PALESTINE

Palestine: Children Laboring

MATT SURRUSCO

BEIDAT, —The elec- on, illuminating the cards strewn across the tricity in the village went out for table, the young men’s grinning faces, and Zthe third time on a warm July a few additional patio areas outside other night. But the young men, some in their Zbeidat homes, where men were drinking teens, didn’t want to stop playing cards. A tea or coffee and talking. On Amjad’s pa- few took out their mobile phones to project tio, Hamza Zbeidat, a Palestinian from the

MICHAEL LOADENTHAL some light on the patio’s low table outside village, and Christopher Whitman, a New Amjad’s house, the regular hangout for a Englander from the United States, were sit- dozen or so of the young men of Zbeidat, a ting with the guys, some teenagers in high village of 1,870 in the northern West Bank. school, others in their twenties and work- Three minutes later, the lights flicked back ing or in universities.

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Hamza, 28, moved to last kets. “The whole point of the agricultural February after getting married five months settlement is exports,” Chris says. Unlike a earlier, but he sees his family in Zbeidat , or cooperatively owned farm, Ar- regularly. Having visited the village doz- gaman is a , a farming settlement, ens of times, Chris, 27, was welcomed as where settlers own some of the land in com- an honorary resident. Both speak mon, though most is privately owned. and English, though each is fluent only Under international law, enshrined in in his native language. Hamza works for Article 32 of the Convention on the Rights Ma’an Development Center, a Palestinian of the Child, which has signed, par- non-governmental organization, out of its ticipating nations must “recognize the right office, as did Chris until Febru- of the child to be protected from economic ary. Their development projects and advo- exploitation and from performing any work cacy work have been based that is likely to be hazardous in Valley villages and or to interfere with the child’s tied to Zbeidat. Since their the child education, or to be harmful reports compare the quality labor issue to the child’s health or physi- of life and resources avail- cal, mental, spiritual, moral able to Pal- encompasses a or social development.” The estinians and Israelis, Chris host of other convention defines a child as and Hamza’s work has also problems— any person under 18. Inter- focused on 31 Israeli settle- national Labor Organization ments in the Jordan Valley, poverty, (ILO) conventions and Israeli including , the unemployment, and Palestinian child labor settlement nearest Zbeidat. and a poor laws set the minimum age to Many of the men and work as 15, but for employ- boys in this West Bank vil- school system. ment considered hazardous lage—including some chil- to a young person’s health or dren as young as 13—work on Argaman’s safety, the minimum age is 18. farms. They earn below the Israeli mini- In the Jordan Valley, many child labor- mum wage, receive no social security or ers, aged 13 to 17, work before and after health benefits from their Israeli employers, school and on breaks, averaging six to seven and have no job security. Many are hired on hours daily. But in Zbeidat and other vil- a daily basis by a Palestinian intermediary, a lages, some leave school before graduating waseet, contracted by the Israeli farm own- to work full time and help support their er to recruit Palestinian laborers. Some 500 families. Few teenagers return to finish to 1,000 Palestinian children work on Jor- their education after starting to work full dan Valley agricultural settlements, accord- time. The physically demanding labor puts ing to Ma’an. The workers, some 10,000 children at risk of exposure to pesticides, to 20,000 , plant, harvest, skin cancer from working long hours in transport, clean, and package settlement the sun, and fatigue, resulting in stunted produce for sale mostly in European mar- growth and bodily injury. Moreover, chil-

Matt Surrusco is a journalist who reported for +972 Magazine from in 2013.

