Smuggling crocodiles, kidnapping Alan Johnston.

I never met Alan Johnston but everyone I have talked to who knows him has spoken very highly of him. He was humble, he was quiet and serious and he was determined to communicate the reality of life in Gaza to the world. Not a single person I have asked about his kidnapping has anything but condemnation for the perpetrators.

Yesterday marked two weeks since his kidnapping and no one has either made demands for his release, or taken responsibility for the crime. There was no local news to be heard all day as all local radio stations were on strike to call for Alan’s release. A large sign looms near the Palestinian parliament building in central Gaza City calling for his release.

This morning I had breakfast in my favorite breakfast joint. There too hung a sign, “free Alan Johnston”.

Few are surprised at the incident, since crime in Gaza has reached unprecedented levels. Cars are stolen, homes broken into, young and old alike are mugged in broad daylight.

A woman tried to smuggle three small crocodiles into Gaza, strapped to her body as she entered the border from Egypt. She was going to sell them to the local Zoo. The contraband was confiscated, for in Gaza this too, is considered a crime.

The financial embargo on the PA means that besides the 40% of Gazans that are unemployed another 30% who are government employees are not being paid. Aid agencies are keeping the Palestinian people alive. This society will soon collapse, it is beginning to already.

Smuggling crocodiles and kidnapping foreign journalists is scarce potential income.

Things you don't see every day

Karen Koning AbuZayd head of the U.N. Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees (UNRWA) was recently reported saying this:

"Everybody is just in bad shape now with the whole economy going down so badly. They just don't have any opportunities," citing high unemployment and shortfalls in wage payments over the past year.

Donors have poured in more money last year than ever before "but that's because we've made everybody aid-dependant."

What does this mean:

The Twalbe family live in the Beach Refugee camp just North of Gaza City. Of the seven school aged children two don't go to school. The oldest, 13-year old Yousef has asthma and has been made fun of at school since he was young. He quit school a long time ago and stays home to help his father at the market. Abd Karim, the third oldest was recently kicked out of his school for getting in too many fights with his fellow students. Even the teachers are scared of him. The school's headmaster said if Abd Karim comes back he would give up his job.

When I asked Abd Karim to describe his surroundings he listed one incident after another of inter-clan fighting and internal political clashes in the refugee camp he lives in.

In 1948 70,000 Palestinians lived in the Gaza District, after the ‘48 war 200,000 refugees were added to the area and the regional classification “Gaza Strip” was created. The root of Abd Karim’s mental instability is a society that was never meant to take the shape it has today. The “Gaza Strip” has never been a sustainable society. When you add 200,000 farmers with their families to an urban prison you create chaos. Anarchy isn't created out of thin air.

Abu Yousef, Abd Karim’s father, sells humanitarian aid that is distributed to his family by organizations like UNRWA. This is his only form of income. At least two of his sons participate in the daily activity of selling plastic bags of flour, rice and bottles of oil at the local market just five minutes away. A shopping cart is filled with the goods in order to transport them to the market. Over five years ago Abu Yousef used to work in Israel as a laborer, like thousands of other refugees like him. Prior to the last Intifada there were 150,000 such daily laborers from Gaza. Being a refugee means, once you had land, now you no longer have land and thus must work on other’s land. In Gaza employment opportunities are extremely scarce.

I have not traveled the world, but I am certain there are other areas on this planet that suffer even more hardship, with higher unemployment, with even more human cruelty and consequently even more human suffering. But here, in this conflict, what grips me, is the fact that it is man-made, in this case there is no need to be gender neutral, because it is largely men that were the instigators, the leaders, the protagonists of this sad chapter of human history. Building one human calamity on another. I can weep over the past, but I am responsible for my activity or inactivity, my words of praise, or condemnation for the injustice of the present.

Abd Karim has epilepsy and is mentally unstable, I believe he is schizophrenic, but Gaza has no psychiatric facilities for children under the age of 15. In the evening when I return to the family’s home the boy has disappeared. Sometimes he returns at 1 or 2am. Abu Yousef worries about him and can’t get to sleep until his son is home.

Getting around Gaza

Signpost in former colonies: Firing weapons not allowed

Flowers growing in a former Israeli army guard tower

These are My Neighbors

Ayman is the head architect at one of the universities in Gaza, he is married and has a daughter called shams, sun. Mohamed is a law student and the head of security at the same university Al-Aqsa. He grew up in Alexandria and the West Bank and then moved to Gaza five years ago. Mohamed hopes to leave Gaza one day. He is very critical of both of Gaza's main parties Fatah and Hamas. He is engaged and longs for the day he can raise a family in a peaceful nation.


