By the way, we are entering Jerusalem illegally...

Here are some pictures from Hebron.

Armed Israeli settler walking freely past the military checkpoint on his way to the complex that houses the mosque and synagogue above the tomb of Abraham.

Military checkpoint in the city.  Palestinian youth waiting to be allowed to continue on their way.

Closed Palestinian shops in Hebron.

Closed shops in Hebron.

Closed shops in Hebron.

Last week we took a trip to Hebron and Bethlehem.  The occupation in Hebron is a bit unique.  About 400 extremist Israeli Jews have occupied the Old City of Hebron with several thousand IOF (Israeli Occupation Forces) soldiers there to "protect" them from their Palestinian neighbors.  The neighborhoods outside of the Old City are Palestinian with illegal Israeli settlements interspersed throughout them.  This has been an area of extreme tension and is a hotbed of settler violence against Palestinians.  The city is home to the tomb of Abraham, a place holy to Jews, Christians, and Muslims.  A church was constructed over the tomb.  Later it became a mosque and then it became a place of worship shared by both Jews and Muslims.  In 1994 Baruch Goldstein, an Israeli physician in a settlement in Hebron, got past Israeli security with hand grenades and a machine gun and entered the mosque at Abraham's tomb where he opened fire on people as they prayed.  He killed 29 Palestinians and wounded another 150.  The people within the mosque fought back with a fire extinguisher and killed him.  His cause of death was officially registered as "murder" although no charges were filed against those who ended his killing spree.  Riots followed that killed 25 Palestinians and 5 Israelis.  A two week curfew was imposed on Palestinians only.  They were not allowed to leave their homes while settlers, including those from Goldstein's community, were free to come and go as they pleased.  A memorial was set up for Goldstein at the nearby settlement. 

After this massacre, the prayer site was split into two - one section for Muslims and one for Jews.  There are three checkpoints to get into the mosque.  Both sides have access through a window to the tomb of Abraham and you can look through the window in the mosque and see people praying in the synagogue.

The actions of Baruch Goldstein were the most horrendous of recent attacks but there is a long history of both violence and dispossession as well as peace and coexistence on both sides.  What is happening today in Hebron is dispicable.

The beautiful Old City is a ghost town.  Most of the Palestinian shops have been forced to close.  The floors above the stores has been occupied by Israeli settlers.  The Palestinian municipal government had to install wire fencing above the shops that are still open and below the windows of the settlers' houses to protect Palestinians from garbage and stones being thrown on them.  

As we were sitting having tea with a Palestinian shop owner, a settler came up to him and verbally threatened him.  He asked him "Why are so many terrorists coming from your home?"  Many families lost their businesses from accusations that they were somehow linked to "terrorism" and therefore were a security threat.  

Israeli soldiers set up checkpoints all throughout the city and Palestinians must show their ID cards when they are just trying to walk down the street.  The soldiers can then hold them there as long as they want for no reason.  We saw this.  When a group of TIPH (Temporary International Presence in Hebron), a group that monitors and reports on Israeli abuses of Palestinians in Hebron, walked by, the soldiers finally gave the young boys back their ID cards and let them go.  

The military presence is much more aggressive and threatening than in Jerusalem.  There are snipers on the roofs with their finger on the trigger and gun pointed following you as you walk by.  Can you imagine your child walking home from school with a sniper's gun trained on her everyday?  When we were shopping in some of the shops that are still in business, a pack of Israeli soldiers walked through for some reason.  They walked through slowly with their machine guns raised and their fingers on the trigger.  They would stop as they approached people, including us, and remain a few minutes eyeing us with their weapons pointed at us.  

Israeli flags fly from the settlers homes but Palestinian flags are not allowed to be flown.

Just this past passover a 2 week curfew was imposed on Palestinians.  One of the families we spoke to keeps a donkey in their house and they were not able to take him out or go out themselves during this time.

The air is filled with desperation as the economy is being strangled and threats occur daily in an attempt to finally clear the city completely of Palestinians.

Hebron is one of the cities that the Israeli human rights organization B'Tselem launched their project "Shooting Back" in which they provide Palestinians with video cameras to document abuse at the hands of settlers and the IOF.  A search on youtube.com will turn up some disturbing footage from Hebron.

I cannot express enough how disturbing the situation is.  Palestinians in the West Bank are occupied by the Israeli military force.  The Oslo Accords produced areas A, B, and C with varying degrees of autonomy for Palestinians but this is no matter because regardless of what type of area you are living in you are still occupied.  As a Palestinians you may have your own Palestinian local government and police force but they are helpless in the face of the Israeli military and your neighbors in the illegal settlements.  There is no one to protect your rights.  You are a citizen of a country that has no power to protect your rights and you are not a citizen of the country that controls whether your rights will be respected or not.

Well before I end this I want to explain the title of the post.  You see we got up early in the morning to take the bus into Jerusalem only to catch a bus there back into the West Bank to go to Bethlehem.  The bus that I usually take, which has Israeli plates and can drive through the checkpoint and into East Jerusalem, was not there. They guys told me I could take this smaller shared taxi.  In the taxi they told me that they could either bring me to the normal checkpoint that I go to and I would have to go through the security process and catch another bus on the other side OR they could take me to another place where I could just walk through easily.  So I said "yeah the second one will be good if you think it is easier."  Three of them were going to this second place too so they could help me find my way.  The taxi brought us close to the normal checkpoint but then turned down some other roads and stopped right by the Wall.  What followed was 20 minutes of climbing up and over things and meandering up and down alleys.  Two of the guys were going to Israel to work.  The other guy is a student at the American University in Jenin and was visiting a school in Jerusalem.  Finally this student said to us, "By the way, we are entering Jerusalem illegally.  The Israelis will not give any of us permission to visit Jerusalem." That is when I realized that we were walking around the Wall and sneaking into Jerusalem illegally.  Great.  So much for security.  It was pretty easy and painless.  Many Palestinians still work illegally in Israel, something families depend on to survive.  It is just that now it takes them longer to get to work because they have to find the cracks in the Wall.