Shepherd Accompaniment: Khalet Makhul, and Protective Presence: Hamra

Protective Presence have a daily schedule. The person responsible allots the volunteers to the places most needy that day. So today we were separated relevantly. Bosmat was with another accompanier and a shepherd from Khalet Makhul until noon. Grazing went well.

I was with another accompanier at a meeting with a lawyer of the Greek Patriarchy (church), owner of about an 11,000 dunam area in the Northern Jordan Valley. This includes parts of the shepherd communities’ area (Ein al-Hilwe, Hamam al-Maleh which has already been completely flattened, Burj, and Meita which has been completely incinerated, and others).

Following the total destruction of Hamam al-Maleh, the structures that remain after the families escaped, the local kindergarten-school everything became a pile of junk a few days ago, by grace of the bulldozer brought by the settlers, their God and the dresses.

The Patriarch’s lawyer, a Jaffa Palestinian residing in Jerusalem, said the church had been giving the entire area freely to Palestinians. Now they are rethinking what to do with the Hamam al-Maleh area and have some very interesting plans. He met the Jordan Valley Israeli army commander and demanded the army take away the fences that settlers had put in place near the Hamam for their cattle.

Then a tour of political figures arrived in the area, an event now happening daily. This time these were Omer Bar Lev and friends who stood near the rubble of the school and nodded sadly at everything they saw. We had them meet the lawyer. Ohad Hamo (famous journalist) also came today. Please expect stories on TV channels 12 and 13 videoed lately…

From there I continued with Bosmat to Protective Presence at Hamra. This is actually a shepherd community living east of the Palestinian village Shibli, alongside the road going from the Jordan Valley up to Nablus. The families there have been threatened ever since settler Moshe Sharvit settled his estate there several years ago. In 2022 we were there for months, until Moshe managed to chase away the family that suffered so terribly. The community in Hamra has been suffering too, but their presence there is very well based.

It is a magnificent community, and unlike other communities, clean as if it were Switzerland… White-clad tents with bamboo walls, concrete bases, stones lining the cloth to prevent outside disturbances. As we got there, two Sharvit boys were there with four of their cows at the entrance, and a stream of sewage along the road where the cows were hanging out. The boys, 14-15 years old, sat and we looked at each other at a distance of about 30 meters. After half an hour we went up to F.’s place and watched the goings on from there. After another hour, the boys went back to their outpost. Chances are they would be back in the evening.

According to F., Sharvit comes there every day and night. He makes much noise with a megaphone or another instrument that makes noise at night. This scares both children and adults. He can also enter the house. Not long ago he entered and harmed the kitchen.
In addition, for years he does not enable the sheep to graze. This means unbearable lives for the locals and their flocks that cannot even walk in grazing grounds, needing this walk almost as much as they need the food itself.

We found time to spend with the children (cannot do without this) while their mother underwent a Shiatzu treatment for her back pains.

The night shift replaced us at 3 p.m.