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A Trip to Palestine and Israel
By Judy Lerner, Greenwich Village
March 4, 2005
Judy Lerner, Peace Activist, demonstrates in Tel Aviv
On Nov. 29, 2004, I returned from a trip to Palestine and Israel. Why and with whom I went says a lot about who I am and what I believe in. When I told friends and family that I had made plans to go to the embattled Middle East (Arafat was near death) I was greeted with everything from "You're crazy, it's too dangerous, you're being irresponsible," to "what in the hell for?"
I must confess that all of those thoughts crossed my mind. But being a stubborn peace activist for over 40 years, I dug my heels in and found myself at LaGuardia Airport at the El Al gate. It was then that I met for the first time my companions in this adventure.
This trip was put together by Yael Petretti, the executive director of Promoting Enduring Peace. Her contacts on both sides of the divide were enormous. She would chart our course between Palestinians and Israelis.
I had never been to Israel and as an American Jew I was aching to see for myself and try to experience some of the angst of both people. We would not see politicians. We would try to see and speak to the ordinary folks wherever and whenever possible.
A prerequisite for the members of the trip was that we be trained in and accept the basic rules of a program called Compassionate Listening. We would meet with people who perhaps we did not agree with, but the rules were clear: "Listen. Hear them. No confrontation."
One could ask questions about how they came to their conclusions, but not to challenge their right to believe. For a partisan like myself, this was an exercise worth experiencing.
The group of eight people and two leaders were as heterogeneous as one could hope for, regionally and ethnically. One Asian woman from Daytona Beach, Fla. Two men, one from Daytona Berkeley, Calif., the other from Hawaii. A woman lawyer from Boston. And a therapist from New York. Three of us were from Connecticut. Four were Christians and four were Jews.
Our age range was interesting as well. I was above the average as the oldest in the group by 10 years. Several were their early 50s, two in their middle 60s, one 74 and moi, 83.
The accommodations were simple and we traveled in a mini-van from one end of the country to another. From East Jerusalem to Hebron, to Haifa and Tel-Aviv. To the Sea of Galilee and stops in Nazareth. An overnight stay in Tamara, hosted by a Bedouin family. The days of talk and more talk. Ten days of looking and listening. Hard on the body as well as the mind, but worth every ache.
We arrived in East Jerusalem the night of Arafat's death, which gave us some pause. But the first night spent in a convent, as in small hotel, dispelled some of those fears. The first task was to prepare us for 10 days of walking, talking and mostly listening.
The schedule included meetings with both Palestinians and Israeli Jews. The Rabbis for Human Rights arranged for an orientation about their work and then took us to an olive grove for our first adventure. We went deep into the West Bank and climbed up a dry rocky hill to a Palestinian grove. We met the men and women who were harvesting the olives. They told us of the difficulties in maintaining their groves. Lack of water and security demands of the Israeli Defense Force (IDF), often cut onto the groves.
But it took no time for us to use our people power to help in the harvesting. Down on our hands and knees, we scraped the small black fruit from the ground and filled many bags that would be taken to the market. The non-stop work was accompanied with non-stop talking. Some in English, some in Hebrew, and some with just smiles, thanking us and embracing us for our help.
One couldn't miss the Israeli tank parked on the top of the hill close to the olive harvesters. I can only assume that the army watches every gathering large or small, working or just hanging out. The well-armed soldiers questioned us about our presence with a warning to me to put down my camera. No pictures here.
After our olive picking we spent the night at a Palestinian home in Hebron. The extended family of mother, father, kids of every size and age, gathered in their spacious apartment welcome us. The host's wife prepared a marvelous dinner eaten, of course, on the carpeted floor and sitting pillows. After dinner, their cousins, neighbors and friends came to see us and spend time talking about the problems they face with the occupation.
It was one hair-raising tale after another. Checkpoint harassment, home demolitions, identity cards and endless hours trying to get to work. A professor of mechanical engineering could hardly contain his anger when he told of the treatment he frequently experiences from Israeli soldiers. Call it humiliation, or lack of respect. My words, not his.
We were to spend the night with this family. Just before we retired to the cots that they provided, we heard shooting in the street below. The Israeli soldiers were on the lookout for (I assume) suspicious Palestinians youths. We darkened the room and peered through the curtained window. It was only three flights up so we could see the soldiers stopping young Palestinian men. One boy was stripped to the waist for the search. Soldiers then ran into small apartment houses in the area looking for? According to our hosts this happens frequently in Hebron. "If they come up to our apartment, please tell them that you are our friends."
