Sufian Odeh used to be able to see his cousin’s house across the street
July 10, 2008 9:25 am Jerusalem, Israel's Separation Wall
A Palestinian family crosses through a gap in the barrier in the village of Al-Ram on the outskirts of Jerusalem. Photograph: Gali Tibbon
Toni O’Loughlin, The great divide: Life in east Jerusalem, guardian.co.uk, July 9, 2008
Sufian Odeh used to be able to see his cousin’s house across the street from his apartment window - until Israel built a wall of concrete down the middle of their neighborhood two years ago.
Standing eight metres high and just 13 metres from his building, it overshadows Sufian’s second-floor apartment like the wall of a prison, darkening this once thriving Palestinian district.
“When I look from the window and see the wall, I immediately close the blinds and smoke a cigarette. It’s like living at the end of the world,” says Sufian, who asked to change his name to preserve his family’s privacy.
His neighbours fled long ago, as the West Bank barrier crept down the main street of al-Ram, dividing families, separating children from schools and patients from clinics, and severing the road back to Jerusalem. Stranded outside Jerusalem by the barrier, al-Ram has become a virtual ghost town.