In episode two of our podcast we speak to Gassim Hamad Tahan from the village of Mufagara, in Masafer Yatta, in the South Hebron Hills.

Gassim told us how the experience he had growing up is different to those of his children and grandchildren, and about his dedication to steadfastly staying on the land, despite violent attacks by settlers, and a colonial army intent on evicting Palestinians from the area.

View episode transcript here

Links

• Scenes from a Jewish pogrom -972 Magazine report on the settler attack on Mufagara
• International Solidarity Movement call to action - Masafer Yatta
• Save Masafer Yatta website
• Masafer Yatta - communities Israel is trying to drive out - by Btselem

If you would like an explanation of the terms used in this podcast, you can find a useful glossary on 140-154 of Shoal Collective's Ebook Interviews with Radical Palestinian Women.

Supported by Shoal Collective.

Hey, welcome to International Solidarity

Movement podcast [followed by Arabic translation]

Hello and welcome to the second episode of the

International Solidarity Movement podcast. My name's

Hazel and I'm happy to be joining you today. So this

interview is with Gassim Hamad Tahan, who is fellahin - which

is basically translatable to being a land worker, a peasant,

or a traditional farmer - in the village of Mufagara, in Masafer

Yatta, in the South Hebron Hills.

We spent some time in Mufaqara as part of ISM's work to be a

presence in case of demolitions or attack by the occupying

forces. We got to join in with some of the traditional work

Gassim and his family do day to day, which involves looking

after a herd of goats, donkeys, chickens, and other animals,

building, as well as being shown how to bake sweets by the

younger people in the family.

We recorded this episode sat in Gassim's family home. Some of

the children can be heard in the background at different points

whispering and bringing tea, and we also left Gassim's full

answers to our questions in Arabic in the podcast, so that

English and Arabic speakers can listen. The valleys and hills

of Massafer Yatta were ruled a closed military zone called

'Firing Zone 918' in the 1980s. This is an Israeli state ruling

that claimed the area was supposedly ‘uninhabited’, and

therefore can be used for the occupying force's military

practice, despite the fact Palestinians have been living

and working in the region for many, many generations with

traditional ways of life, like living in caves, shepherding,

and subsistence farming, sometimes semi-nomadically. The

occupying state has violently tried to force families out of

the area for decades. This has been done through legal rulings

in the courts, supporting settler violence and settlement

expansion, and by carrying out demolitions of Palestinian homes

and property. Now the residents of the firing zone are under a

renewed, imminent threat of eviction.

Gassim told us how the experience he had growing up is

different to those of his children and grandchildren, and

about his dedication to steadfastly staying on the land.

Today we're in the village Mufagara which is in Masafer

Yatta in the Firing Zone 918 and we're interviewing Gassim Hamad

Tahan about his experiences living under the occupation and

the resistance. So yeah, thank you very much for joining us.

I'm just gonna pass over and ask you to just introduce yourself

and your family and maybe the history of the village? And just

say a bit day to day like what it's like living here?

[translation of question then answer from Gassim in

Arabic]

His name is Gassim Hamad Tahan from Mufagara

village. What his daily life [is] here, it's really about

fearing and like scary day, like in any moment he is feeling that

he could be killed or arrested. So fears and his worries are

everyday in his heart and about his small children his sons and

about his house. So like from all of the sides that his life

is like surrounded of fear and worries. Like before the

eighties, before even the occupation came to the Massafer

Yatta area, it was like a good life, a safe life, like really

having a good life with like the family, there was no threats on

them so like he says that all his life is surrounded by

worries and fear from [being] expelled evicted, killed or

arrested even.

And is it possible for you to say a bit more about what

it's like day to day? He’s felaheen, so he's like a farmer

who's living with the land. Is it possible to talk a bit about

that connection with the land and maybe how it has been in the

past and also how it is now. But what does the land like mean for

him?

