MECA funded the construction of a beautiful playground in Beit Skariya village in partnership with Riwaq Association for Architectural Conservation. The playground is located next to the village’s one room elementary school on land donated by the head of the village council. It includes a fun elephant climbing structure with a slide, a small stone pavilion area for children’s activities like theater, and swings.

Before the construction of the playground, one woman in the village complained, “Our children are isolated here. There is no safe place to play because of threats from the settlers and transportation difficulties make it hard to take them out of the village to interact with other children or to participate in summer camps or sports.”

Thanks to MECA and Riwaq, all this has changed. Two mothers told MECA how much the children loved having a space to play both during and after school. Every afternoon, they said, you can find most of the village’s 60 children at the playground.

This small agricultural village, between Bethlehem and Hebron in the West Bank, is broken up into five enclaves by illegal Israeli settlements, Israeli-only bypass roads, and an Israeli military base. The settlements block access to the village, confiscate agricultural land, and settlers regularly harass and threaten the villagers. Many families have been forced to abandon their homes in Beit Skariya. As part of this project, and to help people stay, Riwaq renovated 18 homes and installed insulation in the school, which also serves as a clinic when a doctor visits and as the village’s meeting place.