Shooting Back: The Israeli Human Rights Group B’Tselem Gives Palestinians Video Cameras to Document Life Under Occupation.

AMY GOODMAN: We turn now to a second round of Israeli-Palestinian negotiations, which was stymied on Monday after Israel refused to halt its settlement activity. At the US-sponsored peace conference in Annapolis last month, Israel agreed to end settlement expansion. But the Israeli Construction Ministry unveiled a proposal Sunday to build 740 new homes on occupied Palestinian land near East Jerusalem.

The Israeli human rights group B’Tselem has given Palestinian families across the West Bank video cameras to document how they’re treated by Israeli soldiers and settlers. The project is called “Shooting Back.” Some of the videos depicting abuse by settlers sparked a national debate in Israel earlier this year after they were broadcast on Israeli television.

Oren Yakobovich coordinates B’Tselem’s video department. He recently traveled to the United States, joined me here in the firehouse studio. I began by asking him to explain the project, “Shooting Back.”

OREN YAKOBOVICH: “Shooting Back,” it’s basically giving a Palestinian that’s living in high-risk areas that’s probably going to suffer from human rights violation by the Israeli army and by settlers—we give them cameras, so they can film their life, and basically we can see the violation when it’s occurred.


AMY GOODMAN: How did you come to do this?


OREN YAKOBOVICH: Right. B’Tselem, the Israeli Information Center for Human Rights, is documenting violation since ’89, and the aim is to bring to the Israeli public and to the public in the world and decision makers violation. And the aim is, of course, to advocate for the end of violation. I wish I would not be here speaking about violation, but it’s happening all the time.


So, for many years, what we did, we did reports. We’re still doing them. And it’s a long-term report. We’re investigating the situation in the field. We had field researchers in every big city in the West Bank that—taking testimonies, written testimonies. And we did some films about the reports that we were taking out, but there was kind of frustration that I felt all the time, or we felt in B’Tselem, because we know from written testimony that a lot of things are happening, and we don’t really manage to see them. It was becoming hard, harder, more and more during the years, to bring new information or new visuals to the media and to grab public attention. And we looked for a different point of view, a new point of view, and this is how we decided to start giving cameras to these people that live in these places.


AMY GOODMAN: Where do you get the cameras?


OREN YAKOBOVICH: Where we get them from?


AMY GOODMAN: You just—you buy them and then give them to—?


OREN YAKOBOVICH: Yeah, we buy them.


AMY GOODMAN: And so, do you have support of people in Israel?


OREN YAKOBOVICH: We have support of people in Israel, also in the world. B’Tselem is an NGO, and we—fund by contributions. So we take—we raise money, and we buy the cameras and give them.


AMY GOODMAN: What does “B’Tselem” actually mean, the Hebrew word?


OREN YAKOBOVICH: The word itself, OK, “B’Tselem” is come from the Bible, and the first sentence in Genesis is God created man in His shape. In His shape—


AMY GOODMAN: In His image.


OREN YAKOBOVICH: In image, yes. So, in His image, the Hebrew word for it would be “B’Tselem.” So that’s where it’s coming from. Even though we are not with this organization at all, but the aim is, of course, to point that everyone has been created in the shape of God, and everybody is equal.


AMY GOODMAN: Oren, describe this first video we’re about to watch and listen to.


OREN YAKOBOVICH: Alright. OK, well, this is basically the first video that we took out for the media. It’s happening in Hebron. Just to understand, Hebron is the only Palestinian city where Jewish settlers living in the heart of the city. Usually the settlements will be outside of the major city, around or close by, but not inside. In Hebron, basically because Abraham, the father of our religion, is buried there, it’s a very holy place to the Jews also, and there’s settlements in the heart of the city.


The result of the settlements is a lot of restriction of movements on—that are being held on Palestinians. There are many streets that they cannot really walk. A Palestinian cannot drive cars in these areas. And there is a lot of violation that’s happening there from the settlers that are living there. There are very radical settlers, more radical even than the rest of the West Bank. And we know from a lot of years of watching the place or getting testimonies that a lot of violations is happening there.


What you’re going to see is a clip from a settlement called Tel Rumeida in Hebron. What we will see is a settler from this settlement, from Tel Rumeida, pushing Palestinians that basically are living across the street, on the other side of the road, pushing her back to her home, calling her “whore,” cursing her very viciously. And all this time, you see the soldier standing next to the woman doing nothing, not interfering.


AMY GOODMAN: Tell us about the Palestinian family, in particular the woman, both the Palestinian woman and the Jewish settler woman.


