• ON Saturday evening I arrived in Abu Dis, Palestine, as part of CADFA’s first women’s visit here since Covid.

I last came here 15 years ago as part of CADFA’s first Camden teachers’ visit to Abu Dis.

This morning, Tuesday, the sun is rising across a very much more crowded town than I saw 15 years ago and I am wondering about the future of this town Abu Dis and this country Palestine, whose people are suffering even more than when I was here in 2007.

In 2007 I was shaken at the effect on the people of the new Separation Wall which dominated everything and everyone with its looming presence.

The huge wall, built on their land, takes away much of it – including farmers’ olive groves – and prevents them from freely going into their city to go to hospital, see relatives, shop, or worship (Abu Dis is a suburb of Jerusalem).

I was also shocked to find serious violations of human rights affecting the Palestinian people I met, at every turn.

In the years since, reputable human rights organisations (B’tselem, Human Rights Watch, Amnesty International) have come to agree with what the Palestinians have been saying for years – this horrible situation is apartheid, deepest racism.

When we arrived, I looked for the colourful walls of the Abu Dis youth club that I remembered from 2007 and found that the colours are no more. The building is now white with large images all round it of young people from the town recently killed by Israeli soldiers.

Speaking to Palestinian women, I hear of their fear of the checkpoints and what can happen to their children – there are increasing numbers of children killed by Israeli soldiers and settlers, with impunity for the soldiers, more than 100 this year and rising.

No wonder Palestinians have strong empathy with the Black Lives Matter movement and vice versa. It is shameful that there is hardly any coverage in the UK media about this.

Camden has something very special in a local charity CADFA (Camden Abu Dis Friendship Association), which has built links between people in the two countries for nearly 20 years now with the purpose of raising awareness of the situation here and campaigning for human rights.

I am a retired Camden teacher and my school benefited from visits from young Palestinians taking part in positive projects with young Londoners.

Despite the worsening situation making their lives almost intolerable the Palestinians I have met continue hoping for a better future for everyone.

I hope people will support CADFA’s current project Building Hope. Readers can find out more about that from cadfa.org.

CADFA offers the opportunity to local people to go and see Palestine for themselves in a safe and organised way.

I do recommend these visits and suggest that interested people get in touch with contact@cadfa.org

FIONA MILLAR, NW5