Palestinian Bedouin at risk of forced displacement: Creative communication

In the fragile context of occupied Palestine, the Bedouins in the Jerusalem periphery are among the poorest, most vulnerable and insecure communities who nonetheless face routine home demolitions, confiscation of agricultural and pastoral items crucial for their economic survival, and destruction of solar panels and water pipes essential for decent living conditions. These actions, attributable to Israeli authorities or Israeli settlers who act with impunity, contribute to the coercive environment in which Palestinian Bedouins survive as their land and way of life are encroached upon, making day-to-day life precarious and future development prospects bleak. Within the broader experience of Palestinian society, the Bedouins are at the sharp edge of the Israeli land-grab policies in the West Bank that seek to remove Palestinians from their land in order to expand illegal Israeli-only settlements, despite the condemnation in UN Security Council Resolution 2334 (2016) and numerous other UN documents.

In recent months, the prospects for justice for Palestinians, including Bedouins, before an impartial international tribunal have materialised. In 2021 the International Criminal Court (ICC) confirmed its territorial jurisdiction in the Palestinian territories occupied by Israel since 1967, which includes the areas of East Jerusalem and central West Bank where the Palestinian Bedouins who are the focus of this project reside. Since the formal opening of ICC proceedings in the Situation in Palestine on 3 March 2021, the unlawful settlement activities and other international law violations since 2014 that drive Bedouin humanitarian vulnerabilities and displacement are under consideration by that Court. As such, this is a crucial moment to ensure that academic, policy and general audiences are informed of the international crimes inflicted on Palestinian Bedouins as a result of impunity for repeated violations of international law associated with the Israeli settlement enterprise in Palestine. The aims and activities set out in this FoF proposal seek to inform worldwide online audiences of the situation of the Palestinian Bedouin through a suite of creative digital content output.

This proposal mobilises creativity and cultural assets - in particular the creative media sector in Palestine, and the potential creativity of Palestinian Bedouins as voluntary co-producers of content - to shine a light on human rights and international humanitarian law violations affecting Palestinian Bedouins. It addresses the serious cost of the lack of international accountability for serious human rights violations by 'telling the story' of the plight of the Palestinian Bedouin through different creative media accessible to worldwide digital audiences. In turn, this work enhances SDG 16 (peace, conflict, justice, strong institutions) in Palestine as well as internationally, where weak institutions of global justice continue to fail some of the most vulnerable, and often forgotten, Palestinian communities, exacerbating their humanitarian vulnerabilities and chances for peace, justice, and development in the region.
In response to the UN International Year of Creative Economy for Sustainable Development, this proposed follow-on project builds on a current AHRC-FCDO project that engages a range of SGDs (and primarily SDGs 16 and 10) and enhances it through the production of creative media content targeting general audiences worldwide through digital means. The proposed follow-on project consolidates an international partnership between three academic partners in Northern Ireland, England and Ireland (QUB, TCD, LJMU) and an academic partner and a civil society organisation in Palestine (Al Quds University / Human Rights Clinic - Community Action Center), and includes a new type of partner, a Palestinian creative media production company (Collage Productions), who will deliver the creative content aspects of the project.