15.Gideon M. Kressel.Pdf

LET SHEPHERDING ENDURE SUNY series in Anthropology and Judaic Studies Walter P. Zenner, Editor LET SHEPHERDING ENDURE APPLIED ANTHROPOLOGY AND THE PRESERVATION OF A CULTURAL TRADITION IN ISRAEL AND THE MIDDLE EAST Gideon M. Kressel STATE UNIVERSITY OF NEW YORK PRESS Published by State University of New York Press, Albany © 2003 State University of New York All rights reserved Printed in the United States of America No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission. No part of this book may be stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any form or by any means including electronic, electrostatic, magnetic tape, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise without the prior permission in writing of the publisher. For information, address State University of New York Press, 90 State Street, Suite 700, Albany, NY 12207 Production by Diane Ganeles Marketing by Patrick Durocher Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Kressel, Gideon M., 1936– Let shepherding endure : applied anthropology and the preservation of a cultural tradition in Israel and the Middle East / Gideon M. Kressel. p. cm. — (SUNY series in anthropology and Judaic studies) Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN 0-7914-5805-9 (alk. paper) — ISBN 0-7914-5806-7 (pbk. : alk. paper) 1. Shepherds—Middle East. 2. Shepherds—Israel. 3. Pastoral systems—Middle East. 4. Pastoral systems—Israel. 5. Bedouins—Land tenure—Middle East. 6. Bedouins—Domestic animals—Middle East. 7. Desert conservation—Middle East. 10. Applied anthropology—Israel. 11. Middle East—Environmental aspects. 12. Israel—Environmental aspects. I. Title. II. Series. GN635.N42 K74 2003 306.3'6'0956—dc21 2002030978 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1 CONTENTS LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS vii ACKNOWLEDGMENTS ix Introduction xiii 1 NOMADIC PASTORALISTS, AGRICULTURALISTS, AND THE STATE: SELF-SUFFICIENCY AND DEPENDENCE IN THE MIDDLE EAST 1 2 CHANGES IN LAND USAGE BY THE NEGEV BEDOUIN SINCE THE MID-NINETEENTH CENTURY: THE INTRATRIBAL PERSPECTIVE 27 3 APPLIED ANTHROPOLOGY, CULTURAL SURVIVAL, AND NEW DIRECTIONS FOR THE FUTURE OF THE NEGEV BEDOUIN 69 4 GOVERNMENTAL POLICIES TOWARD THE BEDOUIN 79 5 ENHANCING THE ATTRACTIVENESS OF SHEPHERDING 89 6 ARE SHEPHERDS’ VILLAGES VIABLE? 107 7 DESIGNING A SHEPHERD’S VILLAGE 137 8 “TEACH THE CHILDREN OF JUDAH SHEEP!: THE CRISIS OF SMALL RUMINANTS BREEDING 145 9 TOWARD A BETTER PLAN OF ACTION 173 BIBLIOGRAPHY 191 NAME INDEX 203 SUBJECT INDEX 207 v ILLUSTRATIONS FIGURE 5.1 PRESENT PROPOSED URBAN CENTERS FOR THE NEGEV BEDOUIN (1999). CIRCLES REPRESENT PROPOSED CENTERS. (COURTESY OF E. ATSMON)91 FIGURES 5.2 (A–D)PHASES IN THE EMERGENCE OF A NEW BEDOUIN TOWN. (PHOTOS BY E. ATSMON)94 FIGURE 5.2A A SPONTANEOUS SETTLEMENT.94 FIGURE 5.2B BUILDING THE HOME, WHILE DWELLING IN THE TENT.94 FIGURE 5.2C SHACKS OF FAMILIES WHO ARE CONSTRUCTING HOMES.95 FIGURE 5.2D SPONTANEOUS SETTLEMENT ON THE OUTSKIRTS OF A TOWNSHIP (WHICH CAN BE SEEN IN THE DISTANCE). 95 FIGURE 6.1 (A–B)FIREWOOD (H• AT• AB) GATHERED BY HAND. 121 FIGURE 6.1A INDIGENOUS VEGETATION GATHERED FOR FIREWOOD. 121 FIGURE 6.1B HEAPS OF PINE BRANCHES PRUNED IN THE YATEER FOREST TO BE USED FOR FIREWOOD. 122 FIGURE 7.1 DESIGN OF A RURAL SETTLEMENT FOR THE TARABIN ES-SANE (BE≥ER-SHEVA VALLEY, ISRAEL). (COURTESY OF A. LEVINE) 140 vii ACKNOWLEDGMENTS My thanks go first to the Jacob Blaustein Institute for Desert Research which, since my arrival in 1978, has financed numerous projects over a period of twenty-five years relating to the nature and development of Bedouin societies and, in particular, the Bedouin in the Negev and the Ramle-Lod area of Israel. In the course of fieldwork undertaken in the 1980s, I have worked closely with Dr. Joseph Ben-David and Dr. Khalil Abu-Rabi≤a, who helped me assemble data on a century of land use by the Negev Bedouin. I am greatly in their debt for their collegial support and hard work. The results of our joint study were published in Nomadic Peoples (28, 1991). I here acknowledge with thanks the permission granted me by the editors of this journal and of the Journal of Rural Cooperation (21, 1993), to use material on the nature of contacts between nomadic pastoralists, agriculturalists and the state. I am most grateful to my colleague Dr. Hendrik J. Bruins, who has collaborated with me in previous studies on the problems of sheep-rearing in Kibbutz Sde-Boqer and goat-rearing in Moshav Ezuz, relating problems of shepherding in the arid lands in Israel to those faced by the Massai and the Turkana in Kenya. Our joint work in Kenya was financed by the NIRP (Netherlands Israel Research Programme) which has earned our ix x Acknowledgments profound gratitude for its generous support of our collective research. In this connection, we also thank Joshua Aconga of Moi University