# PALESTINIAN CHRONICLES /// Abandonned structures near Ramallah

While walking on Ramallah's hills (near Beituniya), I once catch sight of peculiar buildings on further away hills. Those buildings are actually concrete structures which have been part of an interrupted construction between the two Palestinian villages of Ein Kinya and Mazra'a al-Qibliya and close from the Israeli settlement Talmon (that you can see on my second photograph).
According to my source (thanks Dror !), it was very likely Palestinian constructions that have been stopped by the Israeli when the second Intifada (2000) started. If it is the case those abandoned structures are an architectural instant, symbol of the Israeli control over Palestinian lives.
I even found another picture of them from another point of view (see the last photograph). If anybody has some more, I would be very interested to see and publish them.

# PALESTINIAN CHRONICLES /// The Palestinian Archipelago

What I call Palestinian Archipelago is the group of "islands" within the West Bank in which since the Oslo Accords (1993) Palestinian have security and civil control (Zone A) and security control joint with the Israelis (Zone B). The rest of the area in the West Bank (Zone C) is completely under Israeli control and composes the "Mare Magnum" all around those islands. I thus worked on a map that would expresses this maritime vision of Palestine.
Feel free to click on it, the resolution is pretty high.

PS: Thanks to a reader's comment, I now know that somebody (Julien Bousac) already got this ready and made a clearer map out of it.

# PALESTINIAN CHRONICLES /// Focus on one settlement: Ma'ale Adummim

Ma'ale Adummim is an illegal Israeli settlement near the Palestinian town of Abu Dis (in the East Jerusalem's region). It is one of the largest settlement of the West Bank and hosts around 34000 settlers. The settlement like a lot of others is situated on the top of a hill in order to gain geographical and topographical advantages against the Palestinians.

# PALESTINIAN CHRONICLES /// Hebron = Hell on Earth

Hebron is a city in the Southern part of the West Bank. Its particularity is that Israeli settlers are both living around the city but also WITHIN the old city center. For example the market street (see pictures above and below) is surmounted by settlers who do not hesitate to throw rubbish or even acid and molotov cocktails on the Palestinian population underneath. Most commercial activities have been shut down by the Israeli soldiers and a whole part of the old city (including the Khalil Al-Rahman Mosque which is extremely important for the Muslims) is controlled directly by the Israeli Defense Forces.
Around the city, Israeli settlements are situated very close from the road and Palestinian villages. Even settlers' agricultural fields are fenced and surveyed by observation towers...

# PALESTINIAN CHRONICLES /// Israeli Defense Forces' checkpoints

Israeli checkpoints in the West Bank are a mean to prevent, control and filter Palestinians’ movement on their lands. They also constitute a good reaction to the political situation: when the conflict is particularly tensed, they are used as much as a “risk control” as a way to oppress Palestinians and limit or dissuade their movements.
Several types of checkpoints exist. Those that are set on the line of the Wall imply a control of every vehicle and every pedestrian (buses’ customers are requested to go off and walk), their goods, their passports, permits etc. Some other checkpoints are spread all over the West Bank (mostly at every entrance of cities) and control a more or less important amount of vehicles depending on the soldiers’ mood and orders.

# PALESTINIAN CHRONICLES /// Israeli Civilian Settlements

picture: Ma'ale Adummim (East Jerusalem's region)

ـJewish settlements within the West Bank are violating the article 49 of the Geneva Convention (see previous article). However, thinking that they simply occupy a land they do not own would be observing them in a very superficial way. In fact, they constitute a very important weapon in the Israeli strategy of oppression towards the Palestinian. All the scales and categories of building engineering are involved in this strategy; nothing is left to chance by Israeli planners, engineers and militaries.
The geographical dimension, to begin with, is studied to disturb as much as possible Palestinian life. In fact, several settlements by their location and their occupation are splitting villages from their fields or blocking exchange between the villages.
The topographical aspect of settlements are probably the most essential dimension: They occupy the top of the hills in order to maintain a constant supervision of their surroundings, benefit of the best view on what they consider to be their land by right and constitute a very visible provocation for whoever see them.
Each settlement owns a mirador that increases this hyper-vision or at least maintain the external appearance of it.
The master plan, then, imposes a strict density of settlers' houses thus allowing a defensible space to be constituted. For the same purpose, those houses are built in a quasi-fortified scheme including strong opaque walls and small windows.
The settlements finally own independent infrastructures from the Palestinian ones including roads, antennas, water and power supplies.
Settlements at night, illustrate perfectly the way they operate. The landscape around is all lighted up. You are on the road, you don't really see them but they definitely see you. The environment is entirely domesticated and controlled via a militarizated vocabulary of the land.

To go further, read Eyal Weizman and Rafi Segal's A Civilian Occupation (see previous post)

Rimmonim (Ramallah's region)

Geva Binyamin (East Jerusalem's region)

Shilo & Eli (Nablus' region)

Ma'ale Levona (Nablus' region)

Pesagot (in Ramallah)

Har Homa (in Bethlehem)

Kochav Ya'akov (Jerusalem's region near Ramallah)

Pisgat Ze'ev (East Jerusalem's region)

Ma'ale Adummim (East Jerusalem's region)

# PALESTINIAN CHRONICLES /// Duheisha refugee camp in Bethlehem

The Palestinian refugee camps which are present in most cities of the West Bank and the Gaza strip are precarious pieces of urbanism similar to slums that host the village population that was living on the territory that was given to Israel in 1948 by the United Nations. Duheisha is one of those camps in Bethlehem hosting currently around 10 000 people.
The main problem with refugee camps is that every new building, construction, renovation are ratifications of the situation and seen as a resignation to it. The architecture developed there is thus very handmade, almost accidental sometimes but creates a surprising form of beauty.

# PALESTINIAN CHRONICLES /// The other side of the wall in Abu Dis

A wall having by definition two sides (and that is what his violence is about), here is the sequel of the last article: the exact other side of the wall (you can tell with the Mosque' minaret on the two articles' fourth picture) within the West Bank in Abu Dis.
It is important here to insist on the fact that the wall is absolutely not matching with the 1949 armistice Green Line and thus split an Arab district of East Jerusalem, sharing DE FACTO its people between Israeli sub-citizens on one side and Palestinians who are not authorized (for most of them) to go to Jerusalem on the other side.

# PALESTINIAN CHRONICLES /// The Wall in East Jerusalem (written on July17th)

I am in Palestine for two weeks (based in Ramallah) and I am thinking to update boiteaoutils on a daily basis about what I am observing from there.I spent my first day in East Jerusalem which was annexed by the Israeli Army in 1967. The separation wall is then built far away from what should be the legal border between Israel and the West Bank. This wall thus splits completely an arab district into two parts. At some point of the wall, not so far away from a group of arab houses, Israeli militaries (I discovered that too late not to be spotted !) are surveying the neighborhood from what seems to be a normal house...

The principle of this wall is as much to filter, control and prevent the movement of the Palestinian population as to claim a tremendous amount of land which attempts to include in the "Israeli territory" as many illegal settlements as possible.

nb: those pictures are taken from the "Israeli side" (even though as I wrote before it is not supposed to be an Israeli area).