Palestinians finding new, creative methods of resisting the Israeli occupation is not new. The newest method, though, is shaving the head and going bald. It is the latest act of resistance as it shows support and solidarity with a fellow Palestinian fighter pursued by all of Israeli manpower.
A few days ago, Palestinian guys in the refugee camp of Shufat shaved their heads as a form of showing support to a fellow camp Palestinian identified as Oday al-Tamimi, who the Israeli occupation accuse of carrying out a shooting attack at an army checkpoint at the camp’s entrance about two weeks ago, killing one soldier and seriously injuring another.
Seemingly, the “wanted” Palestinian is bald, and in order to confuse the Israeli forces looking for him, youths from the camp shaved their heads in an attempt to look like the wanted youth so the soldiers would not be able to recognize him.
This is not the first time Palestinians come up with creative ways to resist the occupation by confusing its forces. More than 80 years ago, Palestinians wore the kuffiyeh and agal (the traditional head cover for men) on their heads to protect the fighters against the English soldiers during the British Mandate on Palestine.
Back in the 1960s and 1970s, Palestinian resistance fighters sneaked into the occupied territories walking backward in order to confuse the Israeli occupation forces and make them think they were leaving Palestine, not entering it.
Shufat camp’s barbershops started offering free haircuts to whoever wanted to shave their heads to show support for Tamimi, something that later turned into a trendy campaign all across the occupied Palestinian territories and even abroad.
Guys from Jerusalem-area towns and villages joined in the trend and posted videos and pictures of themselves shaving their heads in solidarity with the Palestinians in Shufat.
Additionally, Palestinians in several areas in the occupied West Bank and even the Gaza Strip, all joined forces and shaved their heads, proving that Palestinians can be united and come up with innovatively original ways to show support to each other and still resist the occupation in whatever way they can.
This resistance method was even echoed abroad, in Pakistan, where a man tweeted that his son, Salah Eddin, has shaved his head in solidarity with the Palestinians.
The Israelis, on the other hand, were not happy with this resistance trend. Reports said more than 15 Palestinian workers, who happened to be from Shufat refugee camp, were fired from their work as sanitation workers in a town in Palestinian lands occupied in 1948 for shaving their heads bald.
Two weeks ago, life was disrupted in the camp and the town of Anata after the Israeli occupation authorities, in a revenge act for the killing of the soldier at the checkpoint, decided to collectively punish more than 130,000 Palestinian residents of these two neighborhoods by locking them in.
The decision backfired as the camp’s residents declared civil disobedience and started daily protests at the checkpoint demanding an end to the punishment, which forced the Israeli army to quickly lift it even before apprehending the alleged attacker.
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