[translation of question then answer from Gassim in Arabic]

His life as a farmer born before the

occupation arrived and the settlers and everything else

that happened. They were having a very good life, like, going

with their sheep everywhere no one can prevent them to reach

their land. They plough the land, farm it and harvest it, so

they were like really having a simple life, living in caves and

some tents and some like – what was in the past, there was

nothing like services that like came to them. So after the

occupation arrived, the confiscating of the land,

stopping the people to reach their land, and even the settler

harassment on the farmers and also the shepherds - they were

killing the sheep, they were like shepherding with the sheep

when settlers came and killed some of the sheep, and you know

threatening them. So they started like, it was really

something that scared them and prevent them to go, because they

will risk their life for that.

So like he was asking like for all of the countries to stand

with them, because they are simple farmers and they want to

have their simple life. They want to live as the settler

living in the illegal outpost that was established in the

Palestinian land, that have all of the human services - they

want to live like them. Not like if you want to go - if you want

to build a simple tent to live in, like to go out from the

cave, and to live in a simple house, or a tent, they will

immediately demolish it and confiscated it. So he ask just

for like a simple life, safe with no threats. I want to ask

him also about what is his connection with the land.

[translation of question then answer from Gassim in

Arabic]

So his land, like he used to think that cannot

like lost it. So he just take it from his grandfather and his

grandfather took it from his parents also. This like the land

has come to him now, from his father, so now he's like, he has

the connection between him and the land, that he cannot like

leave it. And he can pay any price in order to not to like

leave his land. And even if he would go back to live in the

caves, and if there is any threats on him, he will just

stay on his land because there is no other way to go.

So we also mentioned that this is a firing zone, and I was

wondering if you could explain a bit about what that means.

Because the people who are listening will be coming

internationally they won't necessarily know what are the

conditions, what legally does it mean, and what does it really

mean for the people living here? So if you can explain a bit

about that it would be amazing

Since the ‘67, when the Israeli occupation first

occupied the West Bank, and until it reached Masafer Yatta

in the 80s, they announced Masafer Yatta as a closed

military zone. And from this, like they used this excuse to,

to steal more land and expand more settlements. And settlers

are in, in order to – as one of the tools that the occupation

uses to harass the Palestinians and make them feel, like, scared

and fear to lose their lands.

So since the you know, these like, policy that, you know,

they've announced Masafer Yatta as a closed military zone, and

there are people who's living in this area, and they [the Israeli

occupation] didn't have the right even to announce [the

military zone as uninhabited] because there are the people who

are living here. And this is a threat on the people to be

killed. Because this is a very dangerous thing on the people.

So this like, what they announced as a closed military

zone, is an excuse in order to evacuate the Palestinians from

their lands, from their villages - from their own villages. He's

like, even imagine that he's saying that, that the village is

now in 2022. And until now, there is the fighting and the

eviction, you know. This is like we want to imagine the future

could be a good future, not a bad future. So he just wants to

have days that are like those in the past, there is no

occupation, no harassment, no threats, nothing.

So he's like, just hoping for all of these violations to stop,

and for the Israeli occupation forces to go out, and take the

settlers and the settlements - to take them out. And this what

he means, you know, I just – he mentioned something and I just

mentioned from me just to give them the real idea.

So is it possible to say a bit more about like, if you

remember before the Firing Zone, what it was like growing up

here, and could you expand a bit more on what the conditions were

like how it felt in those times?

[translation of question then answer from Gassim in

Arabic

So he was born in Mufagara village and his

beautiful moment in his life was when he was a child because

there was no fear. Nothing to care about. Life is like funny.

You go to study in Yatta walking like one hour and back. And this

shows how in the past everything was - you can go wherever you

want. wherever you can go, and your parents will not be worried

about you, because there is nothing or any threats on you.

So, he said like, these are the best days that I have lived in.

Now, today like, after he has grown up and all of these

threats came and all of the occupation started to harass the

Palestinians. Even you know, now that his children now they

are studying in At-Tuwani village, and even though the

distance between here and At-Tuwani is just one kilometer.

