Yesterday, I learned the words for rock (zachra) and stone (hajr). Naturally, I learned them from the 14 year old boys in Jayyous

Rock and Stone - Kate-IWPS-Palestine
Saturday, November 23, 2002

Yesterday, I learned the words for rock (zachra) and stone (hajr).
Naturally, I learned them from the 14 year old boys in Jayyous. They
taught me the word for "throw" as well, but I don't remember it.

The people in the village were very upset after last Friday's action,
when 10 internationals (we have decided that Israelis in Palestine
count as internationals) were arrested, so it took them a while to
decide what to do next. They do not want more arrests, but the work
on "the Wall" continues to cut through their land, their greenhouses,
the trees and their wells. They decided they want to do regular
Friday actions, blocking the bulldozers in the morning and staying on
the land through midday prayers. Since Friday is a half day for
Israeli workers, this would mean that the contractor could not
work on the site that day.

Knowing that we had a small group of internationals, Patrick and I
tried valiantly during the week to find Israelis to commit to the
action, but we were not successful. In lieu, I convinced my IWPS
teammates Dorothée and Mariam to come with me; the three of us
brought the international number to around 20. We got up at 5:30, to
leave at 6:00 a.m., and rode to Funduq with the Flying Mohammad, our
favorite cab driver. We had a lot of trouble getting someone to take
us from Funduq to Jayyous, but eventually found a service driver who
agreed to go to Jayyous after dropping people in Tulkarem. We were
worried about that, because on the map Tulkarem doesn't look so close
to Jayyous, but as I've previously learned, Palestinian maps can be
deceiving (worth remembering, once again, that the whole country is
smaller than New Jersey). Plus, as usual, saying you're going to
Tulkarem actually means that you're going to the roadblock two towns
before Tulkarem. So we arrived only a few minutes after 7:00, when
we were supposed to be there. Just as we were entering the town,
Patrick called and told me it was curfew (for a change) and there was
a woman near where we were who needed to be escorted to the site.
We found her, but she wouldn't come with us, even after Patrick
talked to her on the phone in Arabic. Seems to have been some
misunderstanding. When we got to the roadblock the kids make out of
boulders and junk from the side of the road, a feeble but charming
effort to keep the Army jeeps out of their neighborhoods, we got out
of the cab and a group of boys took charge of us, escorting us to the
demonstration site.

The turnout was much smaller than last week, partly because the
military was in town enforcing curfew, which they had not been while
I was there before. According to people who stayed in the village,
they lifted curfew one minute, then reimposed it the next, firing off
tear gas and rubber bullets to let people know about the change of
plans. We formed our blockade with about 60 people, nearly half of
them children, the rest Palestinian women and internationals. The
jeep arrived with the bulldozer and the digger, and the soldiers came
on foot to talk to us. The unit commander, who couldn't be more
than 20, walked straight to Pat and Abu A., the negotiators. I
wondered how he knew who to talk to, if it was just because they were
in the middle, or if he knew them.

He was perhaps the whiniest soldier I've ever heard. "I don't like
this, believe me," he told them. "What can I do?" That was a
refrain throughout the morning. He said he'd give us "five minutes
to decide." He didn't say to decide what, presumably leave or be
tear-gassed. When he came back, he offered a compromise: the
bulldozer would work in the area below us, where it already was, and
we could stay on the land until prayers, "but don't do any trouble."
Abu A. accepted, which seemed fine because obviously the bulldozer
was where it was.

The international organizers had worked with the kids during the week
to figure out some fun stuff to fill the morning, in the hopes that
they wouldn't throw stones. There were colored balloons, and the
kids played football (soccer) in the space between the jeep and our
line. At first the soldiers seemed to find that amusing. When the
football rolled between the wheels of the jeep, one of them kicked it
loose. Suddenly, though, the commander started running toward us.
He had decided the kids couldn't play in that area; he wanted them
behind the line. The older ones drifted to the side to gather stones.
Kids tossed balloons into the open area and they floated toward the
soldiers. One of the soldiers picked one up and it popped. Everyone
laughed. But one young boy wanted to go give them another one. He
was terrified, but approached the commander. The little boy soberly
handed the soldier a pink balloon, and the soldier took it and put it
in the jeep.

