Eyes Wide Open | Photo Blog
#Occupation365: Photo blog
February 2018
Israel’s control over some five million Palestinians throughout the Occupied Territories entails a violent daily routine. This is a reality of constant uncertainty about the present and the future, violated privacy and a totally exposed life that can be disrupted at any moment.
B’Tselem regularly publishes data that illustrate the scope of Israel’s control. From November 2017 to February 2018, we published updates every two weeks, each of them including reports on hundreds of incidents in which the Israeli military entered Palestinian communities, erected flying checkpoints and carried out arrests – including of minors. Read our latest update here.
Palestinians are not politically represented in the Israeli systems that govern their lives. This creates almost unlimited potential for arbitrary use of force against them. The result is abuse and harm to Palestinians, at times with no apparent reason and at others on absurd grounds given a blanket justification of security – but always as part of the ruler-subject balance of power. This is a structurally violent routine – and, as such, can only be ended by ending the occupation.
The following photographs illustrate the routine of occupation that is Palestinian daily reality. They were taken by B’Tselem volunteers and field researchers.
Israeli Border Police do not allow Hebron family to transfer their possessions by truck, forcing them to move house via a checkpoint. Stills from B'Tselem Camera Project video footage, 7 July 2017
Palestinian girl passes through Hebron checkpoint on her way home from school. Photo by B'Tselem , 16 Feb. 2017
Palestinians wait at the crowded Qalandiya checkpoint during restrictions on entry to Al-Aqsa Mosque in Jerusalem following protest against installation of metal detectors at the compound. Photo by B'Tselem, 28 July 2017
Israeli military blocks main entrance to Al-Fawwar Refugee Camp with no formal reason, Feb. 2018. Stills from video footage captured by Musa Abu Hashhash, B’Tselem, 20 Feb. 2018
Israeli police arrest Palestinian teen in East Jerusalem neighborhood of Sheikh Jarrah. Still from video footage captured by Oren Ziv and Shiraz Greenbaum, Activestills.org, 8 Sept. 2017.
Extreme movement restrictions in Old City of Jerusalem during Friday prayer at Al-Aqsa mosque, following protest against installation of metal detectors in the compound. Photo by B'Tselem, 21 July 2017
Palestinians wait at the crowded Qalandiya checkpoint during restrictions on entry to Al-Aqsa Mosque in Jerusalem following protest against installation of metal detectors at the compound. Photo by B'Tselem, 28 July 2017
Damage left by Israeli soldiers in the home of the al-Ja’bri family in Hebron, after the military raided the house, searched it and stripped the family of their clothes. Photo by Ayat al-Ja’bri, 20 Jan. 2017
Earth mounds the Israeli military used to block off the eastern entrance to the village of Kobar, north of Ramallah, as collective punishment. Photo by Iyad Hadad, B’Tselem, 23 July 2017
Israeli soldiers leave Abbas Barghouti’s sign workshop in utter disarray as part of collective punishment against all residents of Kobar, a village north of Ramallah. Photo by Iyad Hadad, B’Tselem, 24 July 2017
Israeli soldiers arrest 13-year-old Palestinian in Beit Ummar, a village in Hebron District. Stills from B'Tselem Camera Project video footage, 16 Oct. 2017.
Eyes Wide Open Photo Blog by B’Tselem is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License. You are free to use the photos in the blog. However, any public use of photos must include copyright credit to the photographer and B’Tselem.
Israel’s regime of apartheid and occupation is inextricably bound up in human rights violations. B’Tselem strives to end this regime, as that is the only way forward to a future in which human rights, democracy, liberty and equality are ensured to all people, both Palestinian and Israeli, living between the Jordan River and the Mediterranean Sea.
Since the Hamas attack on 7 October 2023, Israel has acted in a coordinated and deliberate manner to destroy Palestinian society in the Gaza Strip, committing genocide against its residents. In light of Israel’s actions in Gaza, the public statements made by Israeli decision-makers, and the international community’s failure to take effective action, there is a serious risk that the Israeli regime will expand the genocide to other areas under its control—first and foremost, the West Bank.
B’Tselem calls on the Israeli public and the international community to use every tool available under international law to bring an immediate end to Israel’s genocide against the Palestinian people.