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A Palestinian girl passes time on the streets of a refugee camp in Gaza City. Children in Gaza spend a great deal of their time on the streets because they usually are unable to afford to go to school and there are few playgrounds or parks in the Palestinian territories.
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A woman holds a child in Gaza City's Beach Camp, one of the world's longest-standing refugee camps. The poverty in such areas often makes you feel as if you have taken a step back in time.
The Battlespace exhibition features recent work from Iraq and Afghanistan. It is work from a number of exceptional photographers and promises to give a rarely seen look into these two conflicts.
The show runs from Oct 25th to Nov 11th and you can find more information about it by following this link www.battlespaceonline.org
One week after the death of two young boys in the West Bank village of Ni'lin, protesters began to demonstrate against the military force in the area. The village is home to a weekly protest in which locals demonstrate against the Israeli separation wall that is being constructed nearby and cutting them off from their crops and livelihoods. The deaths of the two young boys only inflamed an already tense situation.
(These images were taken during two separate protests in a two-week period.)
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After Friday prayers the locals meet under olive trees not far from where construction of the wall is proposed.
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A prayer session brings the group together just before the start of the protests.
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Children congregate to watch the events unfold.
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Israeli border police stage themselves nearby with guns, tear gas, spray, batons and attack dogs.
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After the prayer the Palestinians move through a large field in the direction of the border police.
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The two groups meet. The Palestinians chant in Arabic and the border police caution them away. The tension is palpable.
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The border police spray a liquid chemical on the crowd known as "Skunk Spray" in an attempt to disperse the crowd.
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A volley of tear gas canisters is shot from an armored fighting vehicle on the Israeli side.
This story will continue with Part 2.
Post Script: The important events and issues I cover aren't always the subjects that sell to corporate media. These human stories need your support and funding to be told. The cost to produce this work is substantial and I can not continue to do this without your support. Please consider a subscription of $25 per month to help insure I can continue my work:
If you prefer, you can also make a one time donation.After arriving in Israel I began to hear rumors about two young boys who had been shot to death in the West Bank village of Ni'ilin. I traveled to the village with a translator to meet their families.
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It is always difficult to photograph people who have just suffered a terrible loss, but you have to believe in your ability to document their struggle and then present it to the world. You also have to believe in the world's ability to recognize injustice and hopefully move toward change. If nothing ever comes from my work, and from these people's pain, then the situation feels truly hopeless.
In the end, you never feel like you are able to capture the weight and severity of what happened. No matter how hard you try it seems impossible to portray what has happened in a photograph. But you continue to try because it is better to try than to do nothing.
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I started with the family of the first boy, who had just turned ten years old a week before he was killed. His parents explained that he and his friend, the boy who lived next door, were walking down the street when Israeli Border Police, who recently built an outpost on the edge of the village, drove by and allegedly shot each boy in the face, killing them instantly.
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They told me that they filed a complaint against the border police but were told that the incident never happened. They then had the doctor remove the bullet from their son's head and it was confirmed that it was issued to the Israeli Military, who continues to deny involvement and claims the boys were shot by local militants. In a small town where everyone knows each other and has grown up together, the parents found this story difficult to believe.
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I listened as they told me their stories and took time to capture the reactions and expressions of each family member as they listened to each other speak.
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His mother
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His sisters
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His father and uncle
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After viewing the boy's room and the rooftop where his father had been planning to build an addition on the home when he grew up, they took me to their neighbor's home where I once again listened to their stories and tried to express my condolences.
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The second boy's father
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I am taken into the second boys room and shown the bed where he used to sleep.
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His little brother cannot sleep in the room anymore and has had terrible nightmares since the incident. He had shared the room with his brother since birth and does not understand what has happened.
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The boys' families then took me to the local graveyard and showed me the makeshift memorials that they set up for each child. The slap of my shutter seemed inappropriately loud as it shattered the silence in the cemetery.
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In the end, I offered my sincerest condolences to the families and thanked them for letting me into their lives during such a difficult time. I promised them that I will bring their story to as many people as I possibly can.
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Post Script: The important events and issues I cover aren't always the subjects that sell to corporate media. These human stories need your support and funding to be told. The cost to produce this work is substantial and I can not continue to do this without your support. Please consider a subscription of $25 per month to help insure I can continue my work:
If you prefer, you can also make a one time donation.
