This Friday demonstration in Bil'in was marking the 29-11-1947 the United Nation decision to partition the British mandate of Palestine into two states - one for the Palestinians and one for the Jews... This decision supplied Israel state that was built at 15-5-1948 the "justification" and the formal "legality". This decision enabled the the Zionist establishment to build the Israeli state, annex half of the area allocated to the Palestinian state (by secret agreement with the Jordanian rulers who were still under the British hegemony, who got the other half of the area allocated to the Palestinian state) and to expel/transfer hundreds of thousands of Palestinians from their land.
The creative art of this week was a long banner on which were drawn four maps of the region west of the Jordan river. The first one was the map of the British mandate of Palestine - after it was separated from the East of the Jordan part at 1922. The second was the 1947 map of the United Nation division of Palestine between the Palestinians and the Zionist-Jews state to be, that devoured half of Palestine. (In that area were living about 600 thousands Jews and nearly the same number of Palestinians - the overwhelming majority of them were transferred during the 1948 war.)
The third map was of the 1948-1967 borders which included in the Israeli state both the half allocated to it by the UN and additional half from what was allocated to the Palestinians, but was deviled between Israel and Jordan. Thus, living for the Palestinians only 25% of the land.
(Palestinians who were residents of the additional areas to be annexed to Israel by the pre war secret agreement, but were not conquered by it during the fake war with Jordan, were transferred to it after the war, on condition Israel will not expel the Palestinians living in them like it did to most Palestinians in the areas allocated to it by the UN and the areas conquered by it during the "independent war" of 1948 - the Palestinian Nakba.) The fourth map was of the the border of the Palestinian authority - the "A" areas which consists of half of the areas west of the Jordan held by the Jordanians before the 1967 war - 12.5% of the area west of the Jordan.
After this map there was drawn a big question mark.... In addition to the big banner we prepared placards in Arabic, Hebrew, and English to accompany the big banner.
At noon - after the prayer at the mosque ended, we started the demonstration, as usual, with a march on the road leading to the route of the separation fence building. The big banner and the placards were as usual at the front of the march. Participated in it 100 Palestinians, 20 internationals and about 30 Israelis of the Anarchists Against The Wall initiative and others of the anti separation fence coalition. (The relatively small number of Israeli participants was because a similar number of our activists participated the same time in a similar demonstration against the separation fence at the village Abud - the Israeli state forces harassment of Israeli activists coming to Bil'in succeeded only to cause 5 comrades to come 20 minutes after the demo started...)
The march to the fence was as usual - chanting and singing along the road leading to the fence, but just before reaching it we turned to the side and in a swift move through the olive orchards to a location where heavy tractors were working on the fence route. This surprise move enabled us to arrive just near the route and with gradual pressure to even spill into it. This Friday we did not try to stop the work of the tractors, but when they wanted to travel the route towards their parking lot, we did not clear the way and they had to wait till we finished the demonstration there. This Friday - not like that of two weeks before, the state force did not try to disperse us by force and tear gas to clear the way for the tractors. The regional commander who was present just instructed them to wait till the demo end. It seems that the first TV channel brief report of two weeks ago and the detailed report to be on it this Friday, which was not sympathetic to the state forces caused the change of mind.
After a while, when the sweet taste of the small victory lost its luster we decided to move to the near by location where the fence was already built. The swift move surprised the state forces again, and few of us reached the fence route the army insist so much to prevent us. The noise of stone knocking on the metal structure protecting the fence was heard far and wide - another small moral buster for us. We could see how the rushing soldiers were making efforts to take away from the fence one of our comrades who insisted to touch it. Later, the repeating of knocking on the metal structure resulted in a detention for an hour of a comrade - released after the demo ended. In spite of threats of arrests, the bad PR the state forces get for their behavior in the Bil'in Friday demonstrations make them much more cautious in their treatment of the nonviolent demonstrations.
After a two and a half hours demo - instead of the one hour long originally planed, we returned to the village a bit weary but satisfied.
And as usual, in parallel to our non violent demonstration there was the the attrition war between the stone throwing youngsters and the tear gas shooting soldiers in the olive orchards not far from the demo. It seems that even in this endeavor the state forces were much less belligerent.
On our way to the village we met stone throwers from another village who came to join the struggle, who were too on their way home.
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