Imagine that an outside government denies permission for your seriously ill son to travel to a nearby hospital. Or that occupiers of your land periodically close the road to your only medical school. Think about having the road to your house barricaded, requiring you to climb over a mound of earth to enter your home.
What if you want to visit a relative or attend a professional meeting 14km away but have to apply in writing to the outside government every time, and are usually denied the permit? Imagine having to stop once, twice, maybe three times every day going to and from work to show identification to armed soldiers.
These are actual examples of mobility restrictions that the Israeli government imposes on the 2,5-million Palestinian residents of the West Bank of occupied Palestine. One must live and travel in the West Bank, as I did the past two summers, to see how the Palestinian people suffer under these oppressive policies.
Freedom of movement is integral to a peaceful and healthy society, and its violation undermines article 13 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights: ”Everyone has the right to freedom of movement and residence.”
The inability to travel freely in their own land impedes Palestinians’ access — or denies it completely — to schools, hospitals, jobs and families and is taking a toll on the entire fabric of Palestinian society. For many, the pervasive and increasing difficulty travelling in the West Bank has become the worst part of the 41-year military occupation.
Israel restricts the mobility of Palestinians in the West Bank in essentially two ways: closure obstacles and permits.
In April this year, according to data of the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs, there were 607 checkpoints and physical obstacles throughout the West Bank. Maintained by Israeli security forces, they comprised 71 main checkpoints, 17 partial checkpoints, 84 road gates, 72 road blocks, 238 mounds of earth, 17 trenches, 75 road barriers and 33 walls of earth.
In my travels between Ramallah, Bethlehem, Hebron and Nablus, I was appalled at the sheer number of them and the hardships they imposed, especially on children and the elderly.
Another means of impeding movement is the restriction of most major highways in the West Bank to Israelis for access to their hilltop communities (settlements), displacing Palestinians to time- and fuel-consuming back roads. The worst road I travelled is called the ”Valley of Fire” by Palestinians — a steep, tortuous, unlit, two-lane road between Bethlehem and Ramallah that takes 60 to 75 minutes to negate, instead of the 20-minute drive on the direct highway reserved for Israeli settlers.
A complicated system of permits and identity cards further restricts movement. Palestinians must apply for a permit from the Israeli government to go to work, seek medical care or visit relatives in East Jerusalem.
The permit process even applies to medical emergencies. I cared for a two-day-old infant in a Ramallah hospital who required major emergency surgery available only at the Makassed Hospital in East Jerusalem, 14km away, yet the permit and transfer took five days. A friend in Bethlehem visits her sister in Jerusalem only at Christmas, if she is lucky enough to obtain a permit. Another friend tried unsuccessfully for eight months to get permission for his 65-year-old mother to come from Gaza to Ramallah for his wedding.
Israel justifies virtually every action it takes on the basis of its security, be it a road barrier, school closure or travel-permit denial. In reality, these measures help ensure that more than a quarter of a million Israelis living in 125 settlements scattered throughout the West Bank can travel freely and not encounter a single Palestinian.
Israel is entitled to protect its citizens, but the prominent Israeli human rights organisation B’Tselem states that ”Israel fails to appropriately balance its security needs while protecting the rights of the Palestinians under its control”. B’Tselem further notes that in 2007, Israeli security forces killed 373 Palestinians — 290 in Gaza and 83 in the West Bank, including 53 minors — and Palestinians killed three Israelis.
United States presidential and vice-presidential candidates have pledged their support to the government of Israel with token backing for Palestinians. Other than former president Jimmy Carter, public expression for the rights of Palestinians is rare. They have no powerful lobby in the US comparable to the American Israel Public Affairs Committee nor a dedicated civil rights group like the American Civil Liberties Union to advocate for them.
I sensed a deep feeling of hopelessness. The omnipresent movement restrictions leave Palestinians feeling like they are in a prison. They desire freedom and dignity. They are weary of a world that stereotypes them as terrorists and allows Israel to ignore numerous international calls to dismantle the settlements, open roads and withdraw from the West Bank.
Last week, strong support was given to these calls. Departing Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert spoke bluntly of Israel’s failed, decades-old defence strategies, specifically targeting the settlements, calling them ”worthless” and advocating their dismantlement. When the settlements are gone, Palestinians will at last be free to move.
Karen Longstreth is a registered nurse and a freelance writer in San Diego, California. She and her husband were volunteers in hospitals and clinics in the West Bank during the past two summers