❶ Israel poised to raze Bedouin village so Jews can take land

Background from Law & Social Inquiry

. . . ❶ ― (ᴀ) Israeli forces demolishes Palestinian structures across West Bank, assault locals
. . . ❶ ― (ᴃ) Israeli occupation demolishes restaurant, pottery workshop in Nablus, residencies in Hebron
. . . ❶ ― (ᴄ) Israeli forces demolish water pipelines under construction in northern West Bank
❷ Council: Palestinians in need of 30,000 housing units in Jerusalem
❸ POETRY by Yousef El Qedra
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❶ ISRAEL  POISED  TO  RAZE  BEDOUIN  VILLAGE  SO  JEWS  CAN  TAKE  LAND
The Electronic Intifada
Charlotte Silver
Aug. 8 2016
Israeli bulldozers are poised to raze the Bedouin village Umm al-Hiran in the Naqab (Negev) region in the south of the country.
___On 31 July, bulldozers began ploughing a trench around the village, encircling those homes Israel intends to demolish to make way for a Jewish community.
___The village lost its 13-year legal battle in May 2015, when a three-judge panel on Israel’s high court ruled that the government was authorized to demolish the village and displace its residents  [. . . .]
___Like about 40 other Bedouin villages home to 70,000 people in the Naqab, Umm al-Hiran is not recognized by Israeli authorities, leaving its 1,000 residents, who are Israeli citizens, without basic services or rights.     MORE . . .         RELATED. . .

From: Braverman, Irus. “Powers Of Illegality: House Demolitions And Resistance In East Jerusalem.” Law & Social Inquiry 32.2 (2007): 333-372

. . . . while Foucault’s analysis [of the spectacle of a public execution in DISCIPLINE AND PUNISH, 1979] depicts brutality as inflicted upon the human body, in the demolition instance this brutality is imposed upon the nonhuman body of the house. Significant as it may seem, this distinction between human and nonhuman bodies is rendered irrelevant by most of the Palestinian informants. The Palestinian community planner, for example, claimed that “a person whose house has been demolished, I don’t see any difference between him and a person whose only child is killed,” and a Palestinian defense lawyer told me: “to demolish a man’s house is to tear his heart into little pieces . . . the demolition is an . . . extremely inhuman act.”
___Clearly, most Palestinian informants not only themselves relate to their house as interchangeable with their body but also believe that Israel relates to it in a similar way. Accordingly, this is how a Palestinian Jerusalemite that has worked as a planner in the Jerusalem municipality for over thirty years described the situation: “they twist our hand behind our back until they hear a cry of pain: [then] the municipal officials smile with pleasure, and twist our hand even tighter in order to produce a louder cry. They take pleasure in the Palestinian pain more than in anything else.”
___But while the identification of the Palestinian body with the body of her house may establish one cause for its demolition, another explanation is also possible. Such an alternative explanation is provided by a Jewish Israeli defense lawyer who has been representing Palestinians from East Jerusalem for over twenty years. The lawyer suggests that the official Israeli discourse regards the Palestinians as “airplanes that are not even detected by the Israeli radar,” namely as invisible to Israeli administrators. Rather than choosing between these two seemingly conflicting interpretations, it is important to see their simultaneous existence: while the first interpretation embodies the Palestinian in this space by rendering her body opaque, the second interpretation disembodies her, making for a transparent Palestinian body.
___Instead of undermining each other, the bifurcated dialectic between these two bodily interpretations provides for their reciprocal reinforcement.

. . . ❶ ― (ᴀ) ISRAELI  FORCES  DEMOLISHES  PALESTINIAN  STRUCTURES  ACROSS  WEST  BANK,  ASSAULT  LOCALS
Ma’an News Agency
Aug. 9, 2016
Israeli authorities carried out multiple demolitions across the occupied West Bank on Tuesday morning, including residential structures funded by the European Union, in the midst of an unprecedented campaign targeting Palestinian homes, business, and agricultural structures under the pretext of lacking building permits which are nearly impossible to obtain.
___The demolitions — which included two business in Sabastiya, five homes in Umm al-Kheir, and two homes in al-Jiftlik — were immediately denounced by Prime Minister Rami Hamdallah in a statement released on Tuesday.
___“Israel is relentlessly destroying Palestinians’ homes and livelihoods in order to make way for more illegal settlements,” Hamdallah said.     MORE . . .

