We were at least one hundred-strong, representing Europe, America, and Australia,citizens of France, Italy, Sweden, the USA, the UK, and many points in between. We were marching arm-in-arm, chanting in Italian, French, and English.

We were (are!) the International Solidarity Movement to end the occupation of Palestine.

We marched headstrong. From downtown Bethlehem we had set out to let the people of Israeli-occupied Beit Jalla know that we were there for them, that we would help them, and that we would confront the Israeli Defense Force (IDF) on their behalf. We would use our privilege, our standing as internationals "internationalistas!" as a weapon against the occupation.

We were followed by a flock of reporters and camerapersons from around the world, most of them wearing their bulletproof vests with a hastily attached "TV" sign on the front.

We headed up the hill to Beit Jalla. Rounding a corner, we found ourselves in front of an IDF APC (armored personnel carrier). We stood there, ten feet from the olive green beast, as an Israeli soldier waved for us to retreat. We stood there, and prepared our negotiating team --two brave women. They would ask the soldier to let us pass so that we could check on the citizens of Beit Jalla. They took two steps forwards, toward the APC. The soldier pulled out his M16.

There was a shot. Pop!--like a firecracker. I ducked.

Another shot. Pop! I headed for the nearest wall. Another and another. Pop! Pop! Some of us ran back, others held their ground with their arms over their heads. Pop! Pop, pop! I looked and saw that the soldier was shooting at the ground and the building walls around us. Pop, pop!

Those of us still on the front slowly eased back, others retreated to almost around the bend. The soldier, still pointing his gun at us from the safety of his fear and ideology, finally stopped shooting.

I quickly began searching for my affinity group. It was then that I noticed that people were hurt: James' head was a mess of blood. Aisa had gotten a wound in her leg. Phan's finger was bleeding.

And someone I didn't know was being carried away; she was as limp as if dead.

The Israeli APC pushed us slowly down the hill, out of Beit Jalla. Some of us marched arm-in-arm, walking backwards, refusing to let the APC run us out of town.

Others had already retreated to the hospital just down the road, to check on the status of our wounded friends.

No, we didn't end the occupation that day. It still goes on, even after 35 years.

That night we found our host families in the al-Azzeh refugee camp on the verge of total despair. "If they're now willing to shoot at people from the US and Europe, imagine what they are willing to do to us!"

Just imagine what they did to people in Jenin, Ramallah, and Nablus.

Just imagine.

***

It really wasn't supposed to be this way. We weren't supposed to confront a war; we were supposed to spend weeks confronting the occupation.

I went to Palestine to participate in a two week structured campaign of non-violent, civil disobedience and direct action against the daily injustices and brutalities of the Israeli occupation in the West Bank and Gaza Strip.

Several of my friends had participated in these sorts of campaigns, all organized by the International Solidarity Movement (ISM) to end the occupation and the Center for Rapprochement between peoples, both located in Beit Sahour, near Bethlehem.

The ISM had already staged two campaigns, one in August and one in December, 2001.

I was greatly looking forward to my ISM campaign, which included rebuilding demolished houses, reclaiming confiscated Palestinian farmlands, clearing road blocks, monitoring check-points, and solidarity visits to Gaza city and Ramallah.

However, everything changed when a string of suicide bombings starting the hour I arrived in Tel Aviv precipitated one of the largest IDF offensives in Palestinian lands. And by the time most of the internationals of the ISM had arrived in Bethlehem for training, we were facing imminent invasion.

Our first day together was disrupted by constant updates from Ramallah, which was the center of the Israeli incursion at first. The invasion of Arafat's compound and subsequent calls for our presence kept us on edge.

That night, some of us went down to the Church of the Nativity, and caught a glimpse of the Good Friday services. Only four days later would that place become the center of the IDF's ire.

By day two of our ISM training, all bets were off, and we quickly began to feel the walls closing in.

That night we were placed in refugee camps to act as human shields for the inevitable brutality that the IDF would unleash upon the people in the camps.

Between the hotel where the training was taking place and the al Azzeh refugee camp, we saw a statue of the Virgin Mary perched atop a church. It was riddled with bullets. We were told that Israeli snipers hiding out at Bethlehem University used it for target practice.

That night I went to sleep with the sound of constant gunfire overhead. It was then that I knew that our campaign wasn't against occupation. It was a campaign for life itself.

The next day was our fateful march on Beit Jalla.

***

The cafeteria in the Beit Jalla hospital was only serving watery vegetable soup, bread, and tea for dinner --but that was fine by me. For the past week, my host family in the al-Azzeh refugee camp had stuffed me silly. Even under full military occupation, almost total curfew and blockade, they managed to come up with three very square meals a day.

A simple bowl soup suited me quite fine.

The three of us sat down in the poorly lit dining room: John (from the UK), myself, and the Palestinian driver of the ambulance we had been riding around in as human shields that day.

The ambulance driver wanted to improve his English and he eagerly pursued a conversation with us.

All day the ambulances had been working overtime. The IDF had declared a four-hour opening in the permanent curfew in the Bethlehem area, and the ambulances raced around the city under the umbrella of this relative freedom.

