Balata
Refugee Camp sits outside the West Bank city of Nablus. It is
the largest refugee camp in the West Bank with over 21,000 residents,
mostly refugees from Haifa or Jaffa, who made their way to Nablus
when they were driven out of their homes with the creation of
Israel in 1948. The Al-Titi family live on the main street that
bisects Balata camp and most of their story is fairly typical
of any family in the camp. Halima has been a single mother for
10 years and has raised each of her 10 children in the home that
she still lives in. The youngest of her children is Jihad, 18.
Jihad
was a popular boy and a bright student who excelled in English
and mathematics. Though religious, neither he nor his family could
be described as fanatics. Like most boys his age he dreamed of
buying a car one day – a car with a kick-ass stereo. He
had a great sense of humor and an eye on the future, always advising
friends to work hard, learn a trade, and establish themselves
before they took on the responsibility of marriage. He was also
something of a clothes horse – by Balata Camp standards
anyway. He had a girlfriend who he planned to marry someday and
he had many friends. He was especially close to his cousin, Mahmoud.
Like
everyone in Balata Refugee Camp Jihad suffered many hardships
under occupation but they didn’t get him down. He was the
one who always advised others not to dwell on the difficulty of
life under occupation but to be patient and step over the hurdles.
He helped many people who had been wounded or who lost their livelihood
since this second Intifada began in September of 2000. His outlook
was always positive and he never lost sight of his goal.
Shortly
before the Israeli army officially re-invaded earlier this year,
they ‘unofficially’ opened fire on several teenaged
boys in the streets of Balata camp. Jihad’s friend was wounded
and the IDF was not allowing ambulances in to take the wounded
to the hospital. Jihad ran out to the street and picked up his
wounded friend to move him to safety. The army fired at him, hitting
him on the right side. He lost a huge chunk of flesh and underwent
surgery but luckily no vital organs were damaged.
He was
still recovering from this injury on March 1st when an armored
bulldozer, accompanied by a tank, pulled up outside the family
home. Israeli soldiers stormed into the home and forced all of
the members of the family into one room on the second floor. One
soldier found the family’s life savings - $250 – saved
to pay college tuition, and stuck it into his pocket. The family
was told that the IDF needed to destroy their home because ‘suspected
militants’ sometimes visited there. They piled all of the
furniture on the first floor and burnt it. Halima had just finished
furnishing and decorating the first floor in anticipation of her
son’s marriage. The soldiers destroyed everything and then
detonated 2 plastic explosives which they had attached to an interior
wall on the first floor. The house shook violently. Tiles fell
from the kitchens and baths on all 3 floors. Glass broke everywhere.
Doors were blown off their hinges. Cracks appeared in the stone
walls extending from the first floor all the way to the ceiling
of the 3rd floor. The purpose of these explosives was not to make
the home fall but to weaken the structure to make it easier for
the bulldozer, impatiently idling outside, to knock it down. Just
as the bulldozer was about to begin the demolition, representatives
from al-Jazeera began arriving. Someone had called them and luckily
they were nearby and able to arrive in time. The IDF backed off,
presumably because it wouldn’t look good for them to be
seen on international TV bulldozing down a home for no reason
with the family still inside.
Less
than a month later the IDF officially invaded Balata camp. For
several days they fired on the residents from Apache helicopters.
Many homes were destroyed. These were not the homes of militants,
there didn’t seem to be any selection process, they just
destroyed homes at random. One belonged to an old woman who lived
with 2 grandchildren. The home was reduced to rubble. Today you
can see several families living in tents that they have pitched
on the rubble of what used to be their homes.
On April
9, while the invasion was still ongoing, an older son, Moneer
(3), and his 13-year-old son, Saleh, were walking home from purchasing
vegetables for the family to eat. They had almost reached their
door when they were struck from behind without warning by a tank
shell. The shell also hit their home and parts of the home fell
on top of them. Saleh lost his right index finger and suffered
severe damage to his hand. His thumb is also not functional and
does not appear to be healing well. Moneer is now paralyzed and
is confined to a wheelchair. Moneer has a wife and 8 children
who now have no means of support due to his incapacity.
On April
28 the IDF invaded Balata camp again. This time Jihad and his
brothers, along with every other male between the ages of 15 and
50 were forced to strip and were paraded through the streets of
the camp blindfolded with their hands tied behind their backs.