. . . ❶ ― (ᴃ) ISRAELI  OCCUPATION  DEMOLISHES  RESTAURANT,  POTTERY  WORKSHOP  IN  NABLUS,  RESIDENCES  IN  HEBRON
Alray Palestine Media Agency
Aug. 9, 2016
The Israeli occupation forces demolished on Tuesday a restaurant and a pottery workshop in the village of Sebastia, north of Nablus, as well as residential structures in the village of Um al-Kheir near Hebron, local sources reported.
___Mayor of Sebastia municipality said that Israeli forces broke into the village and demolished a restaurant and a pottery workshop, both owned by two local Palestinian villagers, under the pretext of construction without permission.     MORE . . .
. . . ❶ ― (ᴄ) ISRAELI  FORCES  DEMOLISH  WATER  PIPELINES  UNDER  CONSTRUCTION  IN  NORTHERN  WEST  BANK
Ma’an News Agency
Aug. 8, 2016
Israeli forces reportedly destroyed large portions of a water pipeline under construction in the northern occupied West Bank district of Tubas on Monday.
___Arif Daraghmah, the head of the village council in the Jordan Valley and neighboring Bedouin communities, told Ma’an that Israeli forces accompanied by military vehicles and two bulldozers began the demolition process early on Monday morning on the pipeline, which he said targeted a pipeline funded by NGO Action Against Hunger that had been under construction for the past four months in order to provide water to residents of the area.
___Daraghmah added that the Israeli forces completely destroyed the four-kilometer water pipeline between the town of Tubas and the village of Yarza, and also destroyed and seized large parts of the nine-kilometer pipeline connecting Yarza to the village of al-Malih.
___He said Israeli forces were carrying out these demolitions in order to pressure Palestinian residents into leaving the area.     MORE . . .

❷ COUNCIL:  PALESTINIANS  IN  NEED  OF  30,000  HOUSING  UNITS  IN  JERUSALEM
Al-Hourriah
Aug. 8, 2016
Jerusalem will be in need of 30,000 housing units, the Palestinian Housing Council said Monday.
___The council’s technical director in the occupied West Bank, Zuheir Ali, said, at a workshop held in al-Bireh under the title “Housing in Occupied Jerusalem: Facts and Challenges,” that the Palestinians have been facing difficulties in constructing new homes on at least 13% of east Jerusalem lands.
___Ali added that Israeli restrictive measures resulted in a sharp housing crisis and that Occupied Jerusalem is in need of 30,000 housing units, to the tune of around three billion dollars, until 2020.     MORE . . .  

“I  HAVE  NO  HOME,”  BY  YOUSEF  EL  QEDRA

I saw clouds running away from the hurt.
I have no language.
Its weight is lighter than a feather.
The quill does not write.
The ink of the spirit burns on the shore of meaning.
The clouds are tears, filled with escape and lacking definition.
A cloud realizes the beauty she forms—
beauty which contains all good things,
for whom trees, gardens, and tired young women wait.

I have no home.
I have a night overripe with sweats caused by numbness all over.
Time has grown up on its own without me.
In my dream, I asked him what he looks like.
My small defeats answered me.
So I asked him again, What did he mean?
Then I found myself suspended in nothingness,
Stretched like a string that doesn’t belong to an instrument.
The wind played me. So did irresistible gravity.
I was a run of lost notes that have a sad, strong desire to live.
―Translated by Yasmin Snounu and Edward Morin

Yousef El Qedra is a young poet and playwright living in Gaza. He has his BA degree in Arabic Literature from Azhar University, Gaza. Since 2006 he has worked as a project coordinator of theater and youth groups for the Cultural Free Thought Association in Gaza City. He has written several books and plays and published four volumes of poetry, translated into French and Spanish.
From BEFORE  THERE  IS  NOWHERE  TO  STAND:  PALESTINE  ISRAEL  POETS  RESPOND  TO  THE  STRUGGLE.  Ed. By Joan Dobbie and Grace Beeler. Sandpoint ID: Lost
Horse Press, 2012. Available from Amazon.

Demolitions in Umm al-Kheir on Aug. 8, 2016 (Photo: Ma’an News Agency)