In the early morning of February 13th, Israeli forces bulldozed the cultural café and damaged the adjacent sports field that MECA supporters helped build in Silwan, East Jerusalem. Dozens of people responded to MECA’s emergency appeal and a temporary structure was built in just a few weeks.

In the early morning of February 13th, Israeli forces bulldozed the cultural café and damaged the adjacent sports field that MECA supporters helped build in Silwan, East Jerusalem. Dozens of people responded to MECA’s emergency appeal and a temporary structure was built in just a few weeks.

With the help of MECA supporters, the community was able to salvage some of the equipment—like the treasured Foosball table—and build a temporary structure in time for a wonderful celebration on Arabic Mother's'Day in March.  Sadly the wonderful graffiti-art murals made by teens in the community were completely destroyed. Still, there was progress to celebrate and the chance for the community to come together and express their determination to stay on their land and make a better life for their children.

MECA Supporter Cathy Shields joined the Mother's Day celebration and wrote this account:

Mother's Day is celebrated in March in Palestine. On March 22, Madaa Silwan Creative Center held a special Mother's Day program. About 200 people, mainly children and their mothers, showed up for the program which included music, singing, and even drama–all performed by the children who participate in the community center's amazing after school programs.

The children played a wide range of instruments from the piano, to guitars, to the oud. Child after child stood up before the microphone to sing solo parts with such poise and confidence. It was a wonderful program and all the more moving because the performance was held on the site of the recently destroyed cultural cafe. So, here we were in a crowd of people from Silwan with the kids performing where the cultural cafe once stood, where once the wonderful murals were displayed that artists from the US painted with the children from the community, and where ping pong and foosball games for children were housed. Now they have a temporary structure, children's paintings are attached to the surrounding fence, the foosball and other items are repaired, though outside to make room for the stage erected for today’s celebration, and one of the soccer goals survived as a reminder of what once was a field for the kids to play.

Jawad Siyam, Director of Madaa Center, took the stage to rousing applause from the audience. He thanked everyone for coming, acknowledged the music teacher and event coordinator and praised the children for their great performance. Besides coming together and acknowledging mothers, it was also an opportunity for the community to make visible that, they will continue to peacefully resist the violent and illegal activities orchestrated by the Israeli Authorities against the Palestinians in Silwan.