Graffiti in Bethlehem

In preparation for a paper that I presented at the Hebrew University's Visual Constructs of Jerusalem conference, I had the opportunity to visit Bethlehem several times. Though I really came for the Church of the Nativity (more on that later), i was fascinated by the graffiti that ran for miles along the Palestinian-side of the West Bank Barrier Wall, which has been thrown up around towns only in the years since the Second Intifada (2002).

Banksy is the most notable artist on display, with at least three pieces around the city.



It should be noted that these pieces are not actually on the barrier wall proper, but rather they are directly across from the barrier wall, and on the lateral walls of a gas station in nearby Bayt Jala.


On the other hand, there are amazing and unsigned pieces all over the Barrier wall itself. I was rather taken by the above trompe l'oeil rhinoceros, and the ladder from heaven to Jerusalem posted below.


I wondered who took the time to climb behind the low chain link fence, sometimes set off with bits of barbed wire, to paint here. Language was the first indicator: I saw lots of english tags, many with quotes from Gandhi or Nelson Mandela ("only a free man can negotiate") while others promoted the solidarity of "American Pentecostals and Evangelicals for Freedom in Palestine." Still others, set into huge historicizing murals, asked in French and English "how many youths must be imprisoned for liberation?"



I wondered more about how often these walls were cleaned. A helpful cab driver named Nasir told me that there were several other pieces he would have liked to have shown me (including another Banksy piece), but that they had recently been removed. He didn't say by whom.