Three Bedouin villages

Wadi Abu Hindi is a Bedouin village of some 150 families living in around 50 metal houses paid for by the EU.  

You might think that a static Bedouin village is an oxymoron as Bedouin, by definition, are nomadic herders moving through pastures as the seasons change. Prior to 1948 that’s how they lived. Bedouins travelled with their herds, crossing countries and borders. After 1948 previous grazing lands now designated as Israel were closed to them, these included the coastal area, Galilee and the Negev, but nomadic herding was still possible on both sides of the Jordan river. 

After 1967 significant areas of the West Bank were designated military zones and became closed, as did the border between the west and east banks of the river. This forced Bedouin into static villages. 

The people living in Wadi Abu Hindi originally farmed in the Beer Sheva area, now part of Israel - or Palestine 1948 as I am learning to call it. Their village is unofficial and has been demolished - rased to the ground - on three occasions by the military. They have had support from the EU and Norwegian lawyers to stay there and rebuild, but demolition of both houses and the school could happen again at any time. 

They are overlooked by an Israeli settlement which has its own private road to travel towards Jerusalem. By contrast, the approach to the village is a rough track which they are forbidden to pave. There is no contact between the settlement and the village, except we were told that on one occasion when the village had erected a tent for a wedding the settlers rolled burning tyres into the valley towards the tent.  

The other regular contact is through the settlements on both sides of the village using the valley as a rubbish dump. One human rights organisation has claimed that the rubbish includes industrial waste, which threatens to poison the water course.

The village has large herds and is able to earn enough from the sale of milk, yoghurt, cheese and meat to pay around $25,000 a year in legal fees to defend their right to remain. 

The Israeli settlement, illegal under international law, looks down in Wadi Abu Hindi

Jamal Al-Baba, which perches on top of a hill owned by the Vatican and faces Ma’le Adumim, which at over 40,000 is the biggest illegal Israeli settlement on the West Bank, has very little grazing land and so little chance of making a living from farming. It is almost cut off by a large loop in the wall which nearly surrounds it. 

Populated by refugee Bedouin from the Negev, it too has been demolished more than once. When the West Bank was under Jordanian rule (1948 to 1967) they were granted the land around the hill and the Vatican allows them to have communal buildings, such as the school, on their land at the top. 

The Israelis have put particular pressure on Jabal Al-Baba because it is in the way of plan E1, launched in 1997 by Ariel Sharon with the aim is surrounding East Jerusalem with settlements and developing towards the Dead Sea so as to divide the West Bank in half. 

Jabal Al-Baba was the site of a successful piece of international solidarity which brought to an end a plan to build a settlers only tram line from Ma’le Adumim to Jerusalem. Veolia, the chosen contractor, came under pressure from authorities on France and the UK where it holds lucrative waste disposal franchises. 

Another successful international solidarity action was at Khan Al-Ahmad, the third Bedouin village we visited, which is on the road to Jericho. The village was created by Bedouin who had been displaced both in 1948 and 1967. In the eyes of the Israelis it is unofficial and in July 2018 an order to leave from the authorities was resisted by thousands of international supporters, including a French professor who was jailed, released after lobbying by the French embassy, returned to the village and left only when his visa expired. 

Khan Al-Ahmad is also overlooked by a settlement which during the international action diverted its sewer outflow to flow down the valley towards the village. 

Jabal Al-Baba. On the horizon is part of the Ma’le Adumin settlement

Families in all three villages have been offered large amounts of money by the Israeli authorities to leave but we were told none had taken the bait. 

Should they give up a centuries old life of herding for and apartment in a West Bank town with 50% unemployment? They say “no” and I could only look on in admiration at their heroic determination to resist the occupation.

Martin