Bedouin and Bikes
It’s already Monday night, or rather early Tuesday morning, two full days after the end of the Friday/Saturday weekend I’ve been too busy to write about. Since I really do want to get to sleep, this too will be short.
I spent this weekend with friends, on Friday in Lahav Forest in a picnic area surrounded by trees planted by the Jewish National Fund and on Saturday further into the Negev at Mitzpe Ramon, the largest crater on Earth. In both places there were plenty of Israelis enjoying themselves.
The weather was great.
Children kept busy hassling ibexes.
The scenery is spectacular.
But then, also in Lahav Forest is the Museum of Bedouin Culture.
Lots of cultural artifacts.
But only this single glaringly superficial description of pressures on Bedouin to move to officially recognized towns:
No mention of this scene I passed the next day further south, which is common throughout the Negev and even further north:
No mention of the contrast between the lush kibbutz below the observation tower, kept green with water piped from the north, and the stark desert beyond, off across the Green Line into the water-deprived West Bank.
I learned something about Bedouin at the museum, but the visit left me unsettled. The museum was so superficial, so irrelevant, that the gorgeous crafts somehow seemed dishonest. Half the 150,000 Bedouin in the Negev refuse to move to officially recognized towns. The museum ignores the issue, and ignores them. Instead, we get quaint.
Yesterday I learned that, although the museum has some Bedouin working there (including baking pita for tourists and providing local color), the place is run by a Jewish Israeli. I understand the Bedouin themselves have very mixed feelings about the place. I can see why.
Because of my schedule I couldn’t get to last week’s demonstration in Beer Sheva in opposition to Israeli demolition of Bedouin homes. I doubt the story will make it into the museum.