Josh Levinger

I managed to convince my advisor that my traveling to Israel and Palestine was essential to my research, and so I’m off for five weeks. I’ll be conducting interviews with human rights groups, activists and ordinary citizens about what kinds of digital tools they might find useful under the Occupation.

What exactly I should build is still an open question. I’m designing a platform that combines data on the checkpoints, the wall, the road networks, and other arbitrary instruments of control imposed on the population. I want to enable citizens to contribute their local knowledge to the map to keep it dynamically updated. A text message interface for this would probably be the most widely useful. I have a very rough start to this called Ground Truth that uses road data from OpenStreetMap.

Weighed down with electronic gear, I hope I don’t get too harshly interrogated in Tel Aviv. I’ll be updating this site with some regularity as events unfold, although certainly not every day. If you’re terribly interested in my daily status, check my Twitter feed, which I’ll update from a cell phone so everyone knows I’m still alive.

Got to Ramallah after 20 hours and 7 modes of transportation. It’s a busy town, but not quite as chaotic as I had expected. The traffic lights are respected, there is trash pickup, and there are internationals seemingly everywhere.

The lodging is great, sharing with a bunch of very friendly and helpful folks. We had excellent Indian food for the first night, and for several days of leftovers since. Spent the first day recovering from jetlag and walking around the neighborhood, and the last two volunteering with Nitin’s project, Voices Beyond Walls. It’s a two week camp where kids from Jerusalem and Shufat camp learn to make short films. We did a small mapping exercise to start, asking the kids to show us their neighborhoods and the places that make them unique. They had a surprisingly good spatial sense, and made pretty good maps.

Kids in the Hammam

Our tour guides

Anne getting them to explore the scene

Shufat kid enjoying popsicle

Shufat kid enjoying popsicle

Tired at the end of the day

Setting up meetings for later in the week with NGOs. I finished the upload of the west bank to OpenStreetMap, and now it’s merged it with the Israeli one. If only integration in the real world were so easy…

Dome of the Rock

The Wall at Qalandia

Wall between Shufat and Jerusalem

Nadya asked for map updates, so here we go. I made these two while doing the spatial exercise with the kids, and to test out my GPS-photo geocoding workflow. KML files are attached, for your viewing pleasure.

I’ve also been working on the GroundTruth test platform, and fixed several outstanding bugs related to the routing. Of course, now I think I will abandon Mapfish and go back to Django, but it was a good learning experience. Mapfish is just too finicky, and while it’s clearly powerful underneath, I can do everything I need with Django, and get a nice interface for free. Now I just need to convince local NGOs to buy in and share their data, so this tool is actually useful. More on that later.

I met a friend of a friend from the internet today to do some cross-border mapping. We started in the Old City, where she hadn’t seen, getting suitably caffeinated for the walk to come. I took her to Shufat camp, as it’s not currently well mapped in the OSM dataset, and it’s a profoundly different place than Jerusalem, despite being less than 10 miles away. The change from Jewish West Jerusalem to Arab East, and then to the camp itself, is really striking. Language, religion, politics, and government services all shift over a short distance. We talked about the discontinuity as we walked around gathering road and point data.

Ein Kerem Panorama

Then we did a total turn around, and went to the “artists colony” at Ein Kerem. The tranquility of the lush valley hides an ugly past. It was an arab village that was “abandoned” in 1948, or so a resident said, making sure to point out that there wasn’t a massacre here as there was at Deir Yassin only a few miles north. But whether or not there was physical violence, people did not leave these beautiful houses without reason. The very reason the town has so much charm, and is now becoming trendy, is due to the vanished occupants. Those same families now live in places like Shufat, so far from their old homes.

Temple Mount

Herodian column

After that jarring experience, we decided to go for the full Zionist kick at the Western Wall tunnels. She had another friend who met us there, and we were wowed by the multimedia-archaeological spectacle. The tour guide expounded on the glory of King Herod’s engineering feat: leveling the top of Mt Moriah, the center of creation and the spot where Abraham prepared his son for sacrifice, and building upon it a glorious temple. The tunnel follows the western retaining wall of the temple mount, which is far longer than the small “wailing” section reveals. There are some massive stones down there, bigger than those used in the pyramids. Although, it was built 2000 years after Giza with Roman techniques, so let’s not get too excited.

