SHEIKH JARRAH

SHEIKH JARRAH

Today I should have been at Billin or Nillin but because of conditions I signed and also the loss of three thousand shekels as a bond I could not go.  Instead I went to the weekly demonstration in Sheikh Jarrah.  It is also held every Friday.  We marched by all the houses that the Settlers have taken over by force and my heart breaks at the Palestinians stories.
I know the 2 Johns in the stall will be upset and also Mary to hear that the last house that had been taken over when they were there last, the one across the street has also been taken forcibly leaving the Palestinian family of 10 homeless.    I say this to them as they slept in the Palestinians courtyard a few years ago to try and protect them.
We were shown photos of the last eviction and we were standing outside and a young group of settlers were making faces and taunting the Palestinians about the theft of their house and how it belonged to Israel now and the Palestinians would no longer be allowed to live in Jerusalem.   They then went into the house and you could hear things being thrown about and destroyed and people laughing inside.   It is heartbreaking as an individual to even comprehend what it must feel like to be taken forcibly from your home at night and people moving in.  People who do not even make their home there but just stay for a short while and then others move in.
I had tears in my eyes when they showed me also a photograph of their 3 year old daughter, I have a granddaughter of 2 and I cannot imagine what it must feel like to witness.   It showed you a photo of Settlers approx 20 years old pushing a 3 year old girl of a swing and a settler sitting on the swing laughing and the girl lying on the ground crying.  What human being could do that?    I am sorry, for a split second I called them human beings.
The Israeli Police were taking photos at the demonstration so who cares, I have nothing to lose now.    How can they keep my three thousand shekels when apparently according to the Minster of Interior I am allowed in Israel?    After all that is why they take the Palestinian homes because they claim it as Israel.  So I have done nothing wrong.   He never said anything about not going to demonstrations, likely an oversight on his part.  TOUGH.