Article: W Payton, Chicago Flame 10 sept 2002

Humanitarian help
Former professor recounts time in Palestinian refugee camps

Whitney Payton
Issue date: 9/10/02 Section: News

http://media.www.chicagoflame.com/media/storage/paper519/news/2002/09/10/News/Humanitarian.Help-268863.shtml

Gold shoes lit up the African-American Cultural Center on Thursday, when Annie Higgins spoke about her recent experience in Palestine. And her gold shoes matched her spirit last summer as she brought light to the people living in refugee camps in the country torn by conflict with Israel.Higgins is a former University of Illinois at Chicago lecturer and professor of Arabic in the Department of Classics and Mediterranean Studies and a graduate of the University of Chicago. She has resigned from her position at UIC and will be spending a year conducting research in the Middle East, mostly focusing on Arabic poetry and the political and religious references found within it."I have enjoyed my Arabic teaching at UIC, especially because my students have been extremely devoted to critical thinking and looking at issues deeply," Higgins said.She went to Palestine with a group for an International Solidarity Movement from May 29 to June 21, visiting refugee camps in Balata and Jenin. Higgins, doctors and technicians helped families in the Palestinian refugee camps. She also spent time in Jerusalem.Higgins spoke Thursday at the African-American Cultural Center in Adams Hall. Her presentation, titled "Eyewitness: Israel's Occupation of Palestine," offered her personal accounts of her experiences in Palestine.She also presented a personalized slide presentation to the audience, about 25 undergraduate and graduate students, medical students and faculty members."Instead of looking at the political side, I want to look at the human side," Higgins said of the situation in Palestine.In March, the Independent Media Center put out a call for medical personnel to go to Palestine."There's a primitive urge to go help people," said Mike Nordine, a sophomore prenursing student at UIC and an emergency medical technician. Nordine went to Palestine from May 20 to June 23, and he also spoke Thursday about his experiences there.

Nordine and another EMT went to Palestine and Israel as autonomous individuals, he said, without political motives.Higgins talked about a young man in Balata who was studying in his room when he was killed by a sniper. His mother was shot two days later while she was kneading bread in her kitchen.Violence was present every day during Higgins' visit to Palestine."I saw an ambulance go by and heard shooting. They were shooting at the ambulance," she said. "There was a soldier firing an M-16."Nordine worked to help get ambulances through checkpoints by talking to Israeli soldiers. He felt the checkpoints were used "as a way of harassing people by opening the checkpoint for 15 seconds and letting 10 cars through, and then closing them for a half an hour so lines would build up," he said.Most Americans in the International Solidarity Movement group she was with were Jewish, Higgins said. There are Jewish and Israeli organizations that raise concerns and protests against some of Israel's actions.During the discussion segment of the lecture, Alexandria Kalika, a UIC senior majoring in physics, asked Higgins, "What is the attitude toward suicide bombing?" "I didn't hear people actively condemning them, or supporting it, but it is not a surprise anymore" to hear about suicide bombings, Higgins said.Another question Kalika raised concerned what Palestinians want for themselves."They want democracy, fair elections and peace with Israel," Nordine said. "No one I met liked (Palestinian leader Yasser) Arafat."Palestinians in the refugee camp asked Higgins why America and the world are letting these injustices happen."We have the privilege of taxation with representation. As U.S. taxpayers, we are involved by supporting a brutal system of apartheid and illegal collective punishment of an entire population," Higgins said. "Ask yourself, 'Am I doing this in the name of democracy? What am I doing to support democracy for Israelis and Palestinians alike?'"Around campus, UIC students talked about how they see the situation in Palestine. "The U.S. is being partial. It's unfair to Palestinians," Hafiz Ojler said. "I think it's wrong because Palestinians don't have their own land," Dodg Wan said. "Suicide bombing is not right, but they don't have any other means of retaliation.""There is hope as long as we think of Palestinians and Israelis as humans, and we work together toward human rights for everyone," Higgins said.


Media Credit: Photo Courtesy of Annie Higgins
Annie Higgins, former UIC professor of Arabic, stands outside the masjid Al-Aqsa in Jerusalem. Higgins recently returned from her humanitarian trip to help families in refugee camps in the Middle East.