A Tale of Two Cities in Palestine

On 11 January, a group of around fifty Palestinian activists created a village. Named Bab al-Shams (Gate of the Sun), it was comprised of about 25 tents including a clinic and an administrative center. Organized by the Popular Struggle Coordination Committee in the West Bank, the activists planted the posts of their tents in the area that the Israeli government calls E-1.

Recently designated for construction, the construction of the E-1 settlement block would connect Israel’s settlements around East Jerusalem with Ma’ale Adumim, yet another settlement block that is constructed deep in the center of the West Bank. More than simply being illegal, as all Israeli settlements beyond the ‘Green Line’ are, the completion of the project would likely mean the annihilation of a viable Palestinian state and therefore a two-state solution. Its announcement has resulted in an irregular amount of outcry even from Israel’s closest European allies.

Under the Oslo Framework, the West Bank was divided into three different areas. In Area A—comprising the larger population centers and around 3% of the West Bank’s land—Palestinians have full administrative authority and are responsible for security. Palestinians are allowed to build in Area A within certain Israeli-imposed restrictions. Area B (25%) tends to make up the outlands of the populous cities of area A and includes smaller towns and villages and serves as a buffer between Areas  A and C. While it is under Palestinian administrative control, security responsibilities are shared with Israeli in these areas. Construction here is permitted only with express Israeli permission. Area C comprises the rest of the occupied West Bank—approximately 72% of the land. Under full Israeli authority, Palestinian construction here is completely forbidden, though illegal Israeli construction goes on with impunity.

Bab al-Shams was built in Area C.

The Israeli government’s first response to the village was to declare it a closed military zone and hand out eviction notices to the activists. This is a familiar method that Israel employs to dispossess Palestinian living in areas that Israel wishes to incorporate as part of its borders in a final status arrangement. The organizer’s of Bab al-Shams were prepared for this and were able to get an injunction from an Israeli court delaying the eviction order. The Benjamin Netanyahu’s administration was able to overturn the injunction by claiming to Israel’s High Court that there was a “pressing security need” to evacuate the nascent village. Approximately 48 hours after it was created, Bab al-Shams was vacant save for the few Israeli soldiers left behind to prevent Palestinians from returning.

The city of Rawabi tells a different story.

Rawabi is a billed as the first planned Palestinian city. While not directly involved the project falls well within the realm of Fayyad’s initiative of forging a Palestinian state with or without Israel’s permission. Funded by predominantly Qatari investors (like numerous construction projects in Hamas-controlled Gaza), Rawabi is estimated to cost near $1 billion upon its completion. Ground was broken in Rawabi in 2010, but the first residents of the city are projected to arrive sometime this year.

While Rawabi lies within Area A, it has not been immune from Israeli obstruction of different sorts. In order for construction to proceed smoothly, the Palestinians began with Israel as far back as 2010 about an access road part of which would run through Area C. As of today, the lack of such a road is still a problem, however the investment company and the workers have continued to build despite this hardship.

The residents of the nearby Israeli settlement, Atarot, are not thrilled about their new neighbors either. The access road desired by Palestinian builders runs, Israeli settlers say, too close to the road used by Atarot’s colonists. Aliza Herbst, spokeswoman for the Yesha Coucil expressed satisfaction at this turn of events, “I’m really glad the road is there to prevent them from building that city… and yay for us that we have established those communities so that the problem exists.”

More worrying than the predictable obstruction from certain parts of the Israeli government and the Yesha Council, are the criticisms coming from Palestinians activists. The harshest critics from this community come from quite notable sources like Electronic Intifada, the Boycott-Divestment-Sanctions movement, and numerous local Palestinian groups that assert that the Rawabi project serves to normalize the occupation.

One op-ed referred to the Palestinian businessman in charge of Rawabi’s development, Bashar Masri, as a wakil, which the author chose to translate as ‘subcontractor’ but is more often used in reference to collaborators. There’s no doubt that a project of this size requires a large degree of, at the very least, cooperation with Israel, however the use of the term “collaborator” as often used in revolutionary vernacular is hyperbolic if not grotesque. It is estimated (quite conservatively I imagine) that Rawabi will add $85 million to the Israeli economy when all is said in done. Though there is a prohibition on buying products made in Israeli settlements, logistically, said one engineer, raw materials like cement powder and sand had to come from Israeli companies.

Yet another criticism ties into the neoliberal, “free market” aspects of Fayyad’s state building strategy, including the introduction of “Fannie Mae-style” mortgage institutions in order to allow more Palestinians to buy homes on credit and experience the joys of debt.

These two cities represent two very different modes of nonviolent resistance. The Palestinian elite in the West Bank are firmly committed to forging a society under the banner of Fayyadism within and in spite of the constraints placed upon it by the Israeli military occupation. The activists of the popular committees aim to defy those constraints.

Numerous authors, as well as the project’s developers, have admitted the tenuous nature of Rawabi. Though the project has been in planning since 2009, four years later basic questions of about the cities survival linger. Where will its water supply come from? How will a town with a capacity of 45,000 residents function without the abovementioned access road? What becomes of Rawabi in the event of more political turbulence: an Israeli re-occupation, Palestinian factional infighting?  None of these questions have clear answers. It is very much possible that Rawabi—an ambitious albeit controversial and thorny project—might be blown away and destroyed as easily as Bab al-Shams.

Then again, Bab al-Shams has hardly blown away. As the Israeli army was bulldozing the empty tents left by the grassroots activists, the Palestinian Authority created a village council for Bab al-Shams, cementing the Palestinian claim to the land. Moreover, the activists of the Popular Committee have continued to create new villages creating new points of contact with the Israeli occupation and exposing it more and more every Friday. From Bab al-Shams to Bab al-Karama to al-Manatir and most recently Canaan, activists continued to employ this tactic of confrontation.

The Rawabi model, while working within the constraints of the occupation and even in cooperation with its overseers, offers a high risk, high reward potential for Palestinians. The Bab al-Shams model, while it has yet to produce any tangible results for Palestinian society, represents a beacon of hope and defiance. Both, however, with all of their flaws and controversies are national endeavors expressing a deep yearning for self-determination.

In closing, one final point about these two models: the Rawabi model is inherently limited, both by the very real constraints imposed upon a Palestinian society whose every aspect is controlled by an occupying power and by the imaginary lines drawn up in the Oslo Accords. Area A’s meager allotment will inevitably run dry and Palestinian construction will cease or spill over into Area B or C. The Rawabi model, while perhaps ambitious, will inevitably intersect or be subsumed by the model presented at Bab al-Shams.

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