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The Guardian
Harriet Sherwood:
Dec. 5th, 2011
Around 20 bedouin communities between Jerusalem and Jericho are to be forcibly relocated from the land on which they have lived for 60 years under an Israeli plan to expand a huge Jewish settlement.
The removal of around 2,300 members of the bedouin Jahalin tribe, two-thirds of whom are children, is due to begin next month. The Israeli authorities plan to relocate the families from the West Bank to a site close to a municipal rubbish dump on the edge of Jerusalem.
The bedouin say the move would expose them to health hazards, deny them access to land to graze their livestock and endanger their traditional lifestyle. They add that the viability of their existing communities has been seriously eroded by the growth of Jewish settlements, the creation of military zones, demolitions of homes and animal pens, and the building of a highway which cuts through their encampments.
"Because of the [military] closures and the settlements, we are living in a jail which gets smaller every year," said Eid Hamis Swelem Jahalin, 46, who was born in the encampment of Khan al-Ahmar, and has lived there almost all his life.
The relocation plan is the first phase of a longer term programme to remove around 27,000 bedouin Arabs from area C, the 62% of the West Bank under Israeli military control.
The communities have not been formally notified of the plan, which was disclosed by Israel's civil administration, the military body governing area C, to a UN agency.
The head of the civil administration visited Khan al-Ahmar three weeks ago to give verbal warning of the impending removal, said Hamis. "He said the land belongs to the government, that we are illegally here. I told him that I lived here before 1967, before you even came to our land."
The tiny communities perched on the bleak rocky hills which roll down towards the Dead Sea endure a harsh existence without electricity, running water, sanitation, paved roads and medical facilities. The bedouin homes are makeshift structures of wood, corrugated iron and tarpaulin.
The nearby Jewish settlements, in contrast, are connected to utilities and services. Ma'ale Adumim, home to almost 40,000 people and which overlooks the Jahalin communities, has 21 schools, 80 kindergartens, a public transport network, libraries, swimming pools and shopping malls.
The area on which the Jahalin live has been designated by Israel for the expansion of Ma'ale Adumim. Many Palestinians see this as part of a strategic plan to close a ring of Jewish settlements that would cut East Jerusalem off from the West Bank. By stretching down to the Jordan valley, an expanded Ma'ale Adumim would also bisect the West Bank, making a contiguous Palestinian state impossible.
"They want to empty the bedouin from the whole area, and they will put settlers in our place, and there will be no Palestinian state," said Hamis. All Jewish settlements in the West Bank and East Jerusalem are illegal under international law.
The Jahalin were originally from the Negev desert, from which they fled or were forced out following the creation of the state of Israel in 1948. Now the extended tribe is scattered across the West Bank. Those threatened with relocation say they rented the land from its Palestinian owners, who live in the nearby village of Anata. But the Israeli authorities say the land now belongs to the state, and their homes, animal pens and small schools are built without permission – which is practically impossible to obtain – and therefore subject to demolition.
All 257 Jahalin families in the five villages straddling the Jerusalem-Dead Sea highway have been issued with demolition orders.
A school serving their young children, built two and a half years ago from old car tyres and mud, is also threatened following pressure from nearby settlers. "Since the beginning they wanted to move us from here, but building the school made it worse," said Hamis, adding that the settlers saw it as a sign of permanence.
The removal plans are not final, according to the civil administration, whose spokesman has been quoted as saying the Israeli authorities are trying to find an acceptable solution for the bedouin whose communities are "illegally located".
The proposed relocation site is already home to around 4,000 Jahalin who were evicted from their encampments in the mid-1990s. According to the UN, the site "does not meet minimum standards in terms of distance from the municipal dumping grounds previously relocated families report negative consequences, including health concerns, loss of livelihood, deteriorated living conditions, loss of tribal cohesion and erosion of traditional lifestyles."
See original here.
In some African countries, female circumcision is a widely practiced tradition. But as more attention is shone on the practice, also known as female genital mutilation, it's come with other consequences. An African reporter has gone into hiding after her report on the practice in Liberia was published.
But her plans got seriously disrupted. Azango had been working on an article about female circumcision. The World Health Organization and human rights groups have campaigned to stop the practice, which many people call "female genital mutilation." The practice has been custom of sorts in many African countries, including Liberia.
Azango had found a woman to talk to her about what she'd experienced at age thirteen.
"Four women held her down, and a woman cut her," Azango said. "And she said when they cut them they don't use any form of anesthesia. And it hurt. She said it hurt so much."
The victim told her many girls were circumcised at the same time.
Stories about the practice are common in the Western media, but here in Liberia, writing about the topic is still sensitive. It's almost unheard of for a woman to talk in such detail about what happened to her.
In Liberia, genital cutting is typically an initiation into a secret society, called Sande. Girls who join take an oath never to talk about the group or its rituals.
Azango wanted to shed light on the practice.
"Why should you carry a woman through that?" she said. "Grabbing her and torturing her and cutting her is a violation of her rights."
Azango's newspaper, FrontPage Africa, put her investigation on the cover on International Women's Day, March 8.
"Nobody would dare put a women's circumcision story on the front page," said the publisher, Rodney Sieh, "but we can do it."
He said his paper is known for investigative stories that others won't touch. The newspaper expected a backlash, but they were unprepared for how bad it would get.
On the day the story appeared, women reacted so angrily that Azango's editor called her back from the rural village where she was interviewing midwives. Plans for other rural reporting were canceled.
Women were threatening Azango. Some said that if they caught her, they'd circumcise her.
"And when I'm cut, I won't be able to talk," Azango said.
That's because anyone who is cut takes an oath before the cutting. The oath is that if you ever speak of the ritual, you will be killed. The day after the article ran, Azango heard a powerful woman inside the Liberian government looked for her at her office.
A few days later, the threats got even closer. Azango's editor, Wade Williams, met a tenant in Azango's house.
"She said [the article] shouldn't have been published here," Williams said. "(The woman complained) 'yYou cannot degrade our tradition and publish it here. That's an insult to us.' "
Then the woman told Williams if Azango traveled to rural Liberia again, she'd disappear.
Azango went into hiding the day the story ran, almost two weeks ago. She hasn't slept at home or been to her office since.
Azango's met with police recently and filed a statement, the first stage in starting a formal criminal investigation. Officers interviewed her to confirm these were menacing threats, not simply the careless words of angry readers.
Azango thinks all of this furor is less about what she said, and more about who she is.
"If it was a white woman or a foreign journalist doing it, nobody would have a problem" with the story, she said. "But because I'm a Liberian and I live in Liberia, I should know my role. I should know my line of demarcation."
Azango expects things will eventually calm down, and she'll get to go home. And then, when the time is right, she says she wants to do a follow up story.
Editor's note: The reporter on this story, Jina Moore, chose not to interview the complaining women directly out of concern that they could then use that contact to find Azango.
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