and Kenya’s Ministry of Agriculture, in particular, the late Francis Ndaraya, our team member in Nairobi. Much inspiration in my work on the development of livestock breeding in arid lands was provided by the late agronomist, Ya≥acov Orev. His sagacious advice, gained from pioneering work on the amelioration of range lands, in the Negev and in the Sahara frontier of Niger greatly enriched my knowledge of the field here under study. I also benefited from numerous discussions with Dr. Harold Lemel who shared with me his profound knowledge of policy and crisis management in Turkey and Albania. Many individuals were involved in an effort in 1985–86 to test the feasibility of renovating an old Byzantine cistern so that it could serve the Highland Bedouin. My thanks are due to my Bedouin agemates, residents of the Baqqar ridge, of the Jaladin lineage: Salem, Sliman and ≤Awdih; and of the Ziyyadin lineage: Sallam and his son Sliman. I would also like to record my gratitude to my colleague Professor Paul A. Hare, to my neighbors David Palmah, John Krivine, and Arthur Du-Mosch, and to my children, Maya, Yohanan, and Daniel, who spent many Saturdays doing the manual work, required to clean out the silt of millenia. For assistance in fields related to my project, thanks are due to the soil and water expert, Professor Pedro Berliner, the ecologists Professor Aharon Yair of the Hebrew University, Professor Moshe Shachak, Dr. Linda Olsveg-Whittaker and Dr. Bert Boeken of the J. Blaustein Institute, B. G. U. Dr. Avraham Perevolotzki and Dr. Yan S. Landau of the Vulkani Institute and Itshack Moshe of the Keren Kayemeth L≥Yisrael (Jewish National Fund) provided much moral support and advice in the field of sustainable range in arid lands. For enriching my knowledge regarding the development of rangelands in other Middle Eastern countries, thanks go to the delegations sent by the Agricultural Ministries of the Palestinian Authority, Jordan, Egypt, and Tunisia, started by the Madrid accords in 1993. All of us who took part in these meetings shall always remember the contributions raised by the facilitators of the “Initiative to Collaborate to Combat Desertification in the Middle East”; Michael E. Norwelle (1996), Scott Christiansen (1999– 2000) and Rick Tutwiler (2000–2001). The fruitful atmosphere and cordial spirit that characterized our exchanges were attained thanks to them. I want to express my gratitude to BAIF (an NGO in India), and its director Dr. Narayan Hegde, as well as the devoted forester Prahlad Shirsath, who facilitated my testing of research hypotheses about landless herders, in this case, the Rabari of Gujarat (the Raika of Rajasthan). Acknowledgments xi For editorial work on the manuscript of the present book, I would like to thank Professors Paul Hare and Alexander Borg who helped me find appropriate formulations for my ideas and generally improved my English style. Last but not least, I cordially thank Margo Tepper-Shotz, who has been editing my materials and preparing them for publication for over two decades. INTRODUCTION Since my early childhood, the sight of Bedouin herds, campsites, and tents (where I was not infrequently hosted in the company of adult visitors), has been with me. The movement of the tribes in winter to their rangelands situated across the fence enclosing our kibbutz, and their departure in the summer aroused curiosity and considerable awe at their mystifying life cycle among members of my family, my teachers, and other kibbutz members, most of them immigrants from Europe, and these feelings were transmitted to us, children of the kibbutz. The Bedouin’s resourcefulness in the way they eked out a living off the range imbued them in our eyes with dignity, though we could not help also noticing their hardship as their women and children rummaged through garbage dumps in search of food and clothing. They seemed always to be on the verge of hunger. In 1951–1952, I was a young shepherd at Kibbutz Giv‘at Brenner, where on returning home after school I often spent my afternoons preparing sheep pens for the return of the herd from pasture and helped with the milking. During school vacations, I was trained to take out the herd myself and I also tried my hand at shearing in the spring and at other seasonal jobs. At the end of the 1950s, Kibbutz Giv‘at Brenner abandoned sheep rearing, although it was not unprofitable, mainly on xiii xiv Introduction account of lack of manpower and the shrinkage of the open ranges surrounding the kibbutz. During the years 1967–1972, my path once again crossed that of the herds in the course of field research I undertook on Bedouin settlers and their herds in the Ramle/Lod area. Within a decade, most of them had sold their herds because the older shepherds did not find a younger generation willing to take their place.

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