tEnT oF nAtIoNs…a place of PEACE in Palestine…

I was listening Amal speaking today and I wished I could put her words in this post…
“Amal” means “Hope” and she’s part of a Palestinian family who live in a piece of land near Bethlehem… they are all Christians and she really values the Hope God gives … she was saying how sad she feels when people here lose Hope and simply immigrate due to the hard conditions they face every day…

Her great grandfather, Daher Nassar (the drawing on top inside the cave ) came from Lebanon to this land in 1916 when this was an abandoned and barren land… he and his family lived in caves on that time, and soon in 1924 they bought and registered the land as their own, paying all the taxes and whatever was needed to make it official… On that time this man had a vision that this land would one day be a place of peace where people from many nations would gather and have fellowship… He never saw that with his natural eyes, but I’m sure he envisioned what is NOW happening… a man of faith I would say…just like Abraham ☺

Palestine was part of the Ottoman Empire (Turkish), then came under the British control, then in 1947 the UN decided to divide Palestine territory into a Jewish State and an Arab State… Israel came to existence as a State in 1948 ,and in 1949 Palestine was divided into Israel, Jordan and Egypt …So, no more place for the Palestinians, who became refugees in their own land…
This whole situation is too complicated for me to even try to explain, but what I can see now is a so called “Occupied territory”, the “West Bank” and the “Gaza strip”, which is not Israel, but it’s also not Palestine coz the Israelis still control it in different ways…
It’s seams to be the place where Palestinians are allowed to live, but not really free… They cannot cross the borders of this territory for instance, unless they are allowed by Israelis at the “Check Points” (border controls)… some are privileged and have a “blue identity card” which allow them to cross this check points without being stopped or denied access…and if they don’t have the blue ID, they need to ask a permit and depend on the “good will” of the person at the desk office that day…
Amal was just giving the example of young people who need to wake up at 4am, some at 2am if they want to get on time at their university… this because they need to wait hours just to cross the “Check Points” …


So, here I am in a piece of land (Daher's Vinyard) that belong to this family since 1916… now they are surrounded by 2 “settlements” (ilegal occupation), which are basically occupied by Israelis, mostly religious Jews who claim this land as being their “promised land”… they arrive here in caravans and soon they start building their houses on the top of the hills… and they don’t stop building…from here they look like 2 big cities, pretty organized and structured, big houses, nice cars at the door, with electricity and running water… and right between this “rich settlements” this family lives, without electricity, without running water, and with a process in court for 15 years already to try to prove that this land is theirs…
Amal was telling us how one day the “settlers” came in with bulldozers, with guns and accompanied by Israeli army… they wanted to open a road across the two “settlements” (their idea is always to connect the settlements and join them together, and this is how they “conquer” more territory)… “We didn’t react with violence because We have HOPE”, Amal said… They called a lawyer and the “captain” of the settlement for them to see what was going on…In the end they realize they actually have a case in the court to prove the land is theirs, so they cannot do anything before the case is finished…
This was 3 years ago, and the court started much before…they have been spending a lot of money with all this… But they believe in their cause …and they also want to set an example and encourage other Palestinians who are losing hope and simply going away to find jobs and a better life … This family work in different things in Bethlehem to support this land… Amal is a physiotherapist for instance… Soon the wall will separate them from the other Palestinian cities and they will not be able to work there anymore… So, the solution is to move definitely to the land… And they are ready for that !!!

Amal and all the family believe they can live in peace and they can resist without using violence… They believe we are to love our neighbours, and even our enemies…
So the way they reacted when those settlers came was beautiful…
They planted trees, they sang and danced right in front of their eyes ☺…
For this family, planting a tree, and specially an Olive tree, is the best sign of HOPE… “Even if someone would tell me tomorrow would be the end of the world, I would plant a tree today”… This is having HOPE for the future!!!
Amal wants to be a role model to the younger generation who don’t believe there can be a good future here… Everyone is leaving and Immigrating, and that makes Amal very sad…

O.K, this is getting too long already… and I could tell so many more stories…
I’ll just put some pictures with subtitles for you to have an idea of some of the things that we did or saw on this land…


Arriving in the land !!! the hill in front of us …

Daoud showing us some paintings that some palestinian kids did… he was telling how that help to bring out what’s inside those kids and make them think more Hopefully !!!

Daoud showing the Setlement on the other hill and explaining how they cannot have running water , electricity and not even build in their land, while the Setlers have everything...

