Checkpoints

For the last month our TV screens and newspapers have been filled with reports of Israel’s massacre of the people of Gaza. The bloodshed and brutality have caused outrage across the world and calls for international actions to hold Israel to account are growing. Whilst this is going on, the people on the other side of Palestine continue their struggle in relative silence against the gradual ethnic cleansing of their land.

Makhool is situated just higher in the Valley than Al Hadidiya and like them their land is also surrounded by Israeli Military bases and very close to this small community is a training ground and firing range. The road, just 100m away from the homes, is Israeli controlled and busy with settler and military traffic. As a community who rely on grazing sheep, they face many problems from Israeli’s if their sheep wander onto the nearby road. ‘It causes us problems’, said Josef, who explained ‘if they are on the road, they are taken’.

As you cross Al Hamra checkpoint heading for the Jordan Valley you come to a barren area of land with a few demolished buildings and homes made of wood, tin and plastic. Harrab, Suileman, their families, and all the other families of Hamra are surviving under extreme pressure from the Israeli administration that wants to annex the land and ethnically cleanse the area of Palestinians. The first building we came to was a water well and pump that had been destroyed in 1982.

Our first night was spent in Al Jiftlik, a village with the surreal scenario of being half area B and half area C, meaning half gets electricity and building rights while the other half lives in the 9th Century. (We ate in area B and slept in area C, at least Palestinians still have permission for this.) This is the village reported by previous delegations as having a tent school due to Israel’s refusal to allow the Palestinians to educate themselves.