IN STEREO

It’s not secure for us. People go to take a picture with the train. A year ago, we built a tent to make this area safe. It was like a restaurant and for farmers to sell their vegetables to the visitors. The Israeli police came and destroyed it with a bulldozer. Why would you do that? It’s just a tent. We don’t understand. We went in the night and we cleaned up. Hundreds of soldiers came, from here, from there, from this side, from that side. You wouldn’t believe it. And we were just six people there in the night. The soldiers said, “What are you doing here?” And I said, “We’re just cleaning.” They wanted us to make a problem; I felt that. And one month ago, people from Hebron came to visit us here, where the railway is. They thought there was no train – just the old Turkish train, and now it’s stopped. [So] they came and put their [grill on the tracks] to make a barbecue.

The security sent the police. 100 soldiers. And I asked them, “What are you doing? Families, kids, ladies… You want to shoot them with gas? Your security can tell them, ‘There is a train, please get out.’ They didn’t tell them and they asked you to come, to make a problem.” And he said, “I don’t want anybody to be here, because somebody might throw stones at the train.” I told him, “Listen man, forget the politics. It’s a nice area. People come to enjoy it here in the nature and to forget the politics. What do you want?” Battir, it’s like Switzerland in the First World War, in the Second World War. This is what we want to build. After that, he said sorry, and let the people enjoy it and have a barbecue. But in the beginning, he wanted to make a problem. – Sultan