Life under occupation

Exposure visit

First-hand exposure to the hardships imposed on Palestinians by the Israeli occupation of their territories was one of the goals of the 21-26 June visit to Palestine/Israel by the World Council of Churches (WCC) general secretary Samuel Kobia and a small ecumenical delegation. © Andreas Apell/EAPPI

The wall

One of the defining features of the occupation now is a 700-kilometre long "separation barrier". Sometimes a nine-meter high concrete wall like the portion seen in this photo, sometimes a wire fence with movement detectors and an adjacent route for military patrols, in July 2004 the wall/fence has been declared illegal by the International Criminal Court as long as it is built on Palestinian land. © Juan Michel/WCC

Land grabbing

Only 20% of the wall/fence is being built on the internationally recognized Israeli border (or Green Line), while 80% cuts into Palestinian territory, sometimes deeply, a de facto annexation of more than 15% of the West Bank land according to Amnesty International. Together with the land, the wall/fence also grabs substantial water resources. © Juan Michel/WCC

Farmers cut off their land

In the village of Jayyous, some 50 kilometres north of Jerusalem, the fence cuts 200 families off from their farm lands, as Abdul Latif Khaled explained to the WCC delegation. The fence has also blocked access to 95% of the village's water supply. According to Khaled, a village leader, unemployment in Jayyous today is about 60%.

Commuting to work

Salim Aref Jacir, a farmer from Jayyous, explains to the WCC general secretary the problem of having to depend on the gates opening hours to farm his land (gates are supposed to be opened for short periods in the morning, at midday, and again in the evening). The number of gate permits granted to farmers is being reduced for 'security reasons'. Missing the gates' closing time and staying overnight on one's own farming land may cause the loss of one's permit.

Knocking on Jerusalem's doors

Gates-crossing that includes finger-printing, identity check and long waits are a daily feature for Palestinians from the West Bank trying to reach Palestinian East Jerusalem. Over a thousand people, most of them workers, queue early every morning at the main gate in the wall cutting off the Palestinian town of Bethlehem. The elderly, the sick, pregnant women get no special treatment.

Ecumenical accompaniment programme

Monitoring gates and crossing points in the wall/fence is one of the jobs undertaken by participants in the Ecumenical Accompaniment Programme in Palestine/Israel (EAPPI). Launched in August 2002, the programme has received some 350 volunteers from more than 30 churches and ecumenical partners in over 15 countries. Above, ecumenical accompaniers brief the WCC general secretary about their work helping to prevent or at least alleviate daily humiliation and abuses.

International Christian presence

Ecumenical accompaniers also work in the streets of Palestinian towns, villages and refugee camps. They monitor and report violations of human rights and international humanitarian law, support acts of non-violent resistance alongside local Christian and Muslim Palestinians and Israeli peace activists, and offer protection through the fact of their presence. Here, ecumenical accompaniers brief the WCC general secretary and the ecumenical delegation before a guided tour of a Palestinian city.

A house with a view

Many of the over 400,000 Israeli settlers who live in some 200 illegal settlements in the West Bank are mainly motivated by economic reasons. State-subsidized housing of hill-top properties with views and other amenities, including settlers-only highways to reach their jobs in Israel proper make living in a settlement an attractive prospect for young Israeli families. © Juan Michel/WCC

People you wouldn't like to meet

But other settlers are ideologically motivated. Usually heavily armed and with protection from the Israeli army, they establish outposts that later on become settlements or squat in properties in Palestinian cities and neighbourhoods. © Andreas Apell/EAPPI

Under siege from inside

That is the case in Hebron, a Palestinian city of some 160,000 inhabitants whose centre has been invaded by 400-500 radical Israeli settlers. Their presence has emptied what used to be the city's vibrant commercial heart and the homes of thousands.

On the way to school

Radical settlers in Hebron have isolated a Palestinian girls school and regularly harass its students with stone-throwing, spitting and insults from the settlers' children and teenagers, encouraged by their parents. Ecumenical accompaniers escort the students to and from school to help prevent this harassment. The Israeli soldiers posted around the settlers homes for their protection are not very successful at protecting Palestinian school girls. © Andreas Apell/EAPPI

Ways to make life difficult

Alongside walls, fences and check-points, road-blocks too add to the problems of living under occupation in the West Bank. Some 500 check-points and road-blocks hinder, discourage or stop normal life and business. Barriers may also be used as a means of punishment, like the one in the photo, put in place at the entrance of a village near which some stones had been thrown at the movement sensors on the separation fence. © Juan Michel/WCC

Refugee camps

There are some 3.5 million Palestinians living in the occupied West Bank, East Jerusalem and Gaza Strip, out of which 1.7 million are refugees from the 1948 Arab-Israeli war according to UN figures. Another 2.7 million refugees from that conflict registered with the UN are in neighbouring countries). After decades of exile, the refugee camps are no longer made of tents, but are a mass of crowded dwellings. Whether in the West Bank or abroad, Palestinian refugees claim their right to return to their homes. UN resolutions call for their claim to be resolved by negotiation rather than by force. © Juan Michel/WCC

Palestinian Christians

Most Palestinians are Muslim. A historic but shrinking minority are Christian, their number being estimated at about 50,000 for the whole West Bank, East Jerusalem and Gaza Strip (another 100,000 Christians live in Israel proper). Emigration caused by the loss of land, livelihoods and opportunities during 40 years of occupation affects the whole Palestinian society but it is especially heavy among Christians. In the photo: An Orthodox Church in Birzeit, a Christian village near Ramallah.

Life goes on

Amid all the hardships, a life of coping and perseverance goes on in Palestinian cities, towns, villages and refugee camps. Encroached by settlements, settlers' highways, the occupying army, security zones, road-blocks and the separation barrier, Palestinians live in small pockets of land that have begun to resemble open-air prisons. Yet life goes on and many speak of hope still held against hope. © Andreas Apell/EAPPI

High resolution versions of these pictures are available upon request.