West Bank 'plane chalet' helps aviation dreams take off
"And that's the goal: since we don't have planes or airports, people come here instead," he told AFP.
Harsha said he designed the concrete plane himself, with a master bedroom in the cockpit and a children's bedroom in the tail.
The price tag, between 1,000 and 2,000 shekels (about $300-$600) per night, is out of reach for most Palestinians, particularly as unemployment soars due to the war in Gaza.
He has nonetheless been pleased with the reactions to his chalet, having initially faced scepticism.
"I wanted to bring something unique, something new to the area and to Palestine," Harsha said of the unit, which opened a month ago.
Since its launch, his red and white concrete plane has become a local landmark, featuring in local media and on social networks.
Harsha said he originally wanted to place a Palestinian flag on his chalet and call it the "Palestinian Queen", but avoided such signs out of caution.
The guest house is located in the West Bank's Area C, which covers more than 60 percent of the territory and is under full Israeli control.
"I just made it look like a plane. I avoided politics entirely because of the hardships our people are going through," he said.
"We're a people who are constantly losing things -- our land, our rights, our lives."
Using the land
Israel has occupied the West Bank since 1967, and frequently demolishes homes it says are built without permission in the mostly rural Area C.
Though no airport currently services the Palestinian territories, both the West Bank and Gaza once had their own terminals, in east Jerusalem and the southern Gaza city of Rafah, respectively.
Both were closed during the Second Intifada, the Palestinian uprising of the early 2000s, and what remains of east Jerusalem's airport is now isolated from the rest of the West Bank by Israel's separation barrier.
Despite difficulties and threats of demolition, Harsha believes that Palestinians can find freedom and fulfilment in projects like his.
"I encourage everyone who has land to work on it and invest in it -- with creativity and ambition," he said, flanked by his two brothers who helped him build the unit.
Harsha himself has more plans for his land.
"After this aeroplane, we'll build a ship next year," he said.
"It will be something unique and beautiful," he said, pointing out that while many West Bank Palestinians have seen planes flying overhead, a large number of people from the landlocked territory have never seen a real ship at all.
© 2025 AFP
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
France 24
5 hours ago
- France 24
Exceptional Nordic heatwave stumps tourists seeking shade
Tourism has been on the rise in Nordic countries in recent years, driven in part by the trend of "coolcations" -- where tourists flee the heat of the Mediterranean for milder temperatures in the north. But this year record-breaking temperatures in July dashed tourists' hopes of escaping the intense heat. On Monday, the Finnish Meteorological Institute said in a statement that the country had just emerged from 22 days of temperatures over 30C -- the longest such heatwave since records began in 1961. July was also the third hottest month recorded in Norway since records began in 1901, with temperatures 2.8 degrees Celsius higher that the seasonal average nationwide, according to the Norwegian Meteorological Institute. A two-week heatwave, between July 12 and 25, was also the hottest ever recorded in the country. So-called "tropical nights", where the temperature doesn't drop below 20C, have become commonplace in the region. Tourists' hot surprise The unusually high temperatures have been a shock to tourists seeking to escape the heat elsewhere. Moussaab El Bacha, a Stockholm resident, told AFP about his parent's surprise when they came over from Morocco to visit. "They were actually quite surprised by the intensity of the heat here. They had expected a cooler break from the Moroccan summer, but instead, it felt like the heat followed them all the way to Sweden," he said. "It was a bit surreal for them to experience such high temperatures this far north — they kept saying: 'Are we sure we didn't just land in southern Spain?'" In Haparanda, in Sweden's far north, temperatures reached 25C or above for 14 consecutive days in July, and in Jokkmokk, the heatwave lasted over 15 days, something not seen in a century, according to the Swedish Meteorological and Hydrological Institute (SMHI). An ice rink oasis In Rovaniemi, a Finnish town north of the Arctic Circle