Al Khalil

I've been in Al Khalil or 'Friend' (Hebron) since last Thursday. It is called 'Friend' because it is where Abraham, the father of the three Semitic monotheisms, is believed to be buried. It is also the only major city where Jewish settlements have penetrated right into the city centre.

As a result, the city is littered with Israeli sniper towers and lookouts. In my experience the Israeli soldiers were generally ok, except for one soldier near the Abraham mosque who told me 'not to fuck with him'. When I asked why he said he didn't like me standing near the checkpoint, I was making him feel nervous. Presumably he thinks all Arab-looking men are potential sucide bombers or something. The fact that there's these soldiers, often semi-hidden, makes you a little nervous walking through the old city or near the settlements at night.

I was woken up at 2am on Friday morning by the sound of settler kids, around 40 of them but possibly more, walking down the street and shouting at Palestinian homes. Here's a very poor image of it which I tried to take quietly. You can see Israeli army jeeps coming up and telling the kids to move on. But instead of going home they continued down the street towards the Palestinian old city.

Earlier in the day (on Thursday) I was invited to a house directly bordering Kiryat Arba, a big settlement on the west side of Hebron. In the photo above you can see settlers sitting on Palestinian farm land outside the settlement which, of course, they believe belongs to them as well thanks to the Torah. Every Shabat the settlers light giant bonfires and often harass the Palestinians. Fortunately there wasn't any violence while I was there, although they did set fire to a field owned by Palestinians which was dowsed by a fire truck.

I also went with a Christian Peacemaker Team patrol around the Abraham Mosque/Synagogue. In this picture you can see a CPTer (second from right) putting herself between four settler boys (in white) and a Palestinian woman (on the right). The Palestinian woman is technically not allowed to walk on the road during Sabbath and instead is expected to walk through the field on the right. The Orthodox Jews do not permit their own women to walk on the road during the Sabbath either, but the reserve verbal and physical abuse for Palestinian women.

The road in the photo above leads up to the settlement of Kiryat Arba. Below it are Palestinian farms that are routniely harassed. Some like this one are even taken over, the family that lives there being evicted. By law the settlers are allowed to carry guns. It's not unusual to see a teenage boy with an M-16. By the same laws it is illegal for Palestinians to carry guns or large knives under the punishment of imprisonment. You can imagine what a power imbalance this causes!

Of course this is just 1% of what I've seen and done in Hebron. More to follow!