Dec. 11-15: Local Organizer Gets Tuba Kids to School around Settler Blockade, and Other Updates

Tuba is in east-central Massafer Yatta. A-Tuwani and its school are to its northwest, near the main road; and Khalet a-Dabe’ to its southwest, near the bottom of this map inset. A larger map of Massafer Yatta can be found here. To see the broader surroundings, go to B’Tselem’s interactive map and zoom towards the very south of the West Bank.

Dear friends,

I did not write this week. Ya’ir wrote about Khalat A-Dab a’, and that is already enough for a whole month… But naturally that is not how this works. Things keep happening on the ground the whole time. Past continues into present that continues into what in all probability appears to be tomorrow.  

• On Monday, December 11, 2023, A. went forth from Emneizal (in the far southwest of Massafer Yatta) to plow his own land with his donkey and plow. Uniformed, armed settlers forced him out of his field, and with blows and threats forced him to walk by his donkey to the checkpoint nearest the village (about 2.5 kilometers). There they robbed him of his plow ,and after some hours left him.
• That day, in the same village, S.’s tractor was taken.
• Two days later, settlers punctured the two water tanks belonging to I. of Wadi Jeh’eish (1km north of Emneizal).
• That very same day, settlers from around Avigail finally finished off the remains of M.’s car in Umm Barid, which they had already vandalized about a month ago, when they destroyed his home and field three times over. Today’s destruction was done while we were visiting the family at its temporary residence in the neighboring village of Sha’ab Al Butum.
• On Tuesday we visited Tuba, sitting in the beautiful cave of U. and his family. Even long before the current war, Tuba farmers suffered harassment from their neighbors of Havat Ma’on. Now during the war, this harassment has crossed all red lines. “Yesterday, as I began to plow my field next to my home”, U. says, “colonists came and told me I couldn’t plow my field now because there’s a war going on.” With his touching innocence, he tells us: “I didn’t understand what one thing had to do with the other, but there was no one to talk to. They were armed and threatening, and they entered my house as if it were theirs. They also humiliate us. They said to my nephew: ‘You will plow and sow, and our sheep will graze in your field.’ That’s what they said, and that’s what they do. They bring their flocks to our fields and we have nothing left for our own flocks.” He speaks with the deep pain of one who is desperate, but has no intention of giving up his life there. This is such a destructive combination, I think, and I have no solace to offer. I can only contain the pain, frustration and desperation, and promise to distribute this far and wide, and continue coming to visit.

We then visited another family in this small village. A large family, most of whose children and grandchildren go to school. There we heard a more hopeful update for a change:

Tuba children attend school at a-Tuwani, a larger village about a 15-minute walk away. Ever since Havat Ma’on settled between Tuba and a-Tuwani in 1997, the children could no longer take the shorter route because of settler violence, and must take a roundabout route, two hours there and two hours back. In 2004, after great efforts by human rights and peace organizations active on the ground, government echelons decided that the children would be accompanied by an army jeep with soldiers. For 19 years, Tuba children – some of them already parents of the present children – had taken the shorter route accompanied by the Israeli army.

As soon as war broke out, this has stopped, but so have studies at the school. Ten days ago school finally resumed, but the soldiers have yet to return. The children from A-Tuwani go to school, but the children from Tuba and neighboring Mughayir al-Abeed cannot get there. All routes are dangerous. They are all threatened by the vandals, who now dress themselves up in uniform as if they were soldiers. The educational gap keeps growing. For two months now the children have studied online, while exposed to the frequent violent settler attacks on their villages. Now, when they can finally resume their frontal studies at school – a basic right to which any child is entitled – the children of Tuba and Maghayir al-Abid are denied it.

As soon as we parked the car, I already saw 14-year-old S. running to me with her priceless smile. She was followed by the rest of the family’s children, all happy as can be. “We were in school today!”, S. answers the question I didn’t even have time to ask. The light in her eyes drove away at once all the suffering, the humiliation, beatings and frustrations, reducing the desperation and empowering even the parents and grandparents who gathered there.

“How did you get there?” I asked, after we hugged excitedly. “A. took us in a car” the chorus answered. A. from Tuba finished this school seven years ago, graduated University and came back to the village to become a peace activist. He wouldn’t accept Tuba children not studying. So, he saw to it that they got to school. He crowded them into his car which has four seats, and drove them from Tuba to the main road. Three kilometers of a potholed track which are difficult even under normal circumstances. Whoever never saw this track winding from the village to the road, could hardly grasp such difficulty.

From the asphalt road it is still another nine kilometers to a-Tuwani. A. organized the pickup from there onwards, in two other human rights activists’ cars, to bring them to school. It’s an expensive solution (fuel and other car costs) and its coordination is complicated and never a sure thing. It all depends on what happens on the ground on a given day, to say nothing of too many children in a car meant for four (plus the driver) on the harsh route from Tuba to the main road. A. has been trying to make contact with the DCO (official coordination office between the IDF and the Palestinian Authority) in order to bring back the army’s accompaniment. In the meantime, no results. So many obstacles on the way to education…

Even these obstacles are softened by the children’s joy. I was privileged to witness it.

Erella, on behalf of the Village Group [translated by Tal Haran and Assaf Oron]