Qalandiya checkpint: On mental terrorism and language that reveals and conceals

At the sight of the sign fastened by plastic shackles to the entry gate of the vehicle checkpoint, I thought it said: Whoever crosses this line on foot is doomed to die.

But no, it blabbers about Palestinians being forbidden to enter Israel without a permit and that what was publicized on Facebook is ‘fake news’.

I had come to Qalandiya to hear about the ‘security’ forces’ shooting 55-year old Abed Al Hilawa, a deaf and mentally-disabled person who luckily for him was “only” wounded.

After many talks with people I found mainly suppression in a kind of numbness resulting from fear of what happened and what is likely to happen, since no one is immune against the armed personnel.

Everyone in the refugee camp and its environs knows that this place is one of bloodshed, and distance themselves from it emotionally.

So the quiet, the smiles, and sayings such as “God willing… everything is alright” are illusory, and the soft, pleasant mode of speech is but language that “reveals and conceals” in order for the speaker to survive.

And I understood that one of the ways terrorism is practiced here against the local population is of an emotional/mental kind, which is even stronger and more acidulous than physical violence, for there is no escaping it. And it is the source of the fear of saying on the phone what really takes place, for people are haunted by the knowledge that no only they are the ones listening, and that accounts would be settled.