They stare out with determination and conviction from the facades of over 20 buildings in Batan al-Hawa, one of 12 neighborhoods that make up the East Jerusalem Palestinian village of Silwan, overlooking Wadi Hilwa and facing West Jerusalem and the Old City. Their presence is particularly powerful when viewed from a distance: a multitude of large human eyes, variously colored and shaped, facing the world as if to say, “Please look at me now.” Their curious presence, which proliferates through Batan al-Hawa, a neighborhood located in the heart of Silwan where approximately 85 Palestinian families have been facing evictions for decades, would prompt anyone to inquire into their raison d’etre.
To date, 14 Palestinian families have already been evicted from their homes in Batan al-Hawa. The planned evictions come on the heels of the controversial decision in May to evict four Palestinian families in the East Jerusalem neighborhood of Sheikh Jarrah that was postponed for several months due to Palestinian and global outcry.
The large colorful eyes, which are painted like shields on the buildings, aren’t just any human eyes. They depict the eyes of local and international leaders, activists, and martyrs, including those of George Floyd, Alex Nieto, a young American who was shot to death by police in San Francisco in 2016 for which the reason remains unclear, and Iyad al Hallaq, a 32-year-old Palestinian with autism killed by Israeli police in Jerusalem on May 30, 2020.
The murals, part of a multi-site public art project titled “I Witness Silwan,” for which 150 murals are planned, are the result of a decade-long relationship between the Madaa Creative Center, a nonprofit, nongovernmental community arts center based in Silwan, and the US-based Art Forces group, founded and run by Jewish-American artist and clinical psychologist Susan Greene. The two groups have been collaborating since 2011, when they worked on their first community mural in Wadi Hilwa neighborhood of Silwan. The first mural in Batan al Hawa was painted in the spring of 2019.
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