A visit to Ni'lin

We met with our old friend M.A. who is a teacher and a social activist, who has made us meet young people (minors) who had been detained. It’s the occupation routine, the army deploys in the middle of the night, threatens the members of the house and looks for wanted persons. The wanted person is a 17 years old boy. They threaten him that they will search the bodies of his mother and his sister if he won’t give them his mobile phone, then the telephone and the boy are detained. The elder brother is also detained. The accusations are usually stone throwing or participation in demonstrations. Another boy went to buy bread, there was a demonstration in the village against the transfer of the American embassy to Jerusalem. The demonstrators fled when the police arrived but caught the 15 year old boy who tried to explain that he only was on his way to buy bread in the village bakery. They found a slingshot on his body, which the boy denies (the fables have turned, Goliath has the upper hand over David).  The boy was imprisoned for four months, the parents paid a find of 4000 Shekel and he was released. The occupation army does not return from a demonstration empty handed. M.A. told us that once the demonstrators fled and the soldiers arrested the village drunk with a bottle of booze in his hand.

We found the village in a building momentum. The Palestinian authority builds roads. M.A. says that they promised that the work will be finished in 4 months. In the meantime bulldozers pave and asphalt, the commerce tumult takes place on the two sides of the road and there is a lively traffic of earth carrying trucks on the side roads.

The students are in a period of semester exams. Shortly they will go on holiday.

The demonstration routine on Fridays continues.