And they send their children in the morning and you know, they

feel the fears and worries about them. You know, they just count

to ten to take them to the school and to come back, because

there is no safety, there is settlers - they can attack them

or they have threats. And with your children you cannot like

put them anywhere. So like he said like there's a very big

distance between the past and today.

Is it possible to just say like how many children live

in the village and you know what it's like for them growing up

here? We've met a lot of the kids and they're really amazing,

and very funny, and very friendly, they've really

welcomed us as guests very very well, and I really thank them

for that. I was wondering if you could talk a bit about and what

it might be like for them.

[translation of question then answer from Gassim in

Arabic

So he said like these children [are] born under

the risk and under the occupation. And even they said

when we want to walk them to school sometimes, they send the

police sometimes, because maybe the settler will meet them in

the road and they will attack them. So they used to go with

them to take them to school and back. So their like routine -

these children like while they're playing up there, when

they see an army or settler, he just run[s] to his father and he

says ‘there’s army or settlers, maybe they will do [something

to] us, they will attack us’. He says ‘no, just don’t worry’.

So the last thing that I want to add to what is happening. And

really, as you can say a massacre here, that very big

huge number of settlers from the illegal outposts of Havat Ma’on

and Avigail, they gathered and they attacked this village,

brutally. And the army were with them, even they were like saving

them, you know, and protecting them. They were having guns,

they were throwing stones on the houses and there was one child

that was injured on his head. He was sleeping and there was one

big stone it was it was like [thrown on] his head. So he was

hospitalised.

And even then, there was no justice that day. The cars were

burned , and the house were destroyed. And after that every

child here was having a very, very big problems with his

psychological things. So, he was even after that, when he wanted

to go, when he saw settler or army, he would just ask his

father ‘will they do the same thing with what they have done

the last year?’, or something like that.

So these like, also the families, they are just taking

care of the children to like – to get this fear out of them and

you know, to resist as they resist, during their lives. And

you know, he just wants his children and the children in the

community to have their rights as other children in the world.

That they're having the safety. All of the rights of education

to go to school safe, not to face the checkpoints, to not

have the injustice, the attacks. So he just hopes to his children

to have all their rights as other children in the world.

I'm really sorry to hear about the attack. It's

absolutely horrible, and especially a child being injured

is completely unforgivable and really disgusting. I was

wondering if there was anything else that you wanted to share

and also, if you wanted to say anything about - about or for -

international people coming here about why they should come? And

if there's any other message to give to the people who might be

listening?

[translation of question then answer from Gassim in

Arabic]

[translation of question then answer from Gassim in Arabic]

So he's very grateful for the presence here

and he is very thankful for all the efforts that they do that

they came to be in solidarity with the people. And for example

like including he is going to shepherding at least he feels

some people that are standing with them, that there's still

some people who really care about that case, the Palestinian

case, about all the violations that happens against them. And

even now like just to show how the international presence is

important is, for example, it happened with them when one time

is one settler he was going to attack them, but there was

international people with them. And they said for them ‘come

tomorrow without these people’ you know as he just want to

attack them.

So we know that Khallet Al-Daba’ is facing eviction at

the moment imminently and we're just wondering. if they're

evicted does that mean that this village also will be next? Is it

that this will then be evicted as well?

[translation of question then answer from Gassim in Arabic]

[translation of question then answer from Gassim in Arabic]

So he say, he hope not, to the [eviction of]

Khallet al-Daba’ village, but he said if they will evict the

people and demolish everything there they will - they will not

just on[ly] this village, they will go around all the

Palestinian villages in Masafer Yatta. So this will be a threat

on all the people around, in the community, and he hope not to

happen this thing, and to have a big solidarity from everywhere

from outside Palestine or inside, to stop all of this

eviction and ethnic cleansing that the Israeli occupation is

doing.

Shukran, shukran. Hurriya Filistin!