The kids began some rousing chants, and I thought it might make a nice
background for a report on KPFA, so I tried to call and leave a
message for one of the producers, except the extensions I have are
all wrong. While I was staring at my phone for help, the MPs started
charging the crowd. I, and all the internationals, threw ourselves
in between them and the Palestinians, mostly kids, whom they were
trying to grab. The commander stopped and loaded his rifle. Later
he said he did that because everyone was crowding around him, but of
course everyone was crowding around him because he was trying to
pull someone out of a crowd. I find that occupation has a circular
logic all its own.

Our response was not well planned or well executed, but they didn't
get the guy they wanted. When things had calmed down, Pat went to
talk to the soldiers. "What can I do?" the commander asked. "I'm a
good guy, believe me. See how patient I am? When he gave me the
balloon, I took it. You're not supposed to be here, believe me.
This is a closed military area. I don't care about that. But how
can I take that? What can I do?" The "that," according to Pat, that
he couldn't take was not a rock but an insult thrown at him.

At some point, the soldiers came and said that the digger wanted to
go through our line, to replant some trees which had previously been
uprooted. The man whose land the trees were from was in the cab of
the digger. If we allowed it through, we could stay on the land to
pray. We felt it might be a trick, but eventually the Palestinian
negotiator said yes. The line dissolved, and the digger went through
followed by the jeep. After that, there was no need to stand in a
line any more so we just milled around.

The boys started looking for other forms of amusement, and one of the
most popular was teaching us Arabic. A crowd of them approached me
and somewhat shyly asked my name. I told them, then asked theirs.
They spoke English quite well, and we started trading Arabic words
for English ones. They were excellent teachers, and I learned a lot –
nose, eye, hand, finger (which I don't remember), teeth, teacher,
and of course, rock, stone and throw. They led me to a distant rock
and told me to sit in the shade and rest. They taught me the word
for "tired," which I immediately forgot. We talked a bit more. Then
they said I should come with them, they were going to throw stones
at the jeep. "Don't you think that will make problems for you?" I
asked. "No, we always get away." From what I heard, there have been
small battles in town every day this week, the boys throwing stones
at the jeeps, which in turn throw tear gas and shoot rubber bullets
at them. A boy was injured by rubber bullets on Thursday, according
to internationals. "Well I'm not going," I said. "I don't think
it's a good idea."

They were not angry. I had made my choice, they had made theirs.
They would throw stones without the fragile protection of my
presence. As internationals, we discussed what our response would be
and decided that we would neither intervene to protect the Army nor
the kids, though some of us felt we should stay in the area in case
the violence from the Army escalated beyond what was normal and
expected. When the prayers were over, we all tried to urge people
out of the area. The boys massed, readying their slingshots.
They were between 8 and 15. I was moving away with the others when I
saw that Mariam and Dorothée were standing in the middle, taking
notes. I went to stand with them, not sure it was a great idea but
willing to see what would happen.

The bulldozer rumbled down the hill, through with its work for the
day. The jeep sat still, seemingly taunting the boys to throw their
stones. They did. A private security truck joined the jeep. Four
men fired off four different weapons. One fired blanks, one rubber
bullets, one seemed to have tear gas, but I didn't smell it. The
kids didn't hit anything, and neither did the soldiers. For the
thousandth time since I've been in this country, I thought that if
the soldiers didn't hang around the villages, the kids would have
nothing to throw stones at. But of course, the soldiers are kids
too, and they all need their adrenaline/testosterone rush.

This battle was quite short. When it was over, and the jeep was
driving out, the whiny commander stopped to talk to JD, a
videographer who hangs out with ISM and has spent most of the last
week driving back and forth between Ramla Prison, Tel Aviv airport,
Jerusalem and the West Bank. "You see?" the soldier demanded. "Tell
me why." "You know perfectly well why," I said. "The occupation." I
was shocked by the level of hostility in my voice. It had come from
deep inside, quite unexpectedly, and I couldn't control it.

JD was angry too, at me. "This isn't the time, Kate," he barked.
"It's always the time," Mariam said.
"What can I do?" the soldier asked as he drove away.