82 WORLD POLICY JOURNAL Downloaded from wpj.sagepub.com at COLUMBIA UNIV on December 19, 2014 PALESTINE dren are not monitored, work long hours, ley’s land and water resources. The cycle of and are doing jobs not suitable for their age poverty means villagers earn a scant daily nor physical capacities, says Mira Nasser, wage to survive, but have few opportunities a child labor program coordinator in the to move beyond their present circumstances ILO’s Jerusalem office. “There are more or provide a better future for their children. children dropping out of schools entering Indeed children are the ultimate and the labor market to work,” she adds. all too often invisible victims. By age 16, Despite the low pay and taxing physi- some in Zbeidat don’t see the point in cal labor, young Palestinians go to work finishing high school because regardless on settlements because there are few other of the level of education they attain, they jobs. In the governorate, which in- know they will likely end up working in cludes Zbeidat, the unemployment rate is Argaman’s farms, like many of their fam- among the highest in the West Bank—19 ily members and neighbors. “Agriculture percent. In Zbeidat, at least two genera- is not something that you should be doing tions have worked on Argaman, where when you’re 15, 16 years old,” Chris says, labor relations between the earliest Israeli sitting in a hookah bar near the Ramallah settlers and older Palestinian residents central bus station. “There’s no choice in stretch back a generation further. Many the matter. Kids don’t work in settlements Zbeidat men see working on Argaman because they’re like, ‘oh, I’m bored, let’s as a natural progression, following their go get a job.’ They’re not doing it so they fathers, uncles, and older brothers to the have [spending money], so they can spend date orchards and tomato fields. the nights in Ramallah drinking or buying Chris started researching and reporting cigarettes. They’re doing it to support their on the child labor issue in late 2011, five families.” Taking another puff of flavored months after he began working at Ma’an tobacco, Chris jots down all the Jordan Development Center. When writing advo- Valley settlements that he knows employ cacy reports that illustrate the hardships of children: , Petza’el, Argaman, , life in the Jordan Valley, he doesn’t look Na’ama, , Gilgal, Netiv Hagedud, for the “best” story or the most exploit- Qalia, Beit HaArava, Ro’i. ative. “I want to have the rule, not the Though Argaman does not have near- exception,” Chris says. According to him, ly the number of child laborers as Tomer, Zbeidat is the rule. Chris says Argaman—the second Israeli set- tlement built in the Jordan Valley, and the RULE, NOT EXCEPTION third in the West Bank—has a long history. In Zbeidat, the child labor issue encom- For Hamza, the Palestinian from Zbeidat, passes a host of other problems—poverty, Argaman was where he first learned about unemployment, and a poor school system. settlements, working with his father and Furthermore, Chris observes, the practice brothers as a child. He started going to the of using children for manual labor is sim- farm in the fourth or fifth grade, first ask- ply wrong. Still, their labor helps fuel the ing his father to bring him during school settlement enterprise, which keeps Pales- breaks, later doing manual labor like weed- tinians of all ages from working their own ing fields and moving large water pipes land, developing sustainable agricultural with sprinklers to irrigate the land. By the businesses, and utilizing the Jordan Val- eighth or ninth grade, Hamza says, he,

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two of his brothers, and another worker One of the original Argaman settlers, were responsible for preparing 50 acres of David Levy owns a date orchard on 14 land for cultivation. The children worked acres, down the hill from the settlement, before and after school. Hamza could and a short drive from Zbeidat. In a road- have become a waseet as he got older, but side restaurant nearby, Levy describes the he got a job with Ma’an in 2012, around history of Argaman, and the long-stand- the time one of his family members, now ing, good relations between Argaman and 19, dropped out of school to work full- Zbeidat residents. He employs seven to time on an Argaman farm. Hamza speaks 10 Palestinians, none under 18, to work humbly about his opportunity. “The only his land during the harvest season. Some thing I have is my experience in the re- 20 Argaman farmers employ Palestinian gion and my information about the Jor- workers, he adds. dan Valley,” he says. After an hour, Levy drives up the hill in his SUV, past the settlement gate, waving GOOD NEIGHBORS to the soldier in the guard post, and into Located in the northeastern Jordan Valley, Argaman. It’s mid-afternoon on a bright Zbeidat sits just off Israel’s longest road, August day, and the streets are empty, the Highway 90, which runs north to south playground void of children, only a few through the West Bank. The village is sur- people clustering around the gated, out- rounded by land designated as Area C, un- door swimming pool. Walking through the der Israeli control. In the summer, Zbeidat settlement, the buildings and the streets children play outside their homes, kicking a seem sterile. Up a path, past a neat row of soccer ball in dusty side streets and in one of homes with a dog tied up outside, from a the few empty lots in the late afternoon and vantage point atop a lookout post, it’s pos- evenings. Groups of older men sit nearby sible to see past a dirt road and barbed wire in plastic deck chairs, with seats that have fence, down onto Zbeidat. The mosque in been repaired with wire, staples, or string. the center of the village protrudes into the Most of the people living here have landscape, with the homes of Hamza’s fam- the same surname—Zbeidat—including ily and neighbors packed in tight. Hamza and his family. Their ancestors, a In Zbeidat, late one evening, Chris and Bedouin tribe of dis- Hamza are sitting on the tile floor in Am- placed in 1948 from Be’er Sheva, located jad’s living room. The television is still on in central Israel, founded the village. In when some of the young men who work 1962, Jordan agreed to allow Zbeidat in Argaman arrive. One of them, asked if residents to continue leasing village land he had ever been injured while working in for five years, according to a Ma’an report. the fields of the settlement, pulls up his T- After that period, the residents would shirt sleeve to reveal a three-inch long scar own the land. But after the 1967 Six Day beginning in his left armpit and stretch- War, when Israel gained control of the ing to the top corner of his left shoulder. West Bank, Zbeidat’s future was altered. When he was 11 or 12, he began working Israel appropriated some 990 acres of vil- with his father in Argaman. The accident lage land. In 1968, part of that land was happened when he was 14. He fell under used to establish the of the farm tractor he was riding, injuring his Argaman, originally as a military camp. shoulder severely. After surgery and three

