Photo of Majd Burnat on stretcher, July 31, after being shot in the thigh. T-shirt says, “We are all Gaza”
Although the scale of suffering and loss pales compared to Gaza — where more Palestinian children have been killed in the past seven weeks than in the last five years combined — violence in the West Bank lurks at a low burn.
Iyad Burnat speaks with the measured voice of a veteran. As a leader of Bil’in’s weekly nonviolent protests, he’s been shot at, detained, and interrogated. And he’s seen his fellow villagers endure the same. So when his 15-year-old son took a live bullet to the thigh, the father took it in stride.
“What happened to Majd is part of a longstanding Israeli policy to try and scare us, to dissuade us from protesting the occupation,” the 40-year-old Burnat said about the July 31 incident.
But watching his son get shot by Israeli soldiers was just the beginning. On Sunday, while returning from a doctor’s appointment in Jordan — where surgeons refused to say whether the son’s leg would fully heal — Majd was served a summons by the Israeli police. He was ordered to appear for questioning on August 28, his 16th birthday.
Summons order for Majd Burnat, following his shooting, to appear for questioning at an Israeli police station.
“I don’t know what to do,” his father said. “If I take him to the police, they might arrest him. If I don’t take him, they might not let him leave [the West Bank] for his next appointment.”
Burnat’s dilemma, say fellow villagers, is yet another example of the Israeli occupation’s reach. But it also speaks to an essential similarity between Palestinians’ struggle in Gaza and the West Bank.
“Here,” said one villager who asked not to be named, “the physical violence against us isn’t nearly as brutal as it is in Gaza. But it’s also constant. What matters in both the West Bank and Gaza is persistence.”
A father’s dilemma
Every night in this village of roughly 2,000 people, a handful of friends — most of them between the ages of 30 and 40 — gathers on a hill not far from Israel’s separation wall, watching the news out of Gaza and expressing solidarity with their compatriots there.
It was on this hill that Bassem Abu-Rahmeh, Burnat’s cousin, was killed when Israeli soldiers fired a tear gas canister at his chest. The scene was made famous by the Oscar-nominated film 5 Broken Cameras, co-directed by Burnat’s brother, Emad.
When I met Majd for the first time, Emad Burnat was taking his nephew to pick up his school books. It had been fewer than two weeks since Majd was shot. When he entered the school on crutches, his teachers took one look at the teen and asked: “live or rubber bullet?”
Bil’in residents gather on a hill outside the village to watch the latest news out of Gaza.
Lurking violence
Palestinians in the West Bank have grown accustomed to news of their children being harassed or injured. Defense for Children International – Palestine recorded more than 200 Palestinian children in Israeli detention as of June. And although the scale of suffering and loss pales compared to Gaza — where more Palestinian children have been killed in the past seven weeks than in the last five years combined — violence here lurks at a low burn.
The Burnats’ case illustrates the point. When I spoke with Majd by phone on Sunday, he told me about his experience at the Allenby Bridge. “They questioned me in the ambulance that was supposed to be carrying me back to the Palestinian side,” he said. “My father wasn’t there because we had been separated at the border, and he couldn’t get to the ambulance to see me.”
I asked Majd whether he was scared. “It was nothing,” he said. “I’m used to it.”
Majd has also grown used to the pain from his bullet wound. He paces, mostly, because to sit — or stand still — makes his thigh throb. As we were carrying his books back to his uncle’s car, I could see him cringe, inconsolable.
In that sense, this child of Bil’in looks like so many of the Palestinian children I have seen in Gaza. Their’s is a gaze beyond their years, the kind of thousand-yard stare so common to veterans of war, so borne of post-traumatic stress. But the disorder that bears its name — PTSD — does not quite fit here. Here, Israel’s occupation — by the bombs’ bellow or the sniper’s aim — leaves children in constant pain. Here, with nowhere to flee, there is no “P” in PTSD.
As for Majd, his father tells me he will start school on August 31. Within a month, he says, they’ll both be heading back to Amman for a follow-up doctor’s visit, where they’re hoping for a sign that Majd might one day regain feeling in his lower leg.
“We’ll do all this,” Iyad Burnat says, “if nothing happens between now and then.”
“Their’s is a gaze beyond their years, the kind of thousand-yard stare so common to veterans of war, so borne of post-traumatic stress. But the disorder that bears its name — PTSD — does not quite fit here. Here, Israel’s occupation — by the bombs’ bellow or the sniper’s aim — leaves children in constant pain. Here, with nowhere to flee, there is no “P” in PTSD.”
I’ve said the same thing for a long time now.
