The second day of the camp proved to be eventful and interesting but also somewhat confusing. It is of course a huge game (not to minimize the element of resistance in the act) for an eight year old to throw a stone at a soldier. And the soldiers must know that their presence, especially going out of their way to drive past the Palestinian kids, would present an irresistible provocation. This was how day one ended, the demolished home we were trying to rebuild as our own form of resistance caught in the crossfire between children throwing stones and soldiers firing rubber bullets and teargas. All this drew unwanted attention to the rebuilding in its early stages, just as the site was getting established.

Early this morning we learned that the Israeli Border Police were at the site, had confiscated the Palestinian workers’ papers and had ordered them to march to the interrogation center on the next hill, about a mile away. (We learned later they had been held for about seven hours, then released into the West Bank, forbidden to work at our project again). We eventually made our way to the building around 9.30 am. The workers, of course, were not there, but neither were the kids, since Salim had told the Hamdan family that either they kept the local children at bay or we would cease the building.

We had just started laying out the blocks for the roof when the soldiers arrived, accompanied by a Jerusalem municipal building inspector. They informed Jeff Halper, the ICAHD representative at the site, that the building was illegal. Jeff answered that on the contrary, the demolition of the home was illegal according to international law, the Fourth Geneva Convention forbidding home demolitiona in occupied territories. “We go by Israeli law,” the inspector replied, then proceeded to take photographs of the site. Tomorrow we expect the Jerusalem municipality, which has jurisdiction over this section of Anata, to issue us a stop-work order. (To judge from the quality of the streets, lack of sidewalks and garbage everywhere, the only municipal service the residents of Anata receive from the city is evidently the demolition of their homes. Why they would want to demolish this house built on private land on the PALESTINIAN side of the Wall is beyond us.)

Since a stop-work order would imperil both the Palestinian workers and the building equipment (which could be confiscated), the ICAHD staff and camp participants decided to make a strategic withdrawal: we decided to shift our building efforts to another part of Anata where demolitions were frequent, continuing to work on the Hamdan house whenever possible. This was very disappointing for the family as well as for all of us, but we promised the family that the house would be rebuilt within a couple months. We spent the rest of the morning removing the materials from the site so they would not be confiscated, and stripping away yesterday’s work in preparation for the new site.

Back at Beit Arabiya we enjoyed another delicious lunch, followed by a talk from Jamilla Biso, who has organised a summer camp for Bedouin children living just up the hill from Beit Arabiya.

In the afternoon a group returned to the Hamdan work site help load the materials for transportation to the new site. While we were working there was another incident with soldiers again firing at children a small distance away from the building site. More soldiers then arrived at the site and stayed for a while watching as we carried on loading the materials. The day ended with a small but difficult incident. Some of the children came running onto the site showing off a small canister they had found and started to get a hammer and nail to hit the firing pin. An ICAHD member noticed that it was a blast canister which was live, and could have seriously harmed any the children if it exploded. He took it away, but this angered the kids who became quite hostile. In the end the situation was resolved when the canister was given to our Palestinian site foreman.

So day two was one step back, although filled with learning experiences big and small. We will continue with house-building for another family, however, and the Hamdan house will be rebuilt by ICAHD at a later date. The evening finished with presentations from several women’s organizations: New Profile, the Jerusalem Centre for Women, Machsom Watch and one-time Palestinian cabinet minister Zahira Kamal.