Did a sixteen-year-old Palestinian girl named Ahed Tamimi actually dare to slap an Israeli soldier? Yeah she did. And not only once but a bunch of times too. How and why? Listen up. Here’s the true story. You heard it here first.
Ahed and her BFF were just sitting around the house playing Candy Crush or whatever, when Ahed looked out her window and saw two Israeli soldiers enter the yard. “Hey, you—you with the body armor and the assault rifle and the stun gun,” she said to the occupying invader. “What the freak are you doing in my front yard!”
The occupying invader ignored Ahed. Maybe he and his buddy had only just stepped inside the gate to take a piss?
Then Ahed lightly poked at the occupying invader’s arm a few times, just to get his attention because he was rudely ignoring her. “This land is mine,” she said. “God gave this land to me . . .” Or words to that effect. And that’s when the occupying invader suddenly hauled off and hit her—and then Ahed slapped him back. Oops.
And then the BFF and the mom and the sister and the aunt all came out, held hands and made stink-eyes at the O.I.—and the occupying invader backed away. End of story? Not. The occupying invader came back late that night with even more buddies and more stun guns and assault rifles and, well, you know the drill. Off to jail.
That’s just what happens when you object to Israeli soldiers cluttering up your front yard like some weird armed-to-the-teeth lawn gnomes.
Jane Stillwater is a freelance writer who hates injustice and corruption in any form but especially injustice and corruption paid for by American taxpayers. She has recently published a book entitled, “Bring Your Own Flak Jacket: Helpful Tips For Touring Today’s Middle East.” According to Ms. Stillwater, “It’s a fabulous and entertaining book. I loved writing it. And I hope that you will love reading it too.” It’s available at Amazon or you can order it at any independent bookstore.
I’m not color blind. I’ve seen many pictures of Ahed Tamimi, including one where Ahed is standing next to her father, who is very proud of her, and in every picture Ahed’s long blonde hair was loose. She never wore a hijab or veil of any sort.
One picture of Ahed, with her pale white face and long blonde hair, being escorted to or from jail or court by uniformed Israeli Jewish officials was particularly striking, because the cops escorting her had much darker skin. In the United States, people with their skin tones often self-identify as Black. So it looked like Black officials were escorting a young white prisoner, an image that was very likely to be inflammatory in the deeply racist United States, including among Jewish communities who consider themselves to be white and are prejudiced against Blacks.
The next photo I saw posted online was of the uniformed officials of the Jewish state again escorting Ahed Tamimi, but this time Ahed’s hair was covered with a black cloth in such a way that not a single strand of her long blonde hair was visible. The cloth resembled a hijab, only much tighter.
So I have to wonder if the Israelis are forcing Ahed to wear a veil–a veil that she has never worn and that her own family doesn’t make her wear. Do democracies force women and girls to wear veils?
Actually sometimes they do. I remember the story of a woman in the U.S. military, stationed in Saudi Arabia, who was forced by her superiors to wear a burka in what they claimed was deference to local customs. I don’t remember how the case turned out, but it seemed strange at the time that the United States, which claimed to want to liberate women from the veil in Muslim countries, would forced a US citizen and member of the U.S. military to wear a veil.
I know that Orthodox Jewish women are not supposed to let their hair show, and usually wear wigs. But many Jews in Israel are secular–are secular Jewish women also forced to wear veils in court? Only those with blonde hair? Only Palestinians? Or is it only Ahed Tamimi?
I’m waiting to see if any new pictures are posted. If Ahed is being forcibly veiled, it could be a PR disaster even worse than seeing Black Jews oppressing a white Palestinian girl.
Thanks for an informed perspective on this story, Jane. Free Ahed! Free all the Tamimis! Free all the children under eighteen being detained by Israel for throwing rocks at armored tanks! If those tanks are vulnerable to rocks, what good are they anyway? Is their purpose solely to provide tempting targets to children?