One of the travesties of the E-1 settlement plans that Israel has announced to connect occupied East Jerusalem with the West Bank settlements is the situation of the Jahalin Bedouin refugees. On these dry hills live 3000 Bedouins who are not allowed to build anything, can’t send their children to school, and live under power lines but can’t get access to electricity.
The Jahalin Bedouin were expelled from the Negev in 1951. Now they face expulsion from that E-1 corridor.
Two advocates for the Jahalin are in New York to explain the situation, at the UN’s Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues and at Hunter College tonight.
At Hunter at 7 PM, they will present the film “Nowhere Left to Go” and answer questions about the refugees:
3000 of the Jahalin Bedouin, refugees from the Negev, who have lived in the Jerusalem Periphery for the past 60 years, are about to be forcibly displaced yet again, by the Israeli army.
Eid abu Khamis Jahalin, spokesman of the Jahalin Association (Al Khan al Ahmar) will speak, during the week of the UN Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues, about his campaign to prevent their ethnic displacement, to uphold the human rights of these indigenous people and how his fight is so critical for any future peace process. Angela Godfrey-Goldstein, The Jahalin Association’s advocacy officer, will also participate.”
And today at the UN’s Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues, abu Khamis Jahalin and Godfrey-Goldstein will be presenting the following list of demand. Notice the existential element of the Bedouins’ plight, a traditional lifestyle at risk, and the utter contempt for these people exhibited by the Israeli government and settlers.
1. We refugees call for our Right of Return to our own lands inside Israel in the Negev Desert, from which we were forcibly displaced in 1951. We wish to remain where we are, if we cannot return to Tel Arad.
2. Failing the above, we demand full consultation as to plans by the IDF for our future.
3. The current IDF proposal, the ‘Nuweimeh Plan’ is totally unacceptable for many reasons.
4. If the Jahalin are moved from the Jerusalem Periphery, the impact on Palestinian viability will be terminal. The E-1 Development-Displacement plan achieves Greater Jerusalem as a region dominated by Jews, including 80% of all settlers. It makes a 2-state solution impossible, denies Jerusalem as a shared city, negatively impacting the Palestinian economy by 35%.
5. Even without displacement, the situation is untenable, since we 3000+ Bedouin are not allowed to build anything, not able to access education, live under electricity power grids but are not allowed access to electricity, have no access to the road system with vehicles or access to our Jerusalem market and problematic access to health services, water and employment.
6. We seek increased political will on this issue by the international community, as to its third state responsibility to protect civilians under occupation, including our full human rights. Without such increased political will, violence is more likely and the transfer will go ahead.
7. It is urgent to stop the plans now, before they are published and irreversible. This is a slippery slope, the Supreme Court will not rule in favour of us Bedouin, so it is imperative that maximum political pressure be applied NOW to stop the plan’s progress.
8. The settlers in neighbouring Kfar Adumim include the current Minister of Housing, Uri Ariel. The displacement plan is being pursued by those senior in the government with a policy to take over the lands of Al Khan al Ahmar: in Israel there is now (according to Haaretz newspaper) a “settler government”.
9. Any forced displacement (a grave breach of the Geneva Convention, a probable war crime and possible crime against humanity according to a Diakonia legal opinion) will be our final displacement as practicing Bedouin. This will put an end to our traditional lifestyle, herding livelihood and ability to live in desert independently.
10. If there are grave breaches and war crimes, we will demand full transparency and accountability against specific Israeli generals responsible.
11. As the planet heats up increasingly fast, desert is fast advancing: the Negev Desert, our homeland, and neighbouring Sinai Desert where our fellow Bedouin tribes live, as two regional examples. Citizens of the world, and future generations, need our peoples’ wisdom. The world community needs to protect, preserve and respect Bedouin indigenous knowledge, learned over thousands of years, as to how to live in desert extremes with grace and independence and love. This rush to grab our desert land and to “civilise” us, is a foolish, arrogant, blind act of wanton ignorance. If the nations of the world cannot even unite to protect and respect our knowledge, our wisdom, how shall we all cope with overheating of Mother Earth?
Incredibly powerful words — especially point 11.
Reminds me of what Gandhi said about Western civilization: “I think it would be a very good idea.”
Evocative, moving and ‘powerful’ (as Pamela wrote).
It would and has been a crime against humanity. I guess it’s worth preserving archeological and historical sites, but not an ancient culture nor the people who live it today…..
Putting the extinction squeeze on the natives, contemporary style.