Rebecca Vilkomerson tells a quietly-stirring story at The Only Democracy, about the (apparently-accidental) killing by Israeli soldiers of a Bedouin youth two weeks ago in a village in the Negev that is surrounded by military reserves. Vilkomerson explains that Qasr al-Sir was originally part of Dimona, the Israeli city in the Negev where they do hummina-hummina-hummina. Then the village got displaced. But despite the fact that it is a recognized village, it exists in a precarious geographical status, in which boys going for a hike in the hills are fired upon.
When people talk about Israel’s right to exist, which is not something I dispute, I would point out that Israel is routinely denying the right of Palestinians to exist on their lands, and no one gives a hoot. Please note in the following story that there is no real investigation of the killing; and this is accepted around the world. Remember how the killing of one Greek youth detonated political upheaval in that nation? Do you think that Palestinians do not also cherish their children? I apologize for the sloganeering, but– attention must be paid. Vilkomerson:
Qasr al-Sir was an “unrecognized” village in its new location—meaning it didn’t appear on any maps, didn’t receive any basic services like water, electricity, paved roads, sewage treatment, or garbage collection, and its homes could be destroyed at any time. The group of villages that were “recognized” in 2003 are controversial, because in return for the recognition, they gave up the right to the rest of their territorial land.
For Qasr al-Sir, this means that while the village itself now has some “amenities”–such as a school, some paved roads, and protection from home demolitions–it is still dealing with conditions that are unthinkable in Jewish communities in Israel. One of these problems is that right up to its very boundaries, unmarked, is a military training zone where soldiers can fire freely. The village is literally fenced in by the military.
This is no coincidence on a systemic level, as 85% of the Negev (or Naqab in Arabic) has been either requisitioned as a closed military zone or nature preserve. This is one of the ways that the Bedouins in the Negev have been forced to relinquish more and more of their lands, forced into isolated urban and rural areas with minimal, if any services.
The young man who was killed was a member of BUSTAN’s new eco-building training program. He was 19 years old. There was next to no media coverage of his death–one paragraph in YNET (the website of Yediot Ahronot, the largest Israeli daily paper) which mistakenly called the village “unrecognized” and implied that the men were trespassing–and nothing more. Similarly–no real investigation. When folks from BUSTAN called the local police chief to see why not, he was irritated and dismissive of their concerns.
No one thinks the boy was killed on purpose. It was Friday afternoon, almost Shabbat, a time when it should have been quiet and it would have been safe to walk the hills. In that sense, it was a “mistake.” But it was a mistake that speaks entire worlds.