84 WORLD POLICY JOURNAL Downloaded from wpj.sagepub.com at COLUMBIA UNIV on December 19, 2014 PALESTINE days recovering in a Jerusalem hospital, boy’s father is their waseet. The older one he and his family received no compensa- left school when he was 16 to work full- tion from his Israeli employer. In fact, his time on the settlement. He had moved parents didn’t even bother to tell the farm in with his uncle’s family after his father owner what happened, knowing Palestin- died. “If there was something else, I would ian laborers do not have health insurance do it, but there’s nothing else,” he says, or benefits. His father, who is also his smoking a cigarette between short replies. waseet, paid his hospital bills. Today, 10 His younger cousin is still in school, but years later, he earns less than $3 per hour, the 16-year-old works on the settlement or half the Israeli minimum wage, work- everyday, from 2 p.m. until dusk. “Yes, ing seven hours a day, four days a week, it’s hard, but this is the life. I have to do picking grapes and peppers, along with it,” the younger boy shrugs. His family other farm tasks. The other three days of includes his parents, seven brothers, and the week, he studies physical education at cousins. All of the men work on Argaman. Al Quds Open University. Hamza has at least three He has two more years until family members living in he graduates, when he hopes when the waseet Zbeidat who work as waseets to get a better job as a physi- refuses to in Argaman. The eldest, 52, cal education teacher. But if has worked with five differ- he can’t find a job in Zbeidat recruit children ent settlers in the past 30 or a larger city, he will con- looking for years, recruiting workers tinue working in Argaman. settlement and purchasing farm sup- plies. He started working IN THE FAMILY work, the on the settlement when he The scenery along Route 90 children was 15 and became a waseet from Jericho north to Zbei- about five years after that. dat is like an impressionist simply seek The congenial man, with painting of faded yellows, another labor graying hair and a trimmed browns, and grays, inter- contractor who beard, occasionally hires rupted only by another oc- children, some five per- casional car, winding and is willing to cent of his work force. He dipping along mountain hire them. brought his sons to work roads. Low desert shrubs, with him when they were tufts of greenery, and goat and sheep pens still in school. “I’m not a doctor. I’m not made of corrugated metal and other scrap a professor. I’m a farmer,” the waseet says. dot the landscape, marking the homes of Another member of Hamza’s family Bedouin shepherds and their families. De- has worked with the same settler for 15 spite the arid appearance at first glance, years—since he was 14. He recognizes that the region has fertile land and plentiful the work is exploitative, which is why the water resources, as seen by the large swaths waseet refuses to hire children. Still, he had of date palms and other cultivated tracts, dropped out of school to work on Arga- some situated along the . man. “He is trying to tell the kids to go In Zbeidat, two cousins, age 16 and 17, back to school,” Hamza says, translating work together on Argaman. The younger for his relative. But when the waseet refuses

