On April 9, 2021 The New York Times published a half tongue-in-cheek, half serious article titled “Where Boars Hog the Streets” by Patrick Kingsley. It opens with a photo of a large mama boar crossing a Haifa street with eight baby boars and a waiting driver laughing. This is not a laughing manner on so many fronts.
While the wild pigs can weigh up to 300 pounds, in this article they are described as having “sparked a rumpus,” (rumpus being a word I generally associate with unruly kids at a playground). The boars are portrayed in a variety of manners: harmless like squirrels all the way to dangerous pests gobbling up lawns and rooting through garbage, but the visuals are all cuteness. The author soon lapses into the realm of political hasbara. “[Haifa] is one of the few Israeli cities where Jews live alongside significant numbers of Palestinian citizens of Israel, who form about 10 percent of the city’s population.” He quotes Edna Gorney, a poet, ecologist and lecturer at the University of Haifa. “‘I wish we could all in Israel learn to live like they live in Haifa, it’s an example of coexistence — not only between Arabs and Jews, but also between humans and wildlife.’”
Why does this trouble me so much? The last time I saw boars in Israel/Palestine, Jewish settlers were releasing them onto Palestinian agricultural lands where they caused a huge amount of destruction and were virtually impossible to control. In the village of Burin near Nablus, during a visit with Palestinian Medical Relief Society, villagers complained of the nearby Jewish settlements that frequently blocked access to the local villages, burned their farms and olive trees, and raised wild pigs that they released into Palestinian farms.
Just outside the fairly idyllic village of Deir Istiya, there is a valley called Wadi Qana, part of the food basket for the Salfit District. Surrounding Jewish settlers have dumped raw sewage into the valley, contaminating the water, driven families out of the region, dug reservoirs that dry up the natural springs, demolished orchards, uprooted trees, and released wild pigs into Palestinian farms where they eat the smaller vegetation and younger olive trees that were planted to replace the damage done by settlers.
These stories are obviously not so cute or heartwarming. Reports from the region dating back to 2012 indicate that wild pigs are indigenous to Palestine and there has been an explosion in the population due to a lack of predators and laws against shooting the pigs. There is rising damage to Palestinian crops (and not Israeli settlements) due to the policies and practices of the Israeli government. There have also been a number of articles in Vice, The Palestine Information Center, and Al Monitor that confirm that the settlers-releasing-pigs-story is not just urban lore, but fact.
Then we come to the myth that Haifa is a kumbaya model of co-existence in a fractured Israeli society. It is certainly lovely that there is a “liberal Arab renaissance in Haifa,” but the situation is much more complex than gay, tattooed Palestinians having the freedom to party in a bar of their choosing. Jihad Jaburaya, a Palestinian lawyer living in Haifa, explained to me the troubled history of Haifa. Before 1948, 70,000 Palestinians lived in the city and it was a major commercial center, attracting workers from all over the Arabic-speaking world. In the 1948 war, Israeli military forced the inhabitants to flee “into the sea,” many escaping to Lebanon, leaving 1,200 Palestinians to struggle within the newly formed state. When Palestinian properties were seized, they were put under Israeli governmental “companies” that collected rent from the former owners.
The Israelis declared empty Palestinian homes “absentee property” and herded the remnants of the city into a prison like ghetto called Wadi Al Nasnas. Wadi Al Nasnas became the center of Palestinian cultural life, including the home of the poet Mahmoud Darwish. The property seizures included the Islamic wafq which is supposedly protected under Islamic law for families to use. Many of the street names were changed to the names of rabbis or famous Jewish fighters and the remaining names were largely Palestinian collaborators.
In the neighborhood of El Hadar, we saw many traditional stone Arab houses. Jihad noted that it is against international law to sell or renovate properties from expelled people and that rent and sales from “State Property” rightfully belongs to the original owner. He also said that the Israeli government ignored rampant drug use for years and only stepped in when it started affecting Jewish citizens.
The Palestinian population of Haifa (40,000 in 2017) is now a city within a city. Most Jewish citizens live separately from their Palestinian “neighbors” through the forces of history, culture, economics, and unwritten policies including redlining. The schools are segregated, though Palestinian children are taught the usual Zionist curriculum devoid of Palestinian history. When Jihad bought a home in a nicer area, he said he was charged $15,000 more than a Jewish Israeli and when he moved into the upscale property, he was told that he was not allowed to speak to any of the future owners until the property was entirely sold. His Arabic would bring down property values and potentially ruin the neighborhood.
Clearly a city with this kind of traumatic, racist legacy cannot truly be a center of coexistence until there is a reckoning with the past, the full history with all its pain and destruction, and a movement towards recognition and reparations.
The hasbara industry does not want us talking about Haifa with this kind of clear eyed honest assessment of the past or the present. The hasbara industry also does not want us talking about settlers releasing wild pigs onto Palestinian farms, the racist response of the Israeli government towards its Palestinian citizens when it comes to COVID-19 education and vaccines and the neglect of East Jerusalemites, the vaccine apartheid policies toward Palestinians living under occupation. They don’t want us talking about the ever worsening humanitarian crisis in Gaza, Netanyahu’s indictment, the steady rightward shift of the Jewish Israeli public, Israeli attacks on Iranian ships in the Red Sea. The list goes on….
Wild boars nibbling flowers in Haifa is so much more fun. The New York Times should be ashamed.
