“The banality of violence.”

Daily life in a refugee camp.

Snipers in the dark. Occupation forces raid a refugee camp. Screenshot. (Amir, November 2024.)

This piece appears simultaneously in West Bank Alerts.

27 JANUARY—Israel’s attacks on West Bank refugee camps intensified in the immediate aftermath of the Gaza ceasefire. As reported last Thursday by David Hearst for Middle East Eye, this may be prelude to finalizing Israeli plans to “dismantle the refugee camps in preparation for partial annexation.” Since the ceasefire in Gaza was first announced on 12 January, talk among those paying attention has included speculation that Trump may have promised annexation of the West Bank in exchange for Netanyahu’s cooperation in a pre-inaugural pause of the sixteen-month long genocide.

With all of this in mind, I texted an acquaintance I will refer to as Amir to ask about the situation in the refugee camp he and his family call home. In reply, he sent me a series of videos. I publish them here with his permission as documentation of daily life for the estimated quarter million Palestinians living in 19 camps scattered throughout the West Bank.

We already have a fulsome record of Israeli violence against West Bank Palestinians, even if this record is largely missing in the reports of Western mainstream media. These videos document the ordinary, everyday, verging-on-mundane violence camp residents live with from the time they are born. The banality of violence: This is what they show and why I share them in West Bank Alerts. One way to describe my project is to bring us closer to the daily lives of Palestinians—the texture of these lives and what it is like to live them—and in this way humanize Palestinian Christians and Muslims and remove the imposed veil of invisibility.

This first video was filmed by Amir’s fifteen-year old brother this past Sunday, 25 January, at 11:00pm, West Bank time.

Fear and shock can be heard in the boys voice. Curious to know what he was saying, I asked Amir to translate the Arabic. Below are the two WhatsApp audio replies he sent. You will notice that Amir, an Arab man in his twenties, speaks clear and nearly impeccable English, as is common among young, educated Palestinians.

The next sequence of videos was filmed this past November by Amir. Taken together, these videos spanning two months show everyday reality for Palestinians living in refugee camps.

The camp Amir lives in is located in one of the southern governorates. As of this writing, much of the lethal violence has been concentrated in the north, in the governorates of Jenin, Nablus, Tulkarm, Tubas, and Qalqiya, where Palestinian resistance has thus far been strongest.

When you watch the following, think about the courage it took to film Israeli snipers located just beyond the window. I.O.F. soldiers routinely kill people with headshots, when they peer out windows during a raid. Also notice that the only shots fired are from the occupation forces. With the exception of resistance fighters, it is rare for Palestinians to have weapons of any kind. And this is true even though armed resistance is legal under international law.

In this final video, filmed after the above, the snipers are no longer visible but you can hear the deafening sound of gunfire.

One million West Bank Palestinians are registered as refugees. These are the descendants of the original victims of the Nakba who were driven from their villages and homes by European immigrants, Zionists intent on stealing the land and cleansing it of Arabs for their project of constructing a Jewish homeland.

The spirit of resistance is strong among the refugees. Many of them still hold keys to the homes they were forced from and many of them insist upon their right to return. It is for this reason the camps are always targeted for the worst violence. Among other things, their continued presence is an unbearable threat and reminder to Israelis of the lie upon which their country was built: “A land without a people for a people without a land.”

As Israel unleashes its plans to annex the West Bank, very likely with Trump’s consent, the ethnic cleansing of the refugee camps will intensify. The northern camps are already being turned into rubble as Israel ramps up its use of aerial bombardment, bulldozes shops, tears up streets, and destroys the infrastructure necessary to sustain life. Already they are targeting hospitals, paramedics, and journalists.

Soon the camps will look just like Gaza.

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