Everybody Must Get Stoned

Injured in Bil’in anti-wall demonstration

By Joe Carr

 

October 15, 2005

 

I’m still having trouble breathing, but they say the internal bleeding has stopped. I’m writing from a Palestinian hospital in Ramallah, I was injured while protecting Palestinian children from rubber-coated bullets at last Friday’s anti-wall demonstration in Bil’in.

 

Unlike most weekly protests in the US, Bil’in villagers are incredibly creative and give each demonstration its own flavor. Last week, demonstrators dressed in the colors of the Palestinian flag with words written on them like “Hope”, “Peace”, and “Freedom” in Arabic, English and Hebrew, and then wrapped snake puppets around their necks to demonstrate how Israel’s wall is snaking through the West Bank and strangling any chance for positive change. I’ve made lots of puppets and done street theatre in the US, but this was my first time to do so in Palestine, and I must say, I learned a lot of artistic tricks.

 

Just after noon-day prayers, a large group of costumed Bil’in villagers, accompanied by Israeli activists and internationals from the International Solidarity Movement, set off for the wall site while chanting and banging on bottles and cans.

 

As usual, Israeli riot soldiers were waiting at the wall site forming a line to block us from walking any further. A standoff ensued, and eventually smaller groups went off the road to go around the line. Soldiers moved quickly to roughly push the nonviolent demonstrators back onto the road. Soldiers hit, kicked, and drug people through sharp cactus plants. I got repeatedly pushed into rocks, and received a nasty bruise when a soldier nailed me in the back with the barrel of his gun. I wish that had been my only injury that day.

 

Eventually, the soldiers began pushing the crowd back towards the village, and tried to drive army jeeps through the crowd and into Bil’in. Shebab (young Palestinian men and boys) piled large rocks on the road to block the jeeps, and then began throwing stones and using slingshots to defensively drive the soldiers out of the village. The soldiers fired teargas, rubber-coated bullets, and a new experimental bullet that contains chemicals and explodes on impact to cause a large bruise and internal bleeding. Several shebab were injured from this and other weapons.

 

Suddenly, we noticed soldiers taking four Palestinian-looking men away to jeeps. Several of us activists ran down the hill to make sure the soldiers didn’t mis-treat those in their custody. Turns out they weren’t Palestinians being arrested, but agent provocateurs being evacuated. They were Israeli Special Forces placed there to provoke the shebab into throwing stones. 

 

While down with the soldiers, another activist and I interfered with the soldiers firing rubber-coated bullets at the shebab. We yelled at the soldiers to stop and physically blocked their guns, a picture this appeared on the cover of Al Quds (Jerusalem) Newspaper, a leading Palestinian publication. The soldiers began pushing us out of the area. While an Israeli soldier held me from behind and pushed me roughly, a large rock hurled from one of the shebab’s slingshots struck me just below the ribs. I effectively became a human shield for the soldier who would have barely felt the stone through his flak jacket.

 

The soldier quickly pushed me away and I ran from the area to avoid getting hit by any other rocks. Shebab quickly came over to me and apologized and tried to help me up the hill, but I insisted they stay and continue defending their village. I quickly found the paramedics who treated the flesh wound, and later took me to a hospital in Ramallah.

 

X-rays determined that my ribs weren’t cracked or broken so I filled the prescription for an anti-inflammatory and went back to the ISM flat to rest. I found myself in an overwhelming amount of pain; I could barely breathe and couldn’t sit or stand up without almost fainting. After about six hours of anguish, I went back to the hospital and demanded they admit me and knock me out. Doped up on plenty of Tramadole and an IV, I slept like a baby. The next morning, an ultra-sound located a rupture in my spleen and internal bleeding. They thought it might heal on its own, but after a day of continued bleeding they had to operate to keep me from bleeding to death.

 

Palestinian surgeons were able to repair my spleen rather than remove it, and the bleeding has stopped. They hope I’ll be out by next Saturday, so I’m set up with some movies, my computer, and plenty of Palestinian and international visitors.

 

The medical care has been excellent. The nurses are cheery, playful, and frequently present. The doctor has been nice and frank, and even called my parents. The Palestinian healthcare system is mostly public, and this hospital is particularly known for giving free care for those with intifada-related injuries. It’s called the Al-Aqsa Martyrs Hospital, and specializes in trauma.

 

I completely affirm Palestinians right to resist Israeli colonial occupation. Palestinians have the right to do much more than throw rocks at soldiers committing colonial genocide, and they must if they are to survive. Boys with rocks are hardly a match for the Israeli Military heavily stocked with the US’s most deadly weapons, so it is my responsibility to help protect the shebab as they symbolically resist.

 

My only regret, is that right now it isn’t that colonial soldier lying in this hospital bed.