Running with the People and the Olive
By Jacob Wheeler
Sun editor
In northern Michigan, and across the United States, farming the land is our heritage. Most of us may no longer till the soil or milk the cows with our own hands, but we’re proud to have grandfathers and great grandfathers who did so, and we strive to carry on their work ethic.
Farming communities around the world boast a similar love of their land and deep connection with the food that their land harvests — just as we do in Leelanau County. The same goes for farmers who speak different languages and practice different religions and customs than we do — such as farmers in the Palestinian West Bank. They cherish and need their olive trees just as we love our cherry orchards.
That’s the message that Traverse City filmmaker Aaron Dennis and I will try to convey as we travel to Israel and Palestine next month to document the “Run Across Palestine”, a northern Michigan-organized effort to raise money and awareness around the challenges facing Palestinian fair-trade olive farmers. This is a place where the history, economy, culture and identity are rooted in the ancient olive tree. Forty-five percent of the agricultural land in the West Bank is used for growing olives, employing 100,000 Palestinians. And yet their trade is in danger as water and access to land disappear.
“The olive tree plays a very important role as a symbol of our perseverance,” said Vivien Sansour of Canaan Fair Trade and a Run Across Palestine coordinator. “Planting an olive tree is a huge message of hope. When you plant an olive tree, you’re planting a vision for the future.”
Half a dozen runners — most from northern Michigan — will run a marathon each day for five consecutive days, Feb. 4-8, from Hebron in the southern part of the West Bank to Jenin, with visits to holy sites in Bethlehem and Jerusalem. Along the route they’ll stay in villages and interact with local farmers, creating a cultural exchange. Josh Davis, lead vocalist of the popular Michigan band Steppin’ In It, will join them, and record an album together with local Palestinian musicians.
The Run Across Palestine follows on the heels of last year’s Run Across Ethiopia, which featured 10 U.S. athletes running 250 miles to raise over $200,000 to build three schools in coffee-growing communities in the Yirgachefe region, where coffee was first harvested. Both runs are projects of On the Ground, the brainchild of Higher Grounds Trading owner Chris Treter, and both support fair-trade farmers.
“Olive farming is their economic livelihood,” said Timothy Young,” a board member of On the Ground and president of Food for Thought in Honor, Mich. “As a result of the political situation in this region, many have lost access to their livelihood. They came to us and told us ‘Our children will not survive if they don’t have trees to harvest’.”
“We want to make sure there will be farmers to nurture those trees 30 years from now, so we’re providing scholarships to children of these farmers to make sure they can go to school.”
The Run Across Palestine will team up with Canaan Fair Trade, the first fair-trade and organic certified olive growing cooperative in the world today.
“Fair trade puts a face on the food, and fair trade gives us access to those faces,” said Young. “We can see the people who grow our products and we can ensure that there are mechanisms in place that those people will be treated fairly.”
Dennis and I will embed ourselves with the runners, and produce a daily video series that features Palestinian olive farmers. I’ll also post daily blog updates on GlenArbor.com (just as I did during the Run Across Ethiopia), MyNorth.com and other outlets, and write a feature story for the California-based Jewish spiritual magazine, Tikkun.
The Run Across Palestine comes at a unique time, as Palestinian leaders vie for statehood recognition at the United Nations, and as democratic uprisings across the Arab Middle East give Israelis and Palestinians an opportunity to reexamine their complex relationship. In lieu of daily mainstream media coverage that exposes violence and fault lines, we intend to focus on Palestinians’ and Israelis’ common love for the agricultural land, and the food it has provided them for centuries, and how it offers the potential to unite them.
“This is not just a running expedition, and it’s not just a fundraiser,” said Treter. “At the heart of this is an opportunity for all of us to learn more about the rich culture and peaceful people that exist in Palestine, and that’s something we don’t see enough in our news.”
This GlenArbor.com story is sponsored by Misers Hoard in Empire, which recently expanded its business to include new items.
