Catholic Worker Peace Team Arrives at Palestinian Refugee Camp

Wednesday, May 13, 2009,

 

Catholic Worker Peace Team Arrives at Palestinian Refugee Camp

 

Bethlehem, Israeli-Occupied West Bank- The six members of the Catholic

Worker Peace Team (Brenna Cussen, Scott Schaeffer-Duffy, Colin

Gilbert, Jenny Thomas, Mark Colville, and Beth Brockman) left Ariesh,

the Egyptian city closest to the border of Gaza, at 5 am today and

traveled ten hours to the nearest border crossing to Israel. Their

journey through the Sinai peninsula was marked by repeated stops at

Egyptian police checkpoints. It was evident that the Peace Team's

prayer/protests at the Rafah border to Gaza made the Egyptian

government keep them under a close eye. A police escort never left

them until the team was within minutes of the Israeli border.

 

After the team entered Israel, they hired two taxis which took them

north along the Red Sea, through the eastern side of the

Israeli-occupied West Bank to Jericho and then across the West Bank to

Jerusalem and lastly through the 20-foot-high Israeli separation

barrier into Bethlehem where they are staying in the Deheishe Refugee

Camp. One of their taxi drivers was an Israeli Palestinian who is a

sergeant in the Israeli army. He told team members Jenny Thomas, Mark

Colville, and Scott Schaeffer-Duffy that his commander ordered him to

"kill anything that moved" in Gaza during the January attack. He told

the team that he objected to this indiscriminate targeting and noted

that the Israeli air superiority gave them sufficient intelligence to

avoid killing civilians.  He also told the team that he favors a

peaceful solution to the Israeli Palestinian conflict which was just

to both sides. He supported an independent Palestinian state with

Jerusalem as its capital alongside Israel. He said that the Israeli

separation barrier was wrong and that people living together, side by

side, was essential for peace. He noted that his hometown of Eliat,

Israel had a large Jewish and Palestinian population that lived

together in harmony. He said that too many Israeli Jews blamed Islam

for the conflict, but that he believed that Islam and Judaism were at

the heart religions of peace. He recounted an incident when his best

friend, an Israeli Jew who was driving the other members of the team,

had parked his taxi in front of his own, but an Israeli customer who

saw his dark skin mistook him for an Arab and chose his taxi instead.

He asked her why she didn't hire the lead taxi and she told him that

she would not ride with an Arab. He told her that despite his lighter

skin color that he was an Arab. "What was she afraid of?" he asked,

"Did she think he would eat her?"  Both taxi drivers stopped at a

scenic spot on the bank of the Dead Sea not far from Mosada, and posed

for photos arm in arm flashing the peace sign.

 

The team passed many Israeli settlements and entered the West Bank

through the formidable wall in Bethlehem. they noted that the wall is

festooned with hundreds of peace messages including one that said,

"Give them justice and they will reward you with peace.'  Their

Palestinian driver to the refugee camp complained that the Israeli

government had closed all Palestinian businesses for two days due to

Pope Benedict XVI's visit.

 

The team plans to visit two Jewish settlements in Hebron tomorrow and

to tour the Israeli separation wall around Jerusalem and Bethlehem.

They plan to meet with Israeli human rights workers later in the week

and to join nonviolent protests against the wall on Friday. They also

plan to visit the Sderot Media Center to receive an Israeli government

sponsored tour of the impact of rocket attacks from Gaza on that town.

The team plans to return to the United States on Sunday.

 

Team member Brenna Cussen of the Saints Francis & Therese Catholic

Worker in Worcester, Massachusetts said, "Traveling here on highways

from which Palestinians are prohibited by Israel, passing by luxurious

Jewish-only settlements on occupied Palestinian land, passing through

the dreary wall into an impoverished and oppressed Palestinian town is

very hard to bear."

 

Contact: 203 415-5896

 

For more info contact:

Saints Francis and Therese Catholic Worker House

52 Mason St., Worcester MA 01610

508 753 3588

theresecw2 at gmail.com

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Previous Postings:

 

The “Catholic Worker Peace Team” model explained by Scott

Shaeffer-Duffy and Brenna Cussen

http://groups.google.com/group/National-CW-E-mail-List/browse_frm/thread/f7f9bccbaa3fcaac?hl=en#

 

CW Peace Team arrive in Cairo with Medical Supplies and Toys for Gaza

http://groups.google.com/group/National-CW-E-mail-List/browse_frm/thread/7f64d91eff3300fc?hl=en

 

"Rafah Crossing Closed: CW Peace Team Will Attempt to Enter Gaza in

the Morning" first report from CW Peace Team in Gaza

http://groups.google.com/group/National-CW-E-mail-List/browse_frm/thread/1b403a448bebaf70?hl=en

 

Catholic Worker Peace Team delayed at Rafah Border; Medical supplies sit idle.

http://groups.google.com/group/National-CW-E-mail-List/browse_frm/thread/fff62c9e3f7d1130

 

CW Peace Team Praying for Entry into Gaza at boarder.....

http://groups.google.com/group/National-CW-E-mail-List/browse_frm/thread/5d575a837c6efa15