Italian Artist Jorit Recalls Day In Israeli Prison For Painting Mural Of Palestinian Activist Arrested By Israel

It was raining heavily outside. In a dingy room of an Israeli prison, drenched and chilled to the bone, I was awaiting death. Grazing my shoulder on and off was the muzzle of an M-60 machine gun. The soldier who was in his mid-20s screamed, “What were you doing there? Are you not the guy who was painting the wall?” Neither I could say ‘‘no’’ nor could I nod. The only response that came from my panicked heart was: “Can you stop playing with the trigger? I am really afraid.”

I spent only one day in prison but it seemed like years to me.

I will never forget that July of 2018. Growing up in Italy, a country with a fascist past, the issue of Palestine always resonated with me. Their rights to safeguard their home cannot be snatched away. As an artist whose politics is reflected through art, I sided with their cause. I reached Jerusalem not to become a hero or a martyr. I just wanted to know people and observe their lives closely. And what I witnessed was an unending apartheid.

Outside the Al-Aqsa Mosque, one of the holiest sites in Islam, the most common sight was the Israeli army with big guns clinging to their shoulders roaming around vigilantly—to protect the site from ‘its own people’. At several pockets in Jerusalem, one can find refugee camps. The people who escaped the Nakba of 1948 and since then have been staying in these refugee camps can’t even go out without the permission of the military. These people do under-paid work. Their struggle for survival competes with the fight for dignity. Aren’t they refugees in their own homeland?

After seven days in Jerusalem, with the help of a Palestinian friend, I reached Bethlehem. A day before, they had shot down 16 men, including six children. I couldn’t hold back anymore. The wall near the fence became my canvas and I started painting murals of Palestinian teenaged activist Ahed Tamimi who was arrested for slapping two Israeli soldiers. She was just saving her brother who was six years old. But to show mercy to children is the last thing to be expected from them. I continued painting unless they intervened. This wall was legal for the international community except in the eyes of the US and Israel.

As my face was covered, they couldn’t identify me. Still, I along with the Palestinian guy who was helping me, was taken to the prison at gunpoint. They forced us to sit on the floor. And the interrogation began. Throughout the night, they asked us about our network. Still, the sounds of jackboots and their shouts echo in my ears and cloud my mind. Yes, they subjected me to psychological torture, but they couldn’t do anything more!

I had the privilege of being a European. They knew that the Western media would not take it lightly if they kept me in prison for long. But at that moment, no rationale was rational enough to calm me down. I thought they would either kill me or keep me there for years to come. I was yearning to step out, to see the sun again.

I was released the next day with a caveat that I would not be able to visit Israel for the next 10 years. But I don’t know about the Palestinian guy. Where was he taken? Was he killed? I left both Israel and the thousands of people who are incessantly fighting against colonialism and imperialism. As my flight left the land, I could hear the voices of leaders like Nelson Mandela whose struggles for the rights of the Black people in South Africa became a template for the movements against apartheid.

Still, there is hope, perhaps.

(As told to Abhik Bhattacharya)