Dear all,
Just to confirm: I am finally in Rafah and in fact spent the whole day here. It was one of those days that is filled to the brim - though how I will ever do in four days what we planned to do in 8 is still beyond me. I met the Mayor, Said Zoroub, and his family, and people at the municipality. The mayor is an unusually likeable man, as are his wife and children. He is "PA" but only by default - no bs about the Road Map or the Peace Process, down to earth, and manages to maintain a dry sense of humor in the face of appalling conditions and destruction, much of which I witnessed today and will continue to photograph and see tomorrow.
I met with the Rafah Women's Organization for domestic, social and economic violence, got contact information, information on their priorities and hopes for working with us. The woman who heads it impressed me. She was trained as an engineer but has also worked for the city and over the past year opened a number of women's centers in the Gaza Strip with a total staff of 80 people.
After my meeting at the municipality as well as the usual gigantic Arabic meal, I got a tour of part of Rafah. Most of it was awfully depressing, though some of it was lovely - such as visiting the flower 'factories' where Rafah grows what seemed miles of beautiful flowers, primarily carnations, for export to Holland. There is also a new orphanage built by UNRWA for some 65-70 children and there are some new, pre-fab homes going up -- also thanks to UNRWA -- to house some of the displaced. Suffice to say they are tiny and insufficient for the number of people now without permanent dwellings. When I asked him, Said Zoroub said that at least one of the Israeli goals is to push the population of Rafah inward on all sides concentrating it in the overcrowded center away from the borders with Egypt and Israel. All borders are ultimately controlled by Israel as they are surrounded by the IDF. Many people leave the city 'voluntarily' as a result of the impossible conditions; a kind of transfer no one talks about.
As I wrote earlier today, IDF tanks and bulldozers were (and still are as I speak) demolishing homes in the western sector of the city - south of the mayor's house where I am staying. In the process of wrecking everything in their paths, one of the bulldozers struck a key water main eight feet under the earth cutting off water to residents in the western sector of the city (none have water now). Tough shit, of course, and they're still out demolishing what's left of the area.
I visited and photographed the two new water wells in Rafah. You remember that last January the IDF destroyed them and the Norwegian Aid group rebuilt them (at $360,000 each). I also visited the Sheboura Refugee area in Rafah, the poorest area in all of the Occupied Territories. The conditions are abysmal, as one might imagine.
Tonight there is indiscriminate firing down the street from us. The mayor's wife took me with her to visit her sister. As we were leaving their home (about an hour ago) bullets started flying at us -- I mean many rounds, not just a stray shot here or there. We had to rush back inside and then, after a pause in the firing, we ran madly to the car and kept our heads down below the window as our driver, a cousin of the mayor's wife, sped off. We heard more showers of bullets behind us. Noof, the mayor's 17 year old daughter (a lovely and intelligent girl) told me that shooting like this and worse happens every day. (I had asked her and her friend, Raghida, to tell me what they would want to tell Americans if they had the chance. I'll fill you in on that another day.)
Just now, Laura Gordon of the ISM phoned me and I will visit their office in Rafah tonight (it is located in a relatively safe area, she tells me). Tomorrow there will be a demonstration here in the morning and she wants me to come because apparently the media show up only when internationals are present. I look forward to being present.
I've got much more to write but no more time.
Feel free to forward this information out if you want.
Jennifer Loewenstein