International Solidarity Movement
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A Drumbeat for Peace

Published in: Rocky Mountain News

by Jensen
February 8, 2002

Group of 'internationals' confront Israeli forces over the occupation of West Bank, Gaza Strip

RAMALLAH, West Bank --
His name is Daniel, he's 19 years old and he wants to be a chef.

"I like to cook," he confides.

Instead he's manning a machine gun atop an Israeli armored personnel carrier parked outside Yasser Arafat's headquarters.

"I don't want to be here," he says, "but our presence prevents terrorism."

Some would say it causes more terrorism, I reply. Palestinians bitterly resent the presence of Israeli soldiers in Ramallah, the capital of their would-be state, and vow to resist until Israel ends its 35-year-old occupation of the West Bank and Gaza Strip.

"I live in Gilo," says Daniel. "The Arabs shoot at Gilo from Beit Jala all the time. So I have to fight for my country."

The reason Gilo comes under fire is that, to Palestinians, it represents a theft of their land. It is one of 10 Jewish neighborhoods that sprang up on the outskirts of East Jerusalem after Israel captured the Arab sector of the Holy City in 1967.

All this happened long before Daniel was born. His mother came from Canada, his father from Brooklyn and now they live in Gilo. Their son went straight from high school into the army to "protect them from terrorists" and he does so willingly and proudly.

What does Daniel think of the growing number of Israeli soldiers who refuse to serve in the occupied territories because they think the occupation is unjust and actually makes Israel less secure?

"It's easy not to serve," he says, smiling. "All you do is go to jail for a month and then they let you out. But my father fought for this country and I have to do my share. I've finished one year and have two to go. After that I'll get on with my life."

An officer yells out the window of an apartment building whose Palestinian residents have been evicted to accommodate the Israeli troops. "My commander says you must go," says Daniel with a grin.

As we walk away, the unseen officer is still yelling, still chewing him out for talking to journalists. But Daniel waves a cheerful goodbye.

Not far away, a small group of "internationals" has gathered to protest the occupation. A Japanese monk beats a drum as other volunteers from the United States, Britain, Ireland, Canada, Italy and Israel set off hand-in-hand with Palestinian children to deliver messages of peace to the soldiers.

With flags of the various nations raised overhead, the marchers carry signs and the children paper airplanes saying: "Soldiers think! Don't serve a brutal occupation that expels, starves, humiliates and dominates an entire people."

The marchers are unarmed. There is none of the stone-throwing by Palestinian youths that occurs every Friday. But the Israeli troops do not allow them to get close. They fire stun grenades and tear gas that leaves everyone weeping and gasping and sends one old man into a dead faint.

The children throw their paper airplanes and run off. None comes even close to the soldiers. The internationals are stopped in their tracks and deliver their message verbally, by megaphone.

"Why are you firing on innocent civilians?" it booms. "We have a message for you, a message against the occupation, a message against violence. We are asking for freedom for the Palestinian people. You must respect human rights, respect freedom. Listen to your conscience and refuse to serve."

The leaders of this newly formed International Solidarity Movement are two young women who have successfully bridged the Arab-Israeli divide -- Huwaida Arraf, a 25-year-old Palestinian-American born in Roseville, Mich., and Neta Golan, a 30-year-old Jew born in Israel of Canadian parents.

Arraf is engaged to Adam Shapiro, a fellow activist who claims no religious affiliation but comes from a Jewish family in New York. Golan is married to a Palestinian. Both speak fluent Hebrew, Arabic and English.

Arraf studied at Hebrew University in Jerusalem and worked on a kibbutz before obtaining a degree with three majors -- Hebrew, political science and Judaic and Arabic studies -- from the University of Michigan. She returned to Israel with a nongovernmental organization devoted to conflict resolution, but swiftly became disillusioned when she saw how uneven the conflict really was.

Because her job did not allow partisanship, she quit the organization to engage in nonviolent resistance on behalf of the Palestinians. And though she says she has never attacked a policeman, she has been arrested three times for "attacking police officers," charges that were later dropped.

Golan studied Chinese medicine in Tel Aviv before becoming a human rights activist. Much to the dismay of her parents, who live in Israel and disapprove of her activities, she has been arrested more than 20 times for entering "closed areas" since the intifada began.

As an Israeli citizen, Golan is not allowed to enter Palestinian communities sealed off by the Israeli army.

"We eventually got the Palestinians to understand what we wanted to do and an 11-year-old boy turned up with a JCB digger," Zelter says. "He was very brave and very professional, and I think the other Palestinians were afraid. But we formed a human shield and he moved the stones and pushed one of the buses to one side and the people could then take their vehicles to their fields. Some Israeli soldiers were watching from a hill. An army truck moved towards us, but stopped."

At 2am the next day, the Israelis returned and re-erected the roadblock. Then the group returned to play football on a field the Israelis had deemed "forbidden" because it overlooked a road for Jewish settlers -- though not close enough for a Palestinian to throw a stone even with a slingshot, as one of the women explained. Again, the Israelis watched. An army jeep drew up, then retreated when the driver saw that Westerners were playing in the football game. Al- Khader are football champions in this part of the West Bank.

IIt's easy to dismiss the "internationals" as a bunch of do-gooders out of their depth – "ageing hippies", as one Western journalist called them. But the message is all too real for the Israelis. Israel refuses to allow international monitors to police the Israeli- Palestinian war. But the men and women of this solidarity campaign are proving that they can throw a blanket over the sparks, persuade Palestinians to play football rather than throw stones.

Perhaps a real monitoring force – disciplined and without political leanings – could do even better. It might at least take its cue from the last words of Nurse Cavell, which Ms Zelter remembers: "Patriotism," the English heroine said as she faced a German firing squad in the First World War, "is not enough."