The Occupation streams into your consciousness

The Occupation is impossible to avoid. It permeates every aspect of Palestinian life. Invariably, this makes the population acutely political in a way that is quite a change, to put it lightly, to the blissful apolitical nature of Australian society.

Even Ramallah, perhaps the most liberal, cosmopolitan cities in Palestine, has its scars. Several streets bear the imprint of Israeli tank treads. Like the scratches of a giant eagle's talons, you can see them etched into the bitumen almost as if to remind you that even the roads in Palestine have not escaped the Occupation.

Over the past few days I've been to several legal non-governmental organisations (NGOs). Most of the meetings have started with a fair amount of reservation on the NGO representatives' part.

"Who are? Why are you here? Nothing has particularly changed much over here, the Occupation continues unabated," or words to that effect.

The meetings always end on a far more positive note. Its amazing how favourably people react to the knowledge that they have not been forgotten. The most important message I already carry, and it is something which can only be described as inspiring, is that the people of Palestine continue to resist the Occupation.* And that resistence, the resistance of every day people (lay and professional alike) is fundamentally non-violent. That is something that cannot be overstated.

Take the Jerusalem Legal Aid and Human Rights Center. One of their primary activities is to challenge Israel's 'acquisition' of Palestinian land in the Israeli Courts. Rights and access to land are at the very heart of the Israel/Palestine conflict, and the legal regime which seeks to legitimate Israel's land grab is emblematic of this. It is a model for a legal system devoid of justice and it sounds surprisingly similar to the Australian indigenous land rights system (albeit that the timescale is much shorter).

The Israeli legal system of land acquisition is based upon a complex mixture of Ottoman Laws (1500s to 1917), British Emergency Laws (1914-1939), Jordanian Law (1948-1967), and military by-laws issued by the Israeli Commander of the West Bank.** Yet whether de jure (in law) or (de facto), this system is fundamentally discriminatory and it leads to the seizure of the most fertile, highest, and water rich lands.

Palestinian land can be confiscated under several different authorities. Most of the authorities stem from some notion of security or public purpose. The racist irony of these notions of security and public purpose is that they only apply to the Jewish population. So, for example, an ancient Palestinian village may be acquired for the purposes of building a freeway that will be exclusively used by Jewish settlers. Palestinian settlements on high ground deemed useful for military purposes are regularly subject to seizure on the basis of security. These seizures begin with the construction of a military base, but they are often known to expand into civilian Jewish settlements.

Further, under the absentee law established when Israel was first created in 1948, any 'vacant' land may be acquired by the state for a public purpose. This law has been interpreted to include land left vacant by Palestinians even for a short period of time. Jerusalem Legal Aid has represented families which have left their homes on holiday, only to return to find that their land has been confiscated and transfered to Jewish settlers.

To compound the frustrations of evicted Palestinians, Jewish settlers preside over the Courts set up to address these land seizure cases!

I asked why the Center persisted with their efforts to prevent the eviction of Palestinians from their land, despite the inevitable failure of the endeavour. I was told that they sometimes succeeded, around one of every ten attempts, to prevent the eviction of Palestinians from their land. Also, and arguably more importantly, the fact that the Palestinians have followed the due process of law evidences the lack of protection afforded to them by the Israeli justice system. As one judge explained to a Jerusalem Legal Aid Lawyer, "this is a court of law, not justice."

And yet, the Palestinians persist in their attempts not to be marginalised. I suppose when someone is trying to eradicate you, either through murder or theft of your land, your mere existence is a form of resistence.

* Although this is something Amira Haas, a noted Israeli journalist whom I met last night, may disagree with. If I get some time over the next few days I'll put up a post on the conversation. Watch this space.
** An excellent databse of these, and contemporary Palestinian laws is hosted by Beir Zeit University's Law Institute here.