Alaa lives in Beit Hanoun. He grew up in Jordan. His family moved to Gaza in the early 90s when there was much hope for a peaceful future for the Strip. Alaa is one of about 60,000 Palestinians in Gaza that have no national ID or passport. Jordan did not recognized his family as full citizens and when they left the country the lost the IDs they did own. Alaa studied computer science but due to the lack of jobs he works as the guard and caretaker of the building I live in, the Mecca Tower. As a natural comedian he is a constant source of joy and laughter, making the lobby of the Tower a welcome place to come to. I am saddened to hear that he will be leaving his current job soon in order to open a computer store in Beit Hanoun.

Sameer is my tailor down the street. He is actually a sheikh as well as a tailor, but he is the only fatah sheikh I have met in the Gaza Strip. He speaks highly of the days he spent working n Tel Aviv in the 90s where I believe he gained some of his sowing skills. With the poor state of the economy in Gaza Sameer recently moved his shop to his home, a small shack by the side of the road, and rented out the space previously used for his tailor shop for the opening of a falafil restaurant.

I am a regular at Mohamed's family's vegetable and fruit shop just around the corner of my house. I have the tendency to fill a bag with all sorts of vegetables and fruit, onions, potatoes, avocado, apples, pears, tomatoes and then Mohamed will give me a rough estimate of the price. This is my favorite shopping experience in life. I have taught Mohamed and his brother to juggle with oranges. Mohamed is in his last year of high school and hopes to study English at university. They also make fruit juice. My favorite is carrot and orange.

I don't remember the name of this little boy. He is from the Abu Amra family which reside in shacks on the road near my building. They are beounis that once roamed the Negev desert but since the closure of Gaza and the forced migration of Palestinians in the region to the Gaza Strip they are out of work and have lost their living space. He too is my neighbor.

"Humans are dysfunctional”

Ghazi was sitting on the ground eating lettuce, next to his wife who was washing vegetables in a large metal vat. When he heard my voice at the gate, he got up with excitement and slowly walked over on his wooden cane, a large smile on his face, offering me the last leaf of lettuce. He was wearing a brown wool outfit and looking much stronger than the past many times that I had seen him. He was still going to the hospital three times a week for kidney dialysis, but he had also begun teaching Arabic literature and linguistics again three times a week at the Azhar University in Gaza City. While I had been away the infighting in Gaza had deteriorated significantly. One battle occurred at the hospital while Ghazi was hooked up to the dialysis machine. There was shooting in and around the hospital and he was forced to get on the ground and hide. Gaza had never seen what it witnessed in December and January. With a look of horror on his face Ghazi explained, it reached a stage where brother was killing brother.

Ghazi’s son Ihab joined us and for a long time I quizzed him on the process of exporting strawberries from Gaza. Ihab was a salesman of fruit and vegetables, who would buy second grade goods from local growers that couldn’t be exported to Europe and would sell them in Israel and the West Bank. This would require him to spend hours at the Karni crossing between Gaza and Israel, which was the only channel for goods entering or exiting Gaza. Ihab explained to me the methods that the strawberry growers used to sneak their lower quality goods into the container of the high grade ones. Agrexco, the largest Israeli exporter that held a monopoly on the market on the other hand, abused its power by paying the Palestinians much lower prices for their produce than they did growers in Israel that Ihab knew. “Humans are dysfunctional” Ghazi pointed out, every one working only for his own benefit, looking out for their own needs. Ihab, having ended his account of the corrupt strawberry market added, “there isn’t anyone that does any good.”

From other friends of mine in the area I had learned that Ghazi had quite a reputation as a “communist”, in this community this referred more to one’s religious beliefs than to the political ones. Ghazi was certain that it was personal possessions that corrupted. I pointed out that attempts of communist systems failed because the few in power ruled with corruption, he added in defeat that people also stopped being motivated to work. The state of humankind tormented Ghazi.

Rita, Ghazi’s seven year old niece had appeared and was throwing shoes at us from behind a bush, when she was told off she started running after her younger brother Eouda with a broken off stick she found. Just minutes prior Eouda himself had used it to chase after the chicken that was lounging around the garden where we sat.

