Israeli activists help rebuild demolished Palestinian homes
Friday, October 11, 2002 | byJOE ESKENAZI
Salim Shawamreh worked 10 years before he could afford to build a house for his family. It took about 10 minutes for it to be torn down.
The 45-year-old Palestinian newspaper driver—who has had his West Bank home demolished three times—and Israeli Jeff Halper appeared at several public Bay Area events this week sponsored by groups critical of Israel's home-demolition policy.
The Israeli government demolishes the homes of suspected terrorists, their collaborators or, in some cases, family members. Houses built without proper permits are also subject to demolition. But Shawamreh, who is in the latter category, says it's almost impossible for Palestinians to get permission to build.
The Minnesota-born Halper's organization, the Israeli Committee Against House Demolition, has rebuilt about a dozen demolished homes in the territories. The group has utilized the volunteer work of hundreds of Israelis and Palestinians in what Halper stresses is a political action, not a humanitarian one. Half the homes the group rebuilt have been redemolished at least once.
In addition to protesting Israeli policy, Shawamreh characterizes the cooperation of Palestinian and Israeli activists as a positive message for Israel and the world.
"We refuse to be enemies, that's the first message. Second, what's good for Palestinians is good for Israelis, for we will be out of the lose-lose situation we are in now," said the father of six, who now rents a small apartment outside of Jerusalem.
"For me, Israeli blood is important, like Palestinian blood. Both bloods are falling down from this situation. We are asking the help of Jewish communities and also the American people to help us jump over this lose-lose situation and into a win-win for both the nations. Living like this, there will never be a solution. We need the international community and especially Jewish communities here to say, 'OK, we need to make a Palestinian state.'"
The Bay Area trip—sponsored by A Jewish Voice for Peace, Global Exchange and Just Peace Technologies—was part of a fund-raising campaign intended to amass enough money to rebuild 20 to 30 houses.
In the territories, permits are used as "political tools to deny Palestinians the right to build houses on their own private land," said Halper, a former anthropology professor at Ben-Gurion University of the Negev.
"The policy of the government is to confine Palestinians to little islands in the West Bank and Gaza in order to make way for Israeli settlements or make things so miserable for the Palestinians that they leave the country altogether, which is what we call the quiet transit policy. The decision not to allow [Palestinians] to build is a political one."
Shawamreh, whose family fled to Jordan in 1948, spent a decade working as a construction inspector in Saudi Arabia before returning roughly a dozen years ago to the village of Anata, three miles outside of Jerusalem.
He applied for building permits three times between 1990 and 1994, which were denied each time. Finally, in 1994, he went ahead and built a small home without approval. He was subsequently handed a court order notifying him his home would be demolished, but he said it wasn't until five years later that Israeli troops awoke him in the dead of night and gave his family 15 minutes to gather their things and leave.
Assisted by Halper, Shawamreh rebuilt his home twice, but it has been razed each time. Most recently, Shawamreh said troops took the tent his family was living in.
"When we have justice, everything will be OK. You can't support one side and leave the other without support," said Shawamreh. "This will never lead to a fair peace between the two nations."