chapter 13 - r.i.p. skipper

So there was this skinny dude named Skipper who lived in Balata Refugee Camp. He had big huge dark eyes and always wore a baseball cap and a necklace with his friend's picture who died on it. He walked like a shadow and the angles of his face were fine and sharp and beautiful. I'll never forget him cuz one of the first nights I was in Balata, I was hanging out with some Palestinians and internationals at my friend Mohammad's house, and Skipper came over with one of his friends and they both looked like hard-ass gangsters to me, but then Skipper's friend told us that Skipper could dance like a mo-fo, and with a little bit of urging from us he was soon moonwalking across Mohammad's apartment, his forehead all knitted up in concentration, and we were all laughing and hooting and hollering cuz he sure could dance like a mo-fo.

After that night, I passed him often in the streets, but since he was a man and a fighter, too, it wasn't appropriate for me to greet him, so I would try to catch his eye and we would acknowledge each other with a slight uplifting of our chins - too cool for school. I learned later that everyone called him Disco Skipper and that he was always the first to get up and dance at the weddings.

Late in the night on October 8th, Skipper was heading to the place where the army was stationed, weapon in hand. Like the other fighters, he had stayed awake into the night and waited for the army to come, which they did every night. Sometimes they would come and leave, sometimes they would come and shout through a bullhorn, sometimes they would arrest people, and sometimes they would come and try to kill the fighters, who through all of this try to defend the camp as best they can - no easy feat when you are a kid from a refugee camp facing the third largest army in the world. Skipper rounded a corner, came face to face with a soldier,and was shot in the chest. He died in the hospital a few hours later. Like most fighters, he had a will:

"To the children of Palestine. Don't let anyone get you down, you must overcome your weakness and be strong. Finish your education. Ourstruggle must be fought through education, it is our path to freedom."

"Mother, do not cry for me because if I die I will be alive with the people. If I die don't cry, just come to my grave and touch the ground and you will be touching my face. And tell the other mothers what it is like to sacrifice, and that Palestine needs our sacrifice. Palestine willuse my blood to paint her story."

Rest in Peace, Skipper. This song makes me think of you, and the other young men in the camp who never know when their turn will come - just that it inevitably will:

"So Many Tears" Tupac Shakur

Back in elementary,

I thrived on misery

Left me alone I grew up amongst a dyin breed

Inside my mind couldn't find a place to rest

until I got that Thug Life tatted on my chest

Tell me can you feel me?

I'm not livin in the past,

you wanna last?

Be tha first to blast,

remember Kato

No longer with us he's deceased

Call on the sirens,

seen him murdered in the streets

Now rest in peace

Is there heaven for a G?

Remember me

So many homies in the cemetery,

shed so many tears

Lord, I suffered through the years,

and shed so many tears..

Lord, I lost so many peers,

and shed so many tears

(see the article Mohammad wrote, which I have referenced here, at http://electronicintifada.net/v2/article5870.shtml)**************************************************************

I have been back in the States for almost a month. I still feel a little weird, like I've grown a new body part but I don't know where it is, much less how to use it. I've got some crazy mood swings happening. I don't talk a lot, and I still can't get over how much people shower here, and how easy it is to get food - anything you want, at all times of the night!

I find myself marvelling at the amount of free time I have, and wondering what to do with myself. Everything seems too easy. The streets are real quiet and empty here, and anywhere you want to go, you can go there without any worries of how long it will take or what you will have to putup with on the way. Dang. It's really nice here, feels like I'm on vacation at a nice resort.

I have weird flashbacks, too, kinda like what I imagine acid flashbacks must be like. I'll see a concrete wall built for an irrigation ditch andfor a split second I'll go back there, back to Palestine and the apartheid wall. Or at night I'll hear a rumbling in the next room and tense up for a second waiting to hear where the jeeps will stop and realize it's a washing machine. I saw a Humvee on the highway making the trip from mymom's house in Ohio and thought "oo, I forgot my passport." People ask me if I am going to go back, and I start to say "inshaalah" - god willing.

And all the time, in the back of my head, is Palestine, and it's disconcerting to think about my friends in the refugee camp who are dying,physically and soulfully, while I go out to eat and watch baseball. I don't know what I'm doing here. I know that I can work to to help end the occupation more effectively from America, and I have begun that work, but I can't get rid of the feeling that I'm on vacation, that this life is so fabulous it can only be temporary. And I miss Palestine! I miss the way we ate there, sitting together on the floor sharing from the same dishes; I miss Fayrouz's mom and Mirinda soda; I miss the community, how there are always thousands of people outside doing stuff, the vibrant culture andthe kids, the sound of Arabic and the taxi drivers with their loud music and stuffed animals on the dashboard.

I want justice for Palestine. I think peace is a natural outcome ofjustice. If we want peace in the middle east, then we must work for justice, which means holding people accountable for war crimes and human rights abuses, and adhering to the international laws which we have all agreed upon. The Fourth Geneva Convention describes the protections which must be followed for all individuals, regardless of citizenship or lackthereof who are considered noncombatants, as well as combatants who have laid down their arms, and combatants who are out of the fight due to wounds or detention.

These protections include:

**"The prohibition of outrages upon personal dignity, in particularhumiliating and degrading treatment" (I remember the female soldier whowas caressing the buttocks and legs of Palestinian men - "we're searchingfor bombs" she said. I remember how she roughly squeezed the women'shijabs, and screamed at them when they didn't move fast enough. Iremember waiting in line for hours at checkpoints as cars with Israeliplates zoomed by, their faces often pressed to the windows like kids atthe aquarium. I remember the woman on her deathbed on her way to chemotreatment, pleading with the soldiers at a flying checkpoint to let herpass...they didn't until she coughed and spat blood on the ground.)

**All persons "shall not be deprived of the rights of fair and regular trial." (reading this makes me want to laugh hysterically, but i keep itback cuz i might never stop. Palestinians can be arrested and held for 18 hours without any contact. When they are given a trial, it is with anisraeli judge and israeli jury. the appeals process is almost non-existant.)

**"No protected person may be punished for an offense he or she has not personally committed," and "collective penalties and likewise all measures of intimidation or of terrorism are prohibited." (I think about the mother of a martyr in the refugee camp who was put in prison for 15 years; her 5 year old will not see her again until he is a grown man. I think about the man in Bil'in who is not allowed to go to Jerusalem because his son was wounded and paralyzed at a non-violent demonstration in the second intifada and the Israeli government expects him to take revenge. I remember the soldier who told me that even though the checkpoints were inhumane and caused innocent people to suffer, they were neccessary to catch the couple people out of millions who become self martyrs. I remember the stories I heard of people shot during invasions who could'vebeen saved, but died on the ground cuz the ambulances weren't allowed to enter the villages. I think about the villages where we went to protest, who were invaded and punished later that night because a few of its residents were resisting the occupation, just like the nazis did in WW2, which is why we made the geneva conventions in the first place.)

No justice - no peace. When will enough be enough? If it can happen to the Palestinians, - if a government is allowed to create heinous breachesof the Geneva Conventions, allowed to disregard international law and inflict collective punishment upon another group of people - it could happen to you, or to your kids. I think it's beginning here - our government can now officially and legally make you disappear forever, with no trial and no lawyer, if they suspect you of terror. Ask Maher Arar if the US has proven a good judge of who is a terrorist and who isn't.

Who's going to stop it?

magan