Palestinian presence

Dear all,

There are, as always, many things I could share about my first days in Palestine this time around. I have a whole host of lovely stories I was hoping to write about (spending time with friends), as well as a few disturbing stories (going through 6 checkpoints between jenin and ramallah, one of which had soldiers pointing guns directly into each of the cars), but what came out below formed itself a bit differently than I’d expected. I do want to share a one-sentence anecdote, though: My friend Fatima and her family were held at a checkpoint for a half hour the other day because the youngest daughter (12-yr-old Bara’a) stuck her tongue out at a soldier. : )

On a different note, I want to acknowledge that Gaza is in an extremely desperate situation right now with Israeli military attacks and closures the likes of which they have not seen in some time, and the world seems to be forgetting about them because they don’t like the political party that is currently in charge. I am not in Gaza and cannot get there, but I try not to forget it and hope that you don’t either.

Okay, onto my other thoughts…

From Ramallah with love,
Hannah


As I exited the plane and walked through the narrow hallway towards the airport, I stared at the advertisement on the wall: photos of famous people and art from centuries ago, with “the first _____” written above them. Example: “the first Italian lady” was the Mona Lisa. The final one, of course, was “the first Israeli.” The picture, a cactus.

For years on my trips to Israel I would ride through the countryside taking in the landscape absentmindedly, oblivious to the stories of the places I was passing. Now that I know more, it seems impossible to ignore the cacti, fig trees, and pomegranate trees that signify the entrances to destroyed Palestinian villages. Often times building walls remain nearby, if not whole buildings. When they are too obvious to ignore, they are labeled as old Roman ruins, with no acknowledgment at all of the continued lived experience of the indigenous Palestinian people.

Every time I arrive in Palestine, it takes me a few days to detox from the airport and the hours after. It takes a visit to my host family in Dheisheh refugee camp to remember that the cactus is not “the first Israeli”. It takes a free ride halfway from Ramallah to Haris (“But this is your work”/ “Yes, but you’re a friend to the Palestinian people, and money isn’t everything”) to overshadow the conversation in the airport taxi between two Americans going to study Torah in occupied land (“Everywhere you go you can dig an inch under the ground and find remnants of ancient Israel…”).

There are two competing realities of permanence here. I can only hope that the one based on presence, and not the one based on absence, will prevail.

A friend of mine asked me the other day how I see the situation here, whether I have a positive outlook on any of it. This friend has a public job with the Palestinian Authority in which people come to him every day with their problems and he can do nothing about them. He tells me it drives him crazy. He tells me he doesn’t want life to be a series of choices to kill or be killed, imprison or be imprisoned, make people afraid or be afraid. His son is in Israeli prison, and he is hoping he is on the list of 250 Fatah prisoners to be released in Olmert’s new plan. But what about the other thousands and thousands of prisoners? he asks. And what about those who are not Fatah? His wife tells me that their 3-year-old daughter, who has only known her brother in prison, has been dreaming of his release. She woke up a few mornings ago and said, “The soldiers opened the door and took his handcuffs off and he left, so why isn’t he home yet?”

So when this friend asked how I see the situation, whether I see any of it positively, it was hard to know how to answer. All I could think to say was what I usually say to that question, as far removed from his experience as I knew it was. I do not see much hope in the current situation, I told him, but it cannot continue forever. The idea that there can be a Jewish state and a democratic state at the same time is unsustainable, and unless Israel completely wipes out the Palestinian people, this idea will continue to be challenged until Zionism comes to an end. It will not happen soon, and it is too late for true justice in any case, but someday the state will adopt true democratic laws (if not practice); someday military occupation will come to an end; someday refugees will have the right to return; someday this contradiction of a democratic Jewish state will die.

I hope you are right, he responded, and I think you are right, but ultimately I am not looking for their end, I am just looking for our beginning.

Here’s hoping for beginnings and continuations grounded in presence in this land.

Commemorating the Nakba

Dear friends,

This week marked the 59th anniversary of the Nakba, the displacement and dispossesssion of hundreds of thousands of Palestinian people. Friends of mine all across the US engaged in Nakba Day commemorations, remembering the destruction of hundreds of villages and the painful fact that 3/4 of the Palestinian population are refugees even to this day.

We've been publishing photos of actions in Boston, Philadelphia, San Francisco, and Minneapolis throughout the week on a blog: questionisrael.blogspot.com. The culmination, for me, was today, when 50 of us went inside the "New England Celebrates Israel" event to commemorate the Nakba there. We were able to stand silently with banners, and stickers with names of villages, for about 5 minutes (much longer than we were expecting!). The statement from our group is below.

Again, please visit the blog for photos and links to more. A video will be ready in a few days as well.

questionisrael.blogspot.com

Lots of love,
Hannah


STATEMENT FROM OUR ORGANIZING COMMITTEE:

We are here today to commemorate the expulsion and dispossession of the Palestinian people from their homeland and to protest this celebration of Israel’s Independence Day. We stand here to remind those inside and those in our larger New England community that Israeli “independence” equals Palestinian Nakba, or catastrophe.

We are a diverse group of people who support the application of human rights for all people. We are painfully aware that the establishment of a Jewish state in 1948 led to the largest and most persistent refugee problem in the world. In 1948, 800,000 Palestinian people were driven from their homes in a process of ethnic cleansing that continues to this day.

Today, almost 60 years later, more than 6 million Palestinians still wait to return home. Three quarters of the Palestinian population are displaced. One out of every 3 refugees in the world is Palestinian. Many live in refugee camps. All are denied the right to return to their land simply because they are not Jewish.

The right of return for refugees is an international law that applies to all refugee populations in the world. The United Nations has reaffirmed this right specifically for Palestinian people every year since 1948, yet the Israeli government has consistently refused to implement this right. Billions of dollars of US aid give Israel little incentive to conform to international standards of law and justice.

Those of us who are Jewish say, “Not in our name!” The organized Jewish community that has planned this event does not speak for us.

As US taxpayers we say, “Not with our money!” The 15 million dollars PER DAY that the US government gives to Israel does not reflect our desires or our priorities.

