On the day before my arrival in Yanun the olive harvest had begun. All over Palestine, when October arrives and the olive harvesting begins, calls go out for international volunteers to help with the harvest. The volunteers respond, knowing that they are desperately needed in many of the rural parts of the West Bank.

The need arises from at least two basic reasons. One, their labor is needed to offset the labor shortages caused by the Israeli Occupation'ss heavy restrictions on the movements of local labor forces. Two, local Palestinians are subject to a very real threat of violence when they are harvesting olives literally 'under the guns' of the Settler populations living in these areas. The Settlers know that the IDF (Israeli Defense Forces) rarely interferes with intimidation and attacks, whether physical or otherwise, on local Palestinians. However, the presence of 'Internationals' has demonstrated at least some protective value. So Maria , my Danish Ecumenical Accompaniment team-mate (EA), and I traveled the approximately 11/2 hours to Yanon, about a third of it jolting over very rough roads, to spend the night and then the next day picking olives in the groves surrounding Yanun.

I arrived in Yanun along with a van-load of guests being given a hop/skip/jump tour of the varied work that the 28 EA's of Group 9 are doing. They had hopped into Ramallah in mid-day and were now being jumped up toYanun for the same reason that was bringing me there - a chance to see and better understand the circumstances of the rural villagers of Palestine, who still constitute about 42% percent of the total Palestinian population of about 3 million residents in the West Bank.

The Village of Yanun (9 families, 54 people) and its immediate neighbor, Lower Yanoun, which is about a mile away down the valley that runs between the surrounding hilltops, is made up of 7 families--35 people. Probably 50-60 percent are age eighteen or under. The villagers are often from related families that have lived there for at least several generations. They share an elected mayor and have two separate schools for children through middle school ages. The teens attend a school in the much larger village of Aqraba, 15 minutes' very rough drive away. Within the last year the villagers have been the beneficiaries of the Rural Electrification Program of the Palestine Authority, the administrative body of the popularly elected Palestine Legislative Council. Instead of electricity for approximately 4 hours a night, it is available whenever one throws a switch.

In these two agricultural villages, right now the flat fields on the floor of the valley are plowed and ready for planting when the rains begin. Although these villages are located over a natural aquafer and, at least in Upper Yanun village, each house has its own cistern of good tasting, drinkable water, the fields are not irrigated. A significant part of the village economy is the planting, tending and harvesting of olive trees on the surrounding hillsides. Trees are planted just over a wall or just below the road that runs up from the valley floor, along the edge of the hill. They dot the hillsides and extend for miles, usually without any highly visible property markings. The villagers know which tree belongs to which family and rarely need any sorting out by others.

We were enthusiastically welcomed, both by the EA team  in their two spacious rooms and much smaller kitchen  and bathroom, and by a delegation of villagers: Rashid, the mayor, the village school teacher, the head of one of the families who had become the unofficial sponsor of EAPPI's work in the village. The guests were seated on slip-covered foam mattresses lining the walls, with cushions to lean against.

A traditional design, woven carpet made of a straw-like synthetic rather than hand-knotted wool covered the floor between the two opposite rows of mattresses. We were each introduced and the traditional and much appreciated small cups of Arabic coffee were served. Questions were asked and answered:

How many people?        

About 100 in the combined Upper and Lower villages.

How many children in school and how many teachers?       

Upper and Lower Yanoun have their own schools. About 15 children are in the Upper Yanoun school,  perhaps
5 or 6 in that of Lower Yanoun.

Have people been moving out of the village?      

Yes. Returning to the village? Some who left have returned, perhaps to rejoin families. The teacher in Upper  Yanoun would like to live in the village but as yet has been unable to arrange for housing.

Do the houses have running water? Is it drinkable?        

Yes, each house has its own cistern, the water is very good and the villages have always had access to water,  though since the settlements have become so large and use so much water there is fear that the water table  will fall and perhaps there are already signs that this fear is well-founded.

We stepped outside to follow the local men into the street. The lovely valleys and terraced hillsides were lit by the slanting rays of the late afternoon sun as we stood on the stone steps of the EA's rented house. We walked with Rashid around the village, winding up to the next level of the village at the end of each street; one or two young men following in our wake and a few women and small children looking on from one or another set of steps or a doorway.

