Hello everyone, I arrived in the states from the West Bank last week to spend the holidays with my family. I hope everyone had peaceful holidays with your friends and families. I have heard from many of you that you did not receive my emails while I was in the West Bank. I sent everyone on the list the two emails that I wrote, but apparently there must have been something wrong with my email. I will try putting everyone's email in the send to category and not in the bcc category and splitting up the list. Sorry to expose everyone's email accounts. I have put the two emails in this email. I will be returning to the West Bank on January 18 for four and half months. I will live in Ramallah, help with the non-violence trainings for the International Solidarity Movement, study Arabic, and hopefully find a part time job. I will also be fundraising (with the help of Hilary Martin) for the Women and Children's Association of Budrus, the village I lived in for two months. I will send out an appeal letter in the next couple of weeks and more details about this amazing project. I will return to Vermont in the end of May and will help tend the fields that the rest of the Diggers will have already started to cultivate. I will continue to send out occasional emails while I am in Palestine. I f you do not want to be on the list please let me know. Happy New Year! May this be a year of reconciliation and peace… Love S'ra P.S. – A quick commentary on current events in Palestine. The elections in Palestine are far from being free and fair. The Israeli and US governments have selected who they wish to lead Palestine, Mahmoud Abbas, a Palestinian they believe to be a moderate and someone who will make concessions in the peace negotiations. They have already chosen the winner. The Israeli government has allowed Abbas to travel throughout the West Bank, Gaza, Jerusalem and abroad, a right not granted to any of the other candidates. Abbas is permitted to meet with dignitaries from throughout the world and the Middle East, thus providing him a spotlight in the local and international media. The other candidates have been beaten at checkpoints when trying to enter East Jerusalem to campaign, been prevented from traveling inside the West Bank and Gaza, and been arrested with hardly any media coverage of these events. The Israeli government stated that they will allow Palestinians to travel freely and dismantle checkpoints for the election, but I did not see much evidence of this when I was last there. We will have to wait and see… November 25, 2004 Reunion in Budrus I left the West Bank only eight months ago and I find it amazing how much has changed. The physical landscape continues to be scarred by bulldozers, Israeli tanks and humvees. More checkpoints, more trees destroyed to make way for the wall built by the Israeli government, more roads exclusively for Israeli settlers, more children and adults killed on both sides, more concrete walls and separation. I returned to Budrus this week to visit my friends there. Of course I was greeted with more than enough coffee and tea to last me the rest of the year and sweets and sweets and more sweets. Thankfully I have learned a little Arabic and I can sometimes decline these offerings politely. The first night I arrived in Budrus, while I was visiting my friend Najia, we got a phone call. Israeli soldiers killed one of Najia’s close friends in Ramallah, just moments before while we were sipping tea and playing games with the little kids. The soldiers said there was a wanted man in the car. Bullets reigned into the vehicle that Najia’s friend was in, killing three Palestinians. Najia’s friend was not a wanted man. His body was found with several bullet holes in his chest. He had just married and had a baby. After hearing the news the joy of our reunion quickly disappeared, the children stopped crawling on top of me, and sorrow filled our hearts. What do you say to a grandmother who has seen so much death and whose village is being encircled by the wall? I am sorry, my tax dollars most likely bought those bullets that went through your friend’s chest. I just sat there and held her hand while she cried uncontrollably. The last time I was here Najia told me that she had learned to stop crying because if she started to cry she would never stop because there is so much grief every day in the Palestinian life. But there I was holding her while she cried, trying to hold back my own tears in front of her. The next day I went to visit Najia to see how she was and of course she said she was fine and happy to see me but I could still see the pain she carried with her. After 48 demonstrations against the wall in Budrus, construction continues. The area of the wall which was being constructed when I was here last is completed. Now the wall is continuing to the other side of Budrus. The forest and mountains where many people from Budrus would have lunch and bring their sheep and goats to graze is now behind the wall. The last time I was here many families took me to this place for picnics and beautiful walks. The little kids would pick flowers and find turtles in the mountains. Now soldiers stand there with guns pointed towards the village, harassing anyone who goes close to the construction area to harvest their olives. I went with Abu Ahmed’s family yesterday to harvest olives maybe 400 meters from where the wall is being built. In the middle of the harvest while the teenage girls sang Palestinian songs a bomb exploded. We all jumped and turned around to see a huge plume of smoke rising into the air. Apparently these explosions occur often now, to break