RAMALLAH, October 15 (JMCC) - In the Palestinian village of
Lubban al-Gharbi in the occupied
West Bank, more than a hundred Arab women are crafting one of the icons of the Jewish faith. For each skullcap, or kippa, the women ear eight shekels per skullcap. Across the West Bank, where one in five are unemployed, thousands of women weave kippas to be sold across the
Wall to devout Israeli Jews.
From the minaret of the next-door mosque, the call to prayer rings out as their fast-moving fingers click the needles at a rapid rhythm.Under the shade of a leafy vine in the occupied West Bank village of Lubban al-Gharbi, three Palestinian women are sitting, knitting and nattering.
Kippot (as they are known in the plural) are the small domed skullcaps that many Jewish men wear on their heads. Kippa literally means dome.
They are often known by their Yiddish name, the yarmulke. It is said kippot are worn to remind people that a Jewish God is above their heads, watching over them.
It is unusual therefore that in Lubban al-Gharbi, there are more than 100 Palestinian Muslim women involved in a kippa cottage industry. A job is a job, says Fatma Abdul Radwan, who has been making kippot to be exported to Israel for more than 30 years.
She says it does not bother her that she is producing goods for Israeli Jews, despite the decades of conflict and the Israeli military occupation.
Circumstances force you to do some things. We need to make a living in order to live, Mrs Abdul Radwan says.
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BBC...