Where's the film? Hamas's violent crackdown on pro-unity Gaza youth and journalists

How can you ever respect a Hamas police officer who tries to “open” your digital camera hoping that he will find “the film”?

Forget for a second the shameless beating of secondary school girls I had just witnessed from my balcony.

Forget that they broke into my house carrying sticks and guns, manhandled my landlady, her son and daughter.

Forget also, for a second, that a journalist friend of mine was stabbed in her back by a police officer four days ago while walking back home from the Al Kateeba demonstrations – dispersed violently by Hamas mobs and police with sticks and live machine gun fire in the sky.

But when the uniformed thug leading his eight or so juniors presented himself rudely at my door this afternoon, it was just a scene out of Blackadder. Or Mr Bean. With guns.

Just minutes before, at around 11.30am, I was clicking with my camera from my balcony on the 14th floor as around 100 secondary school girls were chanting against the division, for Palestinian unity, just opposite my flat. These brave girls had just finished school (there are not enough classes for Gaza’s children so students attend schools in two shifts). The demonstrations were expected to start at noon, but the free, independent Gaza youth are impatient. Standing in one of the corners in Omar Al Mukhtar Street – Gaza City’s major boulevard leading to Al Jundi Square – they start chanting. And chanting. Other students start arriving. I keep clicking.

My landlady – a strong, secular Marxist who has argued and had fist fights with some of the most heavily armed Israeli commandos in her family home in Beit Hanoun – is excited. Her daughter – wearing the same school uniform as the girls opposite – is dying to go down, but tells me she’ll wait for some more people to gather.

Policemen are still at a distance in the main square, until we hear police car sirens. Trouble is on the way. A white van rams straight into the group of girls. I’m still clicking, can’t confirm if anyone was hit. Apparently not. Police officers storm out of the van – some carrying AK47s, others wooden sticks. Another van comes from the opposite direction. The girls flee, and with them a crowd that was on its way. Police chase the students, beating whoever is in front of them. More police vans turn up, chasing everyone from the main street.

Then, an officer on the street spots me. He points towards me as his peers follow his finger. I’m fucked. Might as well keep clicking. They rush to one of the vans and head off somewhere. My landlady tells me to go into my flat and store my pictures somewhere safe. Wise advice. Her son is guarding the main door to our floor. I dash to my flat and frantically copy everything on every possible disk available. Until, as expected, they arrived. Later I would learn that at the same time other security officers were storming into news agencies’ offices here, breaking equipment and arresting staff from NHK, AP, Al Arabiya and Mayadeen, among others.

I’m still upstairs in my flat when they knock on the main door. My landlady and her son and some other friends open. I can hear the commotion. All my photos are saved. I put the card back in one of the cameras and go to meet my visitors.

“Are you the one taking photos,” the leader, armed with a revolver in his holster, tells me trying to grab my camera.

Yes.

“Why are you taking photos?”

Why not?

“Why are you taking photos from up here?”

Let me come with you in your car to photograph you on the beat.

“Where is your film?”

It’s digital.

“Where is your film?”

Leave my camera.

“Open the camera.”

You can’t open a digital camera.

“So where’s the film?”

There is no film. I can show you the pictures.

“Show me the pictures.”

I can’t show you the pictures if you break my camera.

“What’s your name?”

You tell me your name. You’re in my house. Who are you?

“What’s your name?”

Write me down your name.  (Landlady brings paper and pen. The idiot is trying to open the digital camera to rip out the ‘film’).

Since when is it illegal to take photos?

“Where’s the film?”

There is no film. It’s digital. Show me the law stating photography is forbidden.

“Where is the film?”

Which law states that photography is forbidden?

“Open the camera”

You’re worse than the Israelis.

“What’s your name?”

Write me down yours. Where are you going with my camera? You can’t leave without giving me a receipt. Write down your name and state that you confiscated my camera.

(He is calling someone from his mobile, then grabs pen and writes down a note stating that my camera was confiscating, but does not sign it).

Why are you afraid of telling me your name?

What’s your name?

Write down your name.

My landlady is meanwhile arguing with the rest of the thugs.

“What’s your problem?” she keeps telling them. “Why are you in my house? Since when can’t we photograph you doing your job? Since when can’t I take pictures from my balcony? Didn’t you like being photographed in Rantissi’s time (Hamas leader killed by Israel when the movement was not in government)? Do you think that I, as Palestinian, like seeing these pictures? You’re the shame of our country and our cause. ”

The commotion drags on a bit more, until the only one of them who is not wearing a uniform tries to restore some calm, respectfully, for a change.

“It’s OK,” he said. “You’ll have your camera back. Stay calm.”

What do you mean stay calm, I ask him.

“Write down my name. It’s Ihab Al Baz. You can come and pick it up from the police station in half an hour.”

And they left. With my camera.

When tested, Hamas have shown they are not any different from the Mubaraks, Ben Alis, Gaddafis and Ali Abdallah Salehs of this side of the world. They just don’t have the tanks, the fighter jets and the tear gas.

And they’ve learnt all their lessons from the occupier, just in a more primitive style.

At a press conference given by Hamas spokesmen Sami Abu Zuhri and Fawzi Barhoum later, a journalist asked: “Abu Zuhri how do you explain the attack on the Reuters news agency’s offices happening as we speak? How do you explain it?”

Abu Zuhri was speechless, so Barhoum butted in. “Al Salam Aleikum”. Bye.

Latest: Meanwhile between 30 and 50 mortars have been fired from Gaza into Israel – the highest ever mortar fire from here since the war two years ago. In an equally unprecedented move, Hamas’s military wing Izz Al Deen Al Qassam claimed it had fired 30 of the mortars. Israel has already sent fighter jets bombing parts of Gaza, many more are expected after dusk.

Journey to Gaza blog