This is Gaza

I have realized that every single time I go out of the comfort zone of my home, my work sphere and into the homes of the poor all across the Gaza Strip I am faced with the same string of emotions. I sense pain, discomfort, compassion, incredulity, shock, and a deep, deep sadness that this suffering just will not go away. The sea of people I encountered this Monday are beginning to fade, one into the other, their stories so similar, their pain so common place, their struggles one and the same and yet each one of them faces it alone. The people I met, Essam, the wife of Ramzi, Abd Al-Raziq, the names fade much like their stories do, all of them in need of employment, all of them trying to overcome poverty and all of them needing hope. We can bring them a food basket, but I think in this very intricate act of entering a home, sitting, listening and praying a blessing over the home. some of this longed for hope is sensed, through this act what is communicated is that someone, somewhere cares, someone remembers them and someone takes the time to speak a prayer for them.

One man I met, I have now forgotten his name, had five children, two of his daughters were mentally disabled, one of them nearly blind. He doesn’t have the money to keep paying for the latter’s treatment, in the past he has been able to get her some medical attention, but today she can barely see. His oldest son is in his last year of high school and yet unless their situation changes drastically his father will not be able to pay for his college education. I wondered to myself, what motivates this young boy, sitting next to me, to keep studying hard? What is he studying for if once he is done he will so likely be unemployed like his father and the hundreds of other young men in the neighborhood? This man, like the breadwinner in every other home I visited Monday, used to work in Israel as a laborer. Today, he has been unemployed for five years and helps his father in a little shop he runs from the front of the house. I noticed the items for sale on the dusty shelves on my way in, some chocolates, bread, oil, a few small plastic toys, the stock in the entire shop I doubt would add up to more than $200. The man’s sister also lived with him. Her husband, they told me, had been killed when he rushed to the aid of a local militant, who had been shot by the Israeli army. Her husband was shot and killed in the process. What and who was she living for now? Childless and with no prospect of being married again, she is likely a burden to her unemployed brother who is expected to provide for her.

I saw her just briefly as I left the house. A tall woman, cloaked in black, the look of shame and sadness on her face tore at my conscience.

Volleyball and Civil War

I heard my name called out as I walked swiftly past the main police station in Gaza City. One of the three policemen gathered there, walked over to me, a cigarette dangling from his lips. I had met Ahmed the second week I was in Gaza, when I went to play volleyball with Palestine’s best team, located in the Jabalya Refugee camp. Ahmed was their star player. Warming up that day I paired up with Ahmed, which lead to a slew of questions about my coming to Gaza and sparked the beginning of our friendship. On one occasion when Ahmed was stationed by the building I live in, he snuck up while he was on duty and managed a few hours of sleep, leaving at 6am in order to appear before the senior officer to end his shift. Ahmed was a member of the Presidential guard, a player on the Palestinian national volleyball team, a father and was studying to be a schoolteacher so as not to have to be a soldier anymore. This evening I learned what had caused this desire to grow stronger over the course of the past six weeks.

At the height of fighting between Fateh and Hamas, a Fateh affiliated base was surrounded by Hamas forces. Ahmed was among the 150 soldiers inside the station. The gun battle continued most of the night, until at 6:30am Ahmed’s side ran out of ammunition. The station was stormed; the senior officer was executed. In total 15 men were killed or severely injured that night in the course of battle. The station was burned to the ground. Ahmed did not return to work for one month. The evening I saw him, was his first on duty since returning to headquarters. After questioning his absence, his superiors threatened him and then sent him back to work at a new location. And so, tonight, Ahmed was back on duty, a Kalashnikov awkwardly hanging around his shoulder, a thin beard adorning his face.

I asked him about the volleyball team. The volleyball season had ended and only the final match remained. Ahmed’s team was Fatah affiliated and its only real competitor was its archrival, fitted in green uniform, non other than the Hamas team.

I wondered what would be going through Ahmed’s mind the day of the match. He had seen his colleagues and officers killed in front of his eyes by masked gunmen of the opposing faction. Very soon some of those same men may be facing him again, but on the court for a friendly game of volleyball. Hidden that night behind balaclavas, he would never know if they were the same person.

Gaza focus of Human Rights Report

Read the latest report by John Dugard, the special rapporteur on the situation of Human Rights in the Palestinian Territories Occupied Since 1967.

Gaza: Non-Entity?

