Diaries: Live from Palestine

ISM volunteers Richard Johnson and Sofia Ahmed witnessed two young boys “blown up” in a small field in Jenin Camp yesterday. Sofia reports being only 40 meters away when something exploded. “Although we can’t be positive what it was that exploded, four days ago we saw Israeli soldiers on foot in the exact same place.”

“Why can’t they announce a curfew a little bit louder?” I thought. Yesterday morning, as I stepped into the office, my colleagues tell me that there has been a curfew imposed on the area where I live.

After 23 days of around the clock curfew, residents of Ramallah and other West Bank towns are today for the first time, able to reclaim the streets of their invaded and destroyed, or as one resident described it - “raped” cities.

I am no longer confined to my apartment. I am now confined to parts of one single city; Ramallah. The army is still present in those other parts, in those other cities, in those other roads surrounding every Palestinian town.

Last night I brought Jenin to Israel. I tried to at least. I walked from East Jerusalem to West, seeking a drink after spending a night in the devastated northern West Bank town. Jenin was still on my boots.

We woke up this morning to see if the Israeli troops withdrew from Ramallah as they claimed yesterday or not. To start with my street, where I live, all that had changed was the fortification of the barrier sealing the beginning of my street and now a new one at the other end.

I muster enough courage and decide to defy the curfew by walking ten meters to my neighbor’s home. He invited me over for dinner. Chicken and potatoes. It’s been a while since I’ve tasted chicken. The bombing of Betounia, the town across the hill, started punctually as we were about to eat.

Mohammed graduated from Al Quds Univeristy as an economist. His head is bandaged. He was wounded on Friday, April 5, and remained inside the camp for four days with no medical help, and was then captured and detained for three days until he was released by Israeli Defense Forces at the Salem checkpoint.

When we arrived in Taybeh, soldiers turned us back at the checkpoint. We quickly spotted a taxi driver who drove us to a hilltop and then asked us with a kindly smile, “Can you run?” Grabbing our gear, we scrambled out of his car and began sprinting down the mountainside, across fields strewn with rocks.

We visited the home of Umm and Abu Mahmoud. Their son, Mahmoud, died during the attack on the Jenin Camp. Mahmoud was a 31 year old merchant. His wife was pregnant with their third child, but she miscarried after learning that Mahmoud was killed, reportedly by a bullet wound at the back of his head.