As people who care about equality, justice, and human rights, we say, "Not on our watch!" Israel must respect international law, including the right of return for refugees.

We are here today to declare that Palestinian experience cannot be forgotten, that Palestinian history cannot be erased, that Palestinian voices cannot be silenced! Never again should this kind of catastrophe happen to any people in the world.

And we are here to let the organizers of this event know that they will never be able to celebrate the establishment of the state of Israel without protest until the Nakba is acknowledged and reparations are made.

The Search for 1948

Part 1:

“Where do you want to go?” asked the taxi driver, expecting to give me a short ride and collect a few shekels.

“Baqa’a,” I replied, “but it’s a bit of a project.”

The West Jerusalem neighborhood of Baqa’a is only a 10 minute drive from the place in East Jerusalem where we were, but time travel takes somewhat more imagination.

“I’m looking for a house from 1948,” I told him, and handed him a diagram of a house that looked similar to hundreds of other old houses in the Jerusalem area.

“Is it yours?” he asked.

“No, a friend’s.”

Only a few months ago I found out that a friend of mine in Boston, who I’d always known as Lebanese, was actually born in Jerusalem. In 1948, at the age of four, he and his family, along with 800,000 Palestinian people, were forced out of their home by pre-Israeli forces. They fled to Lebanon, where his father had lived before moving to Jerusalem 20 years earlier. Nobody in the family has been back to Palestine since 1948, so I asked my friend if he would like me to try to find his house. He gathered some information, including a few nearby landmarks and a diagram of the house, and I set off on my search.

This brings me back to Abed’s taxi, where I sat hoping he knew the neighborhoods well enough to help me. I had planned to seek out an older taxi driver, and possibly someone who spoke English so I could make sure to communicate every little detail I knew. Abed is a young guy who speaks very little English, but he seemed interested in and moved by the project, and immediately began to call all the older people he knew.

“Do you know where the Jordanian embassy was before 1948?” he would ask, as this was our major landmark.

“Yes,” one man told him, “but it wasn’t in Baqa’a.”

“No,” said a couple people, “there was barely a Jordan at that time. How could there be a Jordanian embassy?”

So we began to drive, looking for the other smaller landmarks, or for people who might recognize the name of my friend’s father. Abed would pull over next to every older person he saw (Palestinian or Israeli), and ask about the Ummah school, the Jordanian embassy, and the British army women’s headquarters. Some people were vaguely helpful, some not, and some would inform us in a slightly insulted way that they weren’t alive in 1948.

We left Baqa’a and crossed the street to another neighborhood that is still mostly Palestinian, thinking we would have a better chance of finding both people who wanted to help and people who could help. Not two minutes later, we passed an old man and Abed stopped. We got out of the car, said hello, and explained what we were doing. “You’re in luck,” replied the old man, “I know more about these neighborhoods than anyone else in the area.”

Before I knew it, his wife was serving me coffee in the middle of the street and the man was telling his wife and daughters to go ahead to the hospital because he would come in the car with us as long as Abed agreed to drive him to the hospital afterwards. Abed agreed, and we continued on our journey, this time with a new passenger.

We drove for about a half hour with little success, and then the man (whose name I never learned) suggested we stop at an old house on the corner. We knocked on the door, and an old Israeli man answered. He took one look at us and asked, “Are you looking for someone who used to live here?” as he opened the door and let us in. “You’re in luck,” he said, “I know more about these neighborhoods than anyone else in the area.”

So here I was inside a house with Abed the taxi driver, and two older men, one Palestinian and one Israeli, who said they knew everything about the area. They talked for a few minutes and argued amiably for a few more in a combination of Hebrew, Arabic, and English. The interaction had an air of pre-Zionism to it that is difficult to explain. The men were interacting like any two older men would, both trying to be helpful and both trying to prove what they knew. They used language of “Arab” and “Jew” instead of “Palestinian” and “Israeli”, which many people do, but it just seemed right in this situation. Like nationalism and the way it has played out had nothing to do with this simple human search for an old home.

I had started the trip too late, so by this time it was getting dark and I was running late for a meeting. We had gotten some information that might help us for next time, I had a few questions to go back to my friend with, and we took the name and phone number of the Israeli man so we could try again another day.

Part 2:

Two weeks later, the only day out of several that wasn’t pouring rain, I met Abed in Jerusalem. I had received more precise directions from my friend in Boston, including names of other people who lived and worked in the area and, most importantly, a photograph taken from the house in 1940.

Abed met me and told me he knew where the house was, that he had gone back there after our last search. I showed him the photograph and we drove towards the area where he thought the house was. We parked and began to walk around, holding up the photograph to each gate and entrance. We found one house that looked quite similar and currently has a huge construction project going on directly on top of it. The managers were Israeli, the workers Palestinian. We went in and asked the workers what they knew about the house, which wasn’t much. We were stopped on the way out by a manager. Abed explained in Hebrew that we were trying to find a house. The man
glanced at the photo and said, “Yes, this looks like the house.” Another manager came out and ordered us off the property. “This isn’t the house,” he said. “There was nothing here before 1948.”

We stood outside for a few minutes as Abed explained to me (as though explanation was needed) that the Israeli man felt threatened by us. “We need to find an Israeli to help us,” said Abed. “They think you and I are here to claim the house because I’m Arab and you have papers in your hand. They don’t know we’re only here to look and photograph.”

“We should take the house,” I replied, only half joking.

By that time we had realized this was probably not the house we were looking for. The gate looked the same but we couldn’t figure out the angles in the photograph and it just didn’t seem right. Another older Israeli man on the street asked if he could help. Abed explained that we were searching for a house, and the man joined us for the next 20 minutes as we walked around the neighborhood. We kept finding similar sights, but none of them fit together right. Finally he asked, “Are you sure the house is in the German Colony?”

“No,” I replied, “it’s in Baqa’a.”

