This report by Adrian Hart from the International Solidarity Movement on his December visit to the Gaza Strip, has been sent to Southend MP Sir Teddy Taylor. THERE ARE 1,200,000 people in the Gaza Strip. Out of these, 6000 are Israeli settlers and they occupy 40 percent of the land, strategically controlling all of the water and rationing it back to the Palestinian refugees. Water is regularly turned off for days and is used all over Palestine as a weapon of control and collective punishment.
Palestinians have to buy bottled water (along with countless other essential products) from shops supplied by Israeli bottling plants in Gaza settlement areas. This means that they are buying back water that is theirs, according to the United Nations.
When curfew is lifted, for a few precious hours, the Palestinians in Gaza, (where there is 80 percent unemployment throughout the whole West Bank), are forced to give their limited incomes back to International Solidarity activists confront Israeli armoured car the very people keeping them under illegal occupation.
The Israeli government is profiting from the misery of these people's daily lives There is only one road in and out of the Gaza Strip with three Israeli military checkpoints that close at sundown every night. The many refugee camps here cram in 64,000 people per square kilometre, the most densely populated area in the world.
During curfew, in all refugee camps, ambulances are regularly being shot at. This week a Palestinian woman with serious stomach wounds was held by soldiers at gunpoint. For three hours she was prevented from reaching the only hospital, while her two drivers were badly beaten.
The Israeli Occupation Force is currently building a new wall to replace the fence built in 1982 on the 1967 Egyptian border, surrounding settlement areas and the whole Gaza Strip. Many houses are being demolished to do this.
The wall is encroaching on Palestinian land and houses are being demolished while I write. Sixty houses are known to be listed for immediate demolition here in Rafah.
We, representing the International Solidarity Movement, are hoping to delay some of these crimes by placing us internationals in as many houses as possible in the hope of attracting foreign press to the scene to report on this urgent issue. We are 2 USA citizens, | Swedish, | Italian and myself.
Houses are being demolished at a moment's notice, often in the middle of night. There is not a single international press person here: they are not prepared to stay. We have to move around under constant escort as internationals have previously been seen as collaborators.
The rate of killings here is far higher than Jenin, but is not being reported at all! The Israeli Occupation Force are carrying out unobserved and unlimited murders of civilians totally unhindered and no records are available or kept!
To build the foundations for the walls, the Israeli Occupation Force are dynamiting streets, rupturing countless underground sewage pipes.
Many streets in the 50-year old Khan Yunis and Rafah refugee camps, already some of the worst in the world, are now running with sewage. Disease and dysentery is a rapidly escalating problem.
All this while the growing majority of people have no access to adequately supplied clinics and are prevented from reaching the only hospital in the area. The Israel Occupation Force is pouring the rubble from the demolished houses in to soak up the effluent in the streets.
At a meeting with Said from The Popular Committee for Refugees, we were informed that children have been so psy chologically damaged by constant shooting and tank fire at night that 50 percent are regularly bedwetting.
61 percent of children are registered anaemic due to loss of apetite through fear and nervous exhaustion. A school due to be built here by Save the Children has been denied as Israeli authorities have a perma. nent ban on any construction
People in Khan Yunis and Rafah refugee camps sleep in the day as the noise and con stant fear rules out any sleep at night. Most Palestinians are under curfew every night at sundown.
The night before last we were under curfew in Bethlehem, which continued unti 1lam. Due to checkpoint closures it took us two hours and four separate taxis to cover the ten miles to Jerusalem
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16 soclalst resistance February 2003
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