Non violent resistance can take many forms. What they have in common is that they need to be visible and they need to be seen.

The tenacious Sa’id ‘Awad has been mentioned in these pages before.  This link will acquaint you with the combination of legal subterfuge and open seizure that have wrested his land in the South Hebron Hills away from him.  To hang on, Said’s family has an outing each week. The picnic and the boy’s soccer  reinforce his continued presence. Otherwise, the civil authorities can consider the land abandoned and make it available to Israelis whose settlements watch comfortably above on land already taken from Sa’id. They may do that anyway.Volunteers from the NGO Ta’ayush try to keep settlers from disrupting the games, but today is peaceful. The settlers remain hidden somewhere behind their eruv poles.*Volunteers pass the time with Sa’id and his family while the boys play soccerand the Civil Administration plays its role. Today, fortunately, this means that the soldiers, very young and very bored, mostly stay put in military vehicles.

or near them. It could be and has been, worse.The girls, sidelined,take matters into their own hands and invent a new game. 

Finally the boys get interested

For just a moment the grazing area turned soccer field turns hugging field.

*On the eruv, see here and here.  On Ta’ayush https://www.taayush.org/

text and photographs © margaret olin 2017