Damascus Gate

Qalandia backup

I bid my new friend adieu as she went to the airport, and I headed back to Ramallah. There was a long wait at the checkpoint while the rush hour traffic cleared. There’s no actual check going out of Israel proper into the West Bank, but there was a backup nonetheless. Went out for drinks with other internationals, and discussed the relative dependence of Palestine on NGO funding over many rounds of Taybeh beer. The taste of the revolution, indeed.

Went on a tour with the observers from the Temporary International Presence in Hebron. Rosa managed to get us in, as she used to work for the Danish Representative Office in Ramallah, and the observers are mostly Scandinavian. How very diplomatic of them…

"Greater Israel"

The TIPH was created in 1997 as an addendum to the Oslo Process, and so has been temporary for over twelve years, with no sign of it ceasing to be necessary. Hebron is perhaps the mostly starkly divided city in the West Bank, home to 150,000 Palestinians and 530 settlers. The modern settlement was founded by Moshe Levinger and his wife Miriam; to whom I don’t think I am directly related, but which nonetheless colored my experience.The settlers are explicitly ideological, and espouse the goal of establishing “Eretz Israel” from the Nile to the Euphrates, with violence as an acceptable means. They occupy an area in the heart of the old city, near the Abraham Mosque/Cave of the Patriarchs. Violence has gone both ways, with a massacre of 67 Jews in 1929, the killing of six yeshiva students in 1980, and ongoing violence by settlers against the local community. In December 2008, after being forcibly removed from Beit Hashalom, a building they claim to have legally purchased despite the disagreement of the Israeli high court, settlers went on a rampage of Palestinian shops, shooting one man.

Settler Kid

Screen to protect Souq from Settlers

To me, the more insidious violence is the everyday interaction, not the massacres. The old city souq is covered with protective wire to shield the Palestinian shoppers from thrown stones and bottles, although it cannot stop dirty water or urine. As I was walking through taking pictures, a young boy spit at me from several stories up, missing by inches. His aim indicated significant practice.

Settler girl with big gun

Jewish Star on Palestinian shops

Palestinians are forbidden from using several streets by the settlements, separating children from a school. TIPH observers walk every morning with them for protection. On this road, I saw a young woman nonchalantly carrying a very large automatic weapon. When I asked our guide whether a permit was required for such a gun, she replied “I’ll bet she knows how to use it.” The graffiti covering Palestinian shops and schools shows a new use of the Star of David. From its use to identify Jews in the Holocaust, it is now for these people a symbol of nationalism, and a marking of a different kind.

I had been to Hebron before with Jared and Jenna last summer, and we walked around the settlement area some. But being there with the international observers and hearing their assessment was a whole different experience. The souq was nearly empty, perhaps because it was a Friday, but it lacked much of the vibrancy I remember last year. We did avoid having any weapons pointed directly at us, as we had in the Freedom Cafe last summer. That much was a relief. I can’t imagine living in that tense of a situation, as a settler, Palestinian, or international observer. Just being there for a few hours was enough, and left me with lots to think through.

Hannah slept like a rock last night. After a leisurely morning, we went to the Old City so she can get her bearings. Wandered around in the Muslim Quarter for awhile, then moseyed over to the Wailing Wall. Hannah was constrained to the women’s area, but I wandered into the air conditioned synagogue in the tunnels to the left. Fundamentally unfair, but I guess that’s the way it is. Then we ascended the Temple Mount/Haram al-Sharif via the Maghrebi-gate. I thought the whole complex was closed to non-Muslims, but we didn’t have any trouble. It’s a profoundly beautiful spot, as the pictures attest. Sadly, I think that if “we” got to rebuild the temple it wouldn’t be nearly as pretty.

