Palestinian Diary Report of UCU trip to Palestine Dr Douglas Chalmers President Elect UCU Together with the UCU International Secretary, I represented the UCU on a delegation to Palestine, in late 2018. This was a solidarity trip organised with other educational trade unions to bring support to our counterparts in the occupied territories - primarily the General Union of Palestinian Teachers (GUPT). During the trip UCU managed Aida Refugee camp in Bethlehem, to have detailed discussions with our and had detailed discussions during the trip counterpart union, whose general with the Women's Coalition for secretary is based in the Palestine Peace [4], OCHA (the UN Office for the Polytechnic University in Hebron co-ordination of Humanitarian Affairs [5]), in the West Bank. t h e D e f e n c e f o r C h i l d r e n International NGO [6], and were given a From our base in occupied East Jerusalem, guided tour and detailed discussion in we visited schools in East Jerusalem, Jaffa, by community activists involved in a in Nablus, and Ramallah, and met and joint Palestinian/Israeli list [7] in the current had discussions with both the Minister municipal elections. of Education for Palestine, and the GUPT. The latter invited us to attend a delegate meeting in Tulkarm where we observed their scheduled elections. This Table of Contents: was in a meeting of over 750 delegates - a Ben Gurion Airport; Old Jerusalem; p 4 majority of whom were women. Teachers’ AGM Tulkarm; Nablus; Askar Refugee p 5 Camp; Dar Al Fonon centre; Nabi Saleh; We also visited refugee camps in Nablus East Jerusalem Schools; OCHA; Civic Coalition p 9 [1], and Bethlehem [2]. During the visit for Jerusalem; Sheikh Jarrah; Khan Al-Ahmar; to Bethlehem we paid a visit to the Al Aqsa Mosque; Jaffa and Jaffa Coalition; p 21 Lajee cultural centre [3], based at the Womens’ Coalition for Peace; Ramallah Schools; GUPT; p 26 Sabri Sidem (Minister for Education); p 29 Yasser Arafat Museum; Defence for Children p 30 1:https://www.unrwa.org/where-we-work/west-bank/askar-camp 2:https://www.unrwa.org/where-we-work/west-bank/aida-camp International; 3:http://www.lajee.org Hebron University Visit; Old Market; Al-Ibrahami p 35 4:http://www.coalitionofwomen.org/?lang=en 5:https://www.ochaopt.org Mosque; Food Distribution Centre; 6:https://defenceforchildren.org/dci-palestine/ Lajee Centre; Aida Refugee Camp; Bethlehem; 7: https://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/mar/21/israel-elections- Appendices p 41 joint-list-arabs-jaffa “We are trying to present a positive outlook to Palestinians. As educators we want to be a ‘ministry of hope’ applying ethics to how one ought to live and work. However this is not particularly easy when students wake every morning and see more checkpoints and the wall snaking through Palestinian communities”. Sabri Sedum, Minister of Education See P 29 Left to right clockwise: Palestinian Poem from Yasser Arafat Museum; Pupils in Primary school in Ramallah; Garden of Olives, Jerusalem; Local Boy Scout school bank in East Jerusalem over part of a home owned by a 93 year- old Palestinian woman and continuing to We visited the Yassar Arafat Museum occupy the front of her house, (which had [8] during a visit to Ramallah, and were also fortunate to be given a guided tour and had Israeli symbols painted onto the building). Directly across the road from this discussion in the Al Asqa Mosque [9] (Jerusalem). particular home, another settler family had blown the doors off a vacated Palestinian Whilst we were in Hebron we visited the house, the occupants having left in fear, and Al Ibrahimi Mosque [10] . This mosque had been the site of a massacre of Muslim had then likewise occupied that building. worshippers by a settler in 1994. Following this event the Israeli authorities had Later we were able to contrast the occupied, then physically divided the conditions in the enforced run down mosque. This had happened at the same occupied Palestinian areas with the ultra- time as a core of Israeli settlers had modern settlements on the other side occupied part of the centre of old Hebron. of the Israeli constructed partition wall. The These 400 Israeli settlers, were now particular settlements we saw contained guarded by 2000 Israeli soldiers, and the facilities many urban dwellers could only settlement and the actions of its inhabitants dream of, connected by ultra-modern trams continued to be a point of tension in the in some cases, and in other cases by area (see section below). modern roads, which Palestinians are not allowed to use. While in Jerusalem, we were taken to a We also visited the village of Nabi Saleh contested site - Sheikh Jarrah [11], not far from our hotel, where settlers are [12] which between 2009 and 2017 held