One of the cutest goats of the land...this one use to escape often...I don't know how he does it !!! :-)

Playing soccer with the volunteers and some kids form the area who came to spend the day...

Daher taking the girls for a ride on the donkey !!! Maren loved the donkeys :-)

Yan and Bastian, 2 of the german volunteers who spent the last year in the land doing their "civil serviitce"... amazing guys...here in the picture with Emma who met them last year as she also volunteered...they are her little brother...really sweet guys ...

This is one of the walls with an amazing work with tiles and paint... a volunteer who passed by who did it...

That's where we slept...a huge tent with beds and matresses for all those who come by :-)

Emma and Bastian picking figs for our lunch ...delicious !!!

the girls into hard work... cleaning out the stones from a garden!!!

A cute old lady from the family picking the good lentiles for our lunch... she was sweet!!!

Making some nice bread with Olive oil and "zatar"... so good !!! and the stove was perfect..they cooked the bread on top of small stones as you can see in the picture...
Singing together worship songs in different languages...

Breaking the bread and wine with the convoy family... Anne and Jonathan were leaving :-( ... But we had a nice time praying for each other and remembering what Jesus did for us and how through Him we are now a big family of God :-)


That's how the water is collected in this cistern during the winter... then it has to last for the reat of the year !!! As I said they are not allowed to have water coming on pipes as the settlements or the villages around...
caring the water from the cistern on the tractor for the small trees who need a lot of water in this hot days...

And we went to water them one by one...few hundreds...

Picking up some nice almonds :-)

Building up walls for the new stable for the goats and dunkeys... there are a lot of stones, they need to be used somehow :-)

Cleaning the goats shit in the morning... :-)

Picking up grapes to make grape syrup...sooooo good, but such a long process !!! we picked the grapes, we cleaned it, we smashed it to take only the juice (here Maren with Daher's mom)...
they added no sugar at all... next day at 6am we started to make the fire and the big pots boiled till lunch time...
wow... but so tasty in the end :-)...
people eat it with tahini (sesame oil) too, it's really good combination !!!

O.K, pretty big already... CHECK THE WEB SITE ON THE TITTLE IF YOU WANT TO KNOW HOW TO SUPPORT THIS FAMILY OR HOW YOU CAN COME AS A VOLUNTEER !!!

PEACE
SHALOM
SALAAM

tEnT oF nAtIoNs – oThEr pRoJeCtS…

the “Tent of Nations” project goes beyond “Daher’s Vinyard”…
Daoud and Gihan (in the picture between Emma and Bastian) are part of the Nassar family who also run “Daher’s Vinyard”… they are amazing people with a big heart and great vision…they are taking the vision of the “Tent of Nations” out of “Daher’s Vinyard”… they recently rented a place in the neighbour Arab village, Nahalin, so they could somehow help the community there… Gihan gives computer lessons in Bethlehem and she thought she could taught the women in Nahalin as a volunteer… and so it all started…

she already finished the basic course of the first class, and she already started a second class… she didn’t even need to publicize it, the word just run mouth by mouth and there were so many women wanting to come that she needed to divide in 2 classes… The women got really excited and encouraged…
and they are already suggesting other kinds of activities, like English lessons, cooking lessons and even a gimm :-) … They simply need something that brings them out of their houses, coz they do nothing more besides raising their kids…
one of the women there is about 48 years old and her husband works in Sudan… she went there one day and asked Gihan if she could learn “internet”… she didn’t know exactly what that was, but she knew she could communicate with her husband with that :-)…so now she’s attending the computer class…

Gihan asked them if they would like me to teach them how to make necklaces and they all got very excited with that… I was willing to do that, even though I’m not an expert myself… but it was a great experience… they loved it and most of them were really creative…
I wondered if they would want it because they are all traditional muslims (all covered), so I didn’t know if it would make sense, but they loved it… they wear the necklaces outside their closes…
And for me it was a great experience just to get to know them…
For Gihan and Daoud all this is just an opportunity to create relationships with them and also break the walls between Christians and Muslims…
One more time PEACE was taking place :-)…



They also have a group of young kids with whom they hang out, who they encourage and somehow try to help them to live out their dreams…

We also visited this group and we got to see some of the stones some of them painted… the idea was to let them express what they feel inside about the whole situation they live in in Palestine…they use this way because most of them don’t feel free to express what they really feel …
so they painted a stone and then described in a piece of paper what they painted…

Click on the title of this post if you want to read more about this projects or if you’d like to support them somehow…
VOLUNTEERS ARE ALWAYS WELCOME :-) !!!!