Leaving Gaza requires one to walk through a long tunnel made up of turnstiles, X-ray machines, gates, cages and passport controls. This past Wednesday I found the tunnel ending abruptly ahead of me, a crudely fashioned wall bared me from the usual way of entry, instead an opening to the right lead to a place unknown. I turned the corner and found myself in an Orwellian passage leading to a huge building with four automatic doors that were shut tight. Along this fenced in passageway runs an anachronistic, medieval ditch, beyond it a mound made of rubble and dirt of the once magnificently fruitful region of Beit Hanoun. Today, much of the town lies in disrepair and its surrounding land remains green but empty of the life that once grew there. The caged passages are adorned with security cameras and buzzing speakers reminding every passer by that yes, someone, somewhere is watching. Along the way I met a Palestinian businessman who owns a clothing factory in Gaza. Mohamed had a bad back. He was leaning against the fence and breathing heavily. I asked if he needed any help and walked next to him slowly when suddenly he took a hold of my hand, making use of the extra support, we had about 300 meters left to go.

At the sliding gates that opened to a yet unknown world to us, stood nine other such businessmen. I noticed one of them looking around for a video camera to ascertain if we had been spotted waiting there. An odious sign informed the travelers that bags would be searched. The sign apologized in advance for any inconvenience. In big letters it then read, “no weapons allowed”, security, it seemed to imply was the purpose for this special experience.

Suddenly, a door slid open and the ten businessmen, including Mohamed with the bad back and I entered the looming building before it slid shut again. Once inside the true Orwellian experience began. We were faced by the first metal detector and turnstile, the latter would only allow one through if the metal detector did not distinguish any metal items in one’s belongings. My bag caused the alarm to sound and three unfortunate businessmen were restrained from entering along with me. What followed was a procedure to negotiate our release by one of the businessmen speaking Hebrew through an intercom with an out of sight Israeli soldier or police officer, while then translating instructions back to me. After having moved back 20 meters, opening my belongings in sight of one of the security cameras, the automatic lock was released and we were given permission to enter. This was only the beginning.

After walking up a ramp and around a bend we entered a building much like a warehouse, yet I sensed something otherworldly there. Again a turnstile prevented about 40 people gathered there to proceed to the next unknown stage. It would take me over an hour to achieve this feat. A Palestinian (no Israelis were in sight) handed out stickers with numbers on them, one for each traveler and an equivalent number for each bag. Next, everything but the clothes on my body, minus the belt, minus everything in my pockets, electronic items separate, were placed on a conveyor belt and disappeared, while I waited in line to enter yet another metal detector, then a curious X-Ray machine and a further stall with a locked door on either side, much like a cow in a pen, as to give the unseen officers full control over my entering and exiting. Having crossed this obstacle there was another conveyor belt, which eventually spit out the luggage on huge trays with the content of the bags spread about in disarray. When I saw my tray approaching I had to fight my way through the crowds, ascertained all my valuables were included and started dressing. Looking up I noticed a large surveillance room with women and men of various ages scanning computer screens and the people below. I felt small and powerless, a member of a different world than the one above.

After passing through yet another turnstile I spent over half an hour waiting for one of the passport control officers to appear to verify my papers. Here I met Piedro. I had noticed him early on, looking frustrated in the midst of the crowd of Palestinian businessmen and next to a pale, old man wearing a ski cap, who was slowly fingering his luggage and then finally located his pouch of medication filled with an assortment of pills. I later learned that Piedro had never made it into Israel that day.

The Erez terminal is now considered an international border, and yet since neither Israel, nor any other nation on earth recognizes the Palestinians as being members of a state of their own, I wonder what it is that I am entering when I cross from Israel to this non-entity. A now comatose Ariel Sharon not too long ago declared to have ended Israeli “control over and responsibility” for this no man's land, yet this barely seems to be the case.

The world’s memory seems exceedingly short. Yet, this nightmare for the few Palestinians who are permitted to cross here, is a disturbing, reoccurring one.

Read on:
Israeli Supreme Court: Israel still 'occupying' Gaza?

Embargo starting to crack?

An interesting new development is being reported. A division, lead by Russia seems to be taking shape in the Quartet's stance on the new Palestinian Unity Government. Since the formation of a new Palestinian government lead by Hamas, the Quartet- made up of the US, EU, UN and Russia- agreed to not recognize the PA until three requirements were met, the ceasing of all violence, the recognition of Israel and recognizing all past agreements between the PLO and Israel. None of these conditions have ever been applied by Israel, much less expected of it.

Here a worthwhile editorial about the Mecca Agreement.

