Ta’ayush

July 18, 2021. The 9th of Av. Ras at-Tin and Humsa

/ Margaret Olin / Leave a comment
Ras at-Tin. photograph: David Shulman

For miles around Ras at-Tin there is little but rocks, empty hills, yellow grass, and a few passing clouds, except for a dusty rock quarry about two miles to the west named for the settlement Kochav Hashahar. The closest settler outpost is the ironically named Malachei Hashalom, “Angels of Peace,” the tormenters of Ein Rashshash. Sometimes, in their spare time, they also harass the people of Ras at-Tin– a small community of Bedouin shepherds, about 120 souls, leading their lives, hurting no one. Lots of children. Lots of sheep. Lots of fiery sun.

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After Ten Years at Umm Al-‘Ara’is, March 13, 2021 (texts: Margaret Olin and David Shulman)

/ Margaret Olin / 2 Comments
Sa‘id in 2019

1. Why wasn’t I there? (Olin)

It can feel like you’ve been hired as an extra chaperone at a children’s party. On most Saturdays in Um Safa, Sa‘id ‘Awad packs his wife Rima and six, seven, or eight of his fourteen children into his lively SUV, all of them bumping and bouncing on the uneven roads. After a short hike to the family’s fields in Wadi Al-‘Ara’is, the soccer games begin.

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Taybeh Junction, March 5, 2021

/ Margaret Olin / 3 Comments

            This time there’s a twist to the story.

Photograph: Arik Ascherman

Taybeh: the fertile wadi, Irish-green after the rains, plowed and sown with seed along with another flat stony stretch at the top of the hill—maybe 1000 dunams altogether (250 acres), enough to keep several families and their herds going for some months. The land belongs to several private Palestinian owners in the village; they rent it out to Bedouins who live there in the spring and summer, grazing their sheep and harvesting whatever is left of the crops after the settlers and their herds have gotten to them. Last year the Palestinians lost tens of thousands of shekels because of these depredations. Just yesterday one settler boy-man hit Arik hard on the head with a club, splitting in two the helmet Arik was fortunately wearing.

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November 6, 2020. Harat Makhul. Humsa al-Foqa. Text by David Shulman

/ Margaret Olin / 7 Comments

1.

photograph: David Shulman, 2020

 The rains have come in force, the hills are muddy, and there is food for the goats and sheep. Over morning tea in Makhul we get the weekly litany of hurts. Walid—still a boy—was out alone with the herd, and settlers came and beat him. It’s really dangerous to be alone on the hills. A large posse of settlers attacked Qadri and several others; there were two broken legs.  A few days earlier, settlers killed Qadri’s uncle’s cow.

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