10 October 2013
“Uprooted” (click here for full-size image).
Visualizing PalestineThis week marked the start of the annual Palestinian olive harvest, an ancient tradition on which 80,000 families still rely for their livelihoods. Yet these families face growing economic hardship due to Israeli land confiscations, access restrictions, settler attacks, and not least the widespread uprooting, destruction and theft of the trees themselves. The infographic “Uprooted” focuses on the staggering fact that Israeli authorities have uprooted over 800,000 Palestinian olive trees since 1967, the equivalent to razing all of the 24,000 trees in New York’s central park 33 times.This work is part of a series of four the project is releasing as part of a month-long funding campaign it launched this week on a crowd-funding site. I reported in January on the beginnings of Visualizing Palestine, and interviewed Ahmad Barclay, who explained their motivation:
the main driver in what we’re doing is, there’s not a lack of information about Palestine — that’s clearly not the problem. It’s to do with how that’s being disseminated — like if there’s a 200-page report that explains the situation facing child prisoners or whatever under Israeli custody — that’s not going to be read by the mainstream public.
