Spatial agency among children living in the Dheisheh refugee camp in the West Bank: a qualitative investigation of space and place as risk and protection factors from political and military violence

Wars and conflicts have caused millions of people to seek asylum outside their homelands and the issue of refugee camps has become a pressing subject in international policy discussions. Conflicts continue to escalate in different parts of the world, especially in Middle Eastern countries. In 1948, the Palestinian-Israeli conflict forced displacement of many Palestinian people. The resulting camps have developed into cluster camp shelters of three to four stories in the West Bank, Gaza, and other regions around historical Palestine; some are perceived to be like gated communities. Being self-sufficient environments, refugee camps have rarely been approached from the perspective of urban psychology. This research deals with sensory perceptual analysis of Balata, the largest refugee camp in the West Bank of Palestinian Territories. Balata is situated in Nablus and has raised four generations of refugees since its establishment. In order to explore the spatial characteristics of such specific environmental experiences, the research adopted a mixed-method approach – systematically evaluating the related literature on sensory perceptual spaces and applying content analysis methods. The study modified the sensory slider tool of Malnar and Vodvarka according to the framework matrix based on the content analysis. Moreover, the case study analysis consisted of observation of the chosen area and 30 in-depth interviews with refugees who were forced out of their homes and settled in the camp as well as some who were born in the camp. The research results show that investigating what camp residents perceive of the five senses can capture meaningful sensory perceptual experiences and can generate a holistic mental image of the refugee camp. Particularly, perceptions of the built environment reflect the difficulty of life experiences. The study concludes that the characteristics of camps in this seventy-year-old conflict environment may not be found in other parts of the world.

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Perceptions of violence among young people in the West Bank: a qualitative investigation

The Lancet ◽

10.1016/s0140-6736(17)32043-3 ◽

2017 ◽

Vol 390 ◽

pp. S42

Author(s):

Mohammed Shaheen ◽

Rita Karam ◽

Ryan Brown ◽

Peter Glick ◽

Salwa Massad ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Young People ◽

West Bank ◽

Qualitative Investigation ◽

The West

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Substance use among Palestinian youth in the West Bank, Palestine: a qualitative investigation

BMC Public Health ◽

10.1186/s12889-016-3472-4 ◽

2016 ◽

Vol 16 (1) ◽

Cited By ~ 13

Author(s):

Salwa G. Massad ◽

Mohammed Shaheen ◽

Rita Karam ◽

Ryan Brown ◽

Peter Glick ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Substance Use ◽

West Bank ◽

Qualitative Investigation ◽

The West

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Multilocality and the Politics of Space in Protracted Exile

Transfers ◽

10.3167/trans.2021.110106 ◽

2021 ◽

Vol 11 (1) ◽

pp. 92-107

Author(s):

Dorota Woroniecka-Krzyzanowska

Keyword(s):

Political Change ◽

West Bank ◽

Refugee Camp ◽

Political Practice ◽

Time And Space ◽

The West ◽

Ethnographic Fieldwork ◽

Local Residents ◽

Palestinian Refugee ◽

Politics Of Space

This article employs the concept of multilocality to analyze the politics of space under the condition of protracted encampment. Rather than adopting a common synchronic approach to how refugees relate to space, the theoretical lens of multilocality grasps the diachronic dimension of protracted camps understood as places that encompass multiple attachments across time and space: the remembered and imagined places of origin, sites of residence in exile, and future geographies of hope or anticipation. Based on ethnographic fieldwork in al-Am’ari, a Palestinian refugee camp in the West Bank, I analyze multilocality as a political practice whereby local residents and organizations nurture the refugee identity of their communities, resist the permanence of protracted exile, and manifest the necessity for political change.