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to recruit children looking for settlement Palestinian police and courts have no work, the children simply seek another la- jurisdiction over settlements, which makes bor contractor who is willing to hire them. it difficult to prosecute Israelis who em- Some teenagers are the sole breadwinners ploy children, according to Palestinian of their families, especially if their fathers attorney Khaled Quzmar, a legal consul- are disabled or beyond the age to work in a tant for the child rights group Defense for physically demanding job, Chris says. Children International-Palestine. “When In Hamza’s relatives’ home, visitors a Palestinian child goes to work on Israeli sleep in the front room on twin-sized mat- settlements, we don’t have control,” Quz- tresses under thick blankets while the air mar says. In 1995, Israel and the Palestin- conditioner is turned up high. The largest ian Authority signed the Oslo Accords, wall features a scenic painting of a Bed- which established administrative zones in ouin village done by a family the West Bank—Areas A, friend. Another wall displays B, and C—and Israeli civil a framed childhood photo- the israeli and military jurisdiction over graph of Hamza’s 19-year- government Area C, about 60 percent of old relative, who sleeps in the West Bank, where Israeli the room under his picture. must enforce settlements are located. Pal- He works on Argaman and is its own labor estinians can prosecute waseets gone by 6 a.m. laws on for child trafficking if they are traveling through Areas OFFICIAL RESPONSE territory it A or B, where the Palestin- While Ma’an has produced says is under its ian Authority has complete two documentaries on child or partial jurisdiction. labor on settlements, few jurisdiction. In 2007, Israel’s High other organizations have re- Court of Justice ruled that ported on the issue. Government officials— Israeli labor laws must be equally applied Palestinian and Israeli—have been slow to to Palestinians working for Israeli em- respond to this exploitation that is already ployers in the West Bank. Quzmar, the decades old. In recent years, however, some attorney who helped draft the Palestinian Palestinian officials have taken small steps. Authority’s child labor laws, reiterated the Amjad Jaber, director of the Palestinian high court and stated Israeli law must pro- Ministry of Labor’s Jericho office, says his vide Palestinian children equal protection. staff has worked with Palestinian police to But Israeli government oversight of prosecute five child labor cases related to settlement work conditions and enforce- work on settlements since February 2013. ment of labor laws “remain largely ab- But there is little political will outside the sent,” according to a 2013 ILO report on Jericho governorate to pursue arrests of the situation of workers in the West Bank waseets, Jaber says. The government mainly and . “[Israel] ratified ILO con- brings charges for child trafficking when ventions, including child labor-related waseets are caught transporting minors conventions,” says Rasha El-Shurafa, an through Jericho, after recruiting them from ILO program officer in Jerusalem. “The nearby or to work on Jordan responsibility falls to Israel’s authorities to Valley settlement farms. address this issue.”