The whole of Bethlehem, excepting the center of town, which was still the stage for the siege on the Church of the Nativity, had come alive in the those brief hours, as people rushed to get food, get to the hospital, or get home before the IDF would resume its random acts of violence.

I hadn't come onto ambulance duty until around 4 PM. On my first trip out, we picked up a heart attack victim. Rushing back to the hospital, we encountered an APC, just two blocks from the hospital.

The IDF soldier sitting in the back of the APC waved at us to go away, to go back. "Where does he want us to go?" the driver asked me jokingly, pulling the ambulance a few feet closer to the APC. We were about thirty feet from the APC when the soldier quickly brought his M16 to bear and fired off a full-automatic burst. I instinctually ducked my head below the dashboard. The driver and the medic, obviously used to this sort of thing, simply raised their hands for the soldier to see. The soldier let off another burst of fire, and this time I could tell that he was shooting at the ground, near the front of the ambulance.

The driver of the ambulance began to drive in reverse, and I dared a peek over the dashboard. The soldier sent another burst our way, over our heads, for good measure.

We had to double back and find a dirt road to get to the hospital, but we made it and got our patient delivered safely.

Afterwards, the driver asked me, "Were you scared?"

"Yes!" I said, and then I asked him, "Were you?"

"Of course!" he said. And we all shared a good laugh.

That night I finished off two bowls of soup and was nibbling on some bread when the other ambulance driver asked if John and I were eating well in the refugee camps. We responded affirmatively. The ambulance driver said that this is normal. He then added, "Let me tell you something." He then paused and looked at us with an unsettling seriousness. He asked, "Are you listening to me?"

"Yes," John and I said, nodding our heads in unison.

"You have to understand this, so please listen to me." He said, still intently fixing his gaze on us.

"Palestinians truly believe that when they share bread with someone, then that person will never betray them. We truly believe this and you have to understand: When we Palestinians share bread with you, you are now like family, and you must never betray us."

John and I continued to nod our heads in understanding.

Just before we sat down for dinner, I had returned to the hospital with an Arab girl suffering from a ruptured appendix. To pick up the girl, we had traveled a half hour out of Bethlehem, to one of the Israeli settlements surrounding Jerusalem in the West Bank.

Even though most ambulances in Bethlehem do not dare go out after dark, we had gotten special permission from the IDF to travel at night and pick up the girl at the settlement. But nevertheless, we were stopped at the Beit Jalla checkpoint, told to exit the Ambulance, and stood there with eight M16s pointed at us while the IDF soldiers confirmed our permission and searched the ambulance.

After we passed the checkpoint, we headed out onto a freeway, part of the West Bank road network that connects Israeli settlements and bypasses Palestinian cities and villages.

Arriving in our destination, just outside of the Israeli settlement, we found a small scene complete with two Israeli ambulances, some green Israeli soldiers and a dozen bystanders. The ambulance driver and medic jumped out while I stayed inside. The driver talked to the Jewish doctor on the scene while the medic got the Palestinian girl into the back of the ambulance.

Suddenly, the Jewish doctor popped his head into the ambulance and asked, "Hey, where are you from in the states?"

"I'm from Seattle," I said, and then asked him, "Where are you from?"

"I'm from Cleveland," he said proudly. "So, Seattle. You got the Mariners. Great ball team! And that Japanese guy--what's his name?"

"Ichiro?"

"Yea, Ichiro," he said, snapping his fingers. "So, did you catch the game last night on ESPN?"

"No. We don't get ESPN where I'm staying." I didn't add that I'd been staying in a Palestinian refugee camp.

"Yea, great game. But anyway, what are you doing here? Are you a doctor, a nurse, some kind of medical student?"

"No, I'm just a volunteer with the Red Crescent."

"Oh, well good for you! Take care now."

And just as he ducked out of the ambulance, a small boy walked up and asked, "Where are you from?"

Mistakenly, I thought the boy was Palestinian and said, in Arabic, "I'm from America."

In English, he asked me, "Are you a Muslim?"

In Arabic, I said, "No, I'm Christian."

"What?" he asked.

"I'm Christian," I said, this time in English.

"So why do you help them?" he asked.

"Why am I a volunteer?"

"No," he said. "Why do you help them, the Palestinians?"

"I'm just trying to keep people from getting hurt," I said.

"But why do you help the Arabs? You should be helping us, not them. They kill us!"

Looking intently at the little boy, of no more than thirteen years, I couldn't think of a single sentence that would begin to penetrate his dense beliefs.

Luckily, the Ambulance driver hopped into his seat and started driving, but the little boy's gaze was firmly fixed on me as we drove away.

Back on the freeway to Bethlehem, the driver told me that the girl's mother is a domestic servant in the settlement. I looked into the back of the ambulance and saw a distraught older Palestinian woman and her settlement. I looked into the back of the ambulance and saw a distraught older Palestinian woman and her daughter laying down on the gurney as the medic hooked up an IV drip to her arm. The driver added that we had to come and get the girl because no Israeli hospitals--even though they were closer and better equipped--would take her.

(Part 2 next issue)