ADVERT: Palestine is normal

Do an image search for the world Palestine and almost every result contains the national flag. Of those results that are photographs, most show Palestinian protesters. In some there is the added ingredient of an Israeli Defence Force soldier to add contrast.

It is not so easy to find images of the country of Palestine, its landscape and its normality.

Palestine is a dry, hard, mountainous region. Its roads are dusty and, outside of the major cities, are free flowing.

Sometimes it takes a little bit longer to get from, say, Ramallah to Bethlehem, because somebody built a bloody big wall across the road which you now have to 20 miles round.

In the West Bank there are a lot of bloody big walls. But there are also a lot of roads, a lot of cars and lot of advertising.

The huge advertising hoardings are proof that, even in a country of military occupation whose people continually suffer in the struggle for freedom, anyone can still be persuaded to buy crap.