Moving Around - Jerusalem, Ramallah: May 22-23 2011

After starting my trip with a relaxing walk through East Jerusalem last Saturday, I picked up the pace to accomplish my business goals, visit friends, and absorb and share information. On Sunday I headed into the Old City of Jerusalem in search of jewelry. I have always loved wandering through the Old City. I have always hated doing business there.




Russian-language signs at this Palestinian store are a testament to the increase
 in the  importance of Russian-Israelis and Russian tourists to the economy. 

 

It is tough to shop in the Old City. Prices are not marked and negotiation is a must. Shop owners use various techniques to get the price they want. In the tradition of middle east hospitality they invite you to sit down and have Arabic tea or mint coffee while you do business. When you make a counter offer they will often say that they can't let the item go at that price because they paid more for it, whether or not they did. And then finally, if and when you agree to the price, you will find that they do not want to give you a receipt (which you should demand if you are buying for a business). Over the years the Palestinian shopkeepers explained to me that this was because they did not want to pay taxes to Israel on the items they sold. This year a shopkeeper shared more detail with me.

Each month the Israeli government sends a representative to each Palestinian shop in the Old City to look over their receipt book.   The Israeli government sets an expected level of monthly sales for each store (just for example, let's assume $18,000 for a very small store).  If the books show that the shop made less than that, the Israeli government assumes they are hiding income and their shop may be closed.  If their income is more than that, they risk having their monthly minimum raised.   If , like me, you go to a shop to buy in quantity, that might upset the books for the shopkeeper.  The government would look at that receipt and assume that the shopkeeper should be able to maintain similar daily sales.  The shopkeeper might want to spread the sale over several days on the books, giving you multiple receipts dated differently  but that is not possible since the shopkeeper does not know when the Israeli government might show up at the shop to examine their books.  So, they refuse to give a receipt from the books.  If you pressure them a lot, you can get a very informal receipt on a piece of paper, and then hope that the receipt will do if the IRS ever audits your business.

Hence, although the Old City of Jerusalem has stores with interesting vintage Bedouin jewelry that I would like to buy for my customers, I rarely buy it.  I am not a good negotiator, I hate having receipts that might not cut muster, and the entire process takes entirely too long.  But, alas, I did spend a few hours on Sunday in a shop and did come out with a pair of vintage silver Bedouin dowry bracelets, a few beautiful stone necklaces, and two pairs of dangling earrings with original Ottoman coins.  I didn't get the deal I needed, but I am happy with the finds.

In the process, I heard about how it has become more and more difficult for the shopkeepers to buy vintage Bedouin jewelry.  Years ago, Bedouin women who wanted or needed to sell some of their jewelry could travel to the Old City and approach the shopkeeper with the items.  But of course more and more restrictions have put on movement.  Without a permit, Bedouins from the West Bank can't get to Jerusalem.  Bedouins from Gaza would never be able to get a permit to leave and sell jewelry.  If you are a shopkeeper, you have to go out to markets in search of Bedouin jewelry instead of waiting for it to come to you.  You'll never get a permit to get into Gaza to go to the markets there in search of Bedouin jewelry.  So, the closures, the permit system, has impacted the open market in Bedouin jewelry.

Muslim praying in the Christian Quarter

After several hours of wandering through the Muslim and Christian Quarters of the Old City, I headed to the Armenian Quarter to buy jewelry.  Oops!  Sunday.  Shops and restaurants all closed.  I did not think ahead enough.  So, I wanded into the Jewish Quarter to see what changes there may have been in the past year.  Not much.

The Jewish Quarter is beautiful and has been tastefully built with Jerusalem stone.  But it is modern and antiseptic in comparison to the other quarters of the city which transport you into an ancient and exotic world. 

A square in the Jewish Quarter of the Old City of Jerusalem

I then saw dozens of Israeli soldiers heading to the Western Wall and followed them out of curiosity. I was aware that the Israeli Defense Forces (IDF) brings soldiers to the Western Wall for swearing-in after a year of basic training. I also knew that the military training included learning the Israeli "narrative", including that of the Six-Day War, and that this involved field trips to military monuments and museums as well as to the Western Wall. (FYI, I am equally as critical of the political indoctrination of American and other soldiers. But, I am particularly disturbed that the Western Wall, which is a religious site, has become a nationalistic site which is more associated with Israel's 1967 capture of East Jerusalem and the West Bank than with the fervent prayers of millions of observant Jews and others.)


Tourists on the Western Wall plaza were asking soldiers if they could have their pictures taken with them.  Israeli flags marked the right boundary of the prayer area. (This gave me a flashback to Christmas Eve 1996 at Manger Square.  Enormous posters of Arafat were hanging in the square, obscuring the religious significance of the occassion.)  Soldiers were gathered in huddles for training or for preparation for the swearing in ceremony.  I don't know which, since I did not have the patience to stand around long enough.



On the approach to the Western Wall.  Zoom in and note the text at the bottom by the jet fighters!