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In response to questions submitted enough even for food for a family,” he says. to the Israeli Ministry of Economy, Avner “The people [in Zbeidat] are good, but the Amrani, senior research director in the la- life is bad.” The 19-year-old, who started bor relations division, says the ministry has working as a child, can’t leave the packag- received no complaints related to Palestin- ing house for long, nor leave the settlement ian children working in settlements. He now. He probably never will. adds that labor oversight in the West Bank is “less proactive,” and labor inspectors in- GOING FORWARD vestigate when violations are reported. To start addressing the issue of child labor in “As of today, the Youth Labor Law does settlements, the governments of Israel, Pal- not apply to the Judea and Samaria region estine, the United States, and the European [the West Bank],” Amrani replies. Jorda- Union, as well as international stakehold- nian labor law, as part of the legal system ers, including private companies, philan- in the region that predates the 1967 war, thropies, and consumers can all play a role. is applicable in territory controlled by the On a large scale, diplomatic negotiations , he says. However, fol- bringing an end to the Israeli-Palestinian lowing the conclusion of work by a govern- confrontation could begin a new promise of ment team, including representatives of the peace, security, and economic development. Ministry of Justice, Ministry of Economy, Expanding Palestinian businesses, foreign and the legal counsel of the Judea and Sa- investment, and trade would improve the maria region, tasked with examining the financial circumstances of Palestinian par- application of Israeli labor laws in West ents who today have few alternatives but to Bank settlements, Israel’s youth labor law send their children to work on settlements. will be implemented and enforced, includ- Jordan Valley settlements produce ag- ing Israeli employment of Palestinians. ricultural goods valued at some $143 mil- Currently, Israel’s minimum wage law, lion annually, according to the Jordan Val- women’s labor law, and the foreign workers ley Regional Council. At the same time, law apply in the region, but the youth labor the Palestinian Authority is dependent on law has yet to be implemented through Is- American and European foreign aid to keep rael’s defense legislation. the government running and develop and Deep in Argaman farmland, between maintain infrastructure, including roads greenhouses and fields, behind rows of and schools. The World Bank reported in date palms, and inside a produce packag- 2013 that Palestinians’ lack of access to ing house, one of Hamza’s relatives is work- West Bank land has cost $3.4 billion to ing. This young man had dropped out of the Palestinian economy. Palestinian agri- high school in the 10th grade, against his cultural development in the region could parents’ wishes, to work on Argaman. He help improve the Palestinian Authority’s wears a sleeveless, white tank shirt, gray fiscal problems. track pants, and the thin, wispy moustache But barring a long-sought solution to of an adolescent. Six days a week he picks, the conflict, at a minimum, the Israeli gov- cleans, and sorts dates, while also recruit- ernment must enforce its own labor laws ing Palestinian workers—including some on territory it says is under its jurisdiction. a few years younger than he. He earns less This means prosecuting Israelis who ille- than $700 a month. “The money is not gally employ children, do not offer workers

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minimum wages and social benefits, and paigns can also help communicate the fail to adhere to safety protocols required hazards of settlement work to children’s by law, including medical examinations for health, safety, and development. children. Moreover, if Israelis paid a wage Still, Palestinian settlement workers allowing adults to support large families whose rights are violated cannot easily ac- (the average Zbeidat family includes seven cess the Israeli legal system. “Palestinian people, according to Ma’an), the economic lawyers cannot appear in front of Israeli necessity to send children to work in the courts,” says El-Shurafa, the ILO program settlements would be reduced. Further, Is- officer in Jerusalem. “If there is a case of rael’s Ministry of Economy must proactive- child labor, there is no system to take up ly inspect agricultural settlements for labor these matters.” But the ILO and non-gov- violations, especially the grossest violations ernmental organizations can help Palestin- that involve child laborers. ian workers, including children, by build- The Ministry of Economy expects the ing the capacity of Palestinian unions to work of the inter-ministerial team to con- educate workers on their rights under in- clude by August 2014. When the youth ternational and Israeli laws. They can also labor law is implemented in the West help fund attorneys with Israeli citizen- Bank, the ministry says its inspectors will ship to represent Palestinian workers seek- act in response to complaints from em- ing remedies in Israeli courts. This may ployees, employers, and on the inspector’s help deter future abuses by employers. initiative. Laws will be enforced in the Jor- At the same time, boycotts and pres- dan Valley in accordance with Israel’s labor sure against private companies and con- regulations, and “as frequently as they are sumers can effectively rally against abuses, enforced in the rest of the State of Israel.” particularly child labor violations, by re- But inspectors will only be able to pros- fusing to do business with Israeli compa- ecute Israeli employers for violations, not nies operating east of the Green Line in Palestinian contractors. the West Bank. Governments, companies, For its part, the Palestinian Author- and individuals must start by stopping ity must do more to prosecute waseets the purchase of settlement produce plant- who recruit children in Areas A and B to ed, picked, and packaged for sale, in part, work on settlements, and work with non- by Palestinian children. These minors governmental organizations and donor na- deserve a present and future free of work tions to offer alternative work programs that perpetuates their society’s marginal- to youths and adults that help build the ization and generation’s economic disen- Palestinian economy and provide stable franchisement. They have a right to enjoy income for families. Public advocacy cam- their childhood. l

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