Palestine: Children Laboring
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PALESTINE Palestine: Children Laboring MATT SURRUSCO BEIDAT, West Bank—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. SPRING 2014 81 Downloaded from wpj.sagepub.com at COLUMBIA UNIV on December 19, 2014 REPORTAGE Hamza, 28, moved to Bethlehem 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 kibbutz, or cooperatively owned farm, Ar- regularly. Having visited the village doz- gaman is a moshav, 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 Arabic 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 Israel has signed, par- non-governmental organization, out of its ticipating nations must “recognize the right Ramallah 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 Jordan 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 Jordan Valley 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 Argaman, 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 Palestinians, 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 Jerusalem 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 Jericho 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: Tomer, Petza’el, Argaman, Yafit, life in the Jordan Valley, he doesn’t look Na’ama, Niran, 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, SPRING 2014 83 Downloaded from wpj.sagepub.com at COLUMBIA UNIV on December 19, 2014 REPORTAGE 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.