The dark hot night is punctured by short gasping bursts of compressed gas from a dozen or so helium canisters. It’s the night before Al Nakba and in the crowded floodlit dustbowl of a football stadium, Palestinians work through the night. Each black balloon they inflate becomes a personal message of defiance against Israel. With them they hope to peacefully turn the sky over Israel metaphorically black.
A week before, on the other side of the wall, there were howls of happiness. Sixty years of Israeli independence, sixty years since the birth of a new state. Yet back on this side of the wall there were only howls of anger and desperation. One people’s gain becoming another’s loss. This has not only been the state of things for the last sixty years, but also far, far beyond.
This area of the Middle East has always held a particular interest in my imagination. The place that holds such significance to three major religions, the soil that contains so much blood and history. An area that has been fought over again and again throughout centuries, a promised land, a paradise for some and yet a purgatory for others.
The Crusades washed over the sands and left marks that are still visible today – whether it be the castles and towns they inhabited or the genetic traces that mean you can still find fair haired blue eyed Arabs in the region today. Before them the Byzantines, Babylonians, Romans, Greeks right back to the Kingdoms of Judea and Samaria and beyond; the history of the region is complicated, twisted and entwined.
The birth of the Israeli state in 1948, after the withdrawal of the British, began a new saga in the history of the region, a new saga which in it’s way was age old.
The Israeli state was born out of a tragedy on an unimaginable and unprecedented scale. Yet its incarnation into a state seems to have brought many wounds with it, wounds that have infected it’s very foundations and which can sometimes cause uncomfortable parallels. The scale of despair and destruction in the region may be on a far lesser level, but what does that matter or even mean to the individual families on both sides that are affected by the ongoing struggle?
This intense history means that the region has a tension and emotional pitch unlike many other places I have visited. When in the region it is easy to feel that nowhere else exists outside those borders. The Israeli national identity is based around religion rather than a nation state, and thus its bonds are that much tighter and some would argue that this leads it to being less introspective and more self righteous. It becomes harder to pass judgment unless you come from the inside. You can’t take any stance without taking a side. Sitting on the fence is not an option and yet either side the ground is not only a slippery slope, but is also littered with ordnance.
Trying to understand or uncover this complex situation visually becomes incredibly difficult. Not only is it physically difficult to get access to both sides in equal measure, but it needs time. The following images are not from a long term project but merely a 12 day trip into the region. They are simply snippets of daily life, intended to draw on people’s interest in the visual and through that, shift their attention to the story underneath. I firmly believe that if more people visited the region then more people would be drawn to trying to solve the ongoing crisis.
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