Links op de foto ziet u Kholoud Ajarma van het Lajee Center, het cultureel centrum van het Aida vluchtelingenkamp nabij Bethlehem. Rechts van haar zit de Britse fotograaf Rich Wiles die Palestijnse kinderen leert fotograferen. Rich stuurde me gisteren deze email:'Behind the Wall – 'What kind of Peace?'
Sena and Mahmoud grabbed their three children and rushed to the bathroom. Once inside the young couple closed the door quickly and laid their beloved children in the bath tub. The bath was dry. The children aged four, two, and just one year old screamed hysterically. Sena closed the toilet lid and sat on it. At least sitting there she was not in direct line of the bathroom's fragile wooden door. Mahmoud collected what little food was in the house and also took that into their hiding place. It is the holy month of Ramadan so fresh food shopping is done daily meaning the family had little in the way of stocks. Back in the bathroom he perched on the edge of the bath next to where his wife was sitting and in front of their children, but again making sure as to not be in line with the door. They did not leave the bathroom for the next two days except when the Medical Relief entered their house with some meager but much appreciated supplies of bread and tomatoes. Nablus' Al Ayn Refugee Camp houses around 7,000 refugees. These people live cramped together in small houses either side of the main road which bisects the camp into upper and lower sections. From the early hours of Tuesday morning right through until the early hours of Friday morning the cramped living conditions of every family in Al Ayn were reduced further, much like those of Sena and Mahmoud's family, to just one room. The particular room chosen depended on which room offered the greatest level of protection against the barrage of high calibre bullets and heavy artillery that were reigning into the houses from every conceivable angle and direction. When the IOF invaded the camp on Tuesday morning they met determined, if small in numbers, resistance, which was led by members of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP). A handful of activists attempted to repel the attacks and defend the camp and its people. In the ensuing clashes the resistance were heavily outnumbered and the IOF had a huge advantage in firepower. The first shaheed was soon claimed. 18 year old Muhammad Khalid Rida was not the only death on Tuesday in Al Ayn, an IOF soldier was also killed as he and his compatriots invaded the camp. After the death of this soldier the IOF called in huge numbers of reinforcements, and the siege of Al Ayn began... By Wednesday every explosion and house demolition was reverberating right across Nablus such was the intensity of the IOF's destruction. From my base in Balata Camp, around three kilometres away, I could not only hear the explosions but also feel everything physically. Nablus was literally shaking. Wednesday also saw the second shaheed as Adib Damuni, who used a wheelchair for mobility, died instantly after being shot in the head by a sniper whilst sat in his own house. The following day I attempted to enter Al Ayn but the closure was skin-tight. There was no way past the blockades and bullets of the IOF. The camp was entirely surrounded from every side and all entrances and exits I knew of were blockaded. The IOF manning these blockades were in no mood to talk and opened fire on anyone approaching. From vantage points around the camp I could see IOF foot patrols carrying out house to house searches. Armour-plated lorries and bulldozers, personnel carriers, and jeeps filled every street, and foot patrols could be seen entering the narrow alleyways behind a barrage of their own gunfire. At one point the jeeps and lorries manning an upper blockade pulled away and moved 30 or 40 metres down into the camp to a large building. I was able to follow them down cautiously with two journalists and watch soldiers drag two men from the house, blindfolded and handcuffed, before unceremoniously kicking them into the waiting lorry. We were soon seen and ran back for cover as the M-16s were turned in our direction. The shell casings which littered the floor, and the two men who had already been killed, evidenced the lethal munitions these guns were firing. Around 10.30 on Thursday morning a hugely intense barrage of gunfire filled Sena and Mahmoud's house. Mahmoud tried to shout to the IOF soldiers who were carrying out this attack on a civilian family: "We are here in the bathroom, we have no guns! Our children are in here!" The bullets entered every room in the house, including the bathroom where they passed through the flimsy wooden door like a knife through hot butter: "Our children are here, please stop shooting! There is no-one else here!" After a few minutes of this uninterrupted barrage the IOF entered the house. Still Mahmoud shouted to them to stop shooting, begging them not to kill his family. "They ordered us out of the bathroom. My children were screaming. They told us to get out of the house and took us into the house next door. As we left the bathroom they filled it with bullets." Looking around the remains of the bathroom it is clear quite how heavy the firepower was which bombarded this tiny room. All walls, the door, the floor and ceiling, plus the bath, toilet and cabinet are all filled with huge holes. Every other room downstairs is exactly the same, their is not a window or wall left intact in the house. "I knew they wouldn't find anything because their was nothing to find! I hoped they would leave when they realised this..." The soldiers did leave. The patrol left the house before returning to the neighbouring house where Mahmoud was trying to reassure his family that they would be ok: "The commander told me to cover my ears... then they blew my house up!" Explosive devices had been placed all over the upper floor of Mahmoud and Sena's family house. The detonation brought screams from everyone. They were given no reason for these actions and were not questioned or arrested as would have been the case if the IOF had any suspicions towards them. This was simply a show of force. A hideous example of an occupying power demonstrating their strength. An occupying force who know they are answerable to no-one and are free to continue unabated with their war-crimes against a civilian population whilst the world is silent - discussing only upcoming 'peace conferences'.
