A group of students from Bethlehem University are chanting a slogan song:
Netanyahu, son of who?
Collaborator with the CIA!
Netanyahu, you b*st*rd,
Take your dogs and go from here!
The door of Al-Aqsa is made of iron
No one can open it except the martyrs
The door of Al-Aqsa is made of steel
No one can open it except the children
Al-Aqsa, the mosque in the heart of the Old City of Jerusalem is a symbol of the Palestinian claim to the city. In many ways, Abu Ghnaim touches on so many sensitive issues for Palestinians: the presence of settlers in Palestinian areas, their capital Jerusalem, the confiscation of yet more land, the threatening of religious sites, and the livelihood of the Palestinians living around the hill.
I go over to where the students are chanting to try and get a clear picture but the media is swarming like dogs over raw meat. Maybe I got one, maybe I didn't, I think. Whatever, the flags in the wind are beautiful.
The students don't want to stop when the demonstration is declared over. There is movement towards the Israelis, who remain unconcerned and calm. It becomes obvious why. On cue, a group of around 30 Palestinians with matching white and green hats that I had noticed earlier, get in between the students and soldiers.
It becomes clear that they are working for the Palestinian Authority to keep trouble away from the Israelis, although the unofficial 'uniform' makes it obvious that Israel has tied a few conditions to this. The presence of Palestinians wearing uniforms in any photos of this demonstration would make it appear as if Israel was confiscating land near a Palestinian autonomous area. Which of course it is. There's nothing like a little reminder of who is in control of how the world perceives this 'peace' process.
I guess the Palestinians in the hats are from the Amin al-Waqaa'i ("Preventative Security") and pose the question to Kifah, who has just returned from wandering around and photographing. He asks someone. They are, along with others from the Palestinian side of the district Israeli-Palestinian liaison office.
The small scuffle between the soldiers and students arouses the journalists like a lover's touch. In the photo above, count the number of cameras in between the Palestinians and Israelis. The journalists are almost doing the Israelis' jobs for them. This kind of media craziness is so common here that you ponder sometimes that if there were just a few hundred more journalists at each of these things, then peace would reign in the Middle East.
One older man is running around shouting angrily at the students that "it's finished" and is "time for them to go home". The students are a little dissatisfied with this conclusion as they are a little angry themselves. I hear someone call him 'Abu Hassan'. I ask a passing Birzeit student who this is.
"Salah Tamari", I am told, "from the Legislative Council, a former PLO military commander in Lebanon." I feel a little sick that the Authority, in clear coordination with the Israelis, is defining the limits of a pretty quiet protest, in light of the popular anger. Salah Tamari - used by John Le Carré in The Little Drummer Girl as the model for the PLO commander in the book, is a popular figure in Palestinian society as he rejects the big house-big car trappings of the Legislative Council. I wonder how long his popularity will last if things like this carry on? Everyone knows that polite protest isn't something the Israelis generally respond to.
Eventually the student council president at Bethlehem announces that it is indeed over, assuring the students that leaving does not mean that the struggle for their legitimate rights and those of the Palestinians here is over. I start to notice a few Birzeit students in the crowd. Some of them are losing family lands because of this settlement.
We all go home. As usual the story is never quite over.