 

The right boundary of the Western Wall plaza

Small and Crowded Women's praying section of the Western Wall





Large and roomy men's section of the Western Wall





Let's fast forward to Monday.  It was time for me to head up to El Bireh, the sister city of Ramallah, to my usual home base in the West Bank - the City Inn Palace Hotel.  I caught bus 18 at the open bus station across from the Jerusalem Hotel in East Jerusalem, paid 6.5 shekels, let the driver put my suitcase in the trunk area, and took my seat.  I use a combination of shared taxis, public buses, and rides with friends and business contacts to travel around the West Bank.   It is inexpensive, and not too inconvenient.  Car rental poses certain challenges for the average westerner.  Finding one's way around is difficult. Many streets are not marked or not well  marked.  Many signs are only in Arabic.  One needs a real familiarity with the map and needs to be able to read Arabic well enough and quickly enough to figure out what the signs say before passing them by.  And then there is the problem of needing to know what to do at checkpoints, needing to know how to avoid unnecessary checkpoints, and needing to know how to respond if pulled over by either Israeli soldiers, Palestinian soldiers, or Palestinian police.  In general, you will not see tourists to the West Bank driving cars!

To get from Jerusalem to Ramallah, one passes through the Kalandia checkpoint, which resembles a border terminal.  Going from Jerusalem into Ramallah is not a problem, but going from Ramallah into Jerusalem is, since Israel will not let Palestinians travel to Jerusalem without a special permit.  The Kalandia checkpoint becomes a bottleneck in the morning for people headed towards Jerusalem.  On May 15th of this year, the IDF violently put down the attempt of hundreds of Palestinians to force their way through the Kalandia checkpoint in honor of Al Nakba Day - the day Palestinians remember their losses in the 1948 war.

Kalandia checkpoint: Israeli soldiers checking cars heading towards Jerusalem



Pillbox and the Wall at Kalandia with Palestinian grafitti art

Al Amari UN Refugee Camp, enroute to Ramallah Center


I had timed my trip well.  When I went through the Kalandia checkpoint at about 10 AM the traffic was relatively light.  Bus 18 then headed to the Ramallah bus station, next to the Friends' Boys' School.  The busload of passengers  (30 or more) started disembarking, all without fanfare.  However, when I, the only foreigner, disembarked a film crew surrounded me with tv cameras, a boom microphone, and reporters.  They were politely but aggressively trying to interview me, but I insisted that they wait until I got my suitcase out of the bus's trunk.  I knew that the bus would be moving on very quickly with my luggage if I did not grab it right out.

Then I turned my attention to the film crew.  It was a film crew from Canadian Broadcasting Company (CBC) working on a documentary.  A Palestinian artist was among them.  He asked me if he could stamp my passport with an artistic State of Palestine stamp that he had created.  I would have liked to have this stamp on my passport, even though it contained in it no authority.  However, I felt forced to reject the offer.  I told them that I was an American and that I was likely not only to face problems on re-entry to the US but that the Israelis could use the stamp as an excuse to deny me entry into Gaza. As I explained to them, I have obtained the very rare and difficult-to-obtain permit to get into Gaza between now and June 8th, I will be going there next week to help people, and I am unwilling to put that mission at risk by letting them put a "State of Palestine" stamp in my passport.  I did however ask them to stamp a piece of paper for me, which they did.   I wished them luck in their efforts, which should bring some positive coverage for the Palestinian request for statehood which will come up for vote at the UN in September.


Palestine Stamp



City Inn Palace Hotel; my home in El Bireh



I will fast forward over the rest of my day in the interest of getting some sleep tonight.   As usual, I spent some time getting my Palestinian Jawwal SIM card working.  My Israeli Cellcom SIM card does not get reception in some parts of the West Bank and Gaza, so I needed to switch cards.  Tha'er, the driver from the Palestinian Association for Cultural Exchange took me to the Jawwal office to get it working.  I wanted to keep the same number I have had for years, but Jawwal had made some changes to the cards, and I had to replace my SIM card for 10 shekels.  Not bad. 

Palestinian billionaire Munib Al-Masri  is the majority stake-holder in Jawwal.  The Jawwal office in Ramallah is large, spacious, spotless, and secure.  You take a ticket on entering (just like an American deli, bakery, or government bureau), and may have to wait an hour at busy times.  Tha'er took me there  and we looked at cases of cellphones for sale while we waited.  The prices were outrageously high - many times what you would pay in the US.  (There are sales taxes in Palestine on everything, including food.  They are extremely high and they are transparent.  They are added into the price instead of added on.  I don't have the data on what the taxes are item by item, but I have been told that the taxes on cars are 100%.  This means that Palestinians  have a higher cost of living than many industrialized nations although their salaries are a fraction of theirs.  Needless to say, they don't think they get enough for these taxes!)  FYI, call rates for Palestinian and Israeli pay-as-you-go SIM cards  are quite high and are much higher than they are on a UK Vodaphone pay-as-you-go SIM card.  This is one part of the world where Skype is by far your best bet.

As I was bored waiting, I decided to take a picture of the inside of the Jawwal office to share with you.  I snapped one picture and a security guard rushed over telling me "no pictures".  Huh????  What is the problem with taking a picture of a cell phone store.  Paranoia exists on both sides of this Green Line!

 

Jawwal Cell Phone Office



And, a day is not complete without food.  I joined Dr. Adel Yahya of the Palestinian Association for  Cultural Exchange and a visiting delegation of US professors with the Palestinian American Research Center for a fine dinner at a local restaurant.  We all had salads and a Palestinian favorite: Chicken Mousakhan.  Then I had a second dinner cooked by Adel's wife.  Another Palestinian favorite: a swiss chard dish whose name a can't remember.