Amani Odeh was born and raised in Silwan, a Palestinian neighborhood situated just below the Al-Aqsa Mosque compound in illegally annexed and occupied East Jerusalem.
All East Jerusalem neighborhoods, including Silwan, have faced systematic Israeli human rights violations for more than a half century. These coercive practices include arbitrary seizures and demolitions of Palestinian homes, mass Israeli Jewish colonization, the imposition of fragile residency status on East Jerusalem Palestinians in their place of origin, and the strangulation of Palestinian construction, economic growth and livelihoods. Israeli government authorities, together with private actors, plan to seize Silwan’s property, consistent with Israel’s overall objective of establishing a dominant Jewish demographic in annexed Jerusalem.
In Silwan’s Al-Bustan quarter, the vast majority of homes have demolition orders, threatening to displace approximately 1,500 Palestinians to make way for a tourist garden inside the Israeli City of David settler project. Amani, a practicing dentist who still lives in Al-Bustan with her spouse and two young children, describes reality and life in Silwan as a working mother.
As told to producer/director Ghousoon Bisharat and cinematographer/editor Thomas Dallal.
Follow Mondoweiss’s coverage of Silwan here.
Shu al-Qusa/What’s the Story is a video series by Ghousoon Bisharat and Thomas Dallal that illuminates Palestinian life and politics through intimate first-person interviews with Palestinians. View the series here.
Ghousoon Bisharat
Ghousoon Bisharat is an experienced journalist and producer, as well as a strategic communications and international cooperation expert. She has more than 20 years of experience working with leading international broadcast news outlets and the European Union.
Thomas Dallal
Thomas Dallal is an award-winning photojournalist and cinematographer currently based in Haifa. His photographs have appeared in leading international newspapers and magazines thousands of times over three decades, including The New York Times and Der Spiegel among many others and his cinematography work has been broadcast by Aljazeera Documentary.
In 1988, IDF was patrolling the narrow back alleys day or night. Lighting up the hillside sky with flares at nights. Establishing they were the lords of that land.