"Prisoners," says Khaled as we drive through the mountains on our way back to Qarawa. "They are prisoners in their own village."

Khaled is a director for the Palestinian Medical Relief Society (PMRS) in Salfit. He has been kind enough to take me in to his home while I help with the mobile clinics that operate in the area. On this occasion he is asking me about what I saw earlier in the day.

That particular day the mobile clinic went to the small village of Marda in the Salfit district. It was my first day of travel in Palestine and I had no idea what to expect. Before I came to Palestine I had read articles about the crimes perpetrated against Palestinians but my opinion was tempered by the spin of the pro-Israel American media. I was dumbfounded by what I saw and the stories I heard.

My re-education began that morning at the office of PMRS in Salfit. Khaled opened his window and showed me the city that lay below. I noticed the roads, the vineyards and the soccer field and was very pleased to be in such a delightful village. Khaled then showed me one of the features that only a Palestinian would notice. Atop the hill across from the window, he pointed to a fence that surrounds an Israeli settlement. Up until that point, I hadn’t believed what I had read about the conflict. Yet, on my first day I was seeing the truth.

Driving down a restricted access highway.

Photo: Palestine Monitor

The team of a driver, a doctor, two nurses and me loaded up in the PMRS van to go to Marda for the day. I was still thinking about the nearness of the occupation when the driver instructed us to put on our seatbelts. I obeyed but I didn’t understand why. Then I noticed the tower, concrete barriers, armed Israeli soldiers, and lines of traffic. I was at my first checkpoint. Dread flooded over me. I didn’t know what to expect or what to say if we were stopped. Luckily we weren’t. Continuing on from the checkpoint, the passengers pointed out a road some distance away that was an Israeli bypass road, complete with characteristic fences on both sides and street lights every few hundred meters. This highway is one of a network created by the Israeli government with restricted access to Palestinians. The system was designed to expedite travel between illegal Israeli settlements in the West Bank. As I discussed the situation with my Palestinian colleagues in the van they called it "Apartheid."

Along the road to Marda I saw several roadblocks and mounds of dirt and rocks that block the roadways from the highway on which we were driving. Rame, the driver, explained to me that these villages used to be just a few minutes drive from Marda but now it takes journeys of 30 minutes to visit what was once "down the street."

Marda itself is a "gated community," a kind of which I had never seen before. The village is surrounded by a fence with only one entrance and exit. At Israeli soldiers’ discretion, they can close the gate every night at 8pm and open it every morning at 8 am. The fence divides farmers from their fields and keeps medical emergencies that happen at night waiting till morning. Rame tells me that the village has been subject to curfews in the past. When a curfew is in place, all violators are arrested no matter what age. Also, Rame informs me that several young boys from the village had been arrested for nothing more than throwing rocks at Israeli military vehicles. He said that one of the boys had been tortured to the point that he admitted to accusations he was not guilty of. Another boy was detained for 3 years.

Physical roadblock and gate outside the village of Jam’een. This gate is similar to the one that restricts traffic into Marda. Also, this gate serves to separate the two villages that were once neighbors.

Photo: Palestine Monitor

We arrived at the makeshift clinic and began seeing patients. We didn’t see anything terribly eventful except diabetes and minor infections, until a women came in to renew a prescription for heart medication. She started yelling in Arabic about the price. Rame tried to console her but she kept ranting. From the context, I assumed that she was upset mostly about the circumstances that make such medication expensive. Later I asked Rame what she was fussing about and he told me about the financial situation in the village. The fence has put a considerable strain on the people, especially the farmers. The gate controls the movement of people and resources in and out of the village. "One man," Rame told me, "has 20 dependents and only 300 shekels (roughly $80) per month. There is no money in the village."

After the patients had all been seen we packed up and headed back to Salfit. I assumed correctly that we would be stopped at the checkpoint. I tried to look as unobtrusive as possible but a guard noticed me. He took my passport and asked me several pointless questions before letting us through.

The fence that surrounds Marda.

Photo: Palestine Monitor

Back at the office in Salfit I met up with Khaled. As we drove back to his house we discussed matters further. He described the villagers of Marda as prisoners in their own home and said that what Israel is doing is Apartheid. As we continued on our way I saw more settlements and the segregated, Israeli-only highways that cause Palestinians to have to divert around for kilometers.

As I reviewed the events of the day in my head, I realized I was not prepared to see what I had seen. Because of the pro-Israeli media I had falsely assumed that the stories I had heard were few and far between. I would have never guessed that I would experience everything I had read about in less than 8 hours on my first day in Palestine.