CPTnet
28 February 2007
HEBRON REFLECTION: Living resistance

by Janet Benvie

For Palestinians, the simple act of every day living often becomes an act of
non-violent resistance against the cruel, illegal Israeli occupation and
confiscation of their land. These are but a few of the daily acts of
resistance I have witnessed:

A few weeks ago CPT was invited to the wedding of a young couple from the
southern Bethlehem village of Umm Salamuna. The couple chose to hold their
wedding on land confiscated by the Israeli authorities. They had bulldozed
the land in preparation for building a section of the Israeli separation
wall (for further information about the effects of the wall see
http://www.btselem.org/english/Separation_Barrier/Statistics.asp
<http://www.btselem.org/english/Separation_Barrier/Statistics.asp> ).

In addition to the usual wedding guests-- family, friends and neighbors
--Bethlehem District officials and Palestinian, Israeli and international
peace activists attended the wedding.

Last week, I visited a Palestinian family in the Beqa'a valley, a fertile
area north east of Hebron, where approximately sixty Palestinians live.
Under the Oslo agreements, 70% of Israeli occupied Palestinian territories
remained under full Israeli control. Beqa'a is part of this 70%.
Palestinians must go through an expensive and lengthy process to try to
obtain permits from the Israeli Civil Administration. Very rarely does it
give such permits.

The Israeli authorities have confiscated much of this family's farmland and
used it to build the Israeli settlement of Ha Harsina. They took additional
land to build a road that links this settlement and the settlement Kiryat
Arba with Jerusalem. Grandparents of the family proudly showed me the new,
small extension to their home. It was built, they explained, to allow one
of their sons and his family a little privacy in their crowded home.
Israeli bulldozers demolished a previous extension. Another son showed me
his home, and the ruins of his two previous homes demolished by the Israeli
authorities, despite support of the family from Israeli and international
peace activists.

Here in the Old City of Hebron we have only a few neighbors. Most families
have left because of harassment by the Israeli military and settlers. The
Israeli military has welded shut the front doors of many houses. A few
families can use a back entrance to their home, but one family has to enter
through a neighbor's back gate, climb up to the roof, then walk down another
set of stairs into her house.

The Umm Salamuna wedding, and the choice to remain on land in Beqa'a and in
homes here the Old City are all acts of non-violent resistance. I see signs
of hope in this quiet, dogged resistance. When Israelis join with their
Palestinian sisters and brothers in these acts of resistance, that hope
increases.