The tanks
weren't blocking the entrance this morning, for whatever reason,
so ambulances can come and go without being stopped and searched.
These closures with tanks seem to be capricious at best, malicious,
more likely, and seemingly arbitrary.
Mike,
got me to go out to see the mass grave where 18 men and 2 women
were buried in March of this year during the siege and curfew.
As people were killed or died, the morgue across the street at
the main hospital filled up. These bodies were removed to make
room for new victims. They could not be transported anywhere,
again because of the siege and curfew, so they had to be buried.
They are Muslims and prayers were said and the grave decorated.
Families will have to visit here instead of a real cemetery.
The main
group of Internationals here, 9 people, departed for Gaza. They
were joined by Penney, a charming Jewish woman from San Francisco.
I had hoped that she would stay here and go to Hebron with the
group forming. I had told her about the money from Vernie and
Ron to be used by me here for humanitarian purposes. She has been
working with both Israeli peace groups and Palestinian humanitarian
groups. She suggested an organization in East Jerusalem: Palestinian
Counseling Centers. I am to call a woman there, Sihan, telephone
02-656-2272, 656-2627. I am to say Penny sent me. I just asked
Huwaida about the Centre, and she says they do very good work.
As I understand they provide counseling to children who are victims
of the Israeli occupation, but when I get back to Jerusalem I
will look them up and get the details.
Huwaida
arrived and after much cell phoning it was decided that a car
would be ordered to take the Gaza contingent to the first checkpoint
and the remaining would form a group to go into the refugee camp
near here. There were no tanks at the hospital since they are
all down in the Al Amaari camp arresting all men aged between
15 and 50. Huwaida wants as many as possible to go down in the
camp to observe for mistreatment of the men and any other transgressions.
Of course the whole thing is bizarre. Where else in the world
does an occupation power handle the occupied people like animals?
Nowhere.
Just
as we started out the crew for Gaza came back. Their driver had
been stopped and they had to walk back to the hospital. So they
joined us making a procession of 20 from all over the world, but
many from the U.S. There were three of us from Canada. A girl
from Winnipeg, and one from Toronto, who actually lives here working
for Care International among the Palestinians.
We
easily talked our way into the camp, even though the soldiers
were going house to house. Only in this case they actually used
doors to enter. There is no residence in the camp, no arms, just
beat down people without hope. Two of our group went in and stayed
with a family that was being invaded. We went on down to the area
where the men, or some of them, were being detained. We could
not go in the field, but we could film in and I got some good
shots. I went up to the young trooper and confided that I had
served in the U.S. Army as a Sergeant in WWII. He seemed a bit
hazy about when the Second World War was so I clued him in. The
upshot was that I was allowed to go in and photo the water supply
for the men, and was told that there was also bread there.
One of
our group got a bit carried away and got a bit confrontational
(she is Jewish from Brooklyn), with the result that the chief
trooper got upset and belligerent. He ordered us to stand THERE,
and right away. As we wanted to discuss more, he fired one of
those noise bombs and scared the stuff out of us, or out of some
of us. So we retreated up the street. Our leader Brian, who has
been here for 18 months, called the group together and appointed
me and a young female Tamara to be the negotiators with the soldiers
from here on.
The chief
trooper had decided to call in the Border Police and have us detained,
which is not at all what we wanted. So Tamara and I talked him
out of it, and said we would just walk back, so we started out
up the road outside the camp. We headed back into the camp when
out of sight of the troopers, and found a bedlam. The kids were
gesturing that something was to be blown up. All of a sudden there
was indeed a big bang. It sounded like an explosive, and indeed,
we later got to see and photo what they had done. I think they
planted a plastic charge on a metal door and exploded it, wrecking
the door and knocking windows out of the house across the narrow
walkway. I was tugged into a house by a distraught housewife to
photo the damage. I could be much help to here and she spoke no
English. I said ma salaam and left.
We
made out way out of the camp, up to the hill outside, where we
waited for the other half of our group. They had also been into
the camp and down to the other field where the men are being held.
We watched as a young man was tied up and arrested from the house
nearby. After the troopers left, two of our group, a couple, went
down to the house to stay the family a while.
This
couple had been scheduled to go to Hebron with the two girls,
Ananda, Eden, both from New York, and me. They apparently decided
to stay here in Ramallah, and our trip to Hebron is on hold.
