Tears and Mid-City in Israel/Palestine

The below article is taken from John Wright’s blog at http://www.pastorjohnwright.org/archives/2008/12/tears_and_midci.html. Well balanced from an American who cares about being God’s love to ALL.

After the first of January, I hope again to blog more regularly. It has been much too long since I’ve been able to keep up, and I hope things will be different — at least I plan for them to be. I miss the time of cyber-reflection.

I mourn the continued conflict in Palestine/Israel. I’m concerned for my friends in the IDS who have probably been called up; I mourn for the victims of the bombing and the devastation of a society that has become Gaza; I hope that the siege of Gaza that has occurred will soon end so that at least children may eat and the sick have medications given to them. It is always the poorest and the weakest who suffer most in the conflict that arises out of the nation-state system that humans have constructed. At any rate, I wanted to share with you a first hand account received this morning from a member of Mid-City who is leaving Israel today. I won’t mention his/her name so as not to compromise his/her safety through Israeli checkpoints.

Hello all,

I am writing from Jerusalem, as I wait for the clock to reach 2am, which is when I will start the long journey to the States.

As you can probably imagine, the sentiment among Palestinians in the last days, is very emotional. People are in mourning, people are angry, people want to respond. What happened in Gaza was a massacre, the images of killed babies and children is running on television all day long. As I came into Hebron yesterday, many youth were throwing rocks, chanting, and burning tires in response to the massacres. Roads were blocked with stones and tire fires raged and youth paraded with Palestinian flags. The Israeli military was responding with live ammo, concussion grenades, and teargas. As I came into the Old City of Hebron, a kind gentlemen showed me an alleyway towards my house, which would avoid all the teargas. I was able to avoid much of the teargas but my eyes were still stinging from the lingering teargas in the air.

Leaving Hebron today, the scene was very similar. One youth grabbed my arm and pulled me into an alleyway. Just as we rounded the corner, a sound grenade went out, scaring the hell out of me. I thanked him for this gesture, and he proceeded to ask where I was from, I said, "Ameerka." Instantly I could tell that this wasn’t a popular answer at the present moment. He asked me if I had said seen the pictures of babies killed in Gaza. He said that America is responsible for those dead babies. He told me that America needs to be destroyed. He demanded to know if his statements were true or false. "Haada mazbuut," this is true, I said. He told all his friends around him that I was "Amreeki," which garnered many grunts of disapproval. Another sound grenade went off nearby and I figured it was my time to leave.

As I walked away from this situation, I became immediately upset, with the United States’ unconditional support of Israel, especially their recent claims that the conflict needed to end, with Hamas ending their rocket-fire into Israel. Yes partially true, but you aren’t going to say anything about the 350 Palestinians that Israel has killed by bombing one of the most densely populated places on earth? After my emotive thoughts, I wondered why these youth had such a negative reaction to me. I realized that I am the closest to an American representative that these youths have seen since the bombing of Gaza. I don’t think they viewed me as personally responsible, but I am seen as closer to the source, closer to the money flowing from the U.S. to buy Israeli F-16s used in the bombings, closer to the decision-makers giving Israel planes the green light.

And about America needing to die. I don’t think he was saying that all Americans need to die. The sense I get from people, is that America as we know it, needs to die. The America that has funded an apartheid regime like the State of Israel, and provides the financial and military resources to occupy the Palestinian people for 60 years, that America needs to be destroyed. If that’s that what this young man was saying, "mazbuut," that is correct.

As I boarded the bus to Bethlehem, where I change buses to go to Jerusalem, I got into another conversation with 3 men. One man on the bus looked remarkably like Yasser Arafat, and other men in the bus were giving this man a hard time and trying to get him to do an impersonation. Incidentally, he already had a impersonation of Yasser Arafat saved on his phone, brilliant. I got into the conversation when they asked me if I was a good impersonation, I thought it was. They then asked me where I was from. When I said America, they again asked about Gaza, if I had seen the pictures and the videos. They then asked what I was doing here. In my limited Arabic, I explained that I work near Yatta, in a village called Tuwani. I struggled to find the words to describe the work…"I live with Palestinians who have many problems with Israeli settlers and Israeli soldiers. The foreigners with me, we have video cameras, and we try to help, and try to tell our country about what’s happening." There was some conversation among the men as I think they attempted to put together the pieces of what I said, and what they think my work is. Then the ‘Yasser Arafat look-alike’ reached across the aisle to shake my hand. "You are welcome here in Palestine," he said to me, in the first English spoken in the conversation. The other men shook my hand and asked what my name was and where I was going. After I told them my travel plans, they insisted I come with them in their friend’s car and they would drop me off in Jerusalem to catch the bus. Upon entering the car, the driver offered me food and tea, and told me I was welcome here.

These two encounters strike me as profound. The more I think about them, the less I think about them in terms of one being positive and one being negative. The second story really tells about the kindness, hospitality, generosity, and humor of these people. They refused to let me take the bus but instead went out of their way to give me a ride which meant I didn’t have to stand in the rain. They also gave up food which had been made specifically for them, to feed a strange foreigner with long hair. So so generous.

The first story is more difficult, but I am starting to see it in this way…that I was an outlet. So often the only face of the oppressor that Palestinians see, is Israeli soldiers. Often settlers are distant and Israeli or American politicians are a world away. These youth wanted to speak to someone who is partially representative of the oppressor that has held their people down for 60 years. That’s fair, I can’t argue with that. If I was in any small way I target of that response, that’s ok with me. It seemed a healthy release for these youth to be able to tell an American citizen, that the America that supports these bombings and these killings of their sisters and brothers, needs to shrivel up and die.

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Life goes on in the West Bank, as it limps along in Gaza. Palestinians are angry, they want answers, and they want their voices to be heard. The trouble is that the international community has created an system where the voices of Palestinians in regard to this conflict, are so rarely heard. I pray that Palestinians take up a movement of nonviolent resistance. I fear that rockets and suicide bombers of an imminent third intifada will be used as justification for the bombings of Gaza and the continued occupation of the West Bank.

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