gOiNg bAcK aNd fOrTh... wAlLs aNd cHeCk pOiNtS…

I’ve been travelling most of the time with Emma visiting her friends whom she met in her previous visits to Israel/Palestine…
It’s weird that in such a small area we have so often to cross “check points” or go through high security to pass “the wall”…
As foreigners we are ok coz we don’t feel the tension or humiliation of having our access denied in those places, but for a Palestinian this is a daily situation they have to face… waiting in huge lines, having to ask for special permits to go to Israel, being denied access, etc…
often they are also not well treated by the Israeli soldiers… but who can we blame in the end… both sides are victims… victims of the fear that was spread in this land… victims of lies and propagandas…

We went to Bethany which is basically part of Jerusalem…we could have get there in 5 or 10 minutes, but because of the wall, we took more then 30 minutes…
We visited a family there, he works for the British Embassy, she’s a teacher…she hasn’t been paid by the Palestinian government for 6 months, as all the teachers…they were on strike at that time… we heard many stories of his father, a man who cannot even visit the place he was born because of the wall, and because he doesn’t have the “blue identity”, a special card that gives a Palestinian “the right” to go to Israel…
this man was crying telling his story and how humiliating and hard was the time when he and his family had to move to a refuge camp in Jericho… he doesn’t have hatred inside… he doesn’t agree with violence and terrorism, as most Palestinians also don’t… they are tired of war…he says he just wants peace… he wants to see his grandchildren playing with Israelis’ grandchildren…


We also spent a lot of time with another family in Beit Jala…a family who also shared with us their frustration with all the situation… the sadness of loosing their land…the desire of taking their child to the sea… he’s only able to move in Beit Jala, Bethlehem and Beit-Sahur which are all connected in a small area south Jerusalem…
it’s really frustrating all this injustices… and really confusing to understand…
They were really hospitable to us and they made a lot of nice Palestinian food for us to try,
they took us to a party with Palestinian music and “Dabka” dance which I really like…
His parents are so talented as well... He has amazing carvings in Olive Wood
and she does the tradicional Palestinian work...Emma is taking some of her work to the UK to sell it in a Fair Trade shop...
Simple ways of supporting individuals here who have no chance to work around the area...


We visited Eclas and her mom who live in a refugee camp in Bethlehem… Emma helped her as a volunteer last year...Eclas is a disabled woman, wonderful and beautiful lady… she grew up surrounded by foreigners so she learned well English and other languages…now she teaches Arab to foreign people and also to the volunteers who spend some time taking care of her in her house…
She was sharing how once she had to go to an hospital in Jerusalem for many months and her mom couldn’t even go and visit her coz she didn’t have the permission…
She’s a person who loves people and she relates well with every one… iaderyn the hospital she made many friends…for the first time she was getting to know Israelis and she love them all…there was a youth camp she was invited to join and she got along with all the other kids as well as the volunteers coz she could speak English… but then her mom finally came to visit after a month and they all realized she was Arab, even though she never tryed to hide it at all …she assumed they knew she was from Palestine, but suddenly she realized all Israelis stopped speaking with her after that… she spoke with sadness and she said “- I tried to love them, I honestly tried.”
Here is Eclas' mom and also some of the things she does to support the family...



This is a traditional Palestinian work, really beautiful...












May freedom come into this country… Not by violence…Not by man’s strength…



Freedom of fear from each other… letting the walls fall in people’s hearts…


It will not come from Governments, it’s already starting in individuals who take the opportunity to meet each other, to get to know one another, and realize they are both humans…


Love will tear this wall down… or maybe God will have to do something about it so men realize they got it wrong again…


This is not the way any human being was created to live ... May we all have the same rights, no matter where on earth we are leaving...
I wanna make it clear that I’m not taking sides here… as I said, both Israelis and Palestinians are victims… there are no winners in this situation… they both live in fear… they are both affected by the propaganda against one another…


And when I go back and forth, seating and eating with both Palestinians and Israelis, I’m able to love both the same way… I wonder if they would be able to interact freely what would happen…If their kids would study and play on the same places… If they would work together everyday… If they would shop in the same stores…If they would hang out in the night in the same places…If they would eat together at the same table…I believe many miss conceptions would change… I believe many walls in people’s minds would fall… I believe fear would no longer take place and war would no longer be an option…
I pray that the walls may fall, not only the physical walls, but also those in people’s hearts and minds…