, approached the solders and spoke to them for a while. She came back smiling; we had made it through! We left the vans, carrying our things through the checkpoint to the bus which was waiting for us on the other side. As we drove away people said that this was the first bus to be able to leave from Jenin since 2002. In 2002 there was a battle in the camp and many Palestinian civilians were killed as well as some Israeli soldiers (there is a much longer and more complex history about this that I encourage you to read about online- just search "Jenin"). Since this time the movement of people out of the camp has been very limited and the Israeli army has had a big presence within the camp.
We had another major checkpoint to pass through, and we luckily made it through this one without incident. I'm sure that the fancy bus and the presence of internationals in the front seats helped to make this possible. As we headed to Jerusalem the kids were so excited, druming, clapping, snapping pictures, and taking videos the whole way. In Jerusalem we took the kids to the Dome of the Rock mosque and then to lunch. Many of them bought "free Palestine" shirts and presents for their families and teachers. Then we headed to Haifa.
When the ocean first came into view on the way to Haifa the kids started yelling, pressing their faces against the window, and taking pictures like crazy. Most had never seen the ocean before even though they only lived a few hours drive away. We met a youth group of Palestinian kids who live in Haifa and all headed to the beach.
The kids were overjoyed to be at the beach, but as we were walking onto the sand we were immediately harrassed by Israeli soldiers. They saw that some of the girls with us were wearing hijab (a scarf many Muslim women cover their head with) and began questioning us about who we were and why we were there. I was shocked and upset, but I guess that I should have expected the racism since Israel is a state founded on racism (it gives rights to Jews, but not Palestinians). We still managed to have a nice day playing at the beach and spending time with the kids from Haifa.
We woke up the next morning and split into three different groups to go visit the children's villages. The children's families have different stories, but they were pushed out of or fled their villages in 1948. At this time they thought that they were just leaving for a little while until the violence was over and that they would later be able to return home. This "right of return" was recognized by the UN, but Israel has never allowed it to happen.
The kids in my group were from four different villages and we set off with a guide to try to find them or what was left of them. We visited Abed's village first. He had family there who he had never met before and we spent a while in their house. Another of the boys in our group got to see his sister there whom he had not seen in five years (thus you can see how limited the movement of Palestians is).
The second village was even more disturbing to me. There is now a Kibbutz there (owned by Israelis). The kids were so excited to see their grandparents' land and were jumping and begging to get off the bus but there was a crowd of people from the Kibbutz staring at us and were not allowed to be there and so could not let the kids leave the bus. The third village was now fenced, empty land and the kids took pictures of the hill which used to have the village's well on it.
When we reached the fourth and last village there were signed everywhere saying "WARNING: DO NOT ENTER. FIRING ZONE." The village's land was now an Israeli army base. We drove onto the land anyway an searched for remains of the village. All we could find were white stones left over from the houses which were destroyed in 1948.
We met the other groups at the new Ayn Hawd. Ayn Hawd was also a Palestinian village until '48; when the fighting started many of the residents fled up a hill to a place where they could still see their houses. They settled on this hill, expecting to be able to return home, but were never granted the right of return. Instead, a Jewish Dadaist artist colony moved in, taking over the Palestinian houses. The original inhabitants of Ayn Hawd now live in the new Ayn Hawd, a Palestinian village where we all ate dinner.
One of our kids family was from Ayn Hawd and she found her grandparents' house (I was not with this group but heard about it at dinner). The group knocked on the door of the house and were let in by a Dutch artist. He spoke to the group for a while, and at one point she walked to a corner and started to cry. The artist said, "Don't worry, you can come back anytime." One of the boys in the group answered him, "No, actually she can't. Next year she will be 16 and will no longer be allowed to travel."
After dinner we parted ways; I had really bonded with some of the girls and we exchanged emails and I love yous. I will never forget them and hope to see them again someday.
I know that this email is long but I left out so much!! I hope it was interested and I would love to hear your thoughts. I am now in the Deheisha refugee camp near Bethlehem and will write soon about this. Take care!
<3 rachel
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