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Haganah commander Ben Zion Inbar: “We manned the biggest mortar our forces had – a three-inch mortar & when all the Arabs gathered we started firing. When the shells started falling on them, they rushed down to the boats & set off by sea.” (Quigley, ibid p. 60)
The official history of the Carmeli Brigade as well as the recollections of the British officials & Ben Zion Inbar are confirmed by Israeli historian Benny Morris: “The 3-inch mortars ‘opened up on the market square great crowd…panic took hold. The multitude burst into the port, pushed aside the policemen, charged the boats & began fleeing the town.’ British observers noted that ‘during the morning the Haganah were continually shooting down on all Arabs who moved both in Wadi Nisnas & the Old City. This included completely indiscriminate machinegun fire & sniping on women & children attempting to get out of Haifa through the gates into the docks.There was considerable congestion outside the East Gate of hysterical & terrified Arab women & children & old people on whom the Jews opened up mercilessly with fire.'” (Benny Morris, The Birth of the Palestinian Problem, 1947-1949, p. 85; Norman Finkelstein in “Debate on the 1948 Exodus: Rejoinder,” J of P S, Volume XXI, Number 2, Winter 1992, p. 63)
It will never be know how many hundreds or thousands were slain in the streets, but less than 24 hours after the attack began nearly 60,000 of Haifa’s Arabs had been forced to flee for their lives by sea to nearby Acre and Lebanon. The horrific scene at the port as they crowded on every type of vessel to escape was described by an eye-witness: ‘The boats in the port were soon filled with living cargo – overcrowding was horrible. Many turned over & sank with all their passengers.'(Khalidi)
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A brief look at the fall of Haifa:
The Arab defenders of Haifa were “poorly armed with British & French rifles, mostly of World War 1 vintage, & chronically short of ammunition. The entire garrison possessed only fifteen sub-machine guns, an essential weapon in urban warfare. In contrast, Haifa was the home & recruiting base of the 2,000 strong Carmeli or Second Brigade [which had] armored cars, two-inch & three inch mortars, machine guns, Sten & Thompson sub-machine guns, rifles & grenades – all in plentiful quantities & with virtually unlimited supplies of mortar shells & ammunition.” (Prof Walid Khalidi, “Selected Documents on the 1948 Palestine War” p. 87)
As well as Davidka mortars with sixty-pound shells, the Carmeli Brigade used Barrel bombs (nicknamed Barak Bullets) which were “converted oil barrels & spherical sea mines filled with explosives [that were] rolled down onto the Arab quarters from the higher Jewish areas.” (Khalidi, ibid, pp. 87 & 89)
The Carmeli Brigade was ordered to be ruthless against the Arabs, to “kill every [adult] male encountered” & to attack with firebombs “all objectives that can be set alight.” (Benny Morris, The Birth of the Palestinian Refugee Problem, 1947- 1949, New York: Cambridge University Press, 1988, pp. 76-77; quoted by Norman Finkelstein, “Debate on the 1948 Exodus: Finkelstein, J of P S, Vol. XXl, No. 1, Autumn 1991, p. 73)
The Irgun “heroes” of Deir Yassin, needed no such instructions. Arthur historian Koestler described what came after the Davidka mortars & barrel bombs: “ruthless dynamiting of block after block of bazaars & blind alleys until the panic had reached sufficient dimensions to end all resistance.” (Palumbo, The Palestinian Catastrophe, p. 64)
Gunfire continued throughout the night of April 21 as the volunteers fought bravely against impossible odds. Inevitably, they were overwhelmed, which left the Arab civilians undefended. A blood bath followed: “When the Haganah Command learned that the Arab authorities were calling upon the civilians to gather for shelter in the old market place, three inch mortars, according to the official history of the Carmeli Brigade, were ordered to shell the market place.” (cont’d)
For the record:
Video:
Edward Said: Claims to the Holy Land (Israel and the Occupation of Palestine) – YouTube
“The late Edward Said made a short 2-minute intervention on the Jewish claims to the land of Palestine. Conflicting religious claims cannot be the basis for dispossession. Israelites lived on the lands of today’s Palestine for 200 years in total, some 3000 years ago. In the mean time, Arabs have been inhabiting the land. Arabs have the primary claim to the land.”
More evidence that Zionism is en route to history’s dumpster:
Palestinians in Chicago Defeat Extremist Pro-Israel Candidate in Local Elections – Palestine Chronicle
“Palestinians in Chicago Defeat Extremist Pro-Israel Candidate in Local Elections” The Palestine Chronicle, April 12/21
“The Palestinian community in Chicago, Illinois, succeeded in defeating extremist right-wing and pro-Israel candidate, Sharon Brannigan, in the local election, news agencies reported yesterday.
“According to news agencies, the Palestinian community mobilized other Arab communities and supporters of the Palestinian cause to take part in a campaign to ensure Brannigan does not win in the Palos Township Council of Chicago election race.
“Brannigan is said to have carried out ‘many bigoted attacks on Arab Americans and other neighbors.'”
“Palestinians, Arabs, and their supporters participated in the campaign against Brannigan using the hashtag #ByeBrannigan.
“Brannigan and the town’s board attempted to silence the community but they consistently failed, even after they hired a security company to bully protesters and call the Palos Hills police, leading to the arrests of five leaders of the movement, Fight Back news website reported.
“Protesters were vindicated, however, when the judge deemed Brannigan’s testimony ‘contradictory’, dismissed the case, and ‘essentially affirmed the right of protestors to chant and challenge Brannigan and other trustees at the township meetings,’ according to an October 2020 statement from the Arab American Action Network.
“Incumbent Assessor Robert Maloney appeared to win with 62 percent of the unofficial vote, however, results reported by the Cook County clerk’s office last week are unofficial until certified and all mail-in and provisional ballots are counted. The canvass deadline is April 27.”
I wonder whether the writer actually saw wild pigs raised by the settlers…