While catching up on a fellow travelers blog I read that today is International Action Day and the theme for 2011 is Food. Check out The Longest Way Home or to read his post about Water, the theme for 2010 go here.
I've decided to write about my experience with Food on the West Bank in Palestine. I traveled to the West Bank in December 2009 with a fellow student from Utah Valley University to research more about the conflict in Israel and the non-violent efforts on both sides of the wall. To learn more about my trip and our agenda please go here.
There are a mountain of issues to be discussed when it comes to the Palestinian & Israeli conflict, after all its been ongoing for over 100 years. I was lucky to be traveling with my friend who had traveled to the Middle East that summer and had made a lot of initial contacts for us to meet with during our visit in December. One of these contacts is family of a friend and they offered to let us stay in their home for a night so we could talk with him about the issues in their city of Jayyous.
Some of the men in the city were planning to be there when we arrived to talk but unfortunately we were delayed on our travels out to their city. It is common in Palestine to be delayed for any amount of time when you have to travel through checkpoints that are placed in between cities and towns. The Israeli government has checkpoints all throughout the West Bank and getting the authorization and documentation to go through a checkpoint can be extremely difficult and arbitrary, even once you get the right papers there still isn’t a guarantee that the guard on duty will decide to uphold the papers. Checkpoints, which are made of cement and metal bars, nothing remotely aesthetically pleasing, as yet another way to make sure the Palestinians are reminded of Israeli superiority. Unfortunately no cameras or photos are allowed in the checkpoints and it didn’t take long for me to know it wasn’t going to end well for me if I pushed the rules. We didn’t even print out copies of our itineraries and contacts knowing they wouldn’t let us go if they knew why we were there.
Once we finally arrived in Jayyous feeling tired but anxious to start our research, our friend let one of his neighbors know we had arrived and while he then set out to get the others the three of us went on a walk through their small but proud town while getting a private tour of who lived where, getting to ask about their culture, families, education, curfews that had been placed, how often soldiers came in to town. Our friend is a teacher at the local school and let us in to see what their school was like. Small and humble but well kept and clean, he told us that there are days the kids don’t come to school, education isn’t a priority when your basic human rights are in jeopardy but on the days kids can come to school they are obedient, attentive, and excited to be there.
Then we walked towards the outer edge of the city so we could get a look at the apartheid wall dividing the West Bank and Israel. Unfortunately because it was so dark I don't have any pictures of the town or our tour. When we arrived back at the house we had a full meal waiting for us at the table, between the Mediterranean spices and coffee I was lost somewhere in food heaven. We quickly ate as the men started to arrive and were setting up chairs around a hookah.
I had joked with friends about wanting to smoke hookah while visiting the Middle East and before I knew it I found myself sitting around a large hookah with five Palestinian men and my schoolmate chewing the fat. As a woman, sitting around a hookah with men is extremely uncustomary and while they were kind and respectful to me I could tell my presence was a bit unnerving.
It was because of this I offered to be the scribe and because I knew I wasn’t up to the challenge of knowing what these husbands, fathers, brothers, neighbors, sons, friends, and husbands were going though trying to lead a family in such uncertain times. My friend took the lead asking questions; it took no time at all before we were deep into the issues.
The main concern between these men are the rights to their lands, agriculture is their source of food and income and under occupation not all land owners have access to their land. In many cases Palestinian families have lived on the same land and in the same home for generations and while some still have the documentation showing the ownership and inheritance many families don’t and have suffered the loss of homes, income, and basic needs.
One gentlemen in our circle told his story. He and a few family members have land just on the other side of the apartheid wall built by the Israeli government and in order to be allowed access outside of the confines of the walls they need authorization from the government. Luckily for these men their families have been friends for generations and would give their life for one another so when one or more of them get denied for their right to their land the others will chip in and take the best care of the others land. On several occasions multiple crops have been lost because only a couple are allowed access and its simply too much land to maintain. He spoke of friends and family who had lost too much without their land and have to resort to any job they can find which are few & far between and none pay enough to sustain the life they’d been living before.
The economy of Palestine continues to weaken and therefore increases the people vulnerability to the Israeli government. Imports and Exports for the West Bank are authorized and regulated by the Israeli government and often receive the shipments the Israeli government didn’t want which means their food and produce isn’t as good and has a shorter life to sell.
This issue extremely common in the West Bank and in a few days we would be meeting people working towards a solution…
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