Protective Presence

Lower Yanoun,Upper Yanoun, and Israeli settlement chicken farm on top

Road not usually used by Palestinians because of settler harassment

Protective presence to deter harassment by Israeli settlers is the primary mission of the EAPPI team in the Palestinian village of Yanoun, southeast of Nablus. You won't find Yanoun on most maps; its population is 80, not counting the animals.

Ghassan

I made the last leg of my journey from Jerusalem to Yanoun with Ghassan, the driver/interpreter for the team, and was welcomed to the placement house by EAs Mina from Sweden and Tora from Norway.

Upper Yanoun. EAPPI house on left

Mina and Tora at the EAPPI house

Ghassan, who lives in nearby Aqraba, says the people of Yanoun cannot build anything or they will get a demolition order, and they have a hard time farming their olives, because Israeli settlers steal some of the crop and burn some of  the trees.

Site of April 1 incident

The EAs told me that on April 1, the last day of Passover, about 15 teenage Israeli settlers came into the lower village, and one of them was carrying a machine gun. The EAs called the mayor, who called the appropriate Palestinian official, who called his Israeli counterpart, who called the army, which arrived on the scene in 15 minutes to confiscate the weapon and make the youths leave the area (but did not arrest them). To me this is a great example of the effectiveness of protective presence in defusing a bad situation.

New settler fence

Although the Palestinians have deeds to their farms dating back to the Ottoman period, they have to go to court to defend their property because settlers are continually moving their fences down the hillsides. The EAs showed me a new fence that was built just three weeks ago.

They said that the Palestinian Authority recently opened a more direct road from Yanoun to Nablus, but the Palestinians are reluctant to use it because settlers have thrown stones at cars. 

The EAs know all the people in the village and chat with them almost every day. 

Elementary school

Across the street from the EAPPI house is the village elementary school, just below it is a sheep herd, and a little further down is a small store and health clinic, where a doctor and nurse come twice a month.

Sheep herd

Store and clinic

Mina with goat cheese and bread made by neighbor

Donkey in Lower Yanoun

Walking home after the evening check of the area