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Perceptions of sexual risk behavior among Palestinian youth in the West Bank: a qualitative investigation

BMC Public Health ◽

10.1186/1471-2458-14-1213 ◽

2014 ◽

Vol 14 (1) ◽

Cited By ~ 5

Author(s):

Salwa G Massad ◽

Rita Karam ◽

Ryan Brown ◽

Peter Glick ◽

Mohammed Shaheen ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Risk Behavior ◽

Sexual Risk ◽

Sexual Risk Behavior ◽

West Bank ◽

Qualitative Investigation ◽

The West

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Pilgrims, Protest Tourists, and Palestinians: Abu Dis, Bethlehem, Dheisheh Camp

Humanity & Society ◽

10.1177/0160597620964757 ◽

2020 ◽

pp. 016059762096475

Author(s):

Philip Hopper

Keyword(s):

Final Section ◽

West Bank ◽

Refugee Camp ◽

Historical Background ◽

The West ◽

Central Idea ◽

Occupied Palestinian Territory ◽

Palestinian Refugee ◽

Palestinian Territory ◽

Permanent Residents

The central idea of this essay is that nonindigenous vernacular image-making by protest tourists on the Palestinian side of the Israeli separation barrier and elsewhere holds little meaning for the permanent residents beyond a relatively minor revenue stream. Prior to making this argument, I provide a short historical background about the use of vernacular messages in the occupied Palestinian territory known as the West Bank. I then focus on images of martyrs or shaheed and then on separation barrier images by protest tourists mostly in Bethlehem. The final sections are about two artists from the Dheisheh Palestinian Refugee Camp and the images they create within the camp. A coda of sorts discusses a mural within the camp that is venerated by the residents as opposed to the overpainting and defacement that takes place on the separation barrier. Within this final section and elsewhere within this essay, the meaning of sumood is explicated. As a note, protest tourists are defined here not as anti-tourism protesters but rather as tourists whose intent is protest Israeli policies regarding Palestinians.

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Sero Prevalence of COVID-19 in Palestine in 2020

10.1101/2021.10.04.21263131 ◽

2021 ◽

Author(s):

Izzat Rayan ◽

Sharif E. Qaddomi ◽

Osama Najjar ◽

Saleh Abbas ◽

Karmel Mousa ◽

...

Keyword(s):

West Bank ◽

Refugee Camp ◽

Actual Number ◽

Serological Survey ◽

Rt Pcr ◽

The West ◽

Palestinian Territories ◽

Urban Rural

COVID-19 affected different countries differently. The WHO/ PNIPH, WHO/EMRO, and the Palestinian MoH, with assistance from the PCBS carried out a serological survey in the occupied Palestinian Territories in order to estimate the actual number of COVID-19 infection by the end of December 2020. A sample stratified by Region, district, and by type (urban, rural, and refugee camp), and accounting for gender, was taken from Gaza and the West Bank. The results show that 39% of the oPt (38% of the West Bank and 40% of Gaza), had been infected with COVID-19 by the end of December, almost 10 times the number that was detected by targeted Rt-PCR testing.

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Palestinian refugee women and the Jenin refugee camp: Reflections on urbicide and the dilemmas of home in exile

Urban Studies ◽

10.1177/0042098018811789 ◽

2019 ◽

Vol 56 (14) ◽

pp. 2897-2916 ◽

Cited By ~ 1

Author(s):

Sahera Bleibleh ◽

Michael Vicente Perez ◽

Thaira Bleibleh

Keyword(s):

West Bank ◽

Refugee Camp ◽

The West ◽

Palestinian Women ◽

Refugee Women ◽

Right Of Return ◽

The Future ◽

Palestinian Refugee ◽

The Right

In March 2002, the Israeli military launched its most lethal attack on the West Bank since 1967. In the Jenin refugee camp, the assault included the deliberate destruction of homes and infrastructure including the entire Hawashin neighbourhood. This article considers the memories of Palestinian women who survived the urbicidal war on Jenin and confronted the difficulties of reconstruction. It shows how women enacted particular forms of agency during the siege that do not fit into discussions of urbicide or national resistance. Our analysis also examines the reconstruction of the Jenin camp to understand how its transformation reveals its significance for Palestinian women at both the levels of the home and the urban camp. We argue that the meaning of the camp is inseparable from the different ways it is inhabited. Thus for Palestinian women, the spatial reconfiguration of homes during the reconstruction of the camp permanently erased the experience of sociality once lived by women before the attack. This not only reproduced the effects of the urbicide but also disturbed the ways women inhabited the camp and provoked fears that it could be transformed into a permanent space and thus preclude the possibility of the right of return in the future.

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