I have just returned from a 10-day field mission to the West Bank, a place I have worked and documented since the civil unrest of the first intifada. Over the past 36 years, I have continued to return and document the ethnic cleansing and crimes committed by Israeli soldiers and settlers against Palestinian civilians. I have seen the political area worsen under extreme right-wing governments and the deterioration of any kind of human rights in Gaza or the West Bank.
This autumn was horrific. The bombing of Gaza continues while in the West Bank Palestinian farmers struggle to gather olives during the traditional harvest season. Terrorised by armed and extremely violent settlers, the farmers’ ancient way of life is rapidly disappearing. B’Tselem, the Israeli human rights organisation, told me that more than 1,000 Palestinians have been killed by the Israeli military and settlers since October 7, 2023. Dozens of Palestinian communities have been totally erased. This is a clear case of ethnic cleansing.
Meanwhile, as I was working in the olive groves and villages, my hometown of Paris was lit up by fires amid looting and protests. Since late September, high school and university students have blockaded their lycées, filled the boulevards and, on the margins of the city, burned bins and smashed bus shelters. Last weekend, 400,000 people marched across France and more than 1,400 were arrested. By the time this goes to print the figures will be higher.
My empathy is with the protestors, who feel alienated from society and face a grim future. Their anger is genuine and it is justified. Their demands are solid, reasonable even. They would like €10 billion (Dh41.33 billion) in emergency funding to repair crumbling schools where rats come into classrooms, freeze in winter and are boiling hot during the summer – and this summer France had unprecedented heat waves.
The students say they often have classes without teachers, who are paid low wages and sometimes simply disappear. I remember my son telling me his Spanish teacher just disappeared one day and for months they had no one to teach them Spanish. They want smaller classes – many lycees now cram more than 35 pupils into a room. Their school days are often 10 hours long. They also want an end to the gruelling Parcoursup, an admissions platform that decides their future at university – if they even get a chance to go to university.
The background is that France is in dire financial shape. The far right led by Marine Le Pen, an extremist, is rising in the polls. Climate change is no longer a fairy tale – we saw it this summer when temperatures in Paris and other cities skyrocketed. Pensioners worry about their payments being cut and young people worry about their future.
I stand with the students on every issue but one: Palestine.
On the streets and in the protests one can see the Palestinian flag and keffiyehs. Many of these students watched the destruction of Gaza and the West Bank ethnic cleansing on their phones. They know the issues and they are angry. But equating a student struggle with an illegal military occupation is not the way to go.
My worry is that this kind of solidarity is not helpful because of the violence on the Paris streets. I don’t want the Palestinian struggle to be associated with burning and looting. Lumping them together diminishes their separate struggles. The brutal settler attacks, the thousands of olive trees uprooted, the farmers who have been displaced – this is not the same as demands for less-crowded classrooms.
Then there is Gaza, which is all but ignored since the West Bank went up in flames. Even since the ceasefire, 1,400 Palestinians have been killed – and I reckon that is a low figure. Children there do not have overcrowded classrooms, they have Miss Rachel who they watch in their tents. Their universities, their libraries, even the wonderful Edward Said Library where children had music and art lessons, lie in rubble.
Palestinians aren’t asking for a timeline and a budget. They want the right to live without occupation. To move between towns and villages without checkpoints – often set up by settlers with no authorisation. To not live in a land that many say is an apartheid state. To not face ethnic cleansing on their own ancestral land. They want the right to rebuild Gaza and live there peacefully.
The students in France are fighting for their future. I understand that. But when they are arrested, they are released within hours, and they have access to lawyers and courts. The prime minister has met their representatives.
In Palestine, the settlers are armed but the farmers are not allowed to defend themselves. If they fight back with the only thing they have – stones – they are arrested. The Israeli military protects the settlers, and the settlers are sanctioned and protected in turn by the state.
When I drove through the South Hebron Hills near Masafer Yatta – the hamlet where the Oscar winning No Other Land was filmed, I saw school after school closed down. Students can’t get to classes even if the schools are open because settlers block the roads. Israeli military then arrives and says it’s a closed military zone. In a sense – Palestinians are not fighting for their future. At the moment, they have no future.
None of this means French students should stop caring about Palestine. I do believe international solidarity is the one thing that will topple Israeli impunity. Growing awareness in the countries that enable Israel to act this way are slowly changing their political landscape – most notably the US and Germany.
But real solidarity requires a kind of humility. One group is fighting for a better future, which they deserve. The other is simply struggling to stay alive and to live on their own land.