The same goes for many, many people under siege– so very many of them as a result of US direct and indirect violence.
Susie Kneedler
August 26, 2014 11:23 am
Thanks, Samer, for searing, brilliant truth: “Here, Israel’s occupation — by the bombs’ bellow or the sniper’s aim — leaves children in constant pain.” So “there is no ‘P’ in PTSD.”
I’m endlessly sorry, Majd, Iyad, Bil’in, and all Palestine. Iyad, we in Ohio were honored to meet you and send all our deepest concern to you and to all. (Please give our Regards to your wife, whose beautiful art you brought.) We’ll think of you even more in two days, on Thursday, August 28–as the joyous anniversary of Majd’s 16 years is turned into more persecution by the illegal Israeli Occupation. Hope, hope, hope All will be Well with you, Majd.
Susie Kneedler
August 26, 2014 3:08 pm
Majd, know that all admire your bravery in suffering one more of Israel’s countless cruelties:
“Majd has also grown used to the pain from his bullet wound. He paces, mostly, because to sit — or stand still — makes his thigh throb….I could see him cringe, inconsolable….[T]hey’re hoping for a sign that Majd might one day regain feeling in his lower leg.”
We’re hoping with you, fervently.
Thanks, also, Samer, for “Why did Netanyahu take aim at Gaza’s tallest towers?:
The answer has nothing to do with alleged militants.”
“Israel wanted the world to watch as the towers fell.
‘If that sounds all-too-familiar, it should. The parallels with America’s 9/11, which killed close to 3,000 people, would end there. Except that it was Netanyahu himself who used the 2001 attacks to fashion his tactics against the Palestinians. Speaking to a New York Times reporter the day of the attacks, Netanyahu called them ‘very good’ for U.S.-Israel relations.”
“[E]verywhere were scenes of despair….spectacular destruction. But to judge from the defiance on display throughout Gaza…Palestinians are determined to bear Netanyahu’s ‘blows.’ Indeed, given the siege imposed upon them, the people of Gaza have no choice but to stand firm. And that, ultimately, is why Netanyahu will lose this war.”
“Their’s is a gaze beyond their years, the kind of thousand-yard stare so common to veterans of war, so borne of post-traumatic stress. But the disorder that bears its name — PTSD — does not quite fit here. Here, Israel’s occupation — by the bombs’ bellow or the sniper’s aim — leaves children in constant pain. Here, with nowhere to flee, there is no “P” in PTSD.”
I’ve said the same thing for a long time now.
The same goes for many, many people under siege– so very many of them as a result of US direct and indirect violence.
Thanks, Samer, for searing, brilliant truth: “Here, Israel’s occupation — by the bombs’ bellow or the sniper’s aim — leaves children in constant pain.” So “there is no ‘P’ in PTSD.”
I’m endlessly sorry, Majd, Iyad, Bil’in, and all Palestine. Iyad, we in Ohio were honored to meet you and send all our deepest concern to you and to all. (Please give our Regards to your wife, whose beautiful art you brought.) We’ll think of you even more in two days, on Thursday, August 28–as the joyous anniversary of Majd’s 16 years is turned into more persecution by the illegal Israeli Occupation. Hope, hope, hope All will be Well with you, Majd.
Majd, know that all admire your bravery in suffering one more of Israel’s countless cruelties:
“Majd has also grown used to the pain from his bullet wound. He paces, mostly, because to sit — or stand still — makes his thigh throb….I could see him cringe, inconsolable….[T]hey’re hoping for a sign that Majd might one day regain feeling in his lower leg.”
We’re hoping with you, fervently.
Thanks, also, Samer, for “Why did Netanyahu take aim at Gaza’s tallest towers?:
The answer has nothing to do with alleged militants.”
“Israel wanted the world to watch as the towers fell.
‘If that sounds all-too-familiar, it should. The parallels with America’s 9/11, which killed close to 3,000 people, would end there. Except that it was Netanyahu himself who used the 2001 attacks to fashion his tactics against the Palestinians. Speaking to a New York Times reporter the day of the attacks, Netanyahu called them ‘very good’ for U.S.-Israel relations.”
“[E]verywhere were scenes of despair….spectacular destruction. But to judge from the defiance on display throughout Gaza…Palestinians are determined to bear Netanyahu’s ‘blows.’ Indeed, given the siege imposed upon them, the people of Gaza have no choice but to stand firm. And that, ultimately, is why Netanyahu will lose this war.”
http://972mag.com/why-is-netanyahu-taking-aim-at-gazas-tallest-towers/96027/