Apparently the older Israeli man who had helped us the first time had convinced Abed to come to this area. So we got back into the car and headed back up to his house. He answered the door and I shared all my new information with him. It’s near the Trans-Jordanian consulate, I told him, not the Jordanian embassy. There’s a road that goes down from the main street towards their house. Well, these two pieces of information were all he needed. He followed me out to the street, pointed, and said, “Go two more traffic lights. The Allenby building is probably what you mean, and
that’s on your left. There’s a street that goes down from there on the right.”

Something felt right about this, so I got back in the car excitedly and we drove those two blocks, turned right, and got out and started walking. The streets were different than they were described to me, and the building supposedly on the corner wasn’t there. But sure enough, after a few minutes of meandering, I found myself in front of a large building that was in the background of the photo I was holding. I positioned myself exactly at the angle that the photo was taken from, and looked around. One street continued to go down, so I took it. To my right was a synagogue that I guessed was either my friend’s property or his neighbor’s. I hoped it was
not his, that his house had not been completely destroyed and replaced by a synagogue.

We passed the synagogue and stopped in front of the gate to the next house. This was it. Different from the photo, but with the same dimensions, and seemingly the right distance from the larger building up the street. We entered and found ourselves on the stone path described in the e-mail I had in my hand from my friend’s older brother:

“…continue along the stone-paved path… some 8 meters, you reach the level of the house… Move some 10 more meters and you will have the six stone steps (to the left) that lead up to the veranda and you will then be facing the main door, entrance to the house.”

I was facing the main door, the entrance to the house. I wanted to knock on the door, but wanted to take in as much as possible first. I walked around the house, wondering which plants and trees had been there when my friend lived there and which were new.

Finally Abed knocked. No answer. We waited a few minutes and then left. I came back about five minutes later to photograph more and the door to the house was open.

I went to the entrance, knocked, and said “hello?” A man appeared.

“Do you speak English?” I asked.

“A little,” he replied, which turned out to mean a lot.

“My name is Hannah, I’m from the United States, and I have a friend who I think used to live in this house before 1948. Can I come in and look?”

He seemed hesitant but let me in. I asked if I could photograph and he was slightly more hesitant, but again agreed. He asked if I was sure this was the house, and I told him about the description of the path, stairs, and entrance. I asked how long he’d lived there, and he told me only a couple years. He rents the place from a French Israeli man who has owned it for about five years. Before that, the building was owned by a Moroccan Israeli family.

“Since 1948?” I asked.

“Well, the Israeli government probably had it first and then gave it to them, but yes, for a long time.”

I kept photographing. I was a bit hesitant to have any meaningful conversation with him because I was afraid it might spoil my ability to be filming. As I was getting ready to leave, though, he began a conversation:

“The reason I let you in,” he told me, “is that one time my sister went back to Morocco to find our family house. The man currently living there wouldn’t let her in. She cried and cried, and finally he let her in, but he wouldn’t let her photograph. This is why I let you in and let you photograph.”

“Do you want to return to Morocco?” I asked.

“No,” he said, almost laughing at the suggestion.

“If the situation changed?”

“No, Morocco is for the Moroccans and Israel is for the Israelis.”

“What about the Palestinians?”

“We were here first,” he said, “thousands of years ago. This is our land, it says so in the bible.” I had noticed all the torahs and other religious texts in the house, so it did not surprise me that he was religious.

“Sixty years ago my friend was living here,” I said.

“History doesn’t start in 1948,” he answered.

There was no use arguing with religion. We said an awkward goodbye (what I would usually say when someone has let me into his house would be “thank you,” but it didn’t seem right in this situation), and I left.

My search for 1948 was over, and amazingly, it was a success. As I returned to East Jerusalem with Abed, I thought about how many people we had involved in this project, and how important a project it is, both on personal and national levels. I thought about some of those people, and how their names suited the story perfectly:

The sweet and helpful taxi driver is Abed, “one who serves.”

The man currently living in my friend’s house is named Israel.

The old Israeli man who helped us find the house is named Shalom.

Perhaps if more people named Shalom helped refugees find their homes, the word “peace” would have true meaning.

the blood of the people

Just a quick note about the incredibly sad internal Palestinian violence... and a hopeful response. I probably don't know more about the fighting than you all do, because Gaza is just as inaccessible from the West Bank as from the US, where most of you are. Perhaps I hear news with less sensationalism and more emotion, though - people here are really sad and frustrated. So yesterday, at 10 am, I got a call that there would be a demonstration and human chain in Ramallah at 11. I was already in Ramallah, so I decided to go, thinking it would be tiny.

The event was organized by the Farmers' Union and the idea was to include farmers and workers in the political process and involve people in a grassroots process to take back Palestine from those who seek power at the expense of the people. I arrived and saw hundreds of women and men of all ages, girls from school groups, etc.

We began at the parliament building (Hamas-controlled) and the idea was to make a human chain to the PA headquarters (Fatah-controlled). We didn't quite reach it, but we did reach to the center of town, after which time the crowd just started marching and chanting.

"Ya Haniye, w ya rais, dam ilshab mush rhiis" (Hey Haniyeh, and hey president [Abbas], the blood of the people isn't cheap)

"Wahde wahde wataniye, Fatah, Hamas w'shiuiye" (one one nation, Fatah, Hamas, and the communists)

We marched to the PA headquarters and went inside. The guards in their uniforms and guns shook people's hands as we walked by and let us in without protest. I said to a friend, "This is amazing that they're just letting us in."

"They have to," he replied, "We elected them, we put them there." Can you imagine that happening in the US? A group of people marching to the Whitehouse and the guards letting us in...

I felt a little strange going as an international, since I think there's enough foreign meddling in (and foreign reasons for) the internal violence. But as soon as I arrived it was clear it was Palestinian-led, I was one of only a few internationals, and several people thanked me for being there with them. In that moment, being there felt like solidarity. And like an important story to share.

There was tons of press there, but I worry that it was all Arab press. I'm curious if it got any Western press.

