A Morning in Silwan

Morning in Silwan.

Israeli bulldozers are at work. Again.

Israeli police laughing at the Palestinian and Israeli photographers below

The details? Nature and Parks Authority. Land that is both privately owned by Palestinians and part of a National Park. Bulldozers. Probably a hundred heavily armed soldiers. Horses. Dogs. Arrests. Yelling. Cameras. The usual dance.

I don’t care about these details. Who cares about these details? Sometimes details can obscure the truth. Here are the details that matter:

Israel has been occupying Silwan and rest of East Jerusalem for more than four decades.

Israeli soldier preventing Palestinian man from nearing his property

Israeli bulldozers are a regular fixture of the landscape here in Silwan, demolishing structures and houses build “without permits.”

Israel’s occupation authorities virtually never grant permits to Palestinians, certainly not in Silwan. Certainly not in Silwan. Certainly not near the City of David, the ancient site of Jewish history, archeology. Only Jewish history. Certainly not other histories also.

So this morning, in Silwan, the bulldozers were sparked again, the kids with guns wear serious expressions on their still pudgy and sleep-deprived faces. Guarding, protecting, serving. Serving what, though?

Israeli police surround the Palestinian man who had descended part of the hill

This place is growing sicker every day, and we don’t feel it. I think that’s a symptom of our illness, the unfeeling. The ignoring. Closing our eyes. The murder of a 17-year old child in Budrus, the shooting of a 21-year old University Senior near Hebron. Constant, constant oppression. Can anything force our eyes open?

This video that I shot on my iPhone is of a Palestinian man who owned part of the property the bulldozers were tearing into. He tries to get past the arbitrarily drawn police-line, to his property, and is tackled by a soldier whose dog (thankfully still with a muzzle on) jumps on the man. He is then taken away by other soldiers.

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1

totohanthala on February 28, 2013 at 14:16

Sumud

It sure takes alot of guts & sheer bravery
to arrest children for throwing rocks at occupying soldiers
then to haul them away to a jail to be traumatized by sheer ‘legal’ terrorism
until shaking in fear.bleeding, white with pain they sign confessions in a language they do not understand

My my what tremendous courage it must take to point a tank’s barrel at a kid
who is on the way to school who dared to stop to throw a stone at the big ugly beast
What backbone & pluck one must possess to be armed to the teeth harassing women, children & unarmed men in their own country at a checkpoint deciding who can pass who cannot…& when

What kind of gallantry does one need to bomb schools & hospitals
using state of the art weaponry to destroy homes, farms & orchards
as brave cowards slaughter civilians en-caged in an open air prison for voting the wrong way in a free election but voting for a democracy your captors disapprove of
what absurd chutzpah this is to call this crime against humanity; self-defense or justified

A dozen jeeps screech to a stop outside a home in the occupied ‘terror’tories
fully armed soldiers race out shouting then break down the door of a families home at 3 am
to photograph 13 year olds for future reference while mom & dad are forced to freeze by a gun shoved in the face outside in the chill of the night
after the raid to salute such daring gallantry with smiles and salutes which took such pluck & grit

But the truly brave the honestly courageous are those who don’t blink when faced with such overwhelming force
real heroes are those who endure with unconquerable sumud day after day, year after year
they stay with unpassable defiance and refuse to cede or yield
as the Palestinian gets jeered harassed & marginalized by the court fed by zionist policies he smiles with a grace incomprehensible

West Bank Palestinians resist under the yolk of foreign military occupation as they survive by endurance
under the wire mesh overhang of the markets from the trash tossed from above
to the Palestinian who stands up to the racism,abuse & mistreatment with a smile of fortitude & the calmness of valor

i walked with your children on public dirt roads while red-eyed demonic pious immigrants waved guns screaming rabid hatred
i was atop a teachers house in Hebron who showed us where the occupation soldier pissed in her watertank during the 2nd intifada
i broke bread with a family whose lineage goes backs thousands of years and have a stone at the entrance to their farm with the word’s; ‘we refuse to be your enemy’

i was born in a land called canada
my ancestor blood flows Lakota blackfoot
i eschew nationalism, patriotism and others vices of bigotry, elitism, xenophobia & exclusiveness
but i shout with idealism & with solidarity i am Palestinian
i accept that all bloods flow red and one…
2

totohanthala on February 28, 2013 at 14:16

Jaffa; a clockwork orange

by michael hall

I have a key to a home that has no door nor walls
but i can still smell jaffa oranges sweet in the breeze down the hill
over there stands a park where a village once stood
so my grandmother told me one day, almost everyday

Have you ever been to the sea
i’ve never been there but my grandfather has
it was warm and salty he says with moist eyes
but for me the wet of the sea is not allowed

Not too long ago we walked this land from water to water
over the hills and down into the farms tending rows and rows of orchards
some of the olive trees were thousands of years old
before armored bulldozers came broke and razed them into piles of kindling

Al Quds is a dream for all of us to see
without roadblocks checkpoints and permits
without smug smartass soldiers barking and pushing
that day seems so far away

What is ours we cannot build upon
for illegal immigrants with an army tear it down
yet they build what they want where they want
with all the water filling their pools as our crops wither and die

I walked with children in the southern Hebron hills
on public dirt roads not bothering no one
but then it rides roaring down from inside a fortress colony
guns waving, curses launched from inside of beeping revving cars

In the courts to be tried by foreigners in your land is surreal
in a military court judged by bigotry what chance do you have
someone somewhere somehow saw you throw a rock at a tank
you must pay for scratching the paint

Inside the stinking squalid cell in between your beatings
the words of your grandparents echo in your heart
you can almost smell the oranges on the limbs of Jaffa
you can almost taste the salt of the sea….you endure as a freedom rider