"Hope is a national duty"

”Thank you from the bottom of my heart for the time you spend with our people.”

The weight and significance of these words for me, gives me the strength to continue working with human rights in this region. After almost two months it is daunting at times with the lack of immediate impact we can achieve on the ground. Yet being recognized by the Prime Minister of the National Palestinian Authority, Dr Salam Fayyad, was a very encouraging experience.  He said: “We are very grateful that you are here and that you are working with us for peace and human rights.”

The Prime Minister was visiting the villages of Al Walaja, Nahhalin and Al Khadr in the Guzh Etzion block, in danger of being annexed by Israel. There were flags hanging in the air, women out baking the Palestinian bread Zartas under the olive trees inviting us to eat, and olive trees ready to be planted towards the border of the ultra orthodox settlement Beitar Illit. There was even a presence of Palestinian soldiers, despite them being in Area C, which is controlled by the Israeli military. It all contributed to a sense of national pride, happiness and peace, albeit momentarily.

The settlements remained visible reminders in the background, and the knowledge that the very land we were standing on has several demolition and cease of cultivation orders, was the very reason for the visit to the Tent of Nations run by the Nasser family. The Prime Minister admitted having first heard about the Tent of Nations through a Christian delegation of the World Council of Churches recently, proving how important it is that we all care and share our stories from Palestine.

He spoke of “the strong, positive, nonviolent defiance that the Nasser family symbolises.” By exercising their “right to stick around” on the land which they own, and how the Tent of Nations is one of the best example of this. “We live, we build, in the face of an occupation that has ravaged territory and highly fragmented it.”

The Prime Minister said that “hope is a national duty”, inherent in the Palestinian culture. Without hope for the future, it is difficult to motivate ourselves to care for others, to try to make a difference and to experience life in the process of our failures and successes. In response to hearing of Swedish, German, Swiss and British people being present, he also said that: “We are confident that great nations will be with us, holding hand, crossing the finishing line to freedom.”

Therefore I would prefer to press even further, and say that “hope is an international duty.”