Hipster shades

Practicing her Arabic

Us and the Dome

Hannah above the Wall

Met Nitin and the Voices Beyond Walls crew for drinks, so Hannah could meet them. Then we met Hannah’s friends Carrie and Brian for waffles and a walk through the German Colony. She’ll hang out with them on Shabbat, and Jared and I will go on an adventure. More on that later.

The aforementioned adventure with Jared was going to the weekly protest in the village of Ni’lin. The wall passes through their olive groves, and nearby settlements cut them off from 40% of their land. The protest followed Friday prayers in the mosque, and then several hundred people walked to the wall. Or, as close as the Israeli army would let us. Here is a short movie of the march.

First teargas volley

IDF Prepares to meet us

The first volley of teargas came quickly. For ten seconds, I thought “what’s the big deal?” And then it hit. Eyes watering, coughing, sputtering, I ran through the prickly bushes, over loose stone fences, back to relative safety. I was wearing a press vest with ceramic inserts for impact protection. But people have been killed here, including children and internationals. They didn’t fire rubber bullets this time, only teargas, and that was enough for me.

Unyielding

Brave shebab

We moved along the path of the wall, through the olive groves that the people are set on defending from the encroaching settlement. The soldiers followed, firing volleys from two flanks, pushing us up a hill and away from the wall. The wind was in our favor, and I wasn’t gassed again as badly. The shebab who moved forward to throw stones were used to it, and walked defiantly through clouds with only a scarf around their face. I’ll definitely send Jared my gas mask when I get back home; he’ll get more use out of it here than in Boston.

Teargas in the Olive Groves

We walked back to the town through the olive groves. Last time Jared was here, the army invaded the town, and the violence continued for hours. This time at least, it wound down without serious incident. We hailed a taxi and went back to Ramallah to write, reflect, and shower. The shebab of Ni’lin will be back next week, and so will the army.

Here is Jared’s article for Ma’an, fresh off the wire: Israeli soldiers crack down on Ni’lin protesters.

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Update, 7/19: International Solidarity Movement released this video of the protest. You can see Jared and me wearing black press vests running from a huge volley of teargas around 1:55.

Went to Nablus to see the world’s largest knafeh. We got there a little late because our bus broke down, so instead, we got to see a mad crush of people and no knafeh. We didn’t get up the building from which you could actually see the 75 meter long pastry, so I “borrowed” a picture from here.

Broken down on the road to Nablus

Mad crush

Worlds largest knafeh

Met a young conscientious objector at the Nocturno Cafe, which is graced with some excellent graffiti.

Googly-eyes Ghandi

Shomer fucking Shabbos

No legs, no problems

Tooled around Bethlehem, saw the very rock on which Jesus was born. I find it hard to believe that a pregnant woman trudged to the top of a hill to give birth, but I guess it would have been cooler in the church. Good thing it was there.

I made Hannah ride a camel at a truck stop, which was hilarious or humiliating, depending on your point of view. Went to the Dead Sea at night, which was only slightly less oppressively hot than it would have been during the day. Floating in the fetid water under the stars was pretty magical, until it was time to rinse off the bromine stew. On our way back, we were stopped by a friendly soldier who reminded us that we were on the road to Ramallah. I was inclined to ask in mock horror, “oh no, are there Arabs there?” But that would have blown our cover. We promised we would be careful, and traveled on into the night.

Went to this bustling metropolis to do an interview, and drop Hannah off at the airport. After days after day of politics, we relaxed on the glorious beach. I refrained from mentioning the fact that Gaza and Beirut were only 50 miles on either side. Had a nice meal overlooking the sea in old Jaffa, and then went to our hostel for an evening in sauna-like conditions. Remind me not to come to this part of the world in the summer.

Surfer dude

Scooter Cat

Today marks the end of the research portion of my trip, and the beginning of a small vacation with Ruth. As such, I thought it suitable to write some thoughts on my progress so far.

