Apuntes Palestine -- Dispatches from Occupied Territory

Recently The Inquirer started talking to Fernando Reals, a teacher in New York who's ventured to Palestine to volunteer his time and energies. He's keeping a blog of his journey (he says one of the few he's made overseas) at apuntespalestine.blogspot.com.

This is neither an objective news take on the situation there, nor does it purport to be. Consequently, his journal entries describing his arrival in Israel, his encounters with seemingly endless and sometimes floating checkpoints offer a valuable perspective of the situation on the ground.

And considering the recent violence, his dispatches seem all the more pressing. An excerpt:

At 7pm in the evening, three jeeps entered the village shooting tear gas, rubber bullets, and sound grenades at people in the streets for about an hour. Some of us stayed with the Abumariya family, to calm down the children, while others took to the street with still and video cameras in hand. On our tractor ride through town we bumped into army jeeps shooting rubber bullets at children on the street. It was an unbelievable scene. I still can't get used to this level of drama unfolding before my eyes. I felt like I was in the Wild, Wild West. I later found out that the Jeish took a young man from the village for supposedly throwing stones.

Later in the night, while I was writing up the Apartheid piece, new friends from called to me from the street to come down and photograph soldiers. I immediately ran down the stairs with camera in hand when the friends said, "our soldiers." I froze as I saw that there wasn't another hostile incursion occurring, put away my camera, and watched a small platoon of camouflaged masked men with AK-47's, swords, and spraypaint. The Jeevara, Palestinian for Guevara or the PFLP were on the street.

Top City Krew in New York City, never rolled so tough.