Violence and Resistance Series

The communities along the path of the Wall did not sit by and allow Israel to easefully build the Wall, which would eventually create an open-air prison. Soon after the construction began, so did the newest Palestinian led anti-colonial movement, known locally as the popular struggle (muqawameh sha’abiyeh in Arabic). The popular struggle was Palestinian led struggle and in the spirit of the 1st Intifada. Support of the Palestinian popular movement against the Israeli Apartheid Wall was sparked, which included international and Israeli activists joining in solidarity. 

Starting in the north in the village of Jayyus, Palestinian farmers whose land would be confiscated for the site of the Wall, along with activists from the International Solidarity Movement (ISM) began to resist the construction through strategic nonviolent means. Marches, chants, and physically taking up space on the site of the construction occurred on a daily and then weekly basis. As the Wall’s construction traveled further south the movement followed. In 2003 in the village of Mas’ha, Israeli activists joined in the struggle, and by winter 2003/2004 the movement made its way to Budrus, where the unarmed unified struggle of international, Israeli and Palestinian activists were able to move the route of the Wall through ongoing direct actions. The popular struggle continued to travel and countless villages organized against the Wall. 

This collection of photos exposes the violence of the Israeli army against an unarmed movement, but most importantly this collection shows the unified movement from the Salfit region in Deir Ballut and Mas’ha, through the Ramallah district villages of Budrus and Nil’lin, to the Jerusalem villages of Biddo, Beit Sariq, down to the Bethlehem area and further south into the Hebron Hills. This was a part of peace history that never made media headlines because a unified Palestinian led unarmed struggle against Israeli violence, inclusive of International and Israeli activists coming in solidarity, just does not sell in the US.