One Year Ago

January 25, 2007

One Year Ago

One year ago today, I was walking around Gaza City in the midst of the excitement of the first Palestinian parliamentary elections in 10 years. Flags of all colors and political parties were waving on roofs of houses, electric wires at polling places, hoods of cars, and backs of donkeys. People were frustrated by the fact that their presidential elections the prior year had brought no tangible results since the Israeli government refused to negotiate with Abu Mazen (Mahmoud Abbas), but this frustration did not translate into a total disillusionment of the political process at large. In fact, voter turnout was about 75% even despite all the Israeli restrictions on movement, and on the streets the turnout seemed even higher. Every child of every age would tell me who she or he wanted to vote for, generally following their parents’ beliefs but not always. In Dheisheh refugee camp, the Fatah office was around the corner from the Hamas office, which was right next to the PFLP (leftist communist party) office, and everyone seemed to get along just fine.

We had traveled down to the Rafah border crossing with Egypt as the election results started to come in. We walked along the block of houses that had been demolished in the previous few years, including the house Rachel Corrie was murdered in front of as she tried to protect it from demolition. We visited a relative of a friend in the Palestinian police, who told us initial results showed Fatah ahead. They were probably looking at local results. By the end of the night we all knew Hamas had won a huge parliamentary victory, and people were somewhat stunned, with some worried and others hopeful that this might bring necessary change. Only Hamas is seen to stand up for our rights, some said, only Hamas can take care of our internal affairs and improve our economy, and only Hamas can truly negotiate a solution with Israel.

We all know what happened after that. Israel and the West (led by the United States) refused to give the government half a chance to function, and Hamas does not have enough cohesion or support to function despite boycotts and sanctions applied by the world, not to mention Israel’s theft of millions of dollars of Palestinian tax money. In the past year, Israel has repeatedly bombed Gaza, including the power grid that supplies all the water for the region. Gaza is now facing not only a political crisis, but a humanitarian crisis the likes of which have never before been seen there.

One year ago, Palestinian government workers (public officials, social service workers, teachers and others) were making a total of 150 million US dollars each month. Most have not been paid in more than 10 months now, and those who have been paid have only received small symbolic amounts every few months or so. Last summer, at about the 5 month mark, people were incredibly frustrated, angry, and depressed. Now it seems people have gotten used to it. They have already adjusted to the newest manifestation of occupation: no salaries for their work.

One year ago, the Palestinian people elected 132 legislators. Today 41 of them sit in Israeli prisons, the vast majority arrested since their election last year and charged with being members of illegal organizations. Most are Hamas, but according to the Israeli military orders that govern the West Bank and Gaza, it is actually illegal to be a member of ANY political party, including Hamas, Fatah, PFLP, and others. How anyone can use the words “Palestinian” and “authority” together is beyond me.

One year ago, more than 630 Palestinian and 1200 Lebanese people were alive who have since been killed directly by the Israeli military, not to mention countless others dying as a result of ongoing policies of war and occupation.

One year ago, Dunya and I began the Re-Plugged program of Birthright Unplugged, taking Palestinian children from refugee camps to Jerusalem, the sea, and the villages their grandparents were expelled from and fled in 1948. Last week we completed our third Re-Plugged trip with 25 children from Balata refugee camp in Nablus. The trip continues to be beautiful, the reasons for it tragic.

As we were crossing through Huwara checkpoint last week, returning the children to their homes, one child asked me which villages we’ll visit on our next trip from Balata. I told her we do one trip from each camp and that in the summer we’ll be working with children from Jenin. She said, “Inshallah [God-willing] you’ll return to Balata and do another trip from here in the future.”

“Inshallah,” I replied, “we’ll be able to take every child from Palestine on a similar trip.”

“Inshallah,” said another child, “there will be the right of return.”

I looked at him and smiled though I wanted to cry, and quietly said “inshallah.” Of course that’s the reason we do this program, of course that is what we are trying to communicate to the world, and that is usually the way I describe the program to others. But somehow in this moment, crossing through the checkpoint, I was just not thinking on the macro level. But 10-year-old Mansour was. He smiled at me knowingly and continued walking through the turnstyles and fences towards the taxi that would take him back to the camp. I wonder if and when he will leave Nablus again.

One year ago we were in the midst of the 58^th year of Israeli occupation of Palestine. Now we are in the 59^th. I truly hope that when 10-year-old Mansour has a 10-year-old of his own, that he will have no reason to remember last week’s trip with us. This looks no more likely this year than last. I wonder what I might say one year from now.

Back in Palestine

I’ve been back in Palestine for two weeks now, though it seems much longer. We’ve already finished one Unplugged trip, I’ve visited many friends, and now we’re preparing for our Re-Plugged trip. We’ll be taking 20 girls and boys from Balata refugee camp in Nablus to visit Jerusalem, the sea, and the villages their grandparents were expelled from in 1948.

The trip starts the day after a new Israeli law is supposed to take effect. Many of you know that there is already a system of apartheid in place for many of the daily functions in the West Bank (my South African friends insist that the situation here is way beyond apartheid and worse than apartheid ever was, but there are still definite similarities). Israeli citizens and people with Jerusalem ID have yellow license plates, and Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza have green license plates. The new law states that even within the West Bank, Palestinian people with West Bank ID will not be allowed in any yellow-plated vehicles. Their relatives from Jerusalem will not be able to drive them around, even in their own villages. In response, a number of Israeli and international people are organizing “freedom rides” this Friday, where they will use yellow-plated cars to drive around as many Palestinian people as possible on their way to the weekly demonstration against the wall in Bil’in village. Even the UN, which generally does nothing more here than produce reports and maps, has stated that they will not comply with the new law. It remains to be seen whether it will be enforced, and whether it will affect us or not as we try to travel with the children.

