She looks like a young girl from a distance, her uncovered braid floating back and forth as she sweeps, hoists broken doors, and repeatedly crosses the wide expanse with a bucket to fetch water from a cistern. But when she pauses in her chores to interact briskly and anxiously with the men and boys, I see that her face is old. I wish I could show this narrow, taut face and its look of experience and concern, but photographs of girls and all but the oldest women are banned. Yet I know I am looking at the worry of a grown woman, of a mother for her children; it is not the face of a frightened child. In spite of the uncovered hair I still wonder if somehow I could be seeing the face of a woman who failed to grow. She is off again, so I settle on the expression “diminutive person” for now.

Last Wednesday, soldiers in two Civil Administration jeeps and two bulldozers arrived in al-Markez in the South Hebron Hills, one of twelve towns in Masafer Yatta located in the area that Israel knows as “firing zone 918.” They began their destruction there and moved on to three other towns. In all, they demolished 6 houses and 2 animal fences, confiscated 9 solar panels and their batteries, and destroyed 3 water tanks. They made homeless 29 people, including 10 children. The excuse was lack of building permits, but as we know, such permits are not issued to Palestinians.

I found out about the demolitions on May 2, the day they occurred. A group of American legislative aides, constituents, and a few others coordinated by Rebuilding Alliance, an American non-profit organization that works to help Palestinian communities keep their villages standing, had traveled to the village of Susiya in the South Hebron Hills, which is itself currently under a demolition order. There we met with resident Nasser Nawaja, spokesperson for Susiya, as well as with a representative from Haqel, an Israeli NGO that works through legal channels to save Palestinian land from appropriation, and with Elad Orian, from Comet-ME, an Israeli-Palestinian NGO that provides sustainable energy and clean water to these communities. I have written about Comet-ME before (here). Nasser, who works as a field researcher for the human rights organization B’tselm, had just returned from documenting the demolitions. Elad discussed Comet-ME’s commitment to restore services after demolitions and confiscations.

The group also paid a call on red-haired Sami Huraini in nearby Twaneh. Sami is recovering from an operation on his leg, broken in two places late in March when Israeli settlers from the illegal outpost of Havat Ma’on (illegal in the eyes of Israel, not only the international community) ran over Sami in a jeep. The settlers were attacking a group of activists near the Palestinian village of Sarura, which the activists, including Sami, have been trying to protect (see here). He was still limping about on a walker but he seemed in good spirits. He was recovering and expected to return to work soon and continue his studies in International Law at Hebron University. While we were there a group of activists arrived from another NGO, Operation Dove (here) . They were preparing to publish their videos from the morning’s demolitions (here and here). Al-Mirkez was the hardest hit of the four villages, and it is here that Ta’ayush is needed most today. Jinba also suffered demolitions. In early 2017 a ruling was expected from the High Court that might permit the Civil Administration to evict all the villages located in the firing zone. My friend David M. and I went there then to experience with them the agony of waiting for a court decision, but we found their time so taken up with the daily round of problems, hopes and daily chores that the supposedly decisive moment was lost in the shuffle (for an account that day and an explanation of “firing zones,” see here).

Post demolition, things are different. The firing zone seems far. It takes an extra half hour to drive in and around the hills through stone fields accessible only to four-wheel drive vehicles including, I suppose, bulldozers, to al-Markez. Now that we are there, I confront one of the water tanks whose destruction I saw in a video.

But the whole area is dotted with heaps of rubble.

While others work to clear out space to rebuild a structure,

I get a tour through more of the devastation.

We don’t have another bulldozer to clear out the rubble made by last week’s bulldozers. With our tools it can take up to twenty minutes and six men to move a large rock into place and line it up with the others that will eventually form a terraced edge for the new foundation.

But at least the residents have a little time to tend animals

and do other chores that distracted them while they were waiting, but now threaten to get lost in the rubble.

Or become much harder to do because of the lack of clean water and electricity. A refrigerator that no longer has electricity needs to be emptied and cleaned, most of the food discarded and the containers washed. And scarce water that can now only be drawn and carried from a cistern, makes washing dishes a challenge.

Eventually some reinforcements come including two journalists working on a story for a Japanese periodical.

 We are shown where the battery for the solar power had been.

It is Tahrir who draws the water for the dishes and hoists the broken door and other large ruined pieces of their home. She is my “diminutive person.” When I ask her name (in Arabic) she smiles, and does so with the quintessential child’s smile. Soon she is smiling at me from around every corner and bringing delight to one of the most depressing days I have spent in South Hebron. Tahrir means “liberation.” After a while she asks me for my name and transforms it into Margarita. Enthusiasm is contagious. Her brother Hamid asks me to take his picture. He does so in the cave, where as it happens the soldiers saw fit to cut the electrical lines, I suppose to make life more difficult once the villagers acquire new solar panels.

Can you make me a print and bring it to me? I have no computer or phone or any other way to have a picture.

I will try.

text and photographs margaret olin © 2018