Qalandiya - the army destroyed again the fruit stand

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Observers: 
Tamar Fleishman; Translator: Tal H.
Jun-14-2020
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Afternoon
ארגזי פירות בצד ההריסות

One week after the Israeli army destroyed yet again Abdallah Tamimi’s fruit stand, I came to him as one paying a condolence visit. I came to Abdallah to tell him, wordlessly, how sorry I am about what had happened. I came to Abdallah to hear him, not to ask questions.

Abdallah said it was on a Thursday that they (the soldiers) came to the stand and handed his father a paper that said that in one week’s time they would destroy the stand. Why? Because it disturbs traffic.

And they (the soldiers) did come, but not in a week’s time. They 3 days later and destroyed.

The financial damage is estimated at 6000-7000 NIS.

Now Abdallah sits by his fruit crates next to the rubble.

He has a wife and three children at home and needs to feed them, so one works in what one is used to and knows. Abdallah is not the only person whose source of livelihood they (the soldiers) destroyed. There were others like him, there are others like him, and as long as reality is that of the subjugation by a ruler of the ruled, devoid of any rights – there will be others.

I focus on Abdallah because our friendship goes way back.

Like others, he will be back, rebuilding what has been destroyed, for he has no other option.

It’s not ideology, it’s the survival instinct.

***

On my way I was told that inside, in the DCO, a woman with her babyinfo-icon is waiting for a permit to get back home, to Gaza. After nearly 2 hours, on my way back, again I met the man who told me this. There were two women with him – one in her forties and her daughter in her twenties, back from hospitalization in Hebron. They were waiting for the woman with the baby inside. A taxi driver was hired to drive all four, and he was inside too, in the DCO, wanting to help, and translate into Israeli-Hebrew the urgent need of the mother and baby of their permit.

I sat and waited with the two women, the mother and daughter. We waited for a long time for the woman and baby and driver, until they came out.

In between, I was told that ever since Abu Mazen announced freezing all coordination with Israel, hardly any patients cross from Gaza to the West Bank. Everyone fends for themselves. Whoever enters the Gaza Strip needs to spend three weeks in quarantine. There are Corona-virus patients in the Strip, but not many, and these are people who returned there from Egypt through the Rafah crossing.