A small group of boys, probably between eight and eleven or thirteen, were playing with a ball - Basketball or Soccer Ball, they had their own rules. Their play area had low walls around it and was atop an enclosure where the sheep and goats lived, when not in the open. Otherwise any ball would have been gone, down the hill, after a few minutes' play.

The air was quiet, the doves cooing on the roof of a nearby building. The sun was headed toward the western horizon, sinking down behind the silhouetted outlines of Lower Yanoun. It should have been peaceful and serene.

There was, however, another vista silhouetted along the hilltops: the eight story look-out towers and the equally high communications towers of the Settlement and Outposts of Itamar, looking down on the valley and the villages from each of the surrounding high ridges. None of the human inhabitants of these places were visible to us below but, very soon, their presence was felt.

We walked on, now looking across the roofs of the house below. The mayor pointed to a large overturned water tank, lying on its side against the upper wall of one of the houses on the top level of the village. It had been in place just a short distance above the house on the hilltop. One night some of the Itamar settlers had dislodged it and sent it crashing down against the wall of the house-this after at least one suspected but failed attempt to damage it.

Why would they do this?        

They would like us to leave both our fields and our homes. They say "God gave us this land".. They have guns and often shoot at us, at our animals, even at the children. Rashid pointed to four smaller water tanks, a bit further along the rise. 'We put the tanks back in place.'

Will they damage those tanks as well?
Who is responsible for protecting you from such vandalism and violence?

Yes, probably they will try but we hope not. We do not have guns. It is only the Occupation force [the Israeli Defense Forces (IDF)] who might prevent the settlers from doing these things. But they do not. They are not concerned for our protection. They never oppose the settlement activities and do not act against the settlers' violence.

The adjoining house, also on the top level of the village, seemed quite large but was unoccupied. One of the elders of the village had lived there. Time and again his windows had been broken by raiding settlers, on at least one occasion the barrel of a gun thrust through the panes and fired into the room. Presumably by chance, it being the middle of the night, the room happened not to be the sleeping room so no one was injured. Later this old man was physically attacked and injured and had to move out of the house. Now he had died.

Had his death been directly caused by the attacks?

As far as I could tell there was no direct answer to this question? A small shrug of the shoulders, perhaps an acknowledgement that, whether yes or no, there was no one to be held accountable.

The sun had gone down, the light was fading. The sheep and goats were calling out before nightfall; a sort of undisciplined male chorus, mostly bass with a few tenor accents. The birds had already quieted. The visitors, myself and my team-mate Maria excepted, prepared to leave to return to Jerusalem. Thanks for the visit and thanks for the hospitality were exchanged, handshakes all around. A few clasped shoulders. 'We are very grateful that your people are staying here with us. It makes us feel safer. We know they will assist us when they can'.

The van driver backed down the hill until he could turn and Maria and I watched as the group drove off down the valley, disappearing around the bend at Lower Yanun into the gathering dusk. But atop the ridge on the opposite side of the valley, atop the hill beyond Lower Yanun and on the ridge running beyond and around behind the hilltop where we stood, the searchlight-bright lights atop the Itamar Watch Towers threw out brilliant beams of light, punching a path through the night sky down across the village houses. Every day and every night, there on the ridge lines, above the villages, the valleys, the roads and the water tanks, the houses and the olive groves, they cast the shadows of intimidation and violence across the landscape.

End of Part One
[Part Two Coming Next]

I volunteered and was accepted in May to participate in the Ecumenical Accompaniment Program in Palestine and Israel (EAPPI), a program created and sponsored since fall, 2002, by the World Council of Churches. The U.S. sector is administered by Church World Service. The program sponsors "Christian volunteers to live and work in Palestine and Israel to accompany Palestinians and Israelis in their non-violent actions and advocacy efforts to end the Israeli occupation of the West Bank and Gaza" including the construction of the Wall on Palestinian territory. As you might assume, these volunteers pay their own travel and living expenses (at the same time receiving $400 a month allowances).

Should you wish to contribute to this direct action as a part of 'doing what we can', send a check to:

Please mention my name should you do so (Anne C. Stephens).

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