Issue No. 605
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26 Sept. - 2 October 2002 Issue No. 605 Special |
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| Published in Cairo by AL-AHRAM established in 1875 | Recommend this page | ||
Making ends meet, barely, in Tulkarm
Residents of the Tulkarm refugee camp are simply looking for survival. Talal Jabarai visited the overcrowded camp and witnessed the misery
Seated on the edge of the Green Line between the western mountains of the West Bank and the Israeli coastal plain is the town of Tulkarm. Built on the hillside, much of the town's population of 35,000 relies on the fields in the plains below.
Travelling northwards from the town centre, the multi-story stone houses end abruptly, replaced by dual-story clay and brick dwellings. The streets here are narrower and poorly kept. This is a town within a town; it is the Tulkarm refugee camp.
In brighter times, children ran through these streets, and young men went about their daily work. But two years into Al-Aqsa Intifada, the children and youth are forced by curfews to stay at home -- those, that is, whose pictures do not make up the dozens of martyr posters around the camp.
The past two years have created widows and children who will never know their fathers. Majdaleen, 28, was married to a man whose photo is now on one of those posters. He was coming out of the mosque after evening prayers when a tank gunned him down. She now survives with her one-year-old son on $70 a month, and whatever her parents can send her from Nablus.
Israel has labelled Tulkarm one of the "hornets' nests". The area has been responsible for sending out six attackers who have targeted Israelis in nearby population centres. One such attack on an Israeli hotel in the coastal town of Netanya last March killed more than 20. The Israeli Defence Force (IDF) maintains that its actions in the Tulkarm refugee camp, as in other parts of the West Bank, serve the sole purpose of fighting and destroying the "terrorist infrastructure".
Today's Tulkarm refugee camp is different from the one that existed two years ago. The boys' school in the middle of the camp bears evidence of its use as a detention centre, and some of the residents' homes have smashed walls, where the IDF troops carried out house-to-house searches. But not all the damage is physical.
It is from one of these incursions last October that Majdi Abdel-Wahab can recall what is, to him, the blackest day of his life. During house-to-house searches in the refugee camp, soldiers entered Wahab's house from two directions. Their goal was to secure the roof. On the way up, a Palestinian sniper spotted the soldiers through a window and opened fire.
Palestinians are struggling to survive since the Israeli reoccupation of the West Bank in late March. Tight curfews and strangling roadblocks are now the norm (photo: AFP)
One of the soldiers was injured. The rest of the unit, not knowing where the shots came from, opened fire in the house and threw a hand grenade onto the roof, killing the pigeons he had bred for his children, and destroying tiles and part of the façade.
For Wahab, the worst was yet to come.
"They started beating me. They wanted to kill me," recounts Wahab as he stares at the pocked walls and ceilings in the staircase. He has kept the marks as a reminder of that fateful day. "At that moment I didn't know [whether] to be afraid for myself or my children." They broke his arm, and arrested him for two days.
"We were put in the school on the first day and made to sit in the sun all day without water or toilets, until 9pm. We were then taken to an army base. I have never felt cold like that night; we slept on top of each other to stay warm."
Since that day there have been more incursions as part of Operation Defensive Shield and Operation Determined Path. Wahab is worried that this time the officer who saved his life won't be with the soldiers, so he stays with friends every time searches are conducted.
Such incursion, and the closure, means that the majority of the labour force that used to work inside Israel now cannot. "The biggest problem is unemployment," confirms Mohamed Haikal, the camp director.
According to him, unemployment in the camp has reached approximately 65 per cent because of the closure. Now the average income per family is down to between $7 and $10 per day. Wahab used to be a painter in Israel, but because of the closure, and despite never being in prison, he cannot get a permit to get to work. And according to Wahab there is no work in Tulkarm because nobody can afford to build. The work he does get is sporadic at best. He has been hired to paint at the United Nations Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) and other organisations. He says he averages one day of work every two weeks.
"This past year has been more difficult. The first year I had more work, I could sneak out [to Israel]. Now I can't." He has taken on a lot of debts. Wahab hesitates a little before making a confession he is embarrassed to admit: his mother helps him out whenever she can. "I need $400 a month to take care of my family, now I earn $100 at most."
Wahab has six children in school and the seventh about to start university. Wahab wants her to continue her education, so he has borrowed enough money to get her through one semester. He wants all his children to suffer as little as possible.
"When one of my children wants something I feel I have to get it for them, even if it means getting it used or old."
Tulkarm, with over 14,000 residents, is the second largest of the 19 refugee camps in the West Bank that currently house more than 600,000 refugees. And this camp, like the others, is managed by UNRWA, an agency that itself is suffering.
"UNRWA depends on voluntary contributions," however, "the donations do not correspond to the budget," said Sami Mshasha, spokesman for UNRWA in Jerusalem.
As part of their regular duties, UNRWA provides medical and food aid and education for Palestinian refugees, and is responsible for repairing damage to infrastructure in the camps. The situation over the last two years has placed a severe burden on the agency's budget, and has even brought it to the verge of bankruptcy.
"We cannot keep up with the demand. We are offering state-like services, but for how long?" said Mshasha. In his words, "UNRWA picks up the tab for the destruction."
The result is that UNRWA has to limit its services.
Wahab knows well the benefits, and shortcomings, of UNRWA. He suffers from a stomach ulcer, and although UNRWA helps with the treatment, he has to buy medication worth $10, an expense he avoids. "I have to feed my children first. Now I'm just thinking of getting food for the next day."
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