Coverage by BBSNews

BBSNews - 2003-04-27 -- West Bank, Mas’ha - As of just a few minutes ago, 50-60 sticks of dynamite were in place 25 meters from the tents at Mas Ha. There are currently approximately 17 people at the camp including human rights activists from the International Solidarity Movement (ISM), International Womens Peace Service (IWPS), local Palestinians, Israeli peace activists, and two reporters from Voice of America.

The plan for the camp and the residents right now is to flatten the tents and put the mattress pads on top to keep the tent from being torn apart by the blast. The civilians there will gather their things and move out of range of the blast.

The Peace Camp at Mas Ha was erected several weeks ago as a means of educating media and locals about the "security wall", otherwise known as the "apartheid wall"; what it means, its true intent and the devastating effects of the "wall" on the Palestinian people on either side of its path. It was a way of opening dialogue and bringing all people together in solidarity to learn about the wall.

The Israeli government justifies the building of the wall as a means of securing its people from the threat of Palestinian terrorism. If this were the case the logical place to erect it would be along the Green Line separating Israel from the Occupied West Bank. Instead the wall is being built well inside the West Bank in what is clearly an attempt to grab as much Palestinian land as possible for Jewish settlements.

“Walls are not the way to bring peace,” said Jonathan Pollack, an Israeli activist. “In this camp we will show that Israelis, Palestinians and people from many countries can live and work together when we work for justice.”

The Palestinians, Israelis and international activists (from Sweden, France, Switzerland, Germany, the United States, the United Kingdom, Italy, South Africa, Austria, Japan and Canada) have maintained the camp and continued to educate, work together, live together and peacefully oppose the construction of the wall ever since. Were the wall to proceed as planned, it would cut off Mas’ha’s access to 97% of its farmland, greenhouses and olive groves, which provide the livelihood of its 2,000 inhabitants.

Mas’ha lies seven kilometers to the east of the Green Line separating Israel from the Occupied West Bank.

The preceding report was provided to BBSNews by the International Solidarity Movement.

Michael Hess is the Editor of BBSNews in Charlotte, NC. Write to the editor here. Not all submissions are published. Or visit the completely new BBSNews Blog and Forum on our front page - Please Participate in BBSNews!