Haaretz; By Nasser Nawajah
“Unlike you, and most Israelis, water is not something I take for granted. It is a daily existential struggle”.
Dear Minister Bennett:
My name is Nasser Nawajah. Although we have never met, I am sure that you have visited very close to my home. My neighbors from the settlement of Susya are very fond of you. In the last election, 270 of the 381 voters from the settlement of Susya voted for you and your party.
February 12, 2014
At Tuwani – Yesterday in the afternoon Palestinians discovered about eighty olive trees uprooted alongside bypass road 317 near the Susiya junction in the South Hebron Hills.
The olive tree grove belongs to the Hushiya family from the nearby town of Yatta and had been planted only three weeks ago. Yesterday afternoon the owners and B’tselem staff members gathered near the destroyed trees, waiting for the police. The Israeli police and District Coordination Office arrived on the scene and documented the incident. Today Operation Dove volunteers and B’tselem staff went there to take more pictures.
This field is part of the area that settlers from the nearby settlement of Suseya illegally occupied during 2007, planting a vineyard. Immediately the Palestinians with the help of Rabbis for Human Rights filed a complain and started a legal process concerning this land (for more details click here). In 2013 the Israeli High Court ordered the army to dismantle theese crops and the order was implemented by force.
The number of Palestinian-owned trees uprooted and damaged in the South Hebron Hills area since the beginning of 2014 now rises to 100. Olive trees are an essential resource for the Palestinian community, and their damage causes serious economic loss.
Nevertheless the Palestinian communities of the South Hebron Hills area are still strongly involved in using nonviolence as a way to resist to the Israeli occupation. Just two days ago twenty-five Palestinians planted sixty new olive trees on their own land close to Avigayil illegal outpost (for more details click here).
Operation Dove has maintained an international presence in At-Tuwani and the South Hebron Hills since 2004.
Pictures of the incident: click here
For further information:
Operation Dove, 054 99 25 773
[Note: According to the Fourth Geneva Convention, the Hague Regulations, the International Court of Justice, and several United Nations resolutions, all Israeli settlements and outposts in the Occupied Palestinian Territories are illegal. Most settlement outposts, including Havat Ma’on (Hill 833), are considered illegal also under Israeli law.]
On September 22, after having asked to the Israeli singer to cancel the performance without success, the South Hebron Hills Popular Committee, Ta’ayush and Israeli activists organized a protest against Ehud Banai concert in Suseya settlement. For more information clic here.
Pictures of the event: http://snipurl.com/27ve8fa
Il cantante israeliano Ehud Banai domani si esibirà nella colonia di Suseya, nelle colline a sud di Hebron. Questa è una lettera di un abitante del villaggio palestinese di Susiya, più volte evacuato e che subisce le violenze da parte dei coloni del vicino insediamento omonimo.
By +972, September 21, 2013
Several weeks ago a number of Israeli left-wing individuals and organizations launched a campaign to pressure Israeli singer Ehud Banai not to perform in the south Hebron Hills settlement of Susya.
Alongside the campaign, Israeli organizations Rabbis for Human Rights, Breaking the Silence and Ta’ayush offered to take Banai on a tour of the area, including Palestinian Susya, a village that was forcibly evicted in order to make room for the Jewish settlement of the same name. Banai turned down the offer, saying he didn’t have time but said he would do so after the concert.
Mr. Banai eventually canceled his show in the settlement of Susya, citing anger and vitriol directed toward him by the settler community following a Facebook post asserting that he opposes the occupation.
On September, 18, however, he posted yet another Facebook post (both have since been deleted) announcing that he will perform in Susya as planned on September 22.
The following is an open letter to the Israeli singer by Nasser Nawajaah, a resident of Palestinian Susya. (Translated by Talia Beth Krevsky)
Dear Mr. Banai,
At the very moment when news reached us that you decided, nevertheless, to hold your concert in old Susya, my family, residents of Susya and the surrounding land were gathered to write you a letter of gratitude and respect for choosing not to perform on our stolen land. Instead, I find myself writing you a letter principled on deep disappointment over your decision to perform there anyway.
You preferred good relations and a spirit of reconciliation with the settlers over an expression of human solidarity with the victims who suffered from theft and violence at the hands of the same people, in front of whom you will perform. I will not get into your considerations, but I still hope that you came to your decision because there are facts still unknown to you. If you wish, you can learn about them here. Here are a few of them:
Invisible Arabs +972 Magazine
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