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Committee
Members
Meet Founder of Palestinian
Youth Center By
Catherine M. Mooney
Eight Martín-Baró Fund committee
members had dinner in Boston in January, 2002, with Ziad Abbas, co-founder
and director of the Ibdaa Cultural Center, located in Dheisheh Refugee
Camp in Bethlehem, in the West Bank, Palestine. Our dinner was a welcome
chance to meet Ziad personally, learn more about conditions in Dheisheh,
about Ibdaa, and about Ibdaa projects that address the mental health
needs of the community.
  Conditions
in Dheisheh Refugee Camp
Dheisheh is one of 59 Palestinian refugee camps created with the establishment
of the state of Israel in 1949. Dheisheh, which occupies less than half
a square kilometer, is home to about 11,000 refugees. Conditions in
the camp are physically quite difficult. Electrical failures in the
winter are common, and in summer there are frequent water shortages.
The UN manages education, health and security in Dheisheh, but the services
provided are meager. One doctor, who works six hours a day, attends
to the entire camp, seeing an average of 160 patients, mostly children,
each day. Two schools provide basic elementary and preparatory education
for over 2,300 children.
Ziad
Abbas and the Foundation
of Ibdaa Cultural Center
 Ziad
Abbas, now 38 years old, was born and grew up in Dheisheh, sharing a
small one-room house with four siblings and his parents. At a very young
age he realized that he was not free, that his family lacked basic services,
and that they had been forced out of their homes into the refugee camp.
Today, he is a journalist who has worked in TV, films, and with various
news agencies to educate the world about the Palestinian situation.
He recently collaborated on "Promises," an award-winning documentary
that provides a glimpse of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict through
the eyes of young people, including participants in Ibdaa projects.
Over half the 11,000
refugees in Dheisheh are under 18 years old. Dheisheh children,
says Ziad, are experts
at identifying bullets, F-16s, and helicopters. Once when he saw his
9-year-old nephew throwing stones, he ran
to him and
told him to put down the stones and go to school. His nephew responded,
"I don't want to be a coward like you." As their despair rises, Palestinian
youth are becoming increasingly radicalized. Ziad helped found Ibdaa,
which means "to create something out of nothing," in 1995, to give Dheisheh
youth physical and psychological space and programs for responding constructively
to the violence permeating their lives.
Ibdaa programs all stress human rights, gender equity and a democratic
process. Specifically, Ibdaa provides after school activities to protect
youth from street violence. Its computer center hosts a web site that
facilitates communication among Palestinian youth in different refugee
camps. There is a
nursery school, kindergarten, and a library. Ibdaa's internationally-known
dance troupe is the only project in the camp for both boys and girls.
Concerns of girls and women are especially promoted by Ibdaa, which
has started the first all-girls baseball team and designated Sunday
as women's day. Women receive free medical care, learn about health
and other women's issues, and are free to remove their burkhas and enjoy
other activities traditionally denied to them. Ibdaa leadership is now
dominated by women who participated as girls in Ibdaa programs.
 The
Ibdaa Cultural Center is an immense source of pride for Dheisheh residents.
As a focal point for community organizing, Ibdaa has also been the subject
of attacks. In August 2000, its computer server was stolen and the Center,
together with its 14 computers, was burned. They rebuilt, and Ziad told
us how the four-story building, the tallest in Dheisheh, created a psychological
space separate from the noise and violence permeating the streets below.
In March, however, the Israeli Defense Forces invaded the camp and took
over the Center, positioning snipers on its top floor overlooking the
entire camp. They ransacked the Center and once again, its computers,
library and kindergarten have been severely damaged. Ibdaa youth were
rounded up, bound and kept blindfolded for more than 20 hours before
finally being released without charges.
The Martín-Baró Fund supported Ibdaa in 2000, with a grant to fund an
oral history project designed to reconnect young people with their family
and community histories. Work on this project has been disrupted by
the computer center fire and subsequent events. This year (2002), the
Fund has awarded Ibdaa an emergency
grant to rebuild. You can learn more about this group by consulting
the Ibdaa web site once
it is again in service.
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English
to Spanish translations
courtesy
of Melisa Flores
©
2007, Ignacio Martín-Baró Fund for Mental Health & Human Rights
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