It’s the work with children here that gives me inspiration. And I’ve been lucky enough to experience a few amazing examples of it in the past week. On Friday I went to the opening of an exhibit at the Freedom Theatre in Jenin refugee camp. The Freedom Theatre was originally opened by Arna Mer Khamis (the film “Arna’s Children” is about this and what happened to the children as they grew older). Arna’s son Juliano, who made the film, has re-opened the theatre and it serves as a cultural and artistic center for the camp. The exhibit is art about Palestine and Lebanon by the children and by older Palestinian and international artists. The place was packed as the program began, with children sitting on top of each other and in the aisles to make room for all the guests who had come. We were Palestinian, Israeli, and international, people from the camp and people from Ramallah and other cities. Juliano’s first thanks were to the Al Aqsa Martyr’s Brigade, Islamic Jihad, Hamas, Fatah, and other militant and political groups for their support of the theatre. In the atmosphere of tension between Fatah and Hamas, exaggerated by the media but nonetheless very present, it was quite fascinating to see a person with Jewish Israeli and Palestinian heritage standing on the stage welcoming fighters from different factions and Israelis to the same location. Zakaria Zubeidi, head of Jenin’s Al Aqsa Martyr’s Brigade and one of “Arna’s children”, came out of hiding for the day to shake each person’s hand, stand on stage with Juliano, and give a speech. Young girls read poetry, a Palestinian musical group from Haifa performed, people with “security” written on their shirts danced and clapped and laughed. The Brazilian ambassador came and was recognized. It was a good time, and different than any crowd I’ve experienced at any other event.

The next day I attended a screening of 3-5 minute films made by children from Dheisheh and Aida refugee camps in Bethlehem. A group from the US had spent one week with them in a digital storytelling workshop, and the result were these incredible films that the children produced by themselves – they wrote the script and chose photos and music to go with it. Many of the films were about friends and loved ones killed or imprisoned by the Israeli army, or about their villages that they long to return to, or even about their own injuries. One boy, Miras, made a film about being shot just last month in an incident that made international press. He was playing with cousins on his porch and Israeli army snipers opened fire on them. Miras was shot in the stomach. I had read about it when it happened but hadn’t read about his recovery, so it was great to see him there, and to see him already reflecting about it and able to express himself through this medium.

I’ll try to write again after our Re-Plugged trip. I realize I’ve written about a few specific events here without any general analysis. This is partly because the situation does not seem appreciably different than when I was last here – or I should probably say that things are getting worse at a pace that Palestinian people are used to, rather than at the rapid pace they were declining last summer. It’s partly because I’ve been caught up in the day to day with little time to reflect. It’s partly because I haven’t been reading the news and hear only bits and pieces of stories about Fatah and Hamas forming a unity government, Condoleezza Rice’s visit and Palestinian protests against it, Bush bombing Somalia, etc.

So this is just a glimpse of what I’ve been up to. Next time I hope to include a bit more of what I’ve been thinking, once I figure it out myself.

My Brother in Palestine

Dear friends,
In February, as you know, my mother came to visit me in Palestine. She wrote reflections and I sent much of her writing to my list. Just last month, my brother came to visit also (he's studying Russian in Moscow for a few months, so it was relatively easy for him to come). Below is some of what he wrote, both simple stories and political reflections. It's long (perhaps not quite as long as what I sent from my mother a few months ago, but long nonetheless), so take a few days to read it. Included is one particularly disturbing checkpoint experience that I did not write to you all about, so here it is, in Ben's words...
-Hannah

As I was waiting for my plane to Israel, I was surprised that I felt a strong connection with the other people waiting for the plane; I could tell they were going home. Suddenly all I had been told about Jews and Israel over my lifetime entered my head. They had a place to go and be safe. Yet I felt more unsafe in Israel than in Moscow or the US, or a lot of places I have been. This was probably also due to things I have heard about Israel, from many of the same people, saying how dangerous
it is there, asking several times if I was still planning to go. What can explain this dichotomy between Israel being a place for Jews to go to be safe, and people who care about me being worried about me going to Israel?

When I arrived at the airport in Israel, it was impossible to tell that the country was at war, a war in which Northern Israel was being hit by rockets daily. But everyone in the airport seemed completely
normal. It was a completely western airport and feeling. I went through security, said that I was visiting my sister, that I would be meeting her in Jerusalem and then traveling around to see her friends. I got right through, as I did not mention that many of these friends were Palestinian. I followed the directions that sis gave me to exit the airport and turn left, and I saw the Jerusalem sherut. I was the first one there, so it took a while for the sherut to leave, but eventually I arrived in East Jerusalem, went into the cafe she told me to, and there she was, dressed in her Palestine outfit. It was good to see her. I was excited for the next 9 days; I would finally get to see all this stuff she has been writing about for years. My desire for a schwarma had preceded me, and we left the cafe to get me a schwarma. It was good. We met two of Hannah's friends, Ari and another Hannah. Eventually we headed to the bus station and took the bus to Ramallah.

Ramallah seemed like a normal city. There were differences of course with American cities, but it was difficult to tell that it was living under occupation. Of course Ramallah is one of the better off cities
in the occupation, but I was still surprised that the occupation was not apparent.
…
[In Salfit region, Mas’ha village] We first went to a house that is entirely surrounded by the wall or
security fence. The owners of the house now have a key to a gate in the fence, which they can go in and out of, but before that they had to get the army to open up a large gate for them. It is clear that the fence and wall around the house is purely to make it unpleasant for them to live there. The only part where there is wall rather than fence is the direction of the Palestinian village which they are part of, so they can not see it. It is pretty amazing that they still can live there. Their attachment to the land and the house is very strong. Two children were there in the house, and it was refreshing to see them because they didn't seem to realize or acknowledge the situation
they were living in. They seemed just like normal kids. Hannah seems to really enjoy the kids in Palestine. She enjoys kids other places too, but I think the kids in Palestine are especially refreshing
because you can temporarily forget about the situation they are living in. We brought the daughter in the house pictures of a trip Hannah took her on to Jerusalem and to the Sea. She seemed very happy with them, especially when her parents saw them. Hannah runs some trips with Palestinian children to go to Jerusalem and the Sea and possibly their families' old villages because children under 16 are allowed to travel freely. While we were there, the father came home from working as a farmer. He works on land owned by some Palestinian in the States. It takes him a while to get to the land, because he has to walk around the settlement built next to his house.

