[News] ‘People of the Cave’: Palestinians Take Their Fight for Justice to the Mountains

[Anti-Imperialist News]

https://www.counterpunch.org/2020/08/25/people-of-the-cave-palestinians-take-their-fight-for-justice-to-the-mountains/ 
<https://www.counterpunch.org/2020/08/25/people-of-the-cave-palestinians-take-their-fight-for-justice-to-the-mountains/> 



  ‘People of the Cave’: Palestinians Take Their Fight for Justice to the
  Mountains

by Ramzy Baroud <https://www.counterpunch.org/author/ramzy-baroud/> - 
August 25, 2020
------------------------------------------------------------------------

Palestinians are not going anywhere. This is the gist of seven decades 
of Palestinian struggle against Zionist colonialism. The proof? The 
story of Ahmed Amarneh.

Amarneh, a 30-year-old civil engineer from the northern West Bank 
village of Farasin, lives with his family in a cave. For many years, the 
Amarneh family has attempted to build a proper home, but their request 
has been denied by the Israeli military every time.

In many ways, the struggle of the Amarnehs is a microcosm of the 
collective struggle of Farasin; in fact, of most Palestinians.

Those who are unfortunate enough to be living in areas of the West Bank, 
designated by the Oslo II Accord of 1995 as Area C, were left in a 
perpetual limbo.

Area C constitutes nearly 60% of the overall size of the West Bank. It 
is rich with resources – mostly arable land, water and ample minerals – 
yet, relatively sparsely populated. It should not be surprising why 
right-wing Israeli Prime Minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, wants to annex 
this region. More land, with fewer Palestinians, has been the guiding 
principle for Zionist colonialism from the outset.

True, Netanyahu’s annexation plan, at least the de jure element of it, 
has been postponed. In practice, however, de facto annexation has been 
taking place for many years, and, lately, it has accelerated. Last June, 
for example, Israel demolished 30 Palestinian homes in the West Bank, 
mostly in Area C, rendering over 100 Palestinians homeless.

Additionally, according to the United Nations Office for the 
Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA), Israeli army bulldozers 
destroyed 33 non-residential structures as well. This is “the same 
number (of homes) demolished throughout the entire first five months of 
2020,” OCHA reported.

Unfortunately, Farasin, like numerous other Palestinian villages and 
communities across Area C, has been singled out for complete 
destruction. A small population of approximately 200 people has been 
subjected to Israeli army harassment for years. While Israel is keen on 
implanting Jewish communities in the heart of the occupied West Bank, it 
is equally keen on disrupting the natural growth of Palestinian 
communities, the indigenous people of the land, in Area C.

On July 29, Israeli forces invaded Farasin, terrorizing the residents, 
and handed over 36 demolition orders, according to the head of the 
Farasin village council. Namely, this is the onset of ethnic cleansing 
of the entire population of the village by Israel.

Ahmed Amarneh and his family also received a demolition order, although 
they do not live in a concrete house, but, rather, in a mountain cave. 
“I didn’t make the cave. It has existed since antiquity,” he told 
reporters. “I don’t understand how they can prevent me from living in a 
cave. Animals live in caves and are not thrown out. So let them treat me 
like an animal and let me live in the cave.”

Amarneh’s emotional outburst is not misleading. In a recent report, the 
Israeli rights group B’tselem, has listed some of Israel’s deceptive 
methods used to forcefully remove Palestinians from their homes in Area 
C or to block any development whatsoever within these Palestinian 
communities.

“Israel has blocked Palestinian development by designating large swathes 
of land as state land, survey land, firing zones, nature reserves and 
national parks,” according to B’tselem. Judging by the systematic 
destruction of the Palestinian environment in the West Bank, Israel is 
hardly interested in the preservation of animals, either. The ultimate 
goal is the allocation of “land to settlements and their regional 
councils,” B’tselem argues.

Therefore, it should not come as a surprise that, for example, as of 
November 2017, only 16 of the 180 Palestinian communities in Area C have 
been approved for development. The rest are strictly prohibited.

Between 2016 and 2018, of the 1,485 Palestinian applications for 
construction and development in these areas, only 21 permits have been 
approved.

These unrealistic and draconian measures leave Palestinian families with 
no option but to build without a permit, eventually making them targets 
for Israeli military bulldozers.

Hundreds of families, like that of Ahmed Amarneh, have opted for 
alternative solutions. Failing to obtain a permit and wary of the 
imminent demolition if they build without one, they simply move to 
mountain caves.

This phenomenon is particularly manifest in the Hebron and Nablus regions.

In the mountainous wasteland located on the outskirts of Nablus, the 
wreckage of abandoned homes – some demolished, some unfinished – is a 
testimony of an ongoing war between the Israeli military, on the one 
hand, and the Palestinian people, on the other. Once they lose the 
battle and are left with no other option, many Palestinian families take 
their belongings and head to the caves in search of a home.

Quite often, the fight does not end there, as Palestinian communities, 
especially in the Hebron hills region, find themselves target to more 
eviction orders. The war for Palestinian survival rages on.

The case of Ahmed Amarneh, however, is particularly unique, for rarely, 
if ever, Israel issues a military order to demolish a cave. When the 
cave is demolished, where else can the Amarneh family go?

This dilemma, symptomatic of the larger Palestinian quandary, reminds 
one of Mahmoud Darwish’s seminal poem, “The Earth is Closing on Us”:

“Where should we go after the last frontiers?

Where should the birds fly after the last sky?

Where should the plants sleep after the last breath of air?”

However depressing the reality may be, the metaphor is undeniably 
powerful, that of savage colonialism that knows no bounds and 
Palestinian steadfastness (sumoud) that is perennial.

Often buried within the technical details of oppression – Area C, home 
demolition, ethnic cleansing and so on – is the tenacity of the human 
spirit, that of the Amarneh family and hundreds of other Palestinian 
families, who have turned caves into loving homes. It is this unmatched 
perseverance that makes the quest for justice in Palestine, despite the 
innumerable odds, possible.

/Ramzy Baroud is a journalist and the Editor of The Palestine Chronicle. 
He is the author of five books. His latest is “//These Chains Will Be 
Broken/ 
<https://www.amazon.com/These-Chains-Will-Broken-Palestinian/dp/1949762092>/: 
Palestinian Stories of Struggle and Defiance in Israeli Prisons” 
(Clarity Press, Atlanta). Dr. Baroud is a Non-resident Senior Research 
Fellow at the Center for Islam and Global Affairs (CIGA), Istanbul Zaim 
University (IZU). His website is //www.ramzybaroud.net/ 
<http://www.ramzybaroud.net/>

-- 
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