Projects

Throughout history, the sea was considered the primary outlet for the Gaza Strip. This small coastal enclave has acquired many habits from the sea and developed itself through this maritime resource. Today, even with Israel’s acts of aggression and occupation, the sea is still considered vital for Gazan life. The fishing trade has always been an important aspect of the economy in Gaza. However, there was a dramatic decrease in production due Israeli-imposed restrictions because of t...

When we think of Gaza, we tend to associate it with death, destruction, misery, rockets and Hamas. The overall realities of Gaza are indeed rather grim: this tiny coastal strip has grown into an open-air prison consisting of around 1.5 million Palestinians, most of whom are refugees. They have zero control over their borders and airspace, and have very limited access to the Mediterranean Sea which so prominently characterizes this tiny strip of Palestine. An internationally backed siege which...

Every week, Palestinians are taken by Israeli forces from their homes, workplace, schools and at checkpoints. Sometimes the detained are released after a few days or weeks, or remain in captivity indefinitely. Almost every Palestinian home has at least one member who has gone through the imprisonment experience or is still serving an unjust sentence. Since resistance is an integral right for all Palestinians, Palestinians held in Israeli prisons have also found their way of resisting. Hun...

The daily protests in Gezi Park lasted about three weeks. They swept other cities and neighborhoods in Turkey along with international media. The small group of environmental and anti-privatization activists who started the demonstrations in Gezi Park, encountered brutal and massive suppression by the Turkish police. This gained them overnight support of different political and ethnic groups in the country and beyond. Initially, called by Prime Minister Erdoan "Chapuli," meaning loo...

The olive harvest, taking place mainly in the month of October, forms a key part of the Palestinian culture and economy. Olive trees, which grow on nearly half of the cultivated land in the occupied territories, provide 25% of Palestine's agricultural income, supporting some 100,000 families. For generations, those families have come together on their ancestral lands to pick olives, share meals, and divide the harvest. Some olives are cured for eating, but the vast majority are pressed in...

I was already in Gaza prior to Israel’s deadly eight days of attacks launched in November 2012. Once I left, the people I had photographed and interviewed during that terrible week remained at the forefront of my thoughts. I visited Jamal al-Dalu — who lost ten family members in an Israeli air strike on their home — several times. We were standing together when the body of his son was pulled out of the rubble, four days after the bombing. Jamal was to repeat his story to cou...

In an act of mass civil disobedience, more than 150 Sudanese asylum seekers chose not to appear for the evening roll call at Holot Detention Center in Israel’s south on the night of December 15, 2013. Instead, they set out on a march to Be'er Sheva, more than 30 miles away, where they spent the night at the central bus station in freezing winter conditions. The next day, they continued marching toward Jerusalem in order to protest their continued detention without trial under I...

In protest of the Prawer-Begin Plan, which if implemented, will result in the forced displacement of tens of thousands of Bedouin in the Negev desert, Bedouin and other activists organized a 'day of rage.' What started off as peaceful demonstrations, deteriorated into heavy clashes as Israeli army and police responded violently to the protests. Demonstrations took place in the southern town of Hura, Haifa, East Jerusalem, Ramallah and Jaffa. Photos: Yotam Ronen, Oren Ziv, Ryan Ro...

It is very hard to summarise 365 days, especially in an event-haunted place such as Palestine-Israel. This year, Activestills photographers covered more than 700 events, from the Jordan River to the Mediterranean Sea, as well as in Turkey, South Africa, the U.S., Belgium and Germany. This selection is a narrow peek into the amazing struggles and troubling events that took place in 2013, events that will most likely continue to unfold in the coming year. Photographers: Ahmad al-Bazz, Hamd...

Hostility between Israel and Gaza last peaked in 2008, with the Israeli military’s unprecedented “Operation Cast Lead” that killed more than 1,400 Palestinians. Four years later, in a similarly suspicious proximity to Israeli elections, reports of escalation flooded Israeli mainstream media. Using old slogans like "the need to restore deterrence," Israeli leaders heated the border by assassinating Hamas Military Chief Ahmad Ja'abari on November 10, 2012. A...

In 2014, Brazil will host the World Cup. Nobody knows exactly how much it will cost, but the Brazilian government estimates that it will amount to 11.5.billion U.S dollars. But according to ABDIB (Brazilian Association of Infrastructure and Basic Industry), this estimation does not actually match reality and the actual cost will be about 55.42 billion U.S. dollars. If you take the average, the Brazilian World Cup will cost almost 10 billion U.S. dollars more than the last three World Cups com...

Our photgrapher's best photos selection for 2012. Participating: Oren Ziv, Yotam Ronen, Keren Manor, Anne Paq, Ahmad al-Bazz, Ryan Rodrick Beiler, Shiraz Grinbaum.

Public housing solutions are provided by the Israeli government and are rented to citizens that are unable to afford a roof over their heads in the free market. In the last few decades, the system of Public Housing in Israel has gone down a fast deteriorating process of depletion and privatization. As a result, apartment inventory has gone down by 75%, which in turn lead to the hardening of criteria for entitlement and long waiting lists. In addition, most of the apartments are poorly maintai...

