Nabi Saleh village, Palestine
by Brian Wood
10/3/01
** Brian, a member of CCMEP, has been living in the West Bank since May of 2001. To read all his columns, click here.
A small village 25 kilometers north of Ramallah named Nabi Saleh (the good prophet) lies among the vast expanse of new and ancient olive groves. Quiet brown and green open spaces shudder between an occasional Palestinian village and comparatively newer Jewish-only settlements. The serenity offered by spacious, undeveloped lands is a breath of fresh air coming from the bustling cities of Ramallah or Jerusalem. The sun kept us hot on this July day, even more so without the cover of buildings and homes of the city.
On the way to deliver a truckload of clothing for needy Palestinians in 10 villages, we passed through Nabi Saleh. I made a double take as we passed by a house that hosted heavily armed Israeli soldiers on one side and a small two-year-old Palestinian girl standing in the front door. A large Israeli flag posted on the rooftop blew casually in the wind, unaware of its very heated symbolism of superiority and dispossession. On another portion of the roof a smaller Palestinian flag pronounced its claim to the house as well.
We drove past this horrid scene to our pre-arranged destination. After dropping the clothes and sharing a fine cup of coffee with employees of the municipality of the village, we returned to Nabi Saleh. Without hesitation we stopped the car and approached the Palestinian owners of the home. An older woman, two young women, and three or four children sat on the front porch in plastic chairs, quietly talking to one another. We asked if we could talk with them about what was happening in this odd and obviously caustic situation of helplessness and fear. We introduced ourselves and learned their family name is Tamimi. They brought drinks for everyone and arranged seats for all of us. As we sat together in a circle, the Friday shade of the porch cooling our sweaty bodies, the details of the story began pouring forth like boiling water.
Friday the 6th of July, the village was attacked by Israeli soldiers, who are posted all around the village to protect the illegally built, Jewish-only settlement across a short valley. Some homes were damaged by machine gun fire in the attack, including the one belonging to the Tamimis. Israeli soldiers say Palestinians shot at the nearby settlement from the village, bringing the usual overaggressive, unequal response from the Israeli military.
Saturday the 7th of July, the soldiers arrived at the Tamimi home at 4 p.m. and requested to look in the upper portions of the house. There are two apartments upstairs, which are separated only by a thin, plaster divider. A Tamimi son lives in one and his fiancé in the other. They are to be married in a short number of days.
The entire house was recently refurbished to welcome all the guests that would come to the wedding. Special attention was given to the two upper apartments as they newlyweds were to live there. Many months of labor, finances, and effort had gone into this makeover to welcome what was to be a happy occasion and a new beginning--a wedding.
Only 12 hours later, at 4 in the morning, soldiers again knocked on the door of the Tamimi home. Another 65 soldiers surrounded the home while 6 armored personnel carriers and 12 other vehicles, ranging from military jeeps to utility vehicles, perched in close proximity to the home. They asked for the man of the house and the key to the upstairs apartments. Mr. Tamimi cooperated and accompanied the soldiers upstairs, waking his sleeping son and daughter-in-law. Mr. and Mrs. Tamimi thought the soldiers wanted to arrest their son.
After a few moments upstairs, the soldiers informed Mr. Tamimi they were occupying one of the apartments, only for a few days. Mr. Tamimi complained and said this was illegal; they could not do this. The soldiers ignored his plea and ordered them to empty the apartment in 10 minutes. Another argument ensued and the soldiers cut the 10 minutes to 4.
Word was spreading quickly of this takeover and the villagers were gathering outside the Tamimi home. Meanwhile, the Tamimis began transferring small items downstairs. After a few minutes the soldiers pushed the family out of the way, threw the remainder of the items out the windows--except what they kept for themselves-- and began moving M-16s and other military equipment into the apartments.
The demonstration outside the house was growing stronger by the minute. The soldiers decided to disperse the demonstrators by dividing them into 4 groups. Some were taken inside the house and those left outside were divided into 3 separate groups and detained.
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The Palestinian house was rapidly turned into an Israeli military outpost. At every window on the upper floor, camouflage netting, sandbags, and an M-16 sit positioned to protect the neighboring settlement. The guns overlook the garden of dry vegetable plants and fruit trees. The Tamimis fear they will be shot if they even go out to their garden. A neighbor was shot as he walked by the house the second day it was occupied, on his way to visit his mother-in-law who was injured in the protests when the house was first being occupied.
