Saturday 8 September 2007

hebron, westbank.



this is actually a post for that nothing pops up to my mind. or it's just popping but not in cohesion.
yesterday I went with an organisation called Breaking the Silence to Hebron in the Palestinian Westbank. Let's called the occupied area. it is max. 2h away from sin city at the beach but light years away from normal life like in TLV.


on the way to Hebron. Hostile Palestinian land.

Hebron H1. A ghost city.

A lively Arabic market street. Arabs are not allowed to go there. Security reasons. For 7 years now. People livin in the houses are not allowed to leave it via the front door...

...so guys like them are forced to climb over roofs and walk long ways around the restricted streets. security reasons.

a post at the boarder to H1 (Palestinian)

we were not allowed to pass the street because we wanted to visit a Arabic family. security reasons. If we'd liked to visit a settler's house...no problem. For a woman of us with a Norwegian Diplomatic Passport it was also no problem to pass. security reasons?

security fence seperating Israel from the Palestinian areas.

all in all a shocking trip beyond the principles of democracy and partly far beyond humanity. the settlers in Hebron are famous for their violence against the Arabs. spiting, throwing trash, stones and physical attacs are daily life. children beat children beat elder and women. the IDF's task ist to protect the settlers, if they intervene for the Arabs they might be attacted verbally or physical, too.
If... 17 - 21 years old boys with M16s and an incredible power, but no idea about life (I had not then).
In fact the settlers can act like outlaws. And some do.



I saw just one side of the medal, much less to judge the political acting of the State of Israel. But seeing that someone surpresses human rights you could lose your believe in the good of human. but how will end up then?
in millions of security reasons.

2 comments:

michau said...

Must be incredible experience to see. But i think that's not the only place on earth where such things happen. Unfortunately much worse already has taken place. I mean death camps during Second World War, cause what you've shown reminds me of Oświęcim which I've seen and i will never forget.

ptr said...

I wont compare this. not in public...
But yeah...