We then went to lunch back in Hares at Abu Rabia's brother's, Issa's, house. This was my first taste of a Palestinian lunch that I would have several more times. I really enjoyed several aspects of
Palestinian lunches. First of all, there was always a lot of food, and it was good. I also liked the part of lunch where Hannah would be made fun of in Arabic for being a vegetarian; it's good to see that
Palestinians can hassle her about it too.
…
After lunch we went back to the IWPS house. Hannah went to a party I wasn't invited to that night, because it was a women only party, and I stayed in the house and studied Arabic and watched part of a movie. When she got back, we went downstairs where the family I was staying
with was sitting outside. We both sat there for a while, had some tea, and chatted. Huda (the youngest daughter) gave me several things that night including a leaf, a plastic bag, a shoe, and a broken necklace. Hannah talked to Um Rabia for a while and I talked to Abu Rabia. His English is good enough for us to carry on a conversation. We talked for a bit. I remember him saying that he hopes that one day there will be peace and no more bloodshed. He did not mention anything about taking over Israel. I think most Palestinians would be eager for a fair peace, but it is becoming more and more difficult over the years.
…
We then went back to the IWPS house for a bit. They were talking about things that have happened to Palestinians recently, attacks by soldiers and also by settlers. I was a bit shocked how they talked about them and no one was really surprised because it is regular for them. But we never hear about these things in the States. If it was a Palestinian doing the same thing to an Israeli I have a feeling we would hear of it. We then went downstairs to Abu Rabia's. Hannah did not stay long because it was very late, but in the meantime we gave a Russian nesting doll to them. Sajid, the young boy, enjoyed playing with it, but he did not understand the concept of putting it back together in the correct order.

The next morning Abu Rabia drove us to Nablus. We drove through many villages to get there and the scenery was very beautiful. The road just winds through the hills rather than cutting straight through them. It is also much smaller than the roads Israel builds in the West Bank. You know I am not one for keeping the old rather than embracing the new, more efficient roads or society, so I do not say this road was better, it was just different. We drove around Nablus which was a very beautiful city. We drove past an apartment that Abu Rabia owns, and I believe rents out. We went up to the highest point so we could look over the whole city. Then we drove to the center of town and walked for a while through a market. It was very crowded, but interesting. You could tell that tourists do not go to Nablus because we did not have anyone trying to sell us something in English. The only English we heard was little kids saying hi or hello, which occurred a lot in all of the West Bank. We stopped and said hello to some store owners that Abu Rabia knew who all offered us tea, but we declined. Finally we headed out of the city, but we still had to get past the checkpoint.

Going in, we got through the checkpoint rather quickly. I think there might have been only one car ahead of us, and we showed our ids and then were allowed to pass. Going out was a different story. We drove up to the checkpoint and got into a line of cars maybe 10 or 20 long, but they were not noticeably moving. All the people from the cars were standing outside of their cars. We all got out because we were going to have to wait a while. Hannah and I walked up to the checkpoint to have a look and Abu Rabia stayed back with the car. When we got up there we saw many people, maybe 100-200, waiting under a covered area, but there were even more people that did not fit in and were in line outside of that area as well as occupying the side of the street where
cars came into Nablus. When we first got up there, some cars were coming in and people would move out of the way, but soon after, there were so many people in the street that the cars could not get through and the soldiers stopped letting them pass. Getting into Nablus is much easier than getting out, but even so, I think this was bad for going out.

Out of the covered area there was a small exit in which one person would come through at a time and one soldier, of the 10-15 or so that were there, would look at his id and let him pass. It was going very slowly, and I believe more people were arriving to exit the city than were exiting, so there kept being more and more people waiting. People who were sick or injured with doctor's notes would go up to the soldiers and beg to get through without waiting in line. All were at
first refused, whether the note was real or not, but most kept persisting and after a while would be allowed to pass, though some were not and it seemed a bit arbitrary who was allowed to pass and who not. At one point a woman passed out in the covered area. It was very crowded so I imagine very hot even though it was covered. People were shouting at the soldiers to try to tell them that a woman had passed out and eventually she was carried out and given water. The street became more and more crowded (this was where we were standing) and every now and then several soldiers would yell and hold up their guns and force people to move back. Hannah and I had more freedom to move about than the Palestinians did. We were also told to move back, but they did not persist as much as with the Palestinians, and they were also much more polite with us. One of the soldiers spoke English relatively well, and Hannah conversed on and off with him. He said he was a good soldier, not a bad one, and only following orders. I am sure I have heard that excuse before, can't seem to place it right now. At some point the checkpoint was closed, which meant that they
were not regularly checking id's, but that people would still go up to the front and beg to be let through and some were let through, but not as many as when it was open. Hannah asked the soldier why the checkpoint was closed and the soldier said because of people like him, pointing to a guy who had been in a shouting match with the soldier about getting through. Hannah suggested just letting everyone through and then there would not be people like him.

As you may have guessed, but apparently the army does not know, closing the checkpoint did not alleviate the problem of hundreds of people waiting. At one point a Palestinian woman asked us why we were waiting and said that we could just go through because we were not Palestinian, which was probably true. Hannah told her she did not like going through when other people had to wait, and I sort of felt the same way. Eventually we went back to talk to Abu Rabia. He also urged us to just go through, since he would not be able to get through with his car for quite a while, and we were supposed to go to someone's house for lunch. Eventually we decided to go and got our bags and said goodbye to Abu Rabia. It was not exactly under the best circumstances we said goodbye, but I guess it might have been fitting for the situation there. We stayed around the front of the checkpoint for a while longer after we got the bags, mostly because the situation was getting worse, and though we were not sure, perhaps we kept the army from being more aggressive than they would have been by us being there.

The street became very crowded, and I, and I think Hannah too, hopped to the other side of the street where there were not many Palestinians. The soldiers were yelling at everyone to get back. A
couple times the crowd would come forward a bit, there would be yelling and brandishing of guns and people would move back. At one point a soldier, the good soldier, yelled at a family and a girl got very frightened and looked sort of like she was in shock for a couple minutes. The soldier did not understand why she was upset with him yelling at her mother and lifting his gun. Eventually one of the times that the crowd pushed forward, 30-40 people actually got past all the soldiers who were in the meantime yelling and putting the clips into their guns (I noticed the clips are usually set off a few inches from where they would have to be to shoot). One soldier shot in the air and every one got very scared and moved back. After this incident, one of the female soldiers was standing on the street crying, and she was yelled at to go inside. It was a very emotional situation, and I teared up at several points - when the Palestinian woman told us we could go through because we were American, when Abu Rabia told us to go through and we left him there, and at some other points just realizing that this situation is a reality for these people rather than just a one time occurrence for me.

