It's Quiet in Palestine, or is it?

       I have spent yesterday and today with nothing to do but wander around this small city of Beit Sahour, do a little food and umbrella shopping, read my emails and study some Arabic vocabulary. It has been very peaceful. The excitement is all on Al Jazeera News, particularly about the new uprising in Tahir Square, Egypt. Except...
     I went to the website of IMEMC, which you can do too, (http://www.imemc.org/)  to read Palestinian news items from last week, because I knew that this little pocket of peace that I was enjoying was not the full picture of life in occupied Palestine.  But, like the families I had delicious midday meals with on Saturday and Sunday, I was experiencing a welcome bubble -- a respite not to be taken for granted.

Since mainstream media outside of Palestine does not tell about the daily human rights violations and abusive conduct of Israel's army and settlers in the West Bank, Gaza and East Jerusalem, we get the impression that it is quiet here, so the occupation can't be all that bad. I'm going to pass on the news reports I just read online because they help to remind us of why we need to work together to end this occupation.
     The village of Amenzil in the south of the West Bank can't keep their new solar panels, paid for by a Spanish NGO, because it is an "unrecognized village". Neither the vlllage leaders nor the Spanish NGO could get the required Isreal-issued permit for the panels nor even for the buildings on which they are erected. There are many such villages which are denied electricity, water, schools and roads because Israel wants this land without its inhabitants, and uses every pretext to push the people out. The NGO applied for a permit but, getting no response, installed the panels to supply electricity to the village. Typically, Israel waited until the project was up and running before declaring it illegal.
     Al Khader, a community adjacent to Bethlehem, was the scene of a settler attack last week. When one farmer, his wife and sister went to work their land, they found settlers already there, cultivating the earth around the olive trees that did not belong to them. The settlers from nearby Etzion settlement then assaulted the Palestinians before they left.
Additional incidents for the two weeks from November 3 to 16 were recorded by the Palestine Center for Human Rights. Here are some of them:
     * In Gaza there were 8 Israeli missile attacks in which 4 Palestinians were killed, 14 wounded, a central Marine Police station destroyed and a greenhouse damaged. Two of those killed were bombed in the shelter where they had gone for safety. The Israeli army also fired at working farmers from observation towers along the border between Israel and Gaza.
     *In the West Bank there were 91 Israeli military incursions into Palestinian communities resulting in 14 detentions, which Palestinians call "kidnappings since they don't recognize Israel's right to take police action inside Palestinian territory. Among those detained were some of the men that Israel had just released in the prisoner exchange deal brokered by Egypt just a few weeks ago.
     *The Israeli army tore down and destroyed 3 utility poles connecting two Palestinian villages in the barren south because there was no permit for poles. It is impossible for Palestinians in their own villages, on their own land, in their own West Bank to get any kind of permit from Israel which exercises control over every minusha of civil life. I have seen these villages where the lack of electricity next to well-lit settlements is so shocking that even Tony Blair once admonished Israel for this practice.
     *The settlers from Yitzar settlement uprooted 25 productive olive trees in an effort to drive Palestinians from the land. While this is a common practice by right-wing settlers, Israel never punishes the settlers. To the contrary, the Israeli army's job is to protect settlers even when they are attacking Palestinians.
     *Settlers set fire to three Palestinian vehicles.
     *The Israeli army bulldozed land and uprooted trees near Qalqilia in the North to extend the boundaries of Oramit settlement. The army also bulldozed 4 private homes near Jericho in the East because they were winter homes for Palestinian families. That would be like bulldozing your house on Cape Cod because you only use it in the summer.
     *The Israeli military used teargas and rubber-coated steel bullets to disperse nonviolent demonstrators at seven different protests against on-going, increasing thefts of their land and freedom of movement.

     All of these things happened in two quiet weeks of military occupation.