Yesterday evening Israelis came into Bethlehem and shot four men riding in a car near the Freres School -- close to the house of a co-worker and about a 5-minute walk from my house.
The story is here.
One of the men had been on the run for almost 20 years, and recently started popping up on the radio and on TV. A co-worker says that a "collaborator" probably found out that he was around, and called the Israelis, who came in and shot him.
I only started hearing about collaborators -- people who sell information to the Israelis, either to make money to support their families, or as part of a bargain to get themselves off the "wanted" list -- this week, when I saw the film "Paradise Now" for the first time. I'm sure I must have heard about them before, but maybe this is the first time I've consciously thought about them, and what it means to be one. If you haven't seen "Paradise Now", I'd recommend it. It's about two seemingly normal guys in Nablus who get called up for a suicide mission, but it's also about the structures of militant organisations (the ones in charge sending others off to their deaths, eating sandwiches while the chosen bombers are filming their testimonies) and debate among Palestinians as to whether or not suicide bombs help or hurt the Palestinian cause for independence and self-determination.
So today in Bethlehem there's a general strike -- the only shops that are open are the pharmacies. People say that it'll last until Saturday. We shut the front gates to our offices today so that it looks like we're closed, but I think everyone came into work.
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