Janine Hartley

This is story takes you on a journey with Nabia to the land owned for generations by her family but dispossessed by the Israeli Army. Nabia inherited a key so she takes the journey to find out what is left of her family’s homeland.

The large old-fashioned key sat warm in her hand. She clutched it on the two-hour bus trip from Tel Aviv though she knew there would be no door to open, it was likely that not a stone remained of the house, but she longed to see her ancestral lands. 

Next day, Nabia stood in the shade of the one remaining olive tree where her family had farmed and raised their families for generations. Dust from the long hot summer rested on its leaves. The many stumps of a once productive orchard surrounded her like tombstones. Other trees had submitted to the hunger of chainsaws, but olives were more resilient. Small green shoots sprang up along its ancient, gnarled trunk once again it was attempting to bear fruit. Stones of demolished buildings lay scattered among the few remaining walls as a reminder that a community once lived here.  Nabia reached out and placed her palm on the tree feeling its resilience and determination to survive. When she closed her eyes, she could hear the laughter of children playing, smell bread being cooked in wood ovens and richly spiced meals being prepared. She could smell tobacco the men smoked as they sat together under the trees sipping sweet tea after the day’s work, sharing gossip and concerns while the women cooked and shouted for the children’s help. The tree reminded her of the resilience of her family who were expelled along with twenty-four other families, her grandparents with three children, loaded onto trucks by the Israeli Defense Force in 1990 and dumped at the Zip Junction fifteen kilometers to the north. The Shimon Peres government had claimed the land as an archeological site, the family ‘did not have sufficient proof of ownership’. On 3 July 2001, the Israeli army demolished the dozens of homes and bulldozed the cisterns, many ancient, built for gathering rainwater, and then filled them with gravel and cement to hinder their reuse. The caves where they escaped the heat of the day, slept at night and made cheese to sell were blown up. 

Only remnants of the indigenous people remained on their shrinking land, fighting for survival in the harsh political environment of the often-brutal Occupation. Paying five times what the settlers in the new homes pay for water, when they can get it. 

Nabia shivered, maybe it was from the chill in the early morning air or the history of this place, probably both. The Separation Wall Israel built to keep Palestinian people from entering their homelands did not reach this far into the country but the tall, barbed wire fence was more painful in a way, as it allowed them to see their stolen land, but not walk upon it. Palestinian children from the few remaining impoverished families walking the long trip to school were shot by Settlers that had beaten the elders, so children had to be accompanied by international volunteers.

Beyond the fence stood an illegal gated Israeli settlement built on land where her ancestors lived in peace with other faiths for centuries. Row upon row of modern homes stood before her. They all looked the same. Sparkling clear water from pipes not shared with Palestinian farms in the valley below filled swimming pools and irrigated manicured vineyards and gardens. There was no sign of the once thriving town of Khirbet Susya where her mother, grandparents, and their parents before them, had been born and raised surrounded by orchards, animals, extended family and neighbors, only ruins. Nabia stood there, her heart beating like a captive birds. She’d waited a lifetime to feel the earth of Palestine beneath her feet and see for herself where her mother was born before her people were unjustly expelled. 

This had been where her new husband Joseph had made his decision to leave his home and family. He had left the Army, and Israel, before completing his compulsory National Service and now worked in America advocating for global support to stop the destruction of ancient Palestinian villages to make way for new Settlements, and for the rights of its people to return to their land. There had been many United Nations resolutions declaring the Occupation, Settlements, and the Wall illegal and for Israel to honor refugee right of return to their homes. However, with the support of the United States, Israel continues to ignore them. That is how Nabia and Joseph had met, both working toward the same goal. She as the daughter of refugees, and he born to the people who had evicted them. They had wanted to make this trip together, but he is described as a traitor to his people including his family. All hope of reconciliation with them gone since he married Nabia.  

She heard the slow steps of someone approaching. She wondered if she should run from a soldier carrying a gun or stay and hope that the footsteps from behind her were friendly. Turning slowly, she was relieved to see an old man approaching her grasping a staff that assisted the steps of his frail body, the other hand half raised as a gesture that was a welcoming wave and a signal not to fear. He wore a traditional keffiyeh on his head and oversized pants held at the waist with a piece of rope. His long coat open and threadbare, worn away around the hem as evidence that this coat had once been much longer than his height but had worn away as it was dragged through years of walking on bare land. A welcoming smile revealed very few teeth. She returned his smile and walked toward him wishing she had brought her water to offer him but thought it would be easier to get through any ‘security’ checkpoints if she carried nothing. Though frail he sat down on one of the tree stumps as if relieving himself of a heavy burden, he patted a spot beside him as an invitation to share the seat. They greeted each other in the traditional Arabic way enquiring about the health and happiness of themselves and family. Formalities out of the way he asked if the key she held was the reason for her visit. Nabia told the old man that her mother was born here but had left as a young woman and that she, Nabia, had returned to see and feel the land of her language and culture, what remained, and return the key.  She told him that the key had been left to her by her grandmother who had died several years ago in a camp after losing all hope of ever returning to her home. “Some say she died of a broken heart, some say it was her inability to access treatment only available in Tel Aviv. Her final wish was for the key to be returned to Khirbet Susya”.