One of the travesties of the E-1 settlement plans that Israel has announced to connect occupied East Jerusalem with the West Bank settlements is the situation of the Jahalin Bedouin refugees. On these dry hills live 3000 Bedouins who are not allowed to build anything, can’t send their children to school, and live under power lines but can’t get access to electricity.

The Jahalin Bedouin were expelled from the Negev in 1951. Now they face expulsion from that E-1 corridor.

Two advocates for the Jahalin are in New York to explain the situation, at the UN’s Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues and at Hunter College tonight.

At Hunter at 7 PM, they will present the film “Nowhere Left to Go” and answer questions about the refugees:

3000 of the Jahalin Bedouin, refugees from the Negev, who have lived in the Jerusalem Periphery for the past 60 years, are about to be forcibly displaced yet again, by the Israeli army. Eid abu Khamis Jahalin, spokesman of the Jahalin Association (Al Khan al Ahmar) will speak, during the week of the UN Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues, about his campaign to prevent their ethnic displacement, to uphold the human rights of these indigenous people and how his fight is so critical for any future peace process. Angela Godfrey-Goldstein, The Jahalin Association’s advocacy officer, will also participate.”

And today at the UN’s Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues, abu Khamis Jahalin and Godfrey-Goldstein will be presenting the following list of demand. Notice the existential element of the Bedouins’ plight, a traditional lifestyle at risk, and the utter contempt for these people exhibited by the Israeli government and settlers.