August/September 2005

http://alawda.newjerseysolidarity.org

Inside the Lines: Shereen Al-Araj

On August 10, 2005, New Jersey Solidarity - Activists for the Liberation of Palestine hosted Shereen Al Araj, an activist from Wallajah, Palestine, at an informal dinner discussion. Shereen works is a volunteer at Ansar children center in Wallajah working with Palestinian youth. She spent the evening discussing many aspects of the current situation on the ground in Palestine, as well as answering various questions from the audience. This column is the first in a series I will be writing in Al-Awda. In future issues, I will feature other Palestinian voices. The column will explore the power of Palestinian narrative - the true, personal stories of Palestinian lives.

Although Wallajah is located on the periphery of Al Quds, Shereen began the evening by discussing the effects of the Israeli disengagement from Gaza on those who live in the West Bank. While it is true that the disengagement will herald massive change in Gaza, it is incorrect to think that the Palestinians will actually have control. This is not something often reported in the American media. There are already three layers of wall around Gaza, and these walls are not going to go down. The Israelis "will control everything in and out of Gaza," Shereen explained. "from Egypt and from Israel," which will further isolate Gaza from potential trading partners, nearly guaranteeing economic hardship for those who live there. Necessary food imports from Israel will be negatively affected. Borders will also continue to be patrolled by the Israelis. Currently, at the border between Gaza and Egypt, you "have to spend days there if you want to go anywhere." It is "not at all disengagement, not in any case."

Shereen predicts that the pullout of colonial occupiers from the West Bank will be devastating to the Palestinians there as well. There will be no real pullout in the West Bank, they are turning these places from settlements for civilians into military zones and Palestinians cannot even get close to these sites; there is no pullout from the West Bank at all. In fact, these settlements in the West Bank are mostly empty already; says Shereen, “It’s done for the media propaganda and some more money from the US.”

The wall that “Israel” is building in Al Quds has devastating potential. Al Quds is to be divided into sections, the borders of which will need to be crossed before one can travel from one part of the city to another. Getting from one section to another will be difficult. "People with a Jerusalem ID cannot live outside of Jerusalem. They are in risk of losing their ID according to the ‘Israeli’ laws which they invented to decrease the numbers of Arabs in Al Quds and to maintain a Jewish majority," said Shereen. The artificially created boundaries of the wall around al-Quds will separate friends and family members from one another, and those who work in Al Quds but live outside of the city proper will be harshly affected. This is only the latest assault upon the city’s Arab identity; in fact, Shereen says, “the borders of al Quds as the Palestinians know them were changed since 1968 by the ‘Israeli’ occupation, to exclude all the Palestinian inhabited areas and to include the new settlements they built to become what they call ‘Greater Jerusalem .’”

Wallajah suffers the same problem but in a different context, said Shereen. “They want our land empty; that's why they illegally annexed half of our village land to west Jerusalem, but not the people. They are trying to eliminate us from being there by demolishing the houses and by not allowing us to build.” In her own village, "75 houses are in the way" of the new border walls being created, and "we are all in court" in an effort to save them from being demolished, Shereen told us. "One third of our houses were demolished already."

I asked Shereen to tell me more about the Ansar Center. She is a board member responsible mainly for PR and fund raising, and working with the children once a week. The center was started in 2001. "Our location is very difficult because we are stuck between Wallajah and West Jerusalem," explained Shereen. At the beginning of the second intifada, villagers living in the area had nowhere to go, and there was nothing productive for the kids in the village to do. "We had two kids stabbing each other." Shareen and a few others decided they wanted "to do something about this. In the beginning we didn't have a location. Now, we are in a house." The center is a place where children can participate in activities such as dance, theater, music, and sports. The workers are volunteers, and the center exists because of donations. The center also has "a huge summer camp." About 120 children between the ages of six and 16 currently belong to the center. Youth who are older than sixteen often come back to help with the center, and many of them wind up members of important sociopolitical committees during their college years. "Circumstances encourage them [the children at the center] to become activists" on behalf of Palestine. For children who grow up without a sense of hope or conviction, the staff of Ansar Center provides a chance to do something better with their lives. "The center becomes like a club," a safe space for socialization.

"I wouldn't give up my right to return," Shereen proudly stated. She is a woman of strong and enduring spirit. Living with a checkpoint literally next door, she comes into contact with checkpoints daily. "It's a continuous humiliation" to interact with Israeli soldiers who "don't have a heart. I never understood it. How do they brainwash them? A checkpoint is a place where you go and you lose your humanity completely," she told us.

When asked how we in America can help the Palestinian cause, Shereen could not overemphasize the importance of awareness. Most Americans simply aren't aware of what is going on in Palestine, and she believes that, if they were made aware, they would be much more willing to help. "The Europeans are much more involved," she explained, largely because their media does not exclude stories of Palestinian suffering the way the American media does. Meeting the members of New Jersey Solidarity - Activists for the Liberation of Palestine gave Shareen hope, she said. She was pleasantly surprised that so many living in the United States were concerned about Palestine. When asked how activists here could improve upon their efforts, she encouraged activists to "focus your work. You need to have a plan." She encouraged us to continue campaigns that would raise awareness of what is actually happening on the ground in Palestine. "There are many things to do as American activists," Shereen believes. One thing in particular is to raise people's awareness of just how much American money is going to Israel and what it is being used for. Also, knowing that people in America care about their lives gives Palestinian children a sense of hope and worth.