Pains of Exodus

Manel Tamimi, January 2015

April 3, 2015

I met Manel Tamimi while traveling through the West Bank in January. She welcomed us into her home in Nabi Saleh and spoke with us about the horrors her family faces under occupation.

Nabi Saleh is a well known friction point for resistance and holds weekly protests every Friday. The village organizes itself and attempts to walk from their homes across the valley to the spring that used to belong to them. The spring is now a part of the settlement which was built above it. There’s a brilliant profile in the New York Times that describes the Tamimi family and the village.

Manel told us that she classifies herself as a non-violent resistor, but could not call herself peaceful. She said,”I can’t be peaceful in that moment when an Israeli soldier enters my house to arrest my 14 year old son. When I’m watching 2 of my cousins dying in front of me. When my 8 year old faints after being shot with tear gas and the soldier is smiling. Yet, I am nonviolent because a mothers pain is the same pain. I refuse any mother to experience this pain because I’ve experienced it. I understand the meaning of losing your beloved and waiting for your beloved.”

Manel was shot by an Israeli soldier in the leg today with live ammo during the weekly protest.

I heard about this as I am heading to my family’s kibbutz in the south to celebrate Passover—a holiday that marks the freedom of the Jews from slavery in Egypt and their arrival to the land of milk and honey. It is my family’s tradition to have long conversations that are interrupted by food and singing all night long. We often discuss the idea of freedom and I have grown up repeating every year that we are not free until all peoples are free. This sentence has never rung more true for me than in this moment. While we were talking with Manel, she said “Even if one day we free Palestine, I am going to fight for others. Because if you are a human you are going to fight against the pain of others.”

There is weird parallelism in being here in Israel, on my way to the Kibbutz which was founded in 1953, to be surrounded by cousins and tradition, and to know at the same time that across the wall, not so far away, people are hurting because of this claim to this land.

International Women's Day March at Qalandiya Checkpoint

March 7, 2015

Busy week since I've returned. On Wednesday there was a March of over 3,000 women who stood outside the Knesset demanding peace. The event was organized by a new group that formed after the war this summer, Women Wage Peace. The garden across from the parliament was full of Jewish and Palestinian women who gathered to demand peace.

Then this morning I was at Qalandiya checkpoint, the crossing between Jerusalem and Ramallah, with many women who were protesting against the occupation for International Women's Day. The nonviolent demonstration was organized by many feminist groups in Israel and Palestine including Women in Black, Mahsom Watch, Women against Violence, Democratic Women and 40 Mothers. I'm doing research for my masters on women peace movements in Israel/Palestine and the week proved to be first-hand research. Women were all ages, but I spoke with some of the founding matriarchs.

So there we stood on one side of the wall while Palestinian women from the West Bank stood on the other side; united by solidarity, divided by concrete. I joined some of the founding feminists in Israel over 60yrs old, Palestinian women from the North, young women from North and South, and internationals. We chanted, we held signs, we banged drums. One scrawny little woman wearing a straw-hat came up to me and handed me a page telling me to vote for the Joint-Arab list. She described to me how she immigrated to Israel from Canada in order that when she was arrested for protesting, they would be forced to honor her rights. She was spunky and radical and in her late 60s. Another woman and her daughter were part of Women in Black and held a big sign that said "Women against occupation." The daughter was my age and said that she has been standing on street corners and junctions with her mom for 10 years with that sign. A Palestinian woman and I began to talk about the event and her group "Women for Democracy" as the tear gas wafted over the wall towards us. We had to stop talking because breathing led to instant coughing.

From the other side of the wall, our Palestinian compatriots were hit with tear gas—not once, not twice, but three times. We only caught whiffs of it as the wind blew it our way, but it was enough to make me still gag hours later. 15 women were reportedly injured and several rushed to the hospital due to over exposure to tear gas. A peaceful, nonviolent protest for women's rights and it was met by teargas.

Here's to the brave women standing on the other side of the wall from me. And here's for the feeling of hope I had being surrounded by these strong, thoughtful, creative women who are fighting for a change. There's another protest tonight in Tel Aviv, it's being called "Israel wants Change" and is promising to fill Rabin square with people demanding a change in government.

Election season is in full swing here. Stay tuned!

Student Protest @ Hebrew University

November 11, 2014
Palestinian groups on campus organized and received permits for a protest against the death of the 22 year old in Kfar Kana,  an event that some likened to Palestine's Ferguson but with no results. The protest was met by a counter protest of a national Zionist group on campus. Plenty of security, plenty of security barriers, and plenty of students walking to and from classes were suddenly overwhelmed by chanting and crowds. I stood to the side with a Palestinian friend of mine; she translated the Arabic for me and I translated the Hebrew for her. The Palestinian side was chanting for freedom and against occupation. The Israeli side was yelling against terrorism and singing nationalistic songs. Signs shared similar tones: "They kill me because I'm Palestinian."  Or "Terror has descended by foot." "End the occupation" and "We will overcome terror." The Palestinians held up pictures of the young man killed in Kfar Kana, the Israelis held pictures of the young man who died yesterday in the stabbing attack. I was struck by the fact that not only was each group singing and chanting and yelling in a different language, but they're not even talking about the same things. They both hold up images of their martyrs, but it's a different discussion entirely: Freedom and political rights versus terror and nationhood. The narratives are not on the same page, how do you expect anyone that is on the other "side" of the barrier to listen? No one can even agree on what's wrong.

And on that note, back to class...

For video of the protest click here.