which bills itself as the hometown of Santa Claus, temperatures reached above 30C last week. The municipality of Joensuu in southeastern Finland opened an ice rink for people to cool off in, to reduce pressure on the local healthcare services, North Karelia's regional healthcare services chief Mikael Ripatti told AFP. Ripatti said emergency rooms had become overcrowded as people sought care for heat-related health issues. "The aim was to provide a place to go if it was too hot at home," Ripatti said. Other cities opened up similar cooling facilities to the public, with a shop in Helsinki letting people lie down next to its cooling shelves. Arctic heating The Arctic region is heating far faster than other parts of the planet. Of the continents overall, Europe has seen the fastest warming per decade since 1990, followed closely by Asia, according to global data from the US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA). "The length of the period and the high temperatures throughout the day in all parts of the country were very unusual this time," Ketil Isaksen, a climate researcher with the Norwegian Meteorological Institute, said in a statement. "This type of heatwave has become more likely with climate change," the researcher added. Scientists say recurring heatwaves are a marker of global warming and are expected to become more frequent, longer, and more intense. "There have been heatwaves in the past and there will continue to be heatwaves in the future," Hannele Korhonen, a research professor at the Finnish Meteorological Institute, told AFP. But as climate change drives up global temperatures we are "exceeding the heatwave threshold more often, and the heatwaves are hotter", she added. "An in-depth attribution study would be necessary to pinpoint or assess the role of climate change in the prolonged heatwave (that struck) northern Sweden," Sverker Hellstrom, a meteorologist at SMHI, told AFP.
France 24
9 hours ago
- France 24
Jordan sees tourism slump over Gaza war
Although Jordan does not border the Gaza Strip, it has been among several countries across the region impacted by the war between Israel and the Palestinian militant group Hamas. Figures released by the Petra Development and Tourism Region Authority and reported Monday by the official Al-Mamlaka TV showed the number of visitors slashed by 61 percent, from 1,174,137 in 2023 to 547,215 this year. "We feel the repercussions of the aggression on Gaza every day, especially for providers of tourism services," Abdul Razzaq Arabiyat, the director of the national tourism board, told Al-Mamlaka on Friday. He said incoming tourism from Europe and North America has hit a record low, dealing a devastating blow to the hotel industry and tour operators around Petra, in Jordan's south. According to figures from the Petra tourism authority carried by official media, 32 hotels have had to shut down and nearly 700 people have lost their jobs. Petra, famous for its stunning temples hewn from rose-pink cliff faces, is a UN World Heritage site. The Jordanian economy relies on revenues from the kingdom's tourism sector, which accounts for 14 percent of gross domestic product.
LeMonde
5 days ago
- LeMonde
Tsunami evacuations ordered in South America after 8.8 earthquake, but worst risk appears to pass for US
A Peru's traffic police officer sets up a roadblock during a tsunami warning in La Punta, Callao province, Peru on July 30, 2025. CONNIE FRANCE / AFP Fears of a devastating tsunami faded Wednesday, July 30, for the US and Japan after one of the strongest earthquakes ever recorded struck off a sparsely populated Russian peninsula, but new alerts along South America's Pacific coast forced evacuations and closed beaches. Warnings in the first hours after the 8.8 magnitude quake sent residents fleeing to rooftops in Japan and forced tourists out of beachfront hotels in Hawaii, snarling island traffic. In Russia, several people were hurt while rushing out of buildings, including a hospital patient who jumped from a window. Millions of people were told to move away from the shore or seek high ground because they were potentially in the path of the tsunami waves, which struck seaside areas of Japan, Hawaii and the US West Coast but did not appear to cause any major damage. The dire warnings following the massive quake early Wednesday off Russia's Kamchatka peninsula evoked memories of catastrophic damage caused by tsunamis over the last quarter-century. In Japan, people flocked to evacuation centers, hilltop parks and rooftops in towns on the Pacific coast with fresh memories of the 2011 earthquake and tsunami that caused a nuclear disaster. 