Today we went to Ein al Hilwe camp and heard the shepherd, from the day before, had returned after having been handcuffed until he bled and thrown to the ground. These random arrests and brutality are common and there is no one of authority the Bedouins can turn to for help. This camp has 3 illegal settlements surrounding it. Their water is piped underneath the ground and electricity runs over head, neither of which supplies the Bedouins.

 

This morning the mobile clinic with two doctors arrived. Suddenly each and every one of the children developed a cough and the sniffles. They then queued very patiently for a doctor to look at their throats and listen to their chests. This facility arrives once a week and their services are free along with any basic medication required. Any specialist care or medication must be paid for.

We left and traveled further down the road where Fathy showed us a camp the JVS hopes to assist. Water needs to be diverted, through a rubber pipe, to collection point. This is basically like a big garden pound of plastic sheeting four meters circumference by two meter depth. This water comes from the source that is 7 km away. The pipe supplies a farm across the road already, so most of the hard has been completed. Now the pipe has to cross the road and up an incline to reach a collection point. The settlers pipe can be seen above the ground at some point disappearing underground totally by-passing the Palestinians.

From here we now headed south, passing settlement after settlement of fine houses with all the infrastructure of a housing estate anywhere in the U.K. Military training camps can also be seen quiet easily from the road, displaying the unit flags, with tents and camouflage vehicles where they would practice how to … shoot an unarmed shepherd? I am not allowed to take photographs as this could be a threat to security however, these places are not hidden from view.

All along the way Fathy has been making stops to pick firewood, fruits, and anything that may be used as ‘equipment’ in making the school tent. When we arrived at Al Auja we, along with all the families, created an outline of the shape of the school with large stones. All of us then began sewing sack cloth together which will become a school tent. This whole tent is remarkable in so much as everything is reclaimed, e.g coffee sacks, used string. Sewing all day was not hard but back breaking and our knees were numb by the end of the day. However we continued until it was dark and we could see no more.

Throughout the day we stopped only short intervals for glasses of juice and a Scottish sing song. Whilst waiting for our transport we were taken back, in the pitch dark, to a tent for a much appreciated cup a chai. On route to the tent the horizon was ablaze with street lights from a settlement. By the light of a lantern chai never tasted better.