The Immobile Mass: Movement Restrictions in the West Bank

Abstract

Control over land and over labour can be supported by movement restrictions within territories. During the Israel Palestine conflict, the primary form of movement restriction that has been documented is closure to day migrant workers of the borders between Israel and the West Bank and Gaza Strip. In recent years, however, restrictions on movement throughout the West Bank have been applied to the general Palestinian population. International accompaniment work has endeavoured to resist such restrictions and to escape the limitations of traditional human rights documentation. In doing so, it presents alternative views: of the population as more than ‘worker’; and the impact of restrictions on both the individual and the collective. It also demonstrates the material, emotional and cultural aspects of movement. Observation emerges as a principal form of resistance. This suggests that restrictions can be seen as discipline in Foucault’s sense. The West Bank experience, however, is better characterized by a negative rather than the positive conception of discipline associated with the productive control of labour.