'Ring of Fire' Cars jammed streets and highways in Honolulu, with traffic at a standstill even far from the sea. US Secretary of Homeland Security Kristi Noem said the worst was over. Later Wednesday, tsunami advisories for the coasts of Oregon and Washington state were canceled but remained for Hawaii and parts of Alaska and California, where authorities warned sightseers to stay away from beaches. The earthquake appeared to be the strongest recorded since the 9.0 magnitude earthquake off Japan in 2011 caused a massive tsunami and meltdowns at a nuclear power plant. The International Atomic Energy Agency said initial reports showed Japan's nuclear plants were not affected this time. Wednesday's quake occurred along the "Ring of Fire," a series of seismic faults around the Pacific Ocean. It was centered offshore, about 120 kilometers (75 miles) from Petropavlovsk-Kamchatsky, Kamchatka's regional capital. Multiple aftershocks as strong as 6.9 magnitude followed. Russia's Oceanology Institute said tsunami waves of less than 6 meters (20 feet) were recorded near populated areas of the peninsula. Lava began flowing Wednesday from the Northern Hemisphere's largest volcano in a remote area of Kamchatka, the Russian Academy of Sciences' geophysical service said. Evacuations ordered in South America Chile, a place highly vulnerable to earthquakes and tsunamis, raised its warning to the highest level early Wednesday for most of its lengthy Pacific coast and began evacuating hundreds of people. "Remember that the first wave is usually not the strongest," Chilean President Gabriel Boric warned on social media. Get the most out of your experience: download the app to enjoy Le Monde in English anywhere, anytime Colombian officials ordered the complete closure and evacuation of beaches and low-tide areas while maritime traffic was being restricted. Ecuador canceled classes at schools in the Galapagos Islands as well as communities along the coast. Coastlines of New Zealand – about 6,000 miles (9,600 kilometers) from the quake's epicenter – were experiencing strong currents and wave surges. There were no evacuations, but people throughout the South Pacific island nation were warned to stay out of the water and away from beaches, shorelines and harbors. Hawaii downgrades to tsunami advisory Authorities in Hawaii downgraded the state to a tsunami advisory early Wednesday, and evacuation orders on the Big Island and Oahu, the most populated island, were lifted. "As you return home, still stay off the beach and stay out of the water," said James Barros, administrator of the Hawaii Emergency Management Agency. In northern California, tsunami activity continued Wednesday morning with waves of 3.6 feet (1.1 meters) in Crescent City, which has a history of tsunami disasters. Even waves of just several feet high might pose a significant risk. "It might only be 3 feet, but it's a wall of water that's 3 feet and spans hundreds of miles. Three feet of water can easily inundate inland and flood a couple blocks inland from the beach," said Diego Melgar, director of Cascadia Region Earthquake Science Center at the University of Oregon. Russian regions report limited damage In Petropavlovsk-Kamchatsky, the quake damaged a local kindergarten that was unoccupied. A video released by a Russian media outlet showed a team of doctors at a cancer clinic on Kamchatka holding a patient and clutching medical equipment as the quake rocked an operating room. Authorities on the sparsely populated Kuril Islands reported several waves flooded the fishing port of Severo-Kurilsk, the main city on the islands, and cut power supplies to the area. The port's mayor said no major damage was recorded. A tsunami of 2 feet (60 centimeters) was recorded in Hamanaka town in Hokkaido and Kuji port in Iwate, according to the Japan Meteorological Agency. Several areas reported smaller waves, and at least one person was injured. In Iwaki, a city in Fukushima prefecture, which was the epicenter of the 2011 tsunami and quake, dozens of residents gathered at a hilltop park after a community siren sounded and breakwater gates were closed. Workers at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant, severely damaged in 2011, took shelter on higher ground while remotely monitoring operations, the operator said. Hours later, Japan downgraded its tsunami alert but left an advisory in place along the Pacific coast. Le Monde with AP Reuse this content