After further complaints by the family and attempts of the women to attack the soldiers with their bare hands, the soldiers presented the military governor from the neighboring settlement and were told to talk to him. He informed them that the occupation of their house was for security purposes. The security envisioned is this: from the Tamimi house, the soldiers could shoot any Palestinians in Nabi Saleh who were shooting to the nearby settlement.
As the soldiers moved heavier items like furniture out of the apartment, Mr. Tamimi would no longer cooperate. He sat on a couch the soldiers tried to remove. They carried him and the couch towards the door but he fell and was injured as they moved. Persistent in his non-violent efforts of protest, he laid on the floor where he landed, refusing to get up. The soldiers picked him up and carried him to one of the jeeps outside. They took his ID and tried to arrest him. He fainted into darkness, unable to bear his loss and helplessness.
The son and his fiancé, who lived in the apartments now occupied by the Israeli soldiers, were drug out of the house and dumped with the protesters being detained outside. On the way, the soldiers beat the young man and the woman fell on a rock and was injured.
Sleeping, eating, and any routine activity in the house is impossible at this point. The soldiers have a very bad smell from not showering, practice martial arts in the apartments, click their weapons, and constantly move around. These activities are not limited to day light hours. Further, they throw all their trash out the window onto a porch that would otherwise be a very lovely sitting area. There is only one bathroom in the house, but the window of it opens up to the stairwell going up stairs. Since the soldiers also live in the stairwell, the window cannot be opened. No one uses the bathroom except in desperation for lack of privacy and fear of the soldiers.
The men in the Tamimi home do not go to work anymore. They cannot leave the house because they need to protect the women. Without work, the financial situation, already poor in general, is becoming grave. Also, if there are not enough people in the house, the soldiers might take the entire house.
The soldiers abuse the children regularly, cursing at them and pointing their M-16s at them. There are 9 children in the house now. The youngest is 6 months old.
The daughter-in-law who lived upstairs before the soldiers came still lives in her apartment. The soldiers are in one apartment and she is in the other, separated only by the small, plaster divider that doesn't keep out the noise of the soldiers and offers almost no privacy.
One of the Tamimi daughters lived next door, but her home is on the receiving end of the bullets fired from the Israeli soldiers in her parents' house. She has moved into her parents' house, along with her husband and four children, because it is safer there. Another daughter is visiting from the US and living in the house. All together there are 20 people in this two bedroom, one bathroom house, and the apartment upstairs: 9 children and 11 adults.
Instead of hosting a wedding in the home, unwanted housemates have forced a new situation for the Tamimis. The apartment that was prepared for the newly weds will now be a total loss, even if the soldiers leave. Among tears Mrs. Tamimi said, "How can I describe my feelings? What can I say? We can't eat, sleep, or drink. I was expecting to see my son married, but now this won't happen. Instead, I am afraid of being shot. If they blew up the house, this is different. But living with the soldiers? They occupy the whole country. Now I have to live with the occupiers in my house." She expressed their need of support to get the house back. They don't want money. They just want to live in their home.
As we drove away from the village, we had a distant escort to see that we left. This Israeli military jeep followed us after departing from the company of a tank seeking shade under a tree and a behemoth of a bulldozer, the ones that are used to raze Palestinians homes. The monstrosity of this equipment sat juxtaposed to the silence of rural Palestine. Operating in the quiet countryside of Palestine, outside the range of cameras and attention, this machinery and the soldiers who operate without barrier to conquer the enemy: simple farmers tending their lands and animals.
Though a particular case, this scenario is repeated all over the Occupied Palestinian Territories and succinctly symbolizes the nature of the relationship between Palestinians and their occupiers. Little attention is given to such scenarios, though instances like this describe the intent of the occupation most clearly. This is the occupation, that behind the scenes takeover of Palestinian lands and homes, forgotten by history. Then again, Nabi Saleh, the Tamimi family, and thousands of other villagers in Palestine live in rural areas not frequented by history writers or politicians. They are the dispossessed forgotten.