My birthday in Jabalya refugee camp

I spent my 25th birthday in Jabalya, Gaza’s biggest refugee camp. I have known Jamal, a taxi driver in Gaza, for almost two years. I could only protest so many times at his neglecting to host me in his home. In spite of the pleas of his children, whom I had met on a number of occasions outside his home, I realized today why he never did. I have often entered the homes of refugees while distributing food across the Gaza Strip and yet what struck me that day was the familiarity of Jamal sitting by my side against the unfamiliarity of his home.

Entering through the main door I had to duck under a torn cloth that veiled this private space from the world beyond. As I stood up straight I saw the entire house in the blink of an eye, a sensation came over me much like having caught site of something one was not meant to see, the sudden exposure could not be undone. There before me was the living room, court yard and dining room all in one, covered by open skies. Beyond this area were three broken, worn doors. The furthest to the left lead to a small kitchen, the inside of which was out of sight from where I stood, next was a small bathroom, made fully of cement except for a number of rows of tiles pasted to one of the walls thus aesthetically differentiating it from the other two rooms. The last room served as a bedroom for seven of the nine children, in which, Jamal’s wife explained to me, “they all sleep on top of each other.” The parents and the two youngest boys slept in a separate room to near the entrance.

In the courtyard four cracked broken plastic chairs served as the living room furniture. I was quickly offered one of these while the children that entered throughout my visit would be seated on a knee, the floor, or a stone nearby while the eldest present child would occupy the one remaining chair after Jamal, his wife and I had been seated. Hamza, Jamal’s favorite boy, five and a half, was the first to great me. He was the most interactive, the most confident and yet the most shy of the nine children. Only Abdullah was younger and he came in crying, after learning that Hamza had greeted the guest before he had gotten a chance to do so. After sitting on my lap and being the first to receive the gift of a pen his tears were quickly forgotten.

Two pairs of eyes peered in at me through a hole in the wall connecting the Badawi’s home to their relatives next door. Jamal and his brother had divided their father’s house once they were married in order for the two families to receive some privacy from each other. Zaher, the oldest, whom Jamal regularly called a donkey for his lack of desire to study or learn supposedly anything, quickly blocked the hole up with a sweatshirt, solving the problem for the time being. Abdullah appeared wearing a homemade birthday hat that read “F, happy birth to you,” written by Maysa, the oldest girl and certainly the brightest of Jamal’s children. Maysa was third in her class and loved to read. She wanted to become a doctor if her grades were good enough, but in accordance to custom Jamal had a hard time considering sending her to university away from her family outside of Gaza. This, family, after all was home. Zaher was playing games on my mobile phone that I didn’t even realize were there.

Outside a commotion had started and people were yelling at each other. Jamal, at first was unmoved, suddenly picked up his phone and rushed outside upon hearing Zaher’s announcement that it was the neighbors fighting over the electricity lines that were being repaired. The Badawis lived just along the boundary between the Jabalya refugee camp and the Beit Lahya Projects. Electricity cut daily for 12 hours alternating with the neighborhood across the street and it had been found out recently that some of the homes in the Beit Lahya Projects had drawn illegal cables enabling them to have daily 24 hour access to electricity thereby diminishing the electricity levels on Jamal’s block. In his absence Jamal’s wife informed me how “undemocratic” her husband was and how often they had wanted to host me but Jamal just never invited me. Furthermore, she so desperately wanted to repair their home but Jamal would not save the money to do so. UNRWA had promised to repair the house many months ago but claimed to be delayed in light of the Beit Hanoun incursion. Jamal walked in triumphantly announcing he had called the police. Before I left, Zaher, who seemed to have the street smarts of his father, mentioned nonchalantly that the police had never come.

Lunch was served, a plate of avocado dip and a tomato dish along with delicious home made bread and a bowl of olives. It was amazing how something so tasty could come of the tiny kitchen beyond the sight of my eyes. As soon as lunch was done sweat tea with local spices was served then came the birthday cake. Candles were lit and after the family made a good attempt at singing happy birthday in English they switched to Arabic.

Mohamed, Habib and Bilal had returned from school just before the cake was served. With huge smiles they entered one at a time, greeted me and then were reminded by their mother to wish me another hundred years of life. Next came the coffee and the dance performances. An argument went on for a while which song to play and who was actually going to dance for us. From the start Hamza declined the offer, but when Mohamed was given the task, Hamza became jealous and sent his older brother away crying. Soon enough the music was playing and both Mohamed and then Hamza showed us their belly dancing moves. Everyone else sat in a makeshift circle and clapped along.