Notes on my Quaker Connections
in Palestine
By Skip Schiel
(November 13, 2004)
In
a nutshell, fruits borne by
my Quaker connections are myriad.
Without those connections my current trip to
Palestine and Israel would be an
entirely different journey.
Feeling a call to be in Palestine and Israel for an extended period, primarily to observe, comprehend, photograph, and portray what I experience--some would call this: witness with a camera--I wrote letters to many organizations engaged in the struggle for justice and peace in the Holy Land. One of the most promising replies came from Birzeit University near Ramallah, which was willing to engage me in a project about the right to education.
Ramallah happens to be the most active site of Quakerism in Palestine. The city is traditionally Christian; Quakers have been in Ramallah since at least the late 1800s. Motivated by the missionizing instinct, they organized a meeting for worship while establishing a school for girls.
Arriving in Ramallah in
mid September 2004 to begin my work thru Birzeit (I might have landed
anywhere in Israel and Palestine, depending on which organization first
accepted my offer), I visited one of the two friends schools (archaically
named "Girls" and "Boys" but in reality elementary and secondary,
respectively). This first visit was to attend the meeting for worship on
Sunday morning, since the meeting house is currently being renovated. Later
that day I met the principal of the school, Diana Abdel Nour, who was in her
office "catching up." (I'd met her during the summer of 2004 at New England
Yearly Meeting. The summer before at Yearly Meeting I also met the former
directors of the Friends schools, Colin and Kathy South.) Diana invited me
to visit the school the following Monday, coming in time for the chapel
(which in reality is an assembly).
--Could I photograph?
--I don't see why not.
Photographing I felt instantaneous resonance with the people and the place. Thus began my weekly visits to both schools and a growing series of photographs.
So connection number one with Friends in Palestine: Ramallah and Friends schools.
The Birzeit photo project ended prematurely, it did not work out. So I revived my efforts to volunteer my photography. Friends' schools was on my list, not high, but present. I met the Friends schools head, Joyce Aljouni, at a meeting for worship. Learning of my experience teaching photography, she asked me if I'd be willing to lead an afterschool program. Initially, because of prior commitments, I said no, then, as my plans changed, I agreed to offer limited photography teaching at the secondary school.
She informed me that my
offer to photograph the school was not timely--just days before my offer
Joyce learned that a German photographer associated with the Barenboim-Said
music project at the school was going to be photographing. The photographer,
Peter Dammann, and I now work around each other.
With the Birzeit project ending and the apartment they provided no longer available, I was faced with the question of where to base myself and where to live. I wrote my cyber clearness support committee (a twist on the Quaker tradition of clearness or support committee, but not in the actual presence of the members, by email instead). A friend many times to the region, Hilda Silverman, suggested I consult with Jean Zaru, clerk of the Ramallah Friends meeting. She is Palestinian, very wise, experienced in many forms of resistance to Occupation, harbors a dramatic vision of using the soon-to-be-opened Friends meeting house as an international center for the nonviolent transformation of the Palestinian and Israeli society--and might be able to help guide me on my next steps. I'd met Jean at meetings for worship in Ramallah and also in Cambridge when she spoke at our meeting. I emailed her. She suggested asking at the school whether any of the teachers or parents might have a room or apartment to rent.
Joyce replied that the school has an apartment they'd be willing to rent me at a reduced rate, the rate possibly negotiable for services to the school.
Connection number two: Jean Zaru, presiding clerk of Ramallah friends meeting.
I'd heard about the Ramallah meeting house, its deterioration, and one day, ambling around central Ramallah, after noticing on previous occasions a church-like structure--not quite a church, but a house of reverence perhaps--I learned this was the Friends meeting house. Later, Jean asked me to photograph its interior for the international committee which is supervising the renovation.
While searching for more organizations to photograph for, a Friend from South Africa, Jeremy Routledge, contacted me.
--Skip, I'm in Palestine, with the Ecumenical Accompaniers, let's visit.
We had met for the first time in 1990 when a group of us from Friends meeting at Cambridge visited South Africa to learn about the situation and express solidarity with those in the struggle against apartheid. We met again in 1998 when I photographed for the Quaker Peace Center in Cape Town that Jeremy directed at that time. And most recently we came together in Ramallah, he stayed overnight with me. He told me about the Ecumenical Accompaniers program, suggesting I might photograph for them.
One week later, I was at his team's site in Sawahreh, a village east of Jerusalem. I photographed one of their projects observing checkpoints. Later, Jeremy invited me to join his team for a visit to another team in Bethlehem, a group of three clerics that Jeremy jokingly calls "The Three Wise Men." With them we joined an Italian Catholic nun to pray the rosary at the new Separation Wall running thru the birth town of Jesus. I am now photographing their various other teams in Jayyous, Yanoun, Hebron, and Jerusalem.
Connection number three: Jeremy Routledge, South African Friend, and thru him the Ecumenical Accompaniers
One of the Ecumenical Accompaniers teams is in Ramallah, residing at the Swift House, which is owned by the Friends School. I drop by occasionally for tea and to chat, also to photograph some of their activities, such as Emily Mnisi (also from South Africa) working in the Jalazoon refugee camp.
And one final connection with Quakers. In 1992 a Friend, Paul Hood, videotaped at the Friends schools, and later told me
stories of his experience. When that project was beginning, I felt so jealous--that could be me, I thought, maybe making a slide show for the school. His experience enlightened and propelled me to initiate my own. And here I am--not only because of my multifarious Quaker connections in the Holy Land, but because of my Beloved Quaker Community back home--living for awhile at the Friends elementary school, very happy with the sounds of children, the early and late light that streams in my apartment, the connection I have with a long tradition of Friends' activities in some of the most difficult places on earth. Not always are Friends so placed. Thru the bases of the Ramallah meeting for worship and my refuge in the Friends school, I hope to sustain and encourage that tradition.
We will have to repent in this generation, not merely for the vitriolic words and actions of the bad people, but for the appalling silence of the good people.
--Martin Luther King Jr.
Quaker connections links
"A Christian Palestinian life--faith and struggle" by Jean Zaru--