up the bedrock so the wall can be built. The soldiers do not even give a warning or check to make sure that no one is in an olive tree harvesting before the explosions occur. Constant gun fire is also heard from a nearby Israeli military training camp. My friends Nawal and Ahmed built their house on this side of the village to be close to the beautiful pine forest. Now they have a view of bulldozers, soldiers, destroyed and confiscated land. When there are demonstrations near the wall, the tear gas from the Israeli soldiers infiltrates their house, making it difficult for their three-month old son and Ahmed’s elderly mother to breath. Their dream house has become a construction site for their permanent imprisonment. One night while I was in Budrus Abu Ahmed’s four-year old daughter woke up in the middle of the night screaming, “Jesh, Jesh.” (“Soldier, soldier.") She awoke crying, and sweating and with a fever. I imagine that this happens to most children in the West Bank and Gaza. Budrus has proven to be an amazing example of resistance. They have won international attention for their 48 demonstrations and their perseverance. Yet they will still be encircled by a wall with eight other villages with no access to hospitals, higher education and most jobs. Budrus was fortunate that they did not loose more lands and trees. Recently the Israeli government actually gave the village back lands that they confiscated in 1948. This happened because of Budrus’ relentless struggle against the wall. However, this land does not have any olive trees on it to replace the olive trees destroyed in Budrus or the pine forest, which served as a refuge for so many people. December 9, 2005 Arrests in Budrus: A Show of Solidarity Boys throw stones in Palestine, but why? Do they really think that they will be able to hurt a soldier, stop the building of a settlement or the wall or stop an incursion into their village or city? Maybe they will hit a soldier and the solider will get a bruise that will last a week or so, but they will not be killed by this stone. The soldiers fire rubber bullets and live ammunition, which kill, taking lives away. The portion of the Annexation Wall being built now in Budrus is located extremely close to the school. Each morning the bulldozers and jack hammers wake up and start work before the students and teachers arrive to the school. When the boys enter the school, they can see the construction site from the field where they sometimes kick a soccer ball around before school starts. Each day the drilling drains out the sound of children’s laughter and the chirping of the birds. Behind the construction area is an Israeli military training base, a constant roar of gunfire. Soldiers stand close to the bulldozers and construction equipment, looking across at the school, in a forest where the children once where able to go play. They have their guns pointed towards the schoolyard and yell at the children if they stray from the schoolyard to go play in the olive groves between the wall and the school. The wall is wrapping around their village and eight other villages. Soon there will be only one entrance in and out of the entire area. It could take hours to get to Ramallah, where the closest universities and hospitals are, not to mention jobs. So why do the boys throw stones? The stone is a symbolic act of resistance, defiance to the Israeli occupation. The boys sometimes throw stones before and after school at soldiers that are too far away to hit. In return the soldiers fire tear gas, sound bombs and rubber bullets. The schoolyard is littered with the remnants of these weapons. Lately the soldiers have been entering the village more regularly. Two days this week they went to the school in the morning to arrest three young boys who threw stones. The teachers refused them entrance into the school. The soldiers do not know the boys names but they can recognize them. The teachers knew which boys they were looking for so they had the boys change their clothes and snuck them out of the school. Other internationals and I went to the school the last two days to try to deter the soldiers from coming back, they never arrived and hopefully they will stop coming to the school. Of course if the soldiers were not protecting the workers who are building the wall, the boys would have nothing to throw stones at. If there were no bulldozers or humvees, they would play soccer like ordinary boys after school. Budrus hosted their 49th demonstration against the wall on Tuesday. Over 150 village members, 60 Israelis, and 25 internationals came to protest. It was planned and coordinated by the village and Israelis. Thirty-seven Israelis were detained and four arrested at the protest, when asked for identification, they all gave the name of Ahmed Awad, a man from Budrus who was arrested three months ago for non-violently resisting the wall. He has been held in administrative detention for three months, a special legal system established by the Israeli government for Palestinians, a legal system which grants Palestinians no rights. Over forty Israelis intended to get arrested to show their solidarity with Ahmed Awad. They have the privilege to participate in civil disobedience like this, because they know they will be released, a right that Palestinians do not possess. Under administrative detention Palestinians can be held without charges being filed against them for an indefinite period of time. The demonstration on Tuesday turned into a battlefield of young boys throwing rocks and Israeli soldiers using tear gas, sound bombs, and rubber bullets. Tear gas infiltrated many houses