Friends International Center in Ramallah
August 2009 Newsletter
(Vol. III No. 6)

From the Program Coordinator

What do you find on the roof of every Palestinian home and institution that will not be found on the roof of an Israeli home or institution?  

Click here to see the answer

Palestinian homes with water tanks on the roofs.
Israeli homes in the Settlement of Ma’ale Adummim without water tanks on the roofs.   
The Ramallah Friends Meetinghouse with a water tank on the roof of FICR.  

Water has been an issue in the Middle East for a long time.  Today water is becoming a major issue not only in Palestine, but world-wide.  The shortage of water in Palestine and Israel is most obvious in the West Bank and Gaza.  According to recent reports, approximately 85% of the West Bank population (Palestinian) uses 15% of the water from the West Bank and approximately 15% of the population (settlers living in the West Bank illegally) use 85% of the water.  

In the center of Ramallah, where the Ramallah Friends Meetinghouse and the Friends Center is located, we receive water from the city of Ramallah two days a week.  The water begins to flow from the pipes into the two tanks on Monday night and fills the tanks on Tuesday and Wednesday.  The water stops flowing on Thursday.  Since the four new bathrooms were finished this spring, we have two water tanks on the roof – one for the use of the Meeting and FICR and one for the garden and the bathrooms outside.  The challenge is to keep enough water in each of the tanks, especially when we have groups coming to FICR and the Meeting so as not to run out of water.  We ask people not to flush the toilets each time because if they do, there would not be enough water to last the days that there is no water from the city refilling the tanks.  We water the garden only when there is running water from the city so as not to use the water in the tanks.  These two tanks of water are all we have for washing dishes, flushing toilets (even when groups visit), and everyday use until the water begins to flow again on the following Monday night.  

During the month of June, we had the European Quaker delegation in Ramallah.  For three days we were without water.  We could flush only one toilet inside when necessary and were not able to do the dishes at all.  We ended up using paper and plastic dishes and utensils.  

In some towns and villages people are without any running water for weeks at a time.  The Israeli authorities control all the water in the West Bank.  They take it from the Palestinians and sell very little of it back to them for a very high price.  

(Click here to read an article in Ha’aretz newspaper about water.)

(Click here to read what some are doing about it.)

(Click here if you would like to know more about the water situation in the Region.)

Click here for a link to the World Bank Report:  www.worldbank.org/ps

From the Friends International Center in Ramallah

During August we were privileged to have with us an intern, Elizabeth Paxton.  Elizabeth is a graduate student at Harvard Divinity School.  She worked with us on a couple of projects, including organizing a meeting of the Ramallah Friends Garden Committee and presenting to the committee ideas for a Quaker Garden.  These ideas were generated by a group of landscape architecture students at the University of Guelph in Canada.  Their professor, Larry Harder, asked his students to plan a “Quaker Garden in Ramallah” as one of their class projects.  Some very interesting and creative plans for the garden were drawn up by the students.  Elizabeth studied the plans and presented a summary of these plans to the Ramallah Friends Garden Committee.  The Garden Committee, in consultation with students and professors at Birzeit University, will give these plans further consideration and decide on next steps.  In addition to producing some very creative plans for the Quaker Garden, the students at the University of Guelph became knowledgeable about the situation in Palestine, the flora of Palestine, and the principles and beliefs of Quakers as they did the background research for their project.  We wish to thank Larry Harder for his efforts concerning this project.  We will keep you all posted as we make our decisions to move forward.  

Elizabeth Paxton in the mddle of the picture

  
From the Ramallah Friends Meeting

On August 14 Gordon Davies and Betsy Brinson arrived in Ramallah.  They are members of the Richmond, Virginia Friends Meeting, an un-programmed meeting. Betsy and Gordon will be in Ramallah until June, 2010 to volunteer at the Ramallah Friends Schools and Bir Zeit University. Betsy will be helping at the Friends Schools with several history projects. One of these projects will be to collect oral history interviews from school graduates to tell the school story. (Everywhere she goes in Ramallah she says she is finding graduates or individuals who have family who attended Friends Schools.) Gordon will be teaching English literature, philosophy and assisting with several administrative projects at Bir Zeit University. His fall course is on English novels of the immigrant experience. They say that they expect to learn a lot here this year.  We enjoy having them and others as part of the Ramallah Friends Meeting and FICR activities. 

From the Occupation: Monthly Action Focus:

The Right to Enter (RTE) Campaign continues its focus on the responsibility of third states concerning the matter of Right to Enter/Re-Enter the oPt (occupied Palestinian territory) via one of the entry ports Israel controls.  The Campaign is calling on third states to assume their responsibility in enforcing human rights and international law in a situation of military occupation.  

The past month a number of people who have entered the West Bank via the Allenby/King Hussein Bridge from Jordan have received a “Palestinian Authority Only” stamp.  This stamp means that people who want to go to the West Bank and receive this stamp will not be allowed to enter Jerusalem.  The RTE Campaign held a public meeting on this issue to discuss the implications of this stamp for people who have received it.  

(Click here if you would like to know more about what the “PA Only” stamp means and what you can do.)  

(Click here to read the press release.)

The Campaign continues to collect the names of persons - Palestinians and Internationals who have been denied entry at one of the ports Israel controls (Ben Gurion airport or one of the bridges across the Jordan River from Amman).  If you are a person who has been denied entry or know of someone who has been denied entry, please contact Anita Abdullah at anita_abdullah@hotmail.com  

Due to the fact that there is no clear policy for denial of entry, a person is allowed to enter via one of the ports controlled by Israel at the discretion of the Israeli immigration official.  The denial of entry is random.  People continue to be given a one-week visa, a new trend and alternative to being denied entry completely. 

For more information on "Right to Enter/Re-enter" go to www.righttoenter.ps


NOTE:  Please click on the FICR Newsletter Archive below to read previous newsletters that you may not have received and would like to read.  


Kathy Bergen
Program Coordinator
www.ramallahquakers.org