More soldiers arrived at the checkpoint, and basically just stood where the other soldiers were standing to create an increased presence. I pointed out to a couple of the soldiers that a fellow
soldier was crying (she was in a glass enclosure so still visible) and they all pretended not to understand. One soldier that arrived who spoke English asked me what I was doing there. I don't recall what I said. I asked him if this was why he joined the army, and he said "Not for this," and said it in a way that seemed like he was really reflecting about it, not just saying I am just following orders like the good soldier. In general I feel that many of the soldiers did not want to be doing what they were doing, but did not know of any other options. I saw even some of the meaner soldiers have human moments. When one woman was crossing a barrier, her daughter was still on the other side, and the soldier lifted her over as if it was his own daughter. Hannah was upset she did not have postcards of the Refuseniks, which are Israelis who refuse to serve in the army for
reasons regarding the Israeli army's treatment of Palestinians, among other reasons I would suppose. If you refuse to serve in the army, rather than just go and say you have depression in which case they will just let you out of it, you are put in jail for 6 months. I think I would rather that than do what these soldiers do for 6 months.

Eventually the many of the soldiers on the street started checking ids, I believe in order to alleviate the situation. It worked better than closing the checkpoint. If they had only had 5 soldiers instead
of 1 checking ids from the start, or better yet no checkpoint at all, there would not have been a problem in the first place. After a bit of this, Hannah and I just walked through, without ever getting our ids checked on the part of the road where only cars were, past several soldiers.

It is a bad situation, for the Palestinians as well as the soldiers. Now I do acknowledge that it is worse for the Palestinians, since the soldiers can get out of it by being in jail for 6 months rather than dying. But it is still bad for the soldiers that they are forced to do this or face time in jail, as if refusing to oppress people is worthy of jail time. There is also no need for the checkpoint. There is no way you can argue it is for security of Israel. It is a checkpoint between one part of the West Bank and another, and not even the old West Bank, but inside the new one created by the wall. If Israel wants to have borders like these on its international border, it would be reasonable, though it should probably be more efficient. But this checkpoint is not on their border, you have to go through at least one more checkpoint in order to enter Israel. That checkpoint, ironically, is much less guarded than the one at Nablus.

We then went to the house of a woman whose husband is in jail. Hannah met her through the ordeal when he was arrested. He was the one who had meningitis when he was arrested and Hannah struggled to get him proper medical care. We had a nice time. There were several kids there that were running around. One of them was trying to eat a candy bar with the wrapper on because his mother told him to. After she took the wrapper off it was evident why - he didn't so much eat the candy bar as much as smear it on his face and on the ground. We had coffee and
tea as usual…
…
The next day we headed down to Bethlehem where Hannah has a host family in a refugee camp there. We took a shared taxi from East Jerusalem, and by the time we got to the wall around Bethlehem, there were no more Palestinians on the service because access to Bethlehem, or more accurately, access out of Bethlehem is severely limited. The whole area we were driving through, while east of the Green Line, is west of the wall and considered part of Jerusalem. We walked through the checkpoint, which is a large indoor structure, but aside from the girl sitting in the soldier booth, we were the only ones in there that I could see. It's weird they have such a huge structure here, very advanced, but since they don't allow anyone through, no one uses it. We just walked through holding our passports, but not opening them. On the other side of the wall was a lot of graffiti. Some of it was very good. We took a cab to the refugee camp we were staying in. We dropped our stuff off and I met Hannah's host father and saw some host brothers sleeping.

Then we went to Hebron. We exited a different place from Bethlehem, still in Palestinian territory, but the army has put large blocks in the road so it is closed to cars. There are services waiting on either side of the roadblock to take passengers to and fro. Upon arriving in Hebron we first went to a part where there is a checkpoint to get in because a lot of settlers live there, so they only let the
Palestinians who live in there get in, and internationals I guess. Hannah had brought many CD's of pictures from a trip she took many kids in that area on to the Sea and to Jerusalem. She gave many out on the street before we went up to the International Solidarity Movement's and Tel Rumeida Project's office, where she had planned to leave the CD's. Many of the internationals were sitting outside their building with some Palestinian kids. I think that is their main function there, to sit outside and try to keep army and the settlers from doing anything too bad to the Palestinians. The army is not like a police force. They do protect the settlers like a police force, but they do not protect the Palestinians living there like a police force. Settlers can harass Palestinians and they might be told to leave by the soldiers, or the Palestinians might be told to leave. I think you can imagine what happens to Palestinians if they think of harassing the settlers. I don't see why Israel can't protect these people equally, or at least attempt to. I can see why some Israelis and some
Americans resist Israel pulling settlers out of the West Bank, even if I disagree, but I can't see why anyone would think that there should be a "policing" force that only protects the settlers and not the Palestinians. It's not like the Palestinians have the option of making their own police in that neighborhood, or any of the others that the army occupies.

