Ramallah reaction to Israeli air strikes on Gaza

I have photos here of yesterday’s response in Ramallah to the Gaza airstrikes:
Flickr Feed

Within a few hours of unprecedented Israeli air strikes that killed more than 220 Palestinians in the Gaza Strip on Saturday, hundreds of Palestinians waving flags of the various factions gathered at Ramallah’s central Manara circle in the West Bank. Separated from their impoverished and overcrowded fellow Palestinians in Gaza, the Ramallah crowd chanted for unification and solidarity.

Somewhere between 100-200 people then marched past the Muqata’a headquarters of the Fateh-run Palestinian Authority and then onward to the nearby Israeli checkpoint. Youth lit tires aflame in thick black smoke until three Israeli jeeps came down and fired off sound bombs. They only got so far as throwing rocks at the Jeeps before Palestinian riot police showed up and beat back the protesters in hopes of not provoking escalations.

Pictures here

Britain’s New Statesman Mag on the good life in Ramallah

British socialist current affairs mag the New Statesman has a beautiful, vivid description of how the normalcy of daily life in Ramallah defies the struggles, poverty, conflict and occupation that surround the city in the West Bank. It’s one of those things I see from time to time and think, “man, I wish I wrote that!”

(I have an issue with the headline though — Ramallah is no “secret” oasis, it’s well known to be an international destination full of life, culture and social opportunities).

Palestine’s secret oasis
Zoe Flood
Published 04 December 2008
Surrounded by conflict, the West Bank city of Ramallah is undergoing a quiet renaissance

As the sun rises between the hills and disperses low-hanging mist, Ramallah wakes up to a normal, urban life. Vegetable shops roll out their shining, fleshy wares. The exhausts of the city’s orange taxis shake off the chill of night. And although, unlike most other cities, Ramallah has been many decades under occupation, this, for its inhabitants, is just another day.

Despite its violent and difficult past and its uncertain present, Ramallah has an air of normality that is striking. So, too, does the stark, arid land that falls away from its hilltop perch, rising again to where its urban twin, al-Bireh, meets the university town of Birzeit. It is hard to imagine Israeli tanks growling along these vibrant streets, as they did during Operation Defensive Shield in 2002. Or pitched battles being fought near the lush municipal park, complete with faded playground equipment.

The comparative calm of recent years has allowed this city of some 30,000 people, at the heart of a much larger governorate of 280,000, to experience something of a quiet renaissance. While the World Bank this year put unemployment across the West Bank at 19 per cent, Ramallah, as the seat of the Palestinian Authority (PA), has become a centre of relative affluence.

“You can’t feel the conflict here so much,” said a friend who works for a local Palestinian NGO. “In Bethlehem, the wall cuts right through the town. In Hebron, there are the settlers [many with a reputation for attacking both the Israeli security forces and Palestinian civilians]. In Nablus, the tension is palpable.”

Biggest Muslim holiday, Eid al Adha, comes to Ramallah

For a look at Eid in Ramallah in photos and video, see my Flickr feed here.

With as much or more fanfare as Christmas in the US, Eid al Adha has been in the air in Ramallah for the past week. Islam’s biggest holiday, Eid al Adha, or feast of the sacrifice, commemorates the Biblical and Quranic story of Abraham taking his son to the mountain to sacrifice him as a test from God, before God replaces his son with a sheep at the last moment.

The week before the Eid is the time Muslim pilgrims make the Hajj to Mecca in Saudi Arabia as the Prophet Mohammad did at the dawn of the religion — one of the five pillars of Islam. Today is Eid, marking the end of the Hajj pilgrimage and a holy day off for the whole Muslim world. The other Muslim holy day, (Eid al Fitr, or breaking fast) comes at the end of the month of Ramadan, during which Muslims fast from sunrise to sunset.

It’s a festive time of wonderful traditions. All week, Ramallah has been bustling, packed with shoppers from the surrounding villages. The streets around the Manara circle (the town square, basically) have been blocked off to cars and instead filled with street vendors peddling everything from fruit to socks to incense (and lots and lots of colorful helium balloons for the kiddies) and families toting bags from the hundreds of boutiques that make up the West Bank’s commercial center.

At times like these, there is no doubt that Ramallah is indeed the financial and cultural capital of Palestine. It also presents a beautiful image of Palestinians, who are too often maligned in photos and videos only depicting them as masked gunmen or Muslim extremists. Here, in Ramallah on Eid, is a far truer picture of Palestinians: a spirited, social and hospitable nation who cherish the threads of shared traditions and cultures of their land.

Muslim, Christian, Palestinian or visitor — everyone feels and shares in the traditions of Eid here to some extent. Keep reading for a description of Eid day.

Israeli troops drag away 200 illegal settlers in Hebron; Settlers attack Palestinians

New York Times
December 5, 2008
Israeli Troops Drag Jewish Settlers From Hebron Building
By ETHAN BRONNER

HEBRON, West Bank — Israeli troops forcibly evicted about 200 hard-line Jewish settlers from a contested building in this volatile biblical city on Thursday, the first serious clash in what seems to be a spiraling confrontation between the government and defiant settlers.

The operation, carried out by 600 soldiers and policemen with stealth and efficiency, took half an hour with just two dozen relatively light injuries. But events did not end there. Young settlers then rampaged through Palestinian fields and neighborhoods, setting olive trees ablaze and trashing houses.

(article continues with link below video)

Turkish Bath in Ramallah/Al-Bireh

Attention weary tourists, travelers and Palestinian workers alike; those in need of pampering, take note: there’s an inexpensive two-hour experience to be had in Ramallah that includes a massage, a full-body traditional loofah scrub, steam room, pool and hot stone relaxing at the Turkish Bath in the twin city of Al-Bireh.

The bath offers exclusively single-sex schedules and is priced by services: entrance includes using the steam room, hot stone room, pool and traditional turkish bath for 50NIS (about $12); add a and soap massage scrub to that and it’s 70NIS, and with a back massage it’s 80NIS (about $20) — the full package, including all of the above and a full body massage is 110NIS (about $35). The full package can be done in an hour and a half, but to really relax and enjoy the full spa experience, give yourself two hours onward.

The bath asks that you make reservations before you arrive, but two of us were graciously accommodated when (not knowing this), we showed up without.

Click below for the Turkish Bath’s schedule and more about the experience.