It’s something that happens every
day in the Occupied Territories, so why am I writing about it? Because of a
random tweet, because it was written up in the Israeli newspaper, Haaretz,
because the reason it caught my eye was that this article was about newborn
kids—the four-legged variety.
My first thought was: How sad is
that? The arrest and incarceration of children has become so commonplace that
it no longer attracts attention. The abduction of baby goats is more noteworthy
than the abduction of a child.
“Two and half
hours after the kids were born a group of soldiers, probably serving at the
Nahal base at Krayot (not in the
West Bank), showed up and confiscated the goat and
two newborn kids, loading them on their Hummer. Mahamra’s donkey, which had
been harnessed to a water container on wheels, disappeared too.” http://www.haaretz.com/news/middle-east/the-idf-battles-a-palestinian-shepherd-and-his-two-baby-goats.premium-1.507009
My second thought was: In some ways,
taking three goats and a donkey from this man may have even more disastrous
results than arresting a child. It could very well threaten the livelihood of
the entire family. The donkey may be their only transportation; their only
means of getting fresh water, getting to the nearest town to sell their
livestock or buy basic necessities. Sell their livestock? Without the mother
goat and kids, there will be far less livestock to sell, no milk, no cheese. The shepherd is from the village of Maghayir al-Abeed in
the South Hebron Hills. He raises his goats on the same land his father did,
and probably his father before him for generations.
How did such a story
even get into Haaretz? The article states that several nudniks (I looked
it up—nudnik is a Yiddish word meaning persistent pest) took up the case. They
put it up on Facebook and started investigating the abduction of the animals. Others
read about it on Facebook and began to call and add their voices.
They were told the
shepherd entered a closed firing zone with the intention of stealing
ammunition. The kids were less than three hours old—not exactly ideal get-away
vehicles for an ammunition thief. Also, the land is NOT a closed firing zone.
The IDF wants to demolish eight of the twelve villages that are on
30,000 dunums of land (about 7,500 acres) to make it a firing zone. Israel’s
High Court is debating the issue and has ruled that the status quo cannot be
changed until they make a final ruling. Looks like the IDF (Israeli Defense
Force) is getting a head start.
I usually embed a video at the end of my blog post. The one I wanted to share with you does not allow me to embed it. Here is the link:
