FACES OF HEBRON:

One Day in the West Bank

In January 2012, I spent two weeks in Israel/Palestine thanks to the generosity of the wonderful folks who make up the Six Degrees Consortium. I stayed in a convent in Jerusalem's Old City, just a floor above the busy streets of the Muslim Quarter. My time in the Old City was an incredible experience that I will never forget, and there were many moments of joy and discovery. For one day however, I left the magic of the Old City for a tour of the West Bank city of Hebron. Newspaper and television reports had not prepared me for my insight into the reality of life for Palestinians in the occupied territories. I created this series of 12 collages in an attempt to portray the people of Hebron and their struggle for autonomy. More information on the Israel/Palestine situation may be found on the web at http://apartheidweek.org, and a weekly newsletter by Professor Mazin Qumsiyeh may be accessed at qumisyeh.org.

Lori Gordon

February 19, 2012

 

In the narrow, twisting streets of Hebron's Old City marketplace, one can see a strange site by looking overhead. Chain link fence and other heavy gauge wire covers the open area between the rooftops on either side of the street. The wire is necessary to protect the shop owners and customers of the markets from refuse. This trash-garbage, broken pieces of furniture, even large chunks of rebar-embedded concrete-has been thrown from the windows of a high rise apartment building that is situated next to the market. The high rise residents are settlers-hardline Zionists whose avowed purpose is to make Israel/Palestine 100% Jewish.

I decided to use portions of the fence in all of the pieces in this series, both as a visual reminder of the actual wire overhead and as a symbolic device to indicate the virtual prison in which the Palestinians of the occupied territories are forced to live. I also wanted to capture the everyday life of these people; a tailor working in the doorway of his shop, two women on an errand, people with a donkey loaded with belongings making their way through a checkpoint.

My methodology consists of several stages. I first designed the collages on my computer and when I had a mock-up of the piece, I printed out sections of the images on 80 lb. Paper. The images were then individually cut out and fitted together in the manner of a jigsaw puzzle, and adhered to the support. The completed pieces were then coated with a satin UV varnish.


All collages are available for sale. Please email me for prices and availability.

Hebron Collage 1

The expression on this young man's face reflects the misery of the occupation, which has profoundly affected several generations of Palestinians. I placed him walking on the top of several pieces of concrete used by the Israelis to block off a street, and which display grafitti in both English and Arabic. All over the world, there is a growing consensus that the Israeli occupation is a land-based apartheid system, and a call for boycott, divestment and sanctions against Israel is gaining popularity daily. Overhead is the screen of wire, and a pile of settler refuse is in the background.

Hebron Collage 2

I came upon this tailor in his shop, surrounded by his work and intent upon his efforts. He is suspended in mid air, surrounded on all sides by the presence of the settlers.

Hebron Collage 3

The symbolism in this piece is obvious; these men are walking forward, out of the wasteland of the occupation on stepping stones to a future that many people worldwide are affecting to change. Israel is a powerful military state with a profound amount of financial support from other nations, including the United States. The call for BDS campaigns (boycott, divestment and sanctions) is becoming a worldwide phenomenon but change is slow to come to Palestine.

Hebron Collage 4

Palestine can be seen as a study in contrasts, as illustrated by the Israeli jeep and the the boys with their traditional mode of transportation. Both above and below, the chain link fence holds their lives in suspension.

Hebron Collage 6

I saw a good number of Jewish people walking in the Old City area of Hebron, and I do not know if they were settlers or not.  I do know that there are Jews worldwide who are aware of the injustice of the occupation and all of its consequences, many of whom are working to correct the injustice, and I would hate to represent someone who was not a hard core Zionist as a settler. Whoever this man is, he is walking in a chaotic wasteland that is packed with symbolism.

Hebron Collage 6

I saw a good number of Jewish people walking in the Old City area of Hebron, and I do not know if they were settlers or not.  I do know that there are Jews worldwide who are aware of the injustice of the occupation and all of its consequences, many of whom are working to correct the injustice, and I would hate to represent someone who was not a hard core Zionist as a settler. Whoever this man is, he is walking in a chaotic wasteland that is packed with symbolism.

Hebron Collage 7

This man was sitting in the entrance to his shop. Beside him is a scale that is overflowing with testimonials regarding the Israeli occupation of Palestine. I chose to break up the surface of his coat with fractured images of the marketplace to indicate the shattered lives of so many Palestinians.

Hebron Collage 8

This woman was actually photographed in the Arab souk just inside the Damascus Gate. Her expression was so poignant that I placed her  in the Hebron marketplace. When the term "apartheid" is used to describe the situation of Palestinians, it not only refers to the West Bank and Gaza, but to the laws regulating the lives of Palestinians living inside what is now called Israel. While Palestinians in Jerusalem have Israeli citizenship unlike those in the West Bank and Gaza, they are still living subject to a different set of law than the Jewish citizens, and are treated as second class citizens. The settlers' high rise can be seen towering over her, and more lines of testimonials of Palestinian women are providing her support.

Hebron Collage 9  SOLD

This piece incorporates images from the Ibrahim Mosque in Hebron where in 1994 Baruch Goldstein, an Israeli settler and member of the far-right Israeli Kach movement, opened fire on unarmed Muslims praying inside. Twenty nine Muslims were killed, and one hundred twenty five were injured. The niche made of ceramic tiles provides a place for the Israeli soldiers in this image; half of the mosque has been converted to a synagogue, and on Jewish holy days, Muslims are not allowed to enter their mosque. Spilling out of the niche are a pile of plastic rugs kept in the mosque. These rugs are used to cover the carpets when non-Muslims who refuse to remove their shoes are in the mosque. Our guide told us that Israeli government officials have been guilty of this disrespect, as well as Jewish settlers.

Hebron Collage 10

In this collage, I captured a woman approaching a checkpoint for passage to her neighborhood. She is behind a man that has tied his donkey to the fence as he requests that an Israeli soldier open the gate for his animal to pass through. These Israeli checkpoints are everywhere, and while I was allowed to pass through, our guide, a Palestinian activist, was not. I enlarged the physical size of the soldier of soldier before placing him in the guard shack to indicate the David/Goliath nature of the situation at the checkpoints.

Hebron Collage 11

These two women were walking very purposely  down the street. I placed them in front of a barricaded dead end alley; the only place I saw in the marketplace that did not have the protective fence overhead. The trash thrown down from the settler's high rise is piled up 3-4 feet tall in this area. Amidst the trash and barbed wire I created a symbolic protective "roof line" with words of text from a 2009 report on Israel's human rights violations against Palestinian women. More of the text provides a foundation for their feet but some of it has crumbled to pieces, indicating the fractured nature of the protection human rights watch groups can provide.

Hebron Collage 12

I wanted to point to the length of time involved in the displacement of the Palestinian people by including an image of two different generations. The situation has continued for over 60 years.  The older man was a child when the occupation began, and the young men may live to see Palestine become an autonomous nation. For symbolic reasons, I chose to leave out the third, middle generation of Palestinians whose entire lives have been spent as persons of an occupied country.