A helping hand for the Bedouins

A Roman Catholic order, the Comboni Sisters, is making a difference in the lives of about 450 Bedouin families facing forced relocation from their land east of Jerusalem. A Spanish nurse, Sister Alicia Vacas, has been working with Bedouins and refugees for five years. She says the order has organized five kindergartens and sent 25 young women to Italy to learn to be kindergarten teachers.

Sister Alicia

The Comboni Sisters  also operate mobile health clinics for the Bedouins, including one for women patients that has an all-female staff, since Bedouin women do not talk to men. The order is training 18 young women to be community health workers, and they have nearly finished the four-month course. Sister Alicia says women go to Jericho or Ramallah to have their babies, because to go to Jerusalem they would have to request a 24-hour permit two days in advance, and it's hard to predict the exact time of their delivery. She says one cultural health problem faced by Bedouins is congenital insensitivity to pain, because of their tradition of marrying first cousins.

Sister Alicia is personally impacted by the separation barrier because it runs right through the Comboni Sisters' property in Bethany. She and another nun who work in the West Bank live on that side of the barrier, and when she needs to visit the other nuns or go to Jerusalem, she has to go 11 miles around to go through an Israeli checkpoint.