Sunday, December 4, 2016

Not the type of martyr that Mahmoud Abbas will extol in speeches - by Elder of Ziyon

...His very desire to improve people's lives is what made him a target and ultimately a victim. This is the real story, a story that the New York Times and the other media, Western or Arab, will not normally mention.

Elder of Ziyon..
02 December '16..

The New York Times has a long Sunday magazine piece about how terrible life is in the Shuafat neighborhood and camp, which is within Jerusalem's city limits but outside the separation barrier.

Writer Rachel Kushner spent a lot of time talking to prominent citizen Baha Nababta:

So few nonresidents enter Shuafat that my appearance there seemed to be a highly unusual event, met with warm greetings verging on hysteria, crowds of kids following along. “Hello, America!” they called excitedly. I was a novelty, but also, I was with Baha Nababta, a 29-year-old Palestinian community organizer beloved by the kids of Shuafat. Those who followed us wanted not just my attention but his. Baha had a rare kind of charisma. Camp-counselor charisma, you might call it. He was a natural leader of boys. Every kid we passed knew him and either waved or stopped to speak to him. Baha founded a community center so that older children would have a place to hang out, because there is no open space in Shuafat Refugee Camp, no park, not a single playground, nowhere for kids to go, not even a street, really, where they can play, because there are no sidewalks, most of the narrow roads barely fitting the cars that ramble down them. Younger kids tapped me on the arms and wanted to show me the mural they painted with Baha. The road they helped to pave with Baha, who supervised its completion. The plants they planted with Baha along a narrow strip. Baha, Baha, Baha.

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