OREN YAKOBOVICH: Yeah, OK. So the Palestinian is part of part of Abu Eisha family that’s living in the heart of Tel Rumeida. They’ve been there for years, a lot of lot of years. In ’84, if I’m not mistaken, or ’83—I don’t remember—the settlement started, the Jewish settlement started in Hebron. The street that was open all the time to the family and to the people to come to visit her was closed. And now, this is the only Palestinian family that can walk in the street, the people living in this house. And they have nowhere to—the only way out from this house is through this road. So basically every time they’re going out from the door, they’re confronting the settlement—the settlers. And you will see this clip, and after, you see more clips, because we get a lot of material from this family. They are being attacked on a regular basis. Every time they go out of the house, there’s a good chance they’re going to get stones from the children or from the people that are living across the street, from the settlers.


AMY GOODMAN: And tell me about this particular settler woman.


OREN YAKOBOVICH: Don’t say her name, but she is a radical settler, and she’s living on the other side of the street. And she’s kind of representing the settlers population living in Hebron. And I have to say that even for the Israeli audience, she seems extreme, like she’s very extreme. But what we know about her, this is not the first time she’s attacking, not her, not her friends. There’s attacks happening there regularly on a regular basis. And what we see, that the army and the police are not enforcing the law, or there is lack of enforcement there.



AMY GOODMAN: Let’s watch.


HEBRON PALESTINIAN RESIDENT: [translated] She wants to lock us in.


ISRAELI SETTLER: [translated] Get in the house. Get in the house.


HEBRON PALESTINIAN RESIDENT: [translated] I won’t close the door.


ISRAELI SETTLER: [translated] Close it. Close the door.


HEBRON PALESTINIAN RESIDENT: [translated] Stay out of this!


ISRAELI SETTLER: [translated] Close the door.


HEBRON PALESTINIAN RESIDENT: [translated] Stay out of this! I’m not closing the door.


ISRAELI SETTLER: [translated] Sit here, in the cage. Sit here. Close the door.


HEBRON PALESTINIAN RESIDENT: [translated] I don’t want to go inside!


ISRAELI SETTLER: [translated] Close the… Get the camera out of here.


HEBRON PALESTINIAN RESIDENT: [translated] Call the police.


ISRAELI SETTLER: [translated] Turn the camera off.


HEBRON PALESTINIAN RESIDENT: [translated] It’s early in the morning. What do you want from us?


ISRAELI SETTLER: [translated] Shut up!


HEBRON PALESTINIAN RESIDENT: [translated] Don’t you [addressing soldier] see what she’s doing?


ISRAELI SETTLER: [translated] Whore.


HEBRON PALESTINIAN RESIDENT: [translated] You are!


ISRAELI SETTLER: [translated] Whore.


HEBRON PALESTINIAN RESIDENT: [translated] You are! Go away!


ISRAELI SETTLER: [translated] Whore.


HEBRON PALESTINIAN RESIDENT: [translated] Look what she’d doing! Go away!


ISRAELI SETTLER: [translated] Whore.


HEBRON PALESTINIAN RESIDENT: [translated] Go away, you bitch!


ISRAELI SETTLER: [translated] Whore.


HEBRON PALESTINIAN RESIDENT: [translated] Did you see [addressing soldier] what she did?


ISRAELI SETTLER: [translated] Whore. Whooooore. You’re a whore. Your daughters, too. Don’t you dare open this door!


HEBRON PALESTINIAN RESIDENT: [translated] Don’t you dare come here!


ISRAELI SETTLER: [translated] Whore.


HEBRON PALESTINIAN RESIDENT: [translated] I’ll leave the house, as I please!


ISRAELI SETTLER: [translated] Whore.


HEBRON PALESTINIAN RESIDENT: [translated] Leave us alone! Soldier, do you see what she’s doing?




AMY GOODMAN: That video was filmed in Hebron. The Jewish settler woman, the Palestinian woman was filmed by who, Oren?


OREN YAKOBOVICH: The sister of the Palestinian who’s being cursed is the one that’s filming. Basically, there is a kid there, sixteen years old, holding a camera while her sister is being attacked by the settler. You see that the settler is coming to the camera, trying to push her into the house. And her sister is just next to her filming. And she’s filming from—you see, I think it’s a barbwire or like, you know, a net from—


AMY GOODMAN: Through barbwire?


OREN YAKOBOVICH: Through barbwire, yeah, I think, because it’s called the cage house. Because they have so many troubles from the settlers, they have to build kind of a barbwire around their house so they will not—to protect the windows from the stones, to protect them the stone and from all kinds of things that they’re throwing there.




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