- This is how olive oil soap is made in the West Bank.
It's being poured on the floor to cool and solidify.
The Palestinian tradition goes back over a thousand years,
but while the West Bank once had nearly 40 soap factories,
Nablus Soap Company is just one of two still operating.
And today a once thriving industry is struggling
to stay afloat.
Nablus soap is made from just three ingredients,
olive oil, baking soda, and water.
- The first step is to cook all three ingredients together
in a huge stainless steel pot.
- When it's ready,
workers carry out the boiling hot liquid
one bucket at a time.
They pour the liquid soap onto the floor where it cools.
Next, they measure out and mark the soap
with an outline of the distinctive Nablus bar shape.
- Workers use hammers to stamp the soap
with the Nablus Soap Company seal.
And it takes one or two days just to cut the soap
and pile it up.
Then it's left for 40 days to dry
before it's packaged and sold.
While the Nablus Soap Company carries on this tradition,
the soap-making industry in the West Bank has dwindled
from nearly 40 factories at its height in the 19th century
to just two working factories in Nablus.
Israeli restrictions in the West Bank
have made exporting soap difficult.
Plus demand for the soap among Palestinians has dropped off.
That's because many customers are choosing their soap
based on price rather than quality.
- Despite the downturn,
the Nablus Soap Company still employs 10 permanent workers
and hires up to 10 more temporary employees as needed.
- And for Ahmad, producing Nablus soap is essential
to keeping a thousand-year-old tradition alive.