A great divide

We meet Yasir at the Israeli check point leading in and out of the ancient Palestinian city of Nablus. Like him we had been told that we might not be allowed out of the city until 3 am, although the Israeli Defence Force (IDF) soldier seems as unsure as we and the other 400 or so Palestinians waiting there are. The time is 9 pm.

“I wait here for three to four hours everyday.,” says Yasir, a student at the university in the city, who has been enduring this fate for the past three years. “I can see the lights from my village from here, it is only a ten minute walk. But I have to wait.”

“How am I supposed to study? How can we do anything?” he beseeches.

Lying on the deific mountainsides of the West Bank, Neblus is a browbeaten city. We were earlier told that IDF forces would attack Palestinian refugee camps around the city that night as has been a frequent occurrence in for the past five years. Overhead we hear Apache helicopters and see fire orange flares shot over paths leading out of the city ensuring that no one is leaving via an illegal route.

Taking refuge in a local hotel, there is little distraction from the sporadic exchanges of gunfire heard over the city. Barely a sole is in the streets, and those businesses not already closed down are bolt-locked. It is a very un-Arab affair not to see tea drinkers, sheesha smokers and restaurant owners out and about come nightfall.

Like most West Bank communities Nablus is being attacked: either literally by the IDF under the premise of extinguishing insurgents; via vast disruption to daily lives; or undernourishment, as Israel administers all goods going in and out of the Occupied Palestinian Territories. Special passes are needed for Palestinians to pass between cities, including their main economic, social and cultural region of Jerusalem, and these are frequently denied.

There situation is not assisted by fundamentalist Jewish settlers arriving in the West Bank. In Hebron around 50 settler families claimed land where intricate alleyways blinkered by Palestinian shops and homes stood. They duly built on top of the buildings. Now the alleyways below are virtually deserted and seldom are functioning stalls. Fixed above the walkway is chicken wire which holds litter and rocks, some piles so burdensome the wire has drooped down. The local resident who shows us his city says the wire was put there to stop the settlers from chucking stones at the people below. It worked, but now they throw faeces.

Israel’s prevention of a functioning Palestinian state is a method of control used to extend their own settlements in the region and dominate the area’s economic resources. The eight metres high “Separation Barrier”, built by the Israel to keep terrorism at bay, as well as cutting the West Bank into numerous small, detached, impoverished subdivisions, has confiscated 10% of the West Bank. This 10% is the West Bank’s richest agricultural land and contains the majority of its water.

The next morning Nablus is awake and continuing as if nothing has occurred. Last night’s events area part of life, as is the demolished Palestinian government building we see on our way out of the city, razed by Israeli tank fire in the previous month. The Palestinians here will go on using eight times less water per capita than their Israeli neighbours 60kms away. Their toilet systems will continue to be more primitive – unable to take paper – compared to the modern Israeli system. These issues will persist as signs of segregation and persecution. Later as we cross back through the separation barrier the government sign on the Israeli side that greets those passing with ‘Peace be unto you’ seems more Orwellian than ever.

Summer refugee camp

“My neighbour died. She was drinking coffee on her 6th floor balcony and a bomb hit her.

“Every hour bombs hit 10 metres from my house. I just stayed inside because I didn’t know where to go. Then the mayor said I could go.”

Galit Damti has been brought by bus with her husband and two children from her home in Nahariya. She sits beside a 40-foot stage, rigged up to state of the art sound equipment set on white sand that leads to a turquoise blue sea. Bikinis and board shorts strut around the pool tables and chill out areas nearby. Yet, as much as it might be mistaken for one, Damti’s temporary refuge from Hezbollah’s katyusha rockets which reign down on northern Israel is not an Ibiza-style summer festival.

This camp near Askelon, 40kms south of Tel Aviv on Israel’s striking Mediterranean coast has been manufactured for those in most need in the north by Arkady Gaydamak, controversial Russian businessman, whom French police reportedly want to question in relation to an arms-for-oil deal with Angola involving former French officials.

For four weeks he has paid the maintenance costs of approximately $500,000 per day to keep the 6000 people in two tent cities covered, fed, occupied and entertained. This has included refuse collection, 24-hour security, 300 helpers and even the drafting of Israel’s biggest comedians and mainstream pop stars to provide evening entertainment. 35 hairdressers have been found amongst the camp’s numbers – which range from 2-month old babies to 80-year-old pensioners – to provide an additional service and keep refugees busy.

The “city” is run like a summer event. The luminous wristbands used to designate individuals allotted meal times further the impression that a fat one’s going down in Askelon, and on the surface people appear to be enjoying themselves. As I enter the camp my chaperone leaves me with the words, “Have a good time,” and talking to those within gives the impression of relaxed ease. “It’s very nice,” says Lioz, 16, here from Kriatata with her sister and parents. “We can swim, we have everything that we need.” But she also says that she talks to her remaining family in the north everyday, as, scratch the surface and there are of course much more serious issues at play.

Alongside concerns for family members – there’s constant queues to use the free telephones – a sense of persecution runs high. Damti says, “It’s very sad that the world sees it from Lebanon’s perspective and not Israel’s. I don’t know why people say Arab is good and Israel is not. Arabs don’t like America, Israel, Spain, all of the world. I don’t think that the world likes the Jewish. ”

Haviv Gyuav, 30, a disabled army veteran said, “Maybe we are too soft. We tried everything giving them Palestine, Lebanon but still they attack us.”

The camp is symbolic of a pulling together of the Israeli people. In the southernmost city of Eilat, which has almost tripled its population of 55,000 since the war started, refugees are being hosted in their 20s and 30s by local families, restaurants and entertainment is provided at a free or reduced rate and public buildings have been made available for shelter. It is estimated that 6 percent of Israeli’s 7 million population has been displaced by the war.

But it’s the future that people are looking to, as Damti continues, “I am very, very sorry that people in Lebanon died. But I think that we need to take care of Hezbollah for good. The sooner the better, then we can go back to our regular life, after all my husband has only taken a week’s vacation from work.”