It’s plain sick!
There is nothing original in the statement that whatever one might have read, or seen, about Israel and the ongoing conflict with the Palestinians, can prepare one for seeing things for oneself “on the ground”. The large, obscene blot of a Wall (sometimes with gun towers) dominating the skyline and looking down on the people it surrounds. The checkpoints and border-crossings and everything associated with them.
Just as insidious in frustrating, demeaning and harassing the Palestinians, and having nothing whatsoever to do with security issues, are the “sick” policies, rules and strictures in place – which rarely get mentioned in the outside world. A few samplings:
— should a Palestinian wish to complain about whatever to the Israeli authorities – with the possible aim of launching legal proceedings – the law of Israel requires the complaint to first be submitted, in writing, by a Palestinian lawyer. As a prerequisite to initiating any proceeding, the Israeli authority must have responded to the complaint. No response, no court case! Needless to say the Israelis rarely respond and when challenged by foreign governments or NGO’s why this is so, the invariable response from the Israelis is that they are working through the pile. End of story!
–where roads used by Palestinians and Israelis happen to intersect – not a regular thing given the apartheid-like situation in the use of roads – the traffic lights are so calibrated that the time the Israelis can go through the green light is considerably longer than that for the Palestinians. Some time back the ratio was something like a couple minutes to 20 seconds, although now improved
— similarly, where a Palestinian and Israeli road meet and there is a roundabout, the roundabout has been so designed that the Israeli drivers have it much easier to get through
— whilst Israelis have modern air-condition/ed buses to ferry them around in West Jerusalem or to take them across to East Jerusalem, in East Jerusalem itself and to go to the West Bank, bus-system consists almost entirely of old, small, very narrow and basically uncomfortable buses
— applications for building permits submitted by Palestinians are dealt with once a year. Almost invariably the application will be found to be wanting in some respect, or more likely the regulations changed since the application was submitted. The process has to start all over again. Of course that is why most Palestinians have no building permits.
There is something sick about a society which can come up with such measures – a la that part of an Israeli government department that works on what little food should be allowed into Gaza, but just enough to prevent starvation – and a mentality of people like the IDF, which this example so clearly demonstrates.
As told to me just the other day by the person himself, the Director of a refugee camp in Bethlehem arranged to take a group of 8, 9 and 10 year olds to Tel Aviv to see a beach – which none of them ever had. All paperwork was in place and all authorities and permission duly obtained. At the border crossing the IDF stopped the bus proceeding. The IDF officer directly told the children that they were “terrorists” and wouldn’t be allowed to proceed. And they didn’t!
As a barrister I regard the Israeli Court system as wanting in many material respects. But two recent examples
— late last year a Palestinian family took a settler to Court to try and prevent being evicted from their home. It’s a familiar story for Palestinian families. Both the Palestinian family and the settlers were legally represented. The Judge called only the lawyer for the settlers into her Chambers and on returning to the Bench announced that the application was dismissed. No submissions, no arguments, no nothing!
— the parents of Rachel Corrie are presently suing in the Israeli courts for $1 by way of damages in relation to the death of their daughter back in March 2003, killed by a tractor driven by an IDF member running over Rachel – twice! [Go to rachelcorriefoundation.org for a background to the death of Rachel and the aftermath.] The Corries merely seek to establish what actually happened given that the Israelis did not undertake any coronial enquiry, investigation or autopsy. In fact, some of Rachel’s body parts were removed for medical research without permission from any family member. The case has been allowed by the Court to be conducted on a stop-start basis. One day here, another day way down the track, etc. etc. Worse still, the driver of the offending tractor was allowed to give his evidence behind a screen and be cross-examined that way. Finally, the Court has very limited seating and that which there is, is mainly occupied by Israeli IDF and government officials – leaving barely enough room for the Corrie family to be seated let alone allow for access to the Court by any media representatives or others.
Jeff Loewenstein is an Australian who has just visited Israel and Palestine. He blogs at Mahler’s Prodigal Son.