currently trying to encroach into a small weekly demonstrations against the historical Palestinian settlement. This had occupation, and which had been the site of involved amongst other activities, taking recent publicity. The publicity which had captured the 8: http://www.yam.ps/en/ ! attention of a section of the world’s media 9: https://www.aljazeera.com/indepth/features/2017/07/al- had arisen after a young Palestinian woman aqsa-170719122538219.html ! Ahed Tamimi was arrested and jailed 10:https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2016/02/remembering- ibrahimi-mosque-massacre-160225061709582.html! 11: https://www.newyorker.com/news/news-desk/facing-eviction- in-sheikh-jarrah ! #2 12: https://www.youtube.com/user/tamimi1966! for slapping a soldier following her cousin however, that we were only scratching the being shot in the face by a rubber bullet [13]. She had been jailed under ‘anti-terrorism’ legislation. We attempted to visit the site of Khan al-Ahmar [14] which had been in the news in the week of our visit, due to a temporary halt to an Army operation to clear a Bedouin camp. The army had been attempting to clear the camp in order to create a further settlement, which were it Khan Al-Ahmar - Bedouin Camp under threat of eviction to be established would split the West Bank in two. We were prevented from doing so surface in a visit of a week's duration. by a police road block, although (with police Finally, we visited the Holy Sites in aid) a group of settlers could be seen Jerusalem, including the Wailing Wall, but congregating above the camp to continue like other visitors to Palestine we could not the pressure on the Palestinian Bedouin visit Gaza, entrance to which is forbidden. community. In regard to the situation in Gaza however, we did discuss with the GUPT, the minister During our trip we were also given the for Education, and with our University opportunity to explore old Jerusalem, colleagues, the manner in which contact can Nablus and Hebron, which allowed us be maintained and also union activity be to observe some aspects of the oppressive progressed with teaching colleagues there, nature of the occupation and some of the who are suffering in an environment that is day to day issues forced on the people of both stifling in terms of internal politics, and Palestine by the occupation. It was clear also through the deprivations forced by the blockade of the Israeli government. As a union we were very grateful 13: https://www.aljazeera.com/programmes/listeningpost/ 2018/03/ahed-tamimi-story-multiple- for the opportunity to join other narratives-180303101517310.html! educational trade unionists in 14: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Khan_al-Ahmar! making this visit. “It’s like two different worlds in the same city. The Israelis are building hundreds of ultra-modern homes and flats in settlements on the illegal land in and around Jerusalem – i.e. the bits that they invaded in 1967 that aren’t recognised by the UN as part of Israel”. Palestinian community worker commenting on journey from Tel Aviv airport to Jerusalem Left clockwise: The Israeli imposed partition of the Al Ibrahimi Mosque; Palestine home seized and settled in Sheikh Jarrah; Gas canisters fired against demonstrators in Nabi Saleh; New settlement on outskirts of Jerusalem. #3 In some places in Jerusalem they had the Some of the more detailed itinerary of our appearance of travellers’ camps (and as we visit is given below. were to see later, their inhabitants face the constant problems of the Israeli authorities Saturday Oct 20th trying to get them expelled). Ben Gurion Airport The border guard was insistent to know Walk around old city, and through whether we knew or were meeting anyone the Damascus Gate in Israel, but the only person in our group We entered the old city through the to actually get hauled aside for a second, Damascus Gate, past two Israeli police and more detailed discussion was a young army posts. female Moslem colleague from London. Walking around here, it really felt to me as Unfortunately she was also hauled aside on if I was living through history. There were the return trip, after being stopped 5 times markets along many of the streets we between getting off the taxi at Ben Gurion walked with the market within the old walls airport and the plane. She was taken away, reminding me partly of the Grand Bazaar in forced to strip by two female security Istanbul although this market was in the officers, and also had her bag searched open. One difference of course was the before being allowed to proceed. My own Israeli army checkpoints as you went in, and bag was also searched on the way out, as armed Israeli troops intermittently in the were those of a sizeable number of us.