COHI Coexistence Project Volunteers Visit a West Bank Birthing Center

“Have you visited the West bank lately? Do you remember this scenery?” asked the man sitting behind the minibus driver, as we drove along a road near Jenin. Gomer Moshe, the Israeli Coexistence Project Coordinator and midwife, was on the bus but she was barely paying attention to the conversation. Gomer was traveling to the West Bank to visit a birthing center and to join her colleagues from the coexistence project. She was also going to collaborate with Physicians for Human Rights (PHR), an Israeli NGO that travels every weekend to a different area in the West Bank to set up temporary clinics to treat local patients.

It was a beautiful warm day in August, but the gorgeous sites and weather were lost on Gomer because she had more pressing things on her mind. Her attention was focused on the visit that she had been planning for months with her colleague Aisha Saifi, the Palestinian Coexistence Project Coordinator and midwife. The two were going to the Mitaloon Birthing Center where they were going to meet with the three Palestinian midwives who ran the facility.

The Mitaloon Birthing Center, one of many, established five years ago by USAID in the West Bank, is the only center that is still up and running due to the hard work and commitment of three midwives and a nurse. The birthing center only specializes in normal deliveries, where midwives admit expecting mothers to the center to monitor their health and refer them to hospitals if their condition worsens.

Gomer and Aisha had meticulously been planning for this visit. When the two arrived at the facility, it became clear that despite the language barrier and political history, the meeting between the Israeli and Palestinian midwives was to be very natural, easy and productive. With Aisha as the translator, the group talked about midwifery, their careers and traded jokes.

The Israeli midwives appreciated the dedication of the three Palestinian midwives and their commitment to their community and their profession, as they have been running the birthing center all by themselves. As a token of their appreciation, the Israeli midwives gave a physio-ball as a gift to the birthing center. Aisha had informed the Israeli group earlier that the mothers at the center only delivered their babies lying in bed, and the midwives wanted to learn about the different positions and movements during labor.

The insightful and wonderful meeting unfortunately came to an end when members of the PHR came to take the Israeli midwives home. Both groups of midwives were sad at the departure, and promises were made to meet again. The Israeli and Palestinian midwives were grateful for having gotten the opportunity to get to know each other. Even though there is tension from their respective areas, both groups of midwives knew in their hearts that they are united in their efforts to bring peace to all and quality health care to women in the region.