They were taken to jail where they were questioned for several
days and where they suffered more humiliation and torture. While
the men and boys were away in jail, the Israeli army blasted holes
in the walls of all of the homes in Balata camp so they could
move between the houses without entering the streets. They stole
whatever money, jewelry, or electronics they could find in the
homes and they terrorized the women and children. What they didn’t
steal they destroyed. They spray painted black and red arrows
on the walls of the homes to show other soldiers the paths to
take to move through all of the houses in the camp without having
to enter the streets.
A few
days later the army destroyed the home of Jihad’s best friend
and cousin, Mahmoud, by firing 12 tank shells at it. When they
finished, a skeleton of the structure still stood but the windows,
walls and doors were obliterated. Nothing was left inside. It
was just a burned out shell of the building that it once was.
After
the Israeli’s supposedly ‘left the areas recently
re-occupied’ as ordered by George Bush, Jihad and some friends
were returning home from school where they had been peacefully
protesting the occupation. As they stepped out of the car they
were riding in, the Israeli army threw an energy bomb at them.
Jihad suffered severe burns to his right arm, hand, hip and thigh
and he lost most of the sight in his right eye.
Despite
his injuries and losses, despite the fact that the army destroyed
his friends’ home and his family’s homes, despite
the fact that the army imposed curfew and no one could go to work
or school, despite the fact that everything had been stolen or
destroyed, despite being jailed without charge, Jihad still managed
to keep a hopeful outlook. He was still the positive voice of
the camp, encouraging others not to give up, to look toward a
better future.
On May
21, the IDF assassinated Jihad’s beloved cousin Mahmoud.
Mahmoud and 2 friends were visiting a grave in Balata cemetery
when the army fired 8 tank shells, each loaded with over 500 nails
shaped like arrows, at them from the top of nearby Mount Al-Tur.
All 3 were killed by multiple direct hits and a fourth person,
300 meters away, died from injuries that evening. 8 bystanders
were seriously injured. There was severe damage to the surrounding
homes and many gravesites.
The next
day, on May 22, the IDF bulldozed what remained of Mahmoud’s
home – and the homes of 6 other families that adjoined his.
The bulldozer also destroyed many graves in the nearby cemetery.
According to what they told the press, they found a ‘bomb
factory’ in the house and they used that as their justification
for the siege and attack on Balata camp. The home had been empty
for weeks, since they had destroyed it back in April and there
was nothing inside but the burned up remains of the family’s
furniture and possessions, certainly no ‘bomb factory’.
8 days
later Mahmoud’s wife gave birth to an infant son.
Jihad
took Mahmoud’s death very hard. He couldn’t stop crying.
For the first time anyone could remember his talk centered on
all of the injustices he and his family had suffered. He talked
of the crippling of his brother Moneer and the maiming of his
nephew Saleh. He talked about his own injuries which still had
not healed and of his friends who had been killed or injured.
He cried hardest for Mahmoud. The day after Mahmoud was killed
Jihad took some favorite clothing to his best friend and told
him that he wanted his friend to have them. He said that he thought
the Israeli army would kill him next and he wanted his friend
to have something to remember him by. Then he disappeared. Over
the next 3 days Jihad avoided his family and his friends. Halima
kept asking ‘Where is Jihad? Where is my son?’ –
but no one knew. Everyone thought he was just spending time alone
to deal with his grief. At 5:00 in the afternoon of the 4th day
after Mahmoud was murdered, Halima had a feeling of impending
doom and was finally able to reach him on his cell phone. She
tearfully asked him where he was. She told him that he needed
to come home now and grieve with the family instead of grieving
alone. He answered ‘I am far from you. I love you mother,
I will wait for you a long time. Now, I don’t want anyone
else to call me.’ He hung up and turned off his phone.
2 hours
later, on May 28th at 7:00 PM, 18 year old Jihad, the boy who
had so carefully planned his future, walked up to an open air
café outside Tel Aviv and detonated an explosive belt that
he was wearing under his grey t-shirt, killing himself and 2 Israelis
and injuring 27 others. He was the first suicide bomber to come
from Balata Refugee Camp but he wasn’t the last. 10 days
later his good friend who lived in the home next door walked into
an illegal Israeli settlement and opened fire on soldiers in training.
He was shot dead by other soldiers. A few days later another of
Jihad’s friends went on a suicide mission.
The IDF
did not invade and terrorize the people day after day after day
in retaliation for a series of suicide bombers that came from
Balata Refugee Camp. A series of 18 year old suicide bombers came
out of Balata Refugee Camp in response to the IDF invasions and
the terror that they were subjected to day after day after day.