Over the last three weeks I conducted ten interviews, meeting with representatives from B’Tselem, Souktel, Ma’an News Agency, The Center for Peace and Economic Cooperation, Birthright Unplugged, Waze, a conscientious objector, and various activists. I gave a talk to the Decolonizing Architecture collective in Bethlehem, gathering critical feedback on my research direction. I assisted briefly with the Voices Beyond Walls youth video project, and learned how children too are affected by the Occupation.

I rode the bus from Ramallah to Jerusalem nearly every day, subject to the same dehumanizing experience at the Qalandia checkpoint as the Palestinian population. Last week, an old woman noticed me speaking english, and upon learning that I am an American (although I haven’t been telling people that I am jewish), reiterated the importance of bring the story of their suffering to my country. During the long wait in the screening line, she said again and again that we must resist, in our hearts if not with our bodies.

I learned more about the non-technical coping mechanisms that already exist. The status of checkpoints can be relatively easily ascertained by asking taxi drivers, or by calling people who pass through them daily. The prior existence of this literal social network, and the understandable reluctance of the population to submit information that might be misused, could severely limit the utility of a mobile checkpoint reporting tool.

Other tools I had considered, a transit map and bus tracker, also have functional non-technical systems already in place. While as a tourist, I don’t know the detailed routes of the service taxi network, the men who congregate at the bus stations all do, and will tell you where to go even without much Arabic language skill. As there isn’t a defined schedule, buses simply depart when full, a full transit tracker isn’t entirely applicable. Aside from tourists, of whom there are very few, this system would duplicate the already present network, with little added functionality.

I heard again and again from Israelis that the reality of the occupation isn’t widely known by the populace, either due to a lack of information, or more likely, the pervasive dehumanization of the other side. How to tackle this issue is probably outside the scope of what I can achieve in the next year. Maybe the most valuable contribution I can make to the process is to enable some sort of empathy on both sides. Both traumatized populations are in dire need of understanding and discourse. This sounds more like a job for art and literature than science and engineering.

How exactly to do this is left as an exercise to the reader…

At the Innovations in Mobile Data Collection for Social Action in Iraq and the Middle East conference.

We started off by asking questions about when and where mobile or distributed data can make a difference in a rapidly rotating roundtable. Projects I’ve learned about at and through the center were helpful here, but the experience of field workers was much more instructive. Further questions on the conditions that best support gathering this data yielded some good war stories. Central issues include the technical literacy of the field workers, whether the tool is deployed on externally provided phones or “in the wild”, the tradeoff of message syntax vs cost, how to develop incentives for participation, and the privacy of messages sent to shared or village phones. This was just a taste of the experience that user deployment provides, but was enough to make this technologist’s heart sink. The real world is so much messier than the lab…

Twitter stream!

I didn’t end up giving an Ignite talk due to a mis-scheduling, but gave demos of VirtualGaza and GroundTruth to interested and engaged crowds. There was some interest in setting up similar systems in various places, and much curiosity about how I can do this political work in an academic context. A good question, and one for which I don’t have a good answer.

Members of the government of Iraq are here, and much of the discussion was initially aimed at helping them as best we can. However, they appeared to have decided that they have internal issues to address before talking to developers, so the conference took a turn for the technical. I’m a little disappointed, as part of the appeal of coming to this conference was to learn about the issues that face the people on the ground. However, I understand that the Iraqi delegation may not have other opportunities to meet and talk about their shared goals. In any case, now it’s a meeting of technical and experienced international development people, not an attempt to solve the issues facing one country.

Went out to an amazing Lebanese dinner. Katrin said she ordered the bare minimum course menu, but still the food kept coming until we had to beg them to stop. We first sat down to a table of mezze, which we failed to recognize as only appetizers. After eating more than enough, then the meat course came, followed by another meat course, and finally delectable knaffe. We rolled out stuffed, satisfied, and ready for another day.