“We never finished 1948”, a slogan commonly heard in Israel and attributed to Moshe Dayan, refers to the fact that half the population of what some Israelis refer to as the “Great Israel” is Palestinian. The violations of international law inherent in internal displacement, a form of forced population transfer, is especially egregious in Israel and the Occupied Palestinian Territories. Palestinians who were made refugess in 1948 and 1967 are being displaced for the...

Around 400 people from 45 shepherd and farmer families are living in the Palestinian village of Susiya, in South Hebron Hills. They have lived in this region since at least the 19th Century. In 1986 the Israeli authority expelled the residents of Susiya from their original village and declared the zone a “national park.” The families re-established residence on agricultural lands they own next to their previous homes. In 2001 the Israeli army expelled the villagers from their land...

Our photgrapher's best photos selection for 2011. Participating: Oren Ziv, Yotam Ronen, Keren Manor, Anne Paq, Ahmad al-Bazz, Ryan Rodrick Beiler.

Following the 1948 War, the Bedouin population in the Negev Desert, in southern Israel, was forced to change its way of life. In 1953, the Israeli army ordered many of the Bedouins, among them those in the village of Al-Araqib, to abandon their lands for six months during which time the army performed military exercises; to this day, the right of the Bedouins to return to their land has not been recognized. In contrast to their traditional way of life in the desert, many Bedouins were mov...

Gold has enchanted man since ancient times. It is perhaps the oldest and most universal manifestation of wealth. Whether as a bracelet on a wrist, coins on the chest, a crown adorning a king’s head, or a fortune deposited in a Swiss bank. Despite the tumult of history, gold has not lost its value. On the contrary, severe crises that hit the world economy in recent years have lead to a fall in the value of the dollar, one of the cornerstones of the world’s economy. Its in...

Sheikh Jarrah is a Palestinian neighborhood in East Jerusalem located just north of Jerusalem’s Old City. In the western part of the neighborhood is an area of eighteen dunams around the site believed to be the tomb of “Simeon the Just.” Some believe that a small Jewish community settled in this area in the 19th century and gradually dispersed between the 1920s and 1940s. At the end of the British Mandate and the 1948 war the land in the area was transferred to the Jordanian...

The uprising of the Second Intifada in 2000 marked a milestone in the formation of a new type of struggle in Israel and Palestine. The failure of the Oslo Accords resulted in the entrenchment of nationalism across Israel and a political shift to the right, including within the so-called “Peace Camp.” This left a void in the Israeli left-wing within which a new radical left began to grow. At the same time, widespread popular struggle and resistance erupted across the West Bank and ...

On November 29th, 1947, the United Nations General Assembly decided on the division of the Mandatory Palestine and the establishment of two independent states in the territory: a Jewish state and an Arab state. The war that began the following day, will be referred to as the “War of Independence” by Israelis and as the “Nakba” (catastrophe) by Palestinians. As a result of the Jewish military victory, the State of Israel was established and about 800,000 Palestinians lo...

In 2007, a new wave of African refugees began arriving in Israel. Most come from Sudan and Eritrea, areas of genocide and ongoing conflict. In Israel, they lack legal status or support, and are frequently arrested or left to live on the streets. Often refugees are accused of being “enemies” of Israel, citizens of countries such as Sudan which Israel has no official relationship. Months passed and refugees found a home in Tel-Aviv. Community activists helped to provide basic needs ...

We can't continue sleeping; the sweet dreams disappear when we wake up in the morning and open the window. You cannot ignore the battered woman standing in the women's shelter; you cannot turn your head away when you see the immigration police arresting refugees who only want the right to live; you cannot overlook that all the license plates are yellow although this highway cuts through Palestine; and what about the father carrying his weeping daughter out of their home, seized by the...

From 2006 to 2007, we collected photos for an exhibit which opened in May 2007. The show portrays the "victory" of the 1967 war as it is perceived by the Israel public. The exhibit concentrates on four cities occupied by Israel in 1967: Bethlehem, Gaza, Hebron, and Jerusalem. The exhibit intends to show the reality of 40 years of on. The territories occupied in 1967 multiplied Israel's area by threefold and was seen as the greatest success Israel could hope for. Is it trul...

During our documentary work in and around Jerusalem, we have been increasingly exposed to the dark side of the “City of Light.” Here, hundreds of thousands of people are living in the shadows, with identity defined by forces they cannot control, unwanted in their own homes, afraid of being expelled while they are just asking to live peacefully in their city. Above all we wanted to discuss humanity, sadly though, in Jerusalem one’s values as a human being is determined ...

In August 2005, steps were taken to implement the Wisconsin Program in Israel – known here as Me-ha-Lev (From the Heart). Overseas, this program is known as "From Welfare to Work" and signals a new stage in the privatization of social services with the aim of eliminating the welfare state. The Israeli government's goals with privatizing social services is saving money. These institutions never consider the damage on the person, the families. In Israel, the Wisconsin Pr...

After more than 10 years of emptiness and neglect, in early December 2006, a group of people entered the abandoned building at 60 Shenkin Street. They wanted to clean the place up and turn it from an environmental hazard into homes and a community center. For over more than a month, 60 Shenkin Street became a home for social activists, two refugees from Darfur and a single-parent family. It was used as a community center where movie screenings, lectures and parties were held. But t...