December 11, 2000 — Mudeif Productions

*Marthame with the CPT Team in their Hebron apartment.*

Our visit to Hebron was greatly facilitated by Christian Peacemaker Teams (CPT). A partnership of the Mennonites, Quakers, and Brethren, their non-violent message of "Getting in The Way" is taken quite literally - sometimes standing in front of soldiers ready to shoot, sometimes confronting settlers on a rampage, sometimes sleeping in Palestinian homes slated for demolition. And they take their message of non-violence quite seriously - their collection of weapons gathered from areas that have been hit includes not only tear gas canisters and live bullets, but also a couple of marbles (used by Palestinian children in slingshots).

Our original plan had been to leave this morning, but we decided to stick around for a while (having nothing else to do). Among the CPTers are a handful of Mennonites, a Christian Reformed, a Roman Catholic priest, and a Presbyterian minister from Kentucky. They are the only Christians in town, except for a Russian Orthodox monastery (whose services are private, as there are "no Christians in Hebron" - apparently including our friends). Again, curfew had been lifted for a bit and the streets were busy.

*Family opening gifts from their Canadian partner family.*

We headed out to the Baqaa Valley outside of town to visit with a couple of families. Poised near the Kiryat Arba' Israeli settlement, these homes are under constant threat from home demolitions. Some of these homes have already been slated for the bulldozer. CPT has been involved with the Campaign for Secure Dwellings (CSD), which has paired up the families in these homes with congregations in the US and Canada. One among our group came with a word of encouragement (and a bag full of balloons!) from her Quaker congregation. The father has been unable to reach his job in Israel because of the harsh West Bank closure, so in addition to the question mark over their house is a question mark over their whole future.

*The Israeli settlement, now looming over the Palestinian home.*

*The family uses the cave as part of their storage.*

*A recently firebombed Palestinian home.*

We then headed further into the valley to visit with a family whose home had been attacked by settlers a few days ago. About one hundred settlers came over the hill, throwing stones and hurling epithets and threats at the family. The scene they described sounded like stories of Jim Crow-ear lynch mobs. One of the windows that was broken was the one to the bathroom where their three small girls were taking a shower at the time. It was not the first time the family's land had been threatened or confiscated. Three years ago, their olive groves were bulldozed and stone walls were built right up to the back of their house, claiming the land in the name of Eretz Israel. The family has been there at least three hundred years, as the cave of their ancestors attests to that. It was also not the last time their family had been threatened. Their son's house across the valley had been attacked and seized by settlers, who then set up camp until the Israeli military arrived. It was their third house (the first two were bulldozed). A young cousin who threw a stone in response to these attacks was shot in the abdomen and died a few days later.

We then got two calls at once, one from the taxi driver who wanted us to leave quickly - settlers were gathering and blocking the road back into Hebron (always a fear-inducing for Palestinians), the other from a CPTer letting us know that the curfew was back on - a mentally-retarded Palestinian man taunted and spit on an Israeli soldiers and was shot in both legs. The gathering on the road turned out to be a peaceful memorial service for the two settlers killed there a few days previously. And so after waiting a half hour, we drove back to Hebron.

*Israeli settler graffiti on a Palestinian shop in the Old City of Hebron.*

By the time we got back, curfew was in full-effect and only soldiers roamed the streets. The Old City was closed in with gates (one of the CPTers, when he saw them, said, "I haven't seen those in a while!"), and we noticed the Stars of David tagging Palestinian-owned shops - painted by settler youth marking "their territory". We joined the CPTers for dinner, interrupted by a phone call (their phones are their bloodline, and are also putting them into the red) that settlers were gathering again, shooting guns into the air, and headed off somewhere in the valley. We also heard that a settler bus had been hit with a bomb (no one injured, thank God), and our hearts sank with the seemingly unending news of violence.

*Elizabeth sharing some story time with our hosts’ children.*

We spent the night in the Old City with the family who had recently lost their third home. The extent of Marthame's Arabic pastoral care was saying together with the family, "Allahu Akbar" - roughly translated, "God is bigger than all this crap."