EYEWITNESS  FROM  BETHLEHEM

ARTICLES & REFLECTIONS WRITTEN BY TOINE VAN TEEFFELEN

BETHLEHEM DIARY (29)

May 28 – June 4, 2001

These days are tense. It is a strange pressure. The days are without shooting and shelling, but it is as if people are waiting for it, as if it can come any moment. The news tells that places may be hit which were never hit before. After the horrible massacre in Tel Aviv among the Israeli teenagers, the Israeli government decided not to take immediate military retaliation but rather to heighten the political pressure upon Arafat. That is more effective, public relations-wise. That doesn’t mean there is no retaliation. Transport of fuel and oil to the Palestinian areas are cut off. A local paper shows a picture of an assistant sleeping in front of a pumping station to indicate the shortage of benzine. Even more serious is the announcement that the water supply will be limited. It’s hot right now and people need extra water on top of what the municipality can provide. My Arabic teacher just tells me now that she has ordered three tanks of water that cannot be supplied. It is especially people who don’t have a well in their garden who will suffer. Fortunately for us, our landlord who lives on top of our house does have a well, but my family-in-law doesn’t and needs to bring water from the neighbor’s well. I foresee some extra work on the Sunday. Jara loves a traditional Dutch song which is about bringing two little buckets of water from the well, we may sing it together… According to an Israeli minister, the cutting off or limitation of essential supplies is intended to mount pressure on Arafat. Apparently, if we – my family, teachers, students, common Palestinian people – have a little less water to use, we are supposed to be more inclined to pressure Arafat. That’s however not how people’s psychology works, nor is it exactly in accordance with international law.

                                                            * * *

For Palestinians, traveling is now possible just between towns and some adjacent villages but rarely beyond; there is for instance very little traffic between Bethlehem and Hebron. With the summer coming, people have reason to start worrying about international traveling. According to my information, right now Palestinians from the West Bank and Gaza can’t go out, neither through Tel Aviv Airport nor the Allenby Bridge to Jordan which is presently closed. (We start worrying whether Mary and my family-in-law will be able to leave the country for the much longed-for summer holiday). Since all the borders of the Palestinian territories are under Israel’s control, Israeli can completely regulate whomever or whatever comes into or goes out of Palestine. I think that such a situation of absolute dominance typically generates the type of ruthless suicide actions that it is supposed to prevent.

The situation is tense, and the people are depressed as never before. Ramzi, the designer, tells me that he could not work yesterday after hearing that more than 20 workers in four textile companies in Bethlehem were dismissed due to the economic strangulation. He feels there is no future in this country. Also Fuad, Karishma and Shireen at the institute feel depressed in this strange atmosphere of suspense and despair. On Saturday afternoon Ramallah and Bethlehem were ghost towns. Afraid for what could come, people stayed inside. At present Jara participates in a summer camp, largely indoors, at the Rosary Sisters in Bethlehem. On Saturday at 10:00 o’clock the sister called to say that the camp was suspended that day after news came in that the police in Arafat’s headquarters - located nearby - were leaving their work out of fear for shelling. I go and quickly pick up Jara. I also see Fuad, who says that a teacher workshop at the school was cancelled shortly after it started. He received a phonecall from the mayor of Bethlehem who tried to trace who had given orders to close school programs. Later that day, Mary and Jara went for shopping, almost alone on the street. Risky?

Some people don’t take any risks, some do. The problem is that you don’t always have enough information to know whether or not you take a risk. On Friday, the students from Al-Arroub camp come to the institute. They tell that they are “less afraid” than Ismail who had previously called to say he would not come. In order to prevent many people attending the burial of the Palestinian leader Faisal Husseini in Jerusalem, the Israelis created a blockade between Bethlehem and Hebron. But the Al-Arroub boys, as usual, found a way around.

Mary admires the peasant women around Bethlehem who, despite considerable risks for getting a fee or facing other problems, still go with vans along the dirt roads to Jerusalem in order to sell their vegetables and fruits. (Right now it is the season of the mish-mish or apricot, a very short season which is over before you realize it; hence the local proverb: “Until the apricot’s season” - meaning: never).

The male workers take even more risks. There are now of course very few who succeed in passing checkpoints. Last week, a French friend of Mary observed how a soldier at a checkpoint used his gun to hit an old man, a worker who was caught at the checkpoint and who was unable to quickly sit down. There is a rumor that soldiers at the checkpoint near Birzeit University are beating students who try to pass. I know a few students from Bethlehem who study at Birzeit University and who cannot come over to see their family.

                                                            * * *

The roads outside Bethlehem are becoming more and more dangerous. According to local news reports, settlers in Efrat to the south of Bethlehem were called through loudspeakers to gather in a field near Al-Khader, apparently to take revenge actions against the Palestinians in the village. At the Freres we discuss where to organize our next fieldtrip. Sana’s rules out to do it near her school in Battir due to the unsafety on the road leading to the village. Our last fieldtrip was in Artas, but just recently it happened that an Israeli shell landed in the trees close to the monastery there. As a result a fire broke out in the vicinity of the area where we had our last open air drama and dance school performance. We settle for arranging a fieldtrip at the YMCA’s Shepherds Fields in Beit Sahour, and to swim afterwards in a nearby pool.

What are acceptable risks? That is the question which always comes back. Until now, I myself am not really afraid to be hit by bullets. That is not because of courage but lack of experience. You start becoming afraid when something directly happens to you or to your family. I am myself mainly aware of the dangers of “normal” daily life. The moments when I am afraid happen when cars are speeding over 60 or 70 km. an hour on the “Pope John Paul II Street” (a new name, to commemorate the visit of the Pope in 2000) in front of my family-in-law’s house. Because most of the streets in Bethlehem are twisting and turning, drivers tend to give full speed as soon as they ride over a straight, asphalted road such as the one at my family’s. In fact, my sternest conversations with Jara are about not leaving the pavements.

For visitors the risks are a little different, perhaps greater. They travel more than the locals and are not familiar with the roads. Lately, a delegation of Dutch and German youth journalists came over. During one of their journeys they landed in an incident with teargas. As good journalists, most of them wanted to stay.

                                                                        * * *

Return back to HOMEPAGE  

Return to the INDEX of all the DIARIES