"But we are," we all shouted in unison. They never came.
The shooting finally stopped and the soldiers left the area. The guests were able to make their way home.
It was obvious that these street searches occurred frequently in Hebron. What with 500 settlers sitting on the upper part of the town and 1,500 Israeli soldiers defending them against 120,000 Palestinians who also live there, is hardly a formula for peace.
The town is a flash point for both Israelis and Palestinians. The poverty in Hebron hits one as you wander through the streets. Buildings in disrepair, streets poorly kept. Many of the stalls in the narrow alleyways where goods and foodstuff are sold are closed. Permanently? Who knows? Not a pretty sight.
The Christian's Peacemaker Teams who took us about the city pointed to the many restrictions for the Palestinian residents. Roads fenced off for Israeli uses only. Checkpoints abound. School clos¬ings are not unusual for the Palestinian children. Freedom to walk the city, not for the Palestinian residents, and today not even for the eight Americans.
Is it because of Arafat's death? ¬Perhaps. What an introduction to what became for us a heart-wrenching search for some answers to how these two peoples could find a road to peace.
The rest of the trip had its moments of grief and joy. The teachers in Tel Aviv school, who created a peace curriculum with their Palestinian colleagues, were both hopeful and exciting. Young Israeli Jewish girls came to meet us and tell of their camp experience with Arab girls of the same age. They spoke of the friendships that resulted from this experience.
We also visited the Peace Kibbutz, Neveh Shalom/Wahat al Salam, a community of Jews and Arabs, all Israeli citizens who have dedicated themselves to modeling coexistence between two peoples. It is a bilingual and a bi-cultural community. If there is any place where conflicts can be resolved, it appeared to be here.
A high point for me was meeting with the "Refusnicks." These are the young men and women who have refused to serve in the occupied zone. The group is called the Courage to Refuse. And courage it is!
They say very clearly that they will always be there to defend the State of Israel, but never to bear arms in the occupied zone. Some go to jail for several months. Their numbers are growing. Their message to us: "Tell the American Jewish what we are doing and why."
What shocked me the most was the Wall. The Israelis call it a separation barrier. Miles of concrete and barbed wire cutting across olive groves and roads, encircling Palestinian homes and cutting them off from the settlers' homes. These fences are controlled by Israeli soldiers at every checkpoint. Palestinians who have to go to work or from one place to another are stopped - sometimes for hours for "security" reasons. Often olive groves are cut into and homes demolished, all in the name of Israeli security. The violence of the barbed wire struck me as the harshest attack on a people. Who could imagine that those enclosures would lead to peace?
The 16-hour non-stop flight home gave me time to think about what I saw, learned and felt betrayed. Were not we the people who had been oppressed? Are we now becoming the oppressor? But most troubling for me was the hate and anger that I saw in the eyes and faces of the young Palestinians and young Israeli soldiers. Is growing up with hate and anger in their hearts a formula for two countries trying to live side by side?
I returned home in one piece in spite of dire predictions and immediately heard about an action being planned by Israeli and Palestinian artists and writers.
In late January 2005 these two groups were to send 10,000 yellow balloons over the many miles of the Wall as a signal of peace and friendship. Both sides have had enough and want to be heard.
In addition, an Israeli and a Palestinian mother, both of whom have lost children, one in a suicide bombing and one when the Israeli army bombed a West Bank home, are now in the USA on a speaking tour urging an end to the violence on both sides.
They have suffered too much to continue in this mode. Israel is a divided country. Likkud and Labor and all the parties in between have to find a way for working together to end the car¬nage.
Peace groups are once again taking an active role. Violence has had a terrible impact on the Jews and Palestinians both of who have suffered pain and loss. Many Israeli Jews feel that the treatment of the Palestinians, their denial of equal justice and human rights, can only breed more anger and hate.
More and more Palestinians also reject the random suicide bombings, and wish for a resump¬tion of the peace talks. But the issues of the settlements, the right of return, and an end to the occu¬pation, must be addressed. There is growing support for this position if only the governments would get out of the way.
As I stood on a comer in Tel Aviv with other Israeli Women in Black in silent protest against the occupation; I couldn't help but feel that I was on 14th Street in New York City doing the same thing. These Israeli women have been at it since 1988. Their numbers have dwindled, but their courage to protest has not diminished.
I will return to 14th Street next week with my black coat and sign to end the occupation. But I will add to that sign that the women of Israel and Palestine cry out for an end to the killing. Just say STOP!
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