close to the school. One Israeli woman, fell on top of a sound bomb which exploded underneath her, singeing her hair and skin. The ambulance that carried her was tear gassed. Soldiers occupied a house in the village and went to the roof to throw more tear gas and sound bombs. Eventually when night fell the soldiers finally left Budrus and families went to eat dinner after an exhausting day of inhaling tear gas and trying to escape the soldiers. Earlier this year when I was in Budrus, Ahmed Awad, also known as Abu Hassan, invited 15 internationals and Israelis to his house for lunch. Each of us was served five different types of soup, half a chicken, a huge bowl of rice, bread and all the tea and coffee we wanted. We all left barely able to walk, feeling gracious for his family’s outrageously kind meal. Ahmed is a sheep and goat herder. Much of the land where he took his sheep and goats to graze is under Israeli control now. While he is in jail his brother is tending to his animals, a job they both share. The Israelis that came for lunch that day were neighbors and invited guests, not occupiers and invaders. These kinds of gestures strengthen the ties and trust between two people who have been isolated from each other, and who have been taught to hate each other. The people of Budrus and many Israelis have become genuine friends, a hopeful sign for what will be a long process of trust building and living together as neighbors. Meeting Mousa’s Family Yester day I had the honor of meeting my friend Mousa’s family, my friend from Vermont, not to mention a marvelous gardener. Mousa comes from Abud, a village of 2,200 people in the Western Ramallah district. His family was most gracious, with tea, delicious food, and babies to coddle. Christians and Muslims share the village and live side by side. This community has been spared enclosure by the Annexation Wall. However, they feel the effects of the occupation daily. Three illegal Israeli settlements surround Abud. Bet Arie, built in 1982, confiscated 800 dunums from Abud (four dunums equal one acre). Then in 1988 the construction of Ofraim took another 650 dunums from the village. Most recently in 2001, the Israeli military built a military settlement, Naveh Iyyre, for the storage of military vehicles and equipment, which seized 60 dunums of land. Transportation on two of the three main roads into Abud is impeded by roadblocks, huge cement blocks placed in the middle of the road. The cement blocks are still present on the the road that is currently open. The blocks are on the side of the road so the military can completely enclose the village at any moment. Almost daily the military enters the village escalating the situation. They have no reason except to provoke the village. The soldiers have asked the mayor why the boys throw stones at the jeeps. He eloquently replied, “If the soldiers did not come into the village, the boys would not throw stones.” The economic situation in the village mirrors the rest of the West Bank and Gaza. Since the beginning of the Second Intifada almost all Palestinians are not allowed to enter Israel or the settlements to work. Two hundred fifty people from Abud once traveled to Israel and the settlements for employment. Now they are either unemployed or seeking work in Ramallah, like everyone one else in the region. With such high unemployment rates, wages have plummeted in Ramallah. Just like most rural villages in the West Bank, every family in Abud has olive trees. Before 2000, these families exported olive oil to the Hebron region, Gaza and Jordan, but since the Second Intifada, the Israeli government has imposed closure (the inability of people and products to move out of their immediate vicinity). In the last few years the importation of olive oil from countries like Spain, have driven the price of olive oil down, making it impossible to survive off the sale of olive oil. In 2001 the Israeli government cut 3,500 olive trees in Abud, which lined an exclusive Israeli settler road. The Israeli military claimed that Palestinians could hide behind the trees and shoot at settlers as they drove by. For the sake of “security” Abud lost 3,500 olive trees. The military cleared one hundred meters on each side of the road. According to Elias Azar, the mayor of Abud and Mousa’s second cousin, due to the severe economic hardship, approximately half the population of Abud lives outside the village (another 2,200 people). They have moved to the Ramallah or to Jordan or the United States if the could obtain visas. While I was in Abud, I went to meet Dina, a spirited mother of five beautiful children. Last year her husband was murdered in front of her children, no one knows why to this day. This story is similar to the story of so many other martyrs. Now Dina must support her five children and elderly mother on her own. She cleans the classrooms at one of the schools in Abud. While I sat with the family and practiced the little Arabic I know, I looked into those children’s eyes and wanted to cry. Those children, aged 7 to 12, watched the murder of their father, their eyes were no longer innocent, and their childhood was stolen from them in a matter of minutes. This image, an image of absolute horror, will be with them the rest of their lives. Yet their never ending smiles remain in my memory. ------------------------ Yahoo! Groups Sponsor --------------------~--> $4.98 domain names from Yahoo!. Register anything. http://us.click.yahoo.com/Q7_YsB/neXJAA/yQLSAA/MknplB/TM --------------------------------------------------------------------~-> Yahoo! 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