Afterwards we went to meet a friend of Hannah's, Hisham, for ice cream. We went up to the top of a building with a really great view, and it was still pretty cheap. Hisham is an editor of a small
newspaper. It was very interesting to hear all he had to say. He seemed very educated, and it was my only interaction with someone that was involved in running a private enterprise in Palestine. He talked about the war, and we learned a lot from him about that. My favorite part, which is a bit unfortunate for him, is that he got a visa to go to the States, but once he got there he was refused entry because he "falsified" his application. The application asked if he had ever been
arrested for a crime, and he said no, even though, like many Palestinian men, he had been arrested, just not for a crime. Maybe next time he will be clearer on his application, though that could mean he does not get the visa. He also said that he was translating my mother's impressions about Palestine into Arabic and was going to publish them.
…
[Back in Bethlehem, Dheishe refugee camp] After dinner Abu Rabia (Hannah only has host fathers named Abu Rabia) took Hannah and I on a tour of the camp. We walked around the whole camp, saw the school, and interestingly enough saw a wealthy part of the camp. It was not originally part of the camp, but people expanded the camp and made some really nice houses with really nice views. It is weird that these are still basically in a refugee camp. The other houses are very simple, but still nicer than I had expected for a refugee camp. The camp started out as tents in 1948 by the UN, because they thought that the refugees would be able to return once the 1948 war was over. Well they weren't allowed to return, and after a bad winter in which many people died, the UN built small permanent structures. This was in the early or mid-50's. These were where people lived until they started to build better structures in the 80's. I am not sure if they waited so long because building these structures made this living situation more permanent and hence made returning seem more far off, or that they just did not have enough money (what Abu Rabia said). The houses are very close together, and almost all are three on top of each other.
…
Hannah and I went out to a concluding dinner at the same place we ate the first night. We talked for a while about the situation and what she thought the future would look like. When we got back to the apartment, we packed and cleaned. I eventually went to sleep, but Hannah did not because she was leaving very early for the airport. The next day, Dunya and I left at about 8 for the airport. We went with a Palestinian driver who had a car that was able to go into Israel. At the airport there is security outside that stops all the cars. For all of the cars in front of us, the soldier would say a few words to the driver and then let them pass. We were not so lucky because our driver had a Palestinian accent so we were sent off to the side. Then another soldier asked where we were coming from and the driver said Ramallah, which made more problems. The soldier started talking to Dunya and I, mostly to me, and asking me questions. I gave a lot of nondescript answers, and once the soldier realized that I was visiting my sister who worked with Dunya, he started talking to Dunya hoping she would answer more questions. Eventually he took our ids inside a little building. He then came out a few minutes later and said he had to look through Dunya's bags. She is on a list because she works in the West Bank. The driver and I sat outside and eventually Dunya came out with her bag and we went off. While we were sitting there no other cars were stopped.

When we got to the airport, Dunya and I split up and she went to check in. My flight was not until much later (and was delayed as well) so I could not check in yet. I went down to the arrivals area and sat around. Looking at the people arriving and the people greeting them, I did not have the same feeling as when I had seen the people before my flight to Israel. It seemed like they were people who had these privileges at the expense of the Palestinians whom I had spent the week with. They greet family at this modern airport, meanwhile Palestinians can not see some of their family because they are not allowed to travel or if they leave their hometown they would not be
allowed back. I listened to music for a while, pretended I was shopping in a book store while just reading the articles for free, and other such time consuming tasks. I got hungry, so even though Hannah did not want me buying anything at the airport, I went and bought some food at McDonald's. It was actually very good, a sandwich that I had never seen anywhere else. I was able to check in 3 hours before my flight was scheduled to take off originally even though it had been
pushed back two hours. In the check in line, I was approached by someone who started interrogating me about what I had been doing in Israel, why I was going to Russia, why I study Russian, etc. I never said that I was in the West Bank, so I was able to pass with out much
trouble. The metal detector security was incredibly lax for me. I did not take off my shoes, or my belt, and they said I did not need to take change out of my pocket. I walked through and the detector did not go off. It seems like their airport security was much less of a physical security and much more psychological security. If I had seemed strange during my interrogation in line, or had looked Arab, or had said I went to the West Bank, I would have been taken off and put through heavy physical security, but since I was just a normal American Jew, I walked through with relative ease.

My flight was scheduled to leave from the same gate that Dunya's was, so I went to try to meet her, but by the time I got there, they had already started boarding and she had already gotten on. I slept a bit in the corner and occupied my time in other ways to pass the 4 hours until my flight. Eventually I boarded and headed back to the motherland from the "promised" land.

That is it for my summary. Now on to some more opinions. I think that it is pretty absurd for Israel to have the West Bank split up so that Palestinians can not travel freely within it. If they were just
guarding the border (the Green Line) it would be understandable, even though an open border would be best if they could get along. Israel having the right to defend itself gives it the right to guard its border, not to prevent travel in another territory. It does not keep Israel any more secure by not allowing certain people in Hares to go to Ramallah.

It does not seem to me like Israel as a state or government is trying its hardest for a peaceful 2-state solution. They were heralded for taking 8,000 settlers out of Gaza, they won't do the same with the 400,000 in the West Bank and East Jerusalem. And taking the settlers out of Gaza did not lead to an independent Gaza, not with Israel shelling Gaza daily (not just after Shalit) and withholding taxes from the Palestinian government. I think the Palestinian elections are good proof that the USA likes democracy so long as the winners are the ones we want. How democratic of us.

People often say the Palestinians were offered a state in 1948 and they did not accept the deal so that's their problem. This statement is not valid without even saying that the deal was not fair to split the land basically in half amongst a population 93% Palestinian and 7% Jewish. The Palestinians did not accept the terms of the deal, but I don't know that you can say Israel accepted the deal either. Look up a map of the UN proposed distribution of land, Israel did not take the deal. They agreed to it, but then took more. They have gradually and gradually taken more and more land that was not originally supposed to be theirs by the UN plan. But they are praised for being willing to
trade land for peace. If I steal your bike, I shouldn't be heralded for trading it back to you for something, if it is not rightfully mine. Especially if I only offer you the wheels and right handle bar.
If Israel had at any time in their history established a reasonable border for their state and for a Palestinian state, I think we might see two states now. But instead they continued to support settlement into area that was not theirs.

Many of you will read my e-mail and say that the things Israel does are bad and they should stop but also Palestinian violence should stop too. I agree with you, but I don't think Palestinian violence needs to stop before Israel changes their methods. Lincoln did not free the slaves on condition that they did not act up for years and then they would be freed. Slavery was not right so he freed them. What Israel does is not right so they should stop. If a Palestinian then commits a crime in Israel then they have every right to go after him and punish him, but not punish the whole population. Would it be ok if we stopped giving money to inner city schools and other institutions until blacks stopped committing crimes for some amount of time?

My trip to Palestine really opened my eyes to a lot of things. Hannah had already started opening them, but I really had to go there to open them all the way.