Day 2 was spent without our Iraqi counterparts, so we had more technical discussions. Nadav pitched a delay tolerant network that was immediately called “data mule.” Jeff had a good crowd for his balloon and kite demonstrations, and for Cartagen as a vector mapping platform. I was in a conversation about how to incentivize participants in crowd-sourced data collection, and lessons learned from projects around the world. I also met Jacob from Souktel, who I missed connecting with when I was in Ramallah, and had an exciting discussion about ways to track settler violence. With a lot of work ahead of me, the spinning ideas and jetlag kept me up until far too late local time.

Le Ballon Rouge

Roundtable Discussions

Jeff’s mapping workshop

The morning started with a set of “peer assists”, where the assembled technical expertise was applied to specific problems. Two people from the National Democratic Institute in Lebanon presented their ideas for a project to engage youth in the upcoming Lebanese municipal elections. Because voting patterns tend to closely follow sectarian lines, the group is trying to find features that cut across these divisions. Related projects that were mentioned include:

• an analysis of anxiety and excitement expressed on Twitter before the previous election.
• The Johnson and Johnson Baby Center that links women at same stage of their pregnancy, so they can share their experiences.
• A campus-wide game of Risk played at Yale
• News aggregation and crisis response services like Reuters Emergency Service, based on Instedd’sRiff, Al Jazeera Labs mobile reporting tools, and GeoChat
• Story aggregation services like StoryCorps, UNICEF OurStories, Ushaidi and VirtualGaza.

The group eventually settled on a Facebook app with a simple hook, something like “are you excited about the election?”, that lets the developers pull the users status updates to qualitatively analyze.

The second project was on mapping the slums of Cairo and Port Said, where there are issues of determining the informal infrastructure, because they are outside public services.

City of the Dead

Roads, as such, are small and dynamic. Crime is endemic. Police do not venture in, and when they do, the consequences can be severe. Because the negatives are so overwhelming, it was hard to focus on the potential positives. However, there were analogous experiences and stories to tell in the room.

• Similar projects have been done in Khibera, which has much more NGO support than is available in Cairo.
• The German group GTZ has done work in “informal areas”, which are apparently not as underdeveloped as Zor Zara, which I can’t even find on a map.
• It is imperative to engage the community in the mapping process, so that they feel ownership over their space and the data that represents it. Mapping for mapping’s sake is not good enough, it needs to have a “real world” impact.
• But don’t just parachute in to save the day.

The discussion ended with a call for a field trip, so that we can see the place for ourselves.

After lunch, the Iraqi contingent presented the projects they have been brainstorming, and we tried to give technical advice as best we could. Translation of language and ideas was a hurdle, but I think we both got something out of it.

On the drive from Amman to Jerusalem, we shared a taxi with Jacob from Souktel.

Allenby with Jacob

They’re the best mobile aid provider in the region, have mostly palestinian programmers, but was co-founded founded by this canadian HBS graduate. We’ve talked briefly before, but we had a several hour conversation on the complicated nature of work in this area. After arriving at Damascus Gate he left us to return to Ramallah, and we met Jared at Al-Ayed chicken restaurant.

Since it’s Jeff’s first time here, we spent the afternoon trekking around the old city. Did the standard holy sites tour: Church of the Speulchre, Western Wall, Dome of the Rock. Couldn’t actually get up to the mount because it was Friday, but did see some exuberant dancing at the Kotel plaza for the second night of Hannukkah. Then walked along the eastern edge of the wall, overlooking Silwan, a Palestinian village under threat of destruction, and the Valley of Jehosphat, where the dead shall rise when Gog and Magog battle and the Lord returns in glory. Or at least that’s what wikipedia tells me.

Dome of the Rock

Jerusalem with Jared

Ladder of the Status Quo

Pillar of Absalom and Cave of Jehosephat

Silwan

Nose picking at the Church of St Mary Magdalene

Jeff bought some “computers”, which are really knock-off nintendo boards from china, on the street for $20. The first immediately broke upon plugging in to the TV, but I think we can fix it when we get back to the lab. The intention is to develop educational software for this platform, perhaps using the Contiki OS, but I think he just wants to play Duck Hunt.

Unique Educational Computer

Camels!