On Friday, after the IOF had pulled out of Al Ayn, officials of UNRWA began visiting houses in the camp. They told Mahmoud and Sena to leave their skeleton of a former house immediately as it was in imminent danger of total collapse. They are now staying with Sena's brother. His house was not bombed, it 'only' suffered the same gunfire damage as his sister's, and as every other house in Al Ayn… I also visited one of Sena's neighbours, Ahmed. His story differed only in the room which was chosen in which to hide his family. Ahmed, his wife, and their ten children had chosen an upstairs room without an outside window. Their house was similarly devastated: "My children were terrified, ten of them hiding for their lives. I felt like I was just waiting for them (the IOF) to come and kill us..." I asked Ahmed if he was also leaving his house. "To where? I have nowhere else to go..." In the room adjacent to their hiding place of over two full days a small wall-mounted corner unit displayed framed photographs of his children smiling. On the bottom shelf stood a brown teddy bear with a red stomach. Its smile seemed hopeful at first, but inches from its fluffy ears dozens of deep holes in the white walls from large calibre munitions painted a different picture; then, the teddy bear looked like a sick ironic joke. Small plastic Palestinian flags had been laid out around the room and hung from the windows. They were signs of resistance, but also marks of respect for another neighbour in a house that used to stand only a few metres away. In the place of this former house now stand just huge mounds of rubble. All four floors were blown-up. Looking closer it was evident that this was not just mounds of rubble. Scattered amongst the concrete were specks of colour hidden behind the layers of thick concrete dust. A yellow child's sandal, a copy of the Koran with a brown cover, a red and yellow children's book, a gold painted coffee pot... just some of the reminders that this rubble was not that of a building site but rather a destruction site. In the middle of the 'rubble' stood a large and proud red flag flapping in the wind. Its colour is symbolic and it marks the spot where the PFLP activist was killed on Tuesday. The PFLP is a Marxist organisation, hence the red colour, but the colour also seems to symbolize the blood that was shed here... A man sifting through the debris turned to talk to me. He offered his hand and welcoming greetings despite the fact that over the last few days he has seen his house blown to pieces and his brother killed. He saw me looking at the flag: "He was my brother... 40 of us used to share this house, five families in total. Now look what we have left..." There was literally nothing left, except memories. From a neighbouring house a washing line that was previously strung across the front of the demolished house now just hung down limply. No doubt washing was done on Monday and hung out over night to dry. Three small school uniforms were hanging from the line, washed, and dried, but never worn. Further down the same street I found a woman sifting through rubble trying to salvage more children's clothes. The walls to the bottom floor of her house had been blown away. Four beds and their mattresses lay amongst the rubble. She was picking up small dresses and clothes one by one, dusting off the debris, and checking what was still in one piece. In the narrow alleyways mounds of rubble covered the paths; people were climbing where they used to walk. I watched three children pushing an elderly man in a wheelchair; the streets were only just wide enough to accommodate the chair. I went over to offer help as they pulled him from his mobility aid and attempted to carry him every time the path was blocked with the remains of house walls. Children stood in the streets comparing empty tear-gas canisters, remains of explosive devices, and assorted bullets that they had collected. In another part of the camp people told me that their neighbourhood had been totally cutoff and not even the Medical Relief were allowed access so they had been without fresh food or medical supplies for the sick or injured. Another man told me how the IOF had severed water pipes and that people who had water in their rooftop tanks were just waiting until that too ran out, or bullets penetrated the tanks, before they would have none at all. The whole camp was a literal wreck. I doubt there is a house that remains undamaged in some way.
The funerals of the two shaheeds were not held until Friday morning, this was the first day that people had been able to leave their houses to bury their dead… Just outside the camp I saw an empty cardboard box lying alongside the road. On the front its writing was in English. It read 'UN Practice Grenades. Property of the Government of Israel.' Another small white label on the back of the box read 'Combined Systems Incorporated. New York.' What happened for three days in Al Ayn Camp was no practice session. This was planned and organised inhumane destruction of property and of lives. These actions were war-crimes, and they were carried it seems at least in part with UN munitions, and certainly with US funded and made weapons. These war-crimes are making millions of dollars for the US economy. Condolleza Rice had been in Palestine earlier in the week to discuss the November 'Peace Conference' that we keep hearing about. The 'Peace Conference' promoted by George Bush, the same George Bush who recently agreed the 'Memorandum of Understanding' military aid package to Israel. This aid package offers levels of financial support for Israel's military to the tune of $30 billion over the next ten years. Whilst Ms Rice sat smiling and making noises about 'Peace' for the press in Ramallah, around 30 kilometres away in Nablus peoples lives, houses, and families were getting blown apart by weapons funded and at least in some cases made by her own country…
What kind of peace is it she wants???'
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