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Haggai Matar: A group of Israelis used to take food, water and supplies to villages in the West Bank, then – once construction of the wall began – the people in the West Bank needed not only material support, but also support in direct action, which is how Anarchists Against the Wall started. These Israelis started going out to try and stop the wall being built by chaining themselves to trees, climbing on bulldozers and so on. Then the group formed out of that.Have you achieved anything major in the last decade?
We've constantly challenged apartheid and invoked inspiration by showing that the Israelis and Palestinians can work together – that the majority can be partners in this constant struggle – without it being a threat to either group. It's shown that, despite both the parties being forced apart for so long, we can still cooperate, and I think it's demonstrating that potential that's been our biggest achievement.Okay. What makes your group different from other groups in the West Bank opposing the wall?
We present this alternative that is otherwise virtually impossible to imagine for Israelis. If you say to the average Israeli, "Come with me, let's go and be effective about the wall," they would say, "You're mad and you're risking your life by going there – you'll get killed." By doing this on a daily basis and inviting other Israelis to join, you can expose them to a reality that they know nothing about. And people do join and are then presented with a different alternative.
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Well, the protests are unarmed, but they're not necessarily non-violent, because sometimes people throw stones at soldiers during demonstrations. The political reality here complicates everything, because violent conflict would make Israelis even more opposed to this movement and make things worse for Palestinians.And it must be frustrating when you have the Israeli army and police fighting back violently.
Yeah, but I think you can try to succeed without reacting violently. The possibility to spread images, photos, videos and messages is so much better now than it used to be with the internet, and social media has played a big role in our fight and activism.What are your thoughts on some of the accusation levelled at members of the group by the Israeli government? Are they an inflation of what really happened?
Definitely. The government and the army use the courts and the prison system as a way to oppress political events, and in that sense they're doing their jobs very well. But what we want to create is a way for people to be able to demonstrate freely and without fear of having to suffer or spend time in prison for it.

I think that, had the media done its job better and given Israelis a better, clearer, more regular picture of what the occupation looks like, it might not have gone on this way for as long as it has. Except for a few left-wing parts, the rest of the media have just hidden anything of inconvenience – anything inconvenient for the Israeli army. And there have been protests where both Palestinians and us have been depicted in a very negative way, saying that we're violating the peace rather than demanding freedom, so yeah, the media definitely has a strong role to play.
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Well, Israelis just don’t really think about the occupation at all, and whenever there are protests and violence, they just ask, "Why are they rising up?" or "Why are they attacking us?" And we can’t talk to them, so it never evolves into any kind of understanding about the occupation. That's just the kind of entrapment that we live in in Israel.Do you see the wall ever coming down?
I think it'll have to come down one way or another, but we can’t really tell when. It’s not something that's just around the corner, it's very unpredictable and it's probably going to take a long time. Perhaps more pressure from Israelis to break away from current policies and politics would help, but without that the chances of it coming down any time soon are very low.Follow Sascha on Twitter: @SaschaKouvelisMore stuff from Israel and Palestine:The American Student Who's Planning an Israeli-Palestinian Music FestivalNo One in Palestine Was Very Happy to See Obama This WeekIsraeli Soldiers Are Allegedly Killing Palestinians with Horrible Illegal BulletsIsraeli Settlers Don't Want Palestinians On Their Buses