Photo: Via Wikimedia Commons.
Same difference: Ruth Hawthorn tells the story of two raids
‘This isn’t just a story about a raid. It is a story of injustice.’
‘We are very conscious that many others are much worse affected than us, and we must ensure that we use our experience on their behalf too.’
Caroline Nursey, clerk to Westminster Meeting, following the police raid on the premises.
We only met Amjad in February, but he affected us deeply from the start. He came to us through a local scheme in Camden which hosts small groups of community workers who are visiting from Palestine’s West Bank. They stay for around ten days – a few days in London, before dispersing to visit other groups around the country. We had offered our spare room for one of the group.
Amjad arrived with a suitcase the size of a trunk, and an impressive range of additional bags and backpacks. Nearly every conversation he had with us was interspersed by calls from home: his work is with young people and women in the Askar refugee camp near Nablus. He was busy arranging activities and support groups, helping individuals, and raising funds. He is currently raising money to establish a medical clinic near to the Askar camp, to provide first aid for the victims of the frequent raids from (or on behalf of) nearby settler villages – there are preventable deaths following these as the nearby hospital is an hour away.
Amjad is in his fifties. He grew up in the camp, but his parents had lived in Jaffa before 1948. He is portly and avuncular, multilingual, a non-stop talker, friendly with everyone, and an expert user of social media, which he uses to explain and promote his commitment to peace, respect, and self-belief. His wife and children live with him and his elderly parents are nearby; the extended family is all around him. His passion is to help the children in the camp to grow up believing in themselves, and in the possibility of a peaceful community and future, in spite of the challenges in their daily experience.
‘What’s in the case?’ we asked, and he opened it on our kitchen counter. It was filled (over-filled!) with artwork from the Nablus children, destined for an art show in Sheffield, which was set up to raise awareness of their situation, and to give examples of their lives: what they care about, what they like to do, and what they’d like to become. The materials were soon spread around the kitchen and living room – children’s paintings and drawings, mostly watercolour and pencil, and thoughtful and poignant: a lot of doves, and many girls in hijabs, singly or in groups, or dabke dancing. Amjad knew all of them, and everyone here, too, in London and in Sheffield, and was always gentle, with time for everyone.
We heard of the darker side of the children’s lives, with the tragedies that we know from our own press. How can he live like this and continue to do the work he is doing? ‘This is our life,’ he said. When we said goodbye it was as if a whole community was leaving the house.
That was a couple of months ago. His week in the UK had gone well, and since then he’d been back in the West Bank, meeting people wherever he was invited, carrying on with his fundraising, and arranging activities for the young people. Then, last Saturday morning, ten days after the event that shook British Quakers at Westminster Meeting House (I’ll explain the connection), I received this WhatsApp at 5:35am:
‘At dawn today, safety vanished from my home, from my father’s house, from the heart of the camp where we are simply trying to survive despite the cruelty surrounding us. I have never been so afraid as I was last night.
‘Did they knock on the door? No. They tore it down – on top of my father, who is eighty years old – without even giving him the chance to open it. He fell against the wall, and with him, my heart collapsed. They dragged him to my house as if moving an object, not a dignified, elderly human being.
‘Did they knock on the door? No. They tore it down – on top of my father, who is eighty years old – without even giving him the chance to open it.’
‘They stormed into my home like wild beasts, screaming at my wife and son. They shouted “Who lives here? Where are the weapons?” – with terrifying aggression. I, who have always taught my children to believe in human dignity and human rights, was left powerless. I looked at my father’s shocked face, my trembling wife, my son not yet understanding why they were yelling at him.
‘Upstairs [back in her house] my mother was alone. For hours we had no news about her. Every minute was an eternity of fear and pain.
‘My brother’s house faced the same fate. They ransacked it as if looking for something to justify their violence. Their target? My nephew Qassem, eighteen years old, who was preparing to take his high school exams in two months. They arrested him, shattered his future, and destroyed his family’s hope.
‘This isn’t just a story about a raid. It is a story of injustice. Of brutality carried out in the name of “security”. Of violence that doesn’t distinguish between women and men.
‘We do not live in a just world. There are no human rights. No animal rights. The strong crush the weak – plain and simple – without accountability, without witnesses.
‘Everything we learned about democracy, justice, and dignity vanished in the moment my father fell and Qassem was torn from his family.
‘I write to you, my friends around the world, not to seek your pity, but so that you may tell our story. So that you may become the echo of this injustice. So that you may stand against it.’
I was overwhelmed with sadness for my friend. Of course because of the terrible experience that he and his family suffered, but even worse was his despair. We had been in awe in February at how he could believe so strongly in human rights and human dignity, devoting his life to building that same belief in the children in his community, in spite of a lifetime of considerable insecurity and violence. This particular raid was the last straw. As he asks, and in line with the lessons we Friends learned at Westminster Meeting House, we must stand against it.
Comments
Thank you Ruth. At last a piece that confronts us with the reality of what is happening - and has been going on for 18 months.
It is hard to read and it should be hard to read. Quakers need to be on the streets, publicly, “officially”, standing against genocide and in solidarity, for peace and for justice. I don’t care (pace letters) whether they are “encouraging” or protesting. Just be there. Please. I am adding Amjad and his family to my prayers. It’s a long list. Nicola Grove
By Nicola Grove on 17th April 2025 - 9:56
Yes, this is how it is if you live in Occupied Palestine, occupied by the Israeli state in contravention of International Law and the rights of the Palestinian people. By what right are people being treated to this? So many families have been subject to this cruel and violent intimidation and the parents are powerless to protect their children from these invasive aggressive raids and how terrified the children are, even more so when raised from their beds in the early hours… How has this state become so inhumane, so unable to perceive the sheer cruelty of their actions? And that is not even mentioning the horror of Gaza! Let us stand up to this, it is not in our name. Jane, April 18th 2025
By Jane King on 18th April 2025 - 17:15
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