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Jerusalem: Israel or Palestine?
Mar 28th, 2008 by Mark & Jen
We’ve come across a few no-brainer business opportunities since we started traveling nine months ago. The first was in China. With the incessant construction, we envisioned ourselves getting gloriously rich opening a business in cranes and scaffolding. Here in Israel, the same is true of fencing, security perimeters, barbed wire, and concrete walls.
In all seriousness, we’ve had a lot of “we had no idea” moments in the past two weeks. We hope we can convey some of what we have been learning.
For those unfamiliar, for four hundred years the Muslims controlled the land that is now Israel. In 1516 the Ottomans captured Jerusalem from the remaining the Crusaders. For four hundred years, Arabs built homes and mosques, planted their fields, raised their children. In 1917, Britain entered and Jews began moving to Jerusalem. And then in 1948, the British left and Israelis won their state in the Arab-Israeli War. Four hundred years of Arab settlement abruptly ended.
The city of Jerusalem was divided into western (mostly Jewish) and eastern (mostly Muslim) areas. Subsequently, Israel annexed East Jerusalem in the 1967 Six-Day War. (This is still the source of much contention, as most Palestinians view East Jerusalem as the potential capital of the Palestinian state. In addition, Israel’s annexation of East Jerusalem has not been recognized by the international community.)
Fast forward to today, and it isn’t too hard to read between the lines — Israel is making a valiant attempt to portray a peaceful Jerusalem for the would-be tourist (us). Our second day in the city, upon returning to our hotel, we were blockaded by dozens of police. A helicopter circled overhead. Multiple locals informed us it was simply routine security for an international diplomat that was visiting. We learned later a Jewish rabbi had been stabbed in the neck by an unknown assailant. This was only a few days after the shooting at a Jewish seminary.
What about “the other side” of the story? We participated in a tour of East Jerusalem, led by a Palestinian, Abu Hassan, visiting portions of the separation barrier (the official Israeli term is “security wall”; many Palestinians refer to it as the “annexation wall”) being built by Israel — a move Israel contends is necessary for national security. If the wall is indeed for security, Abu points out, why does the wall annex 46% of the West Bank (would-be Palestine) and why it is often erected through the middle of Arab neighborhoods, separating families from families instead of Israelis from Palestinians? In the most egregious example, the wall makes a ninety degree turn at the home of an American woman, goes behind her house, turns again, and then continues unabated up the street. We’re told she had sufficient connections with the US Embassy to ensure her house (and property value) didn’t end up on the wrong side of the fence (pun intended).
We thought again and again of the parallels to the Berlin Wall. But, this wall is three times as long and twice as high. It meanders, mostly ignoring the Green Line from the 1949 Armistice, even snaking to ensure wells stay on the Israeli side of the fence lest they fall into would-be Palestinian territory. (As a side note, Israel currently controls the majority of would-be Palestine’s water — Abu points out you can easily identify Palestinian settlements by looking for the black water tanks on the roofs, a telling sign of water scarcity.)
We stopped along the wall of one Palestinian community. The entrance was blocked. Flowing out from under it through large drainpipes was a stream of sewage. Abu explained, “Last week, the gate was slightly open — just enough to squeeze through. Now, they’ve closed it — to test us, see what we will do. People can only cross through the drainpipes now. In a tour yesterday, we saw a woman coming through the drainpipe carrying a child. She stumbled and fell in the filth. As she rose and tore off her soiled coat, she cursed life and God and Israel and her ruined dress. It is humiliating.”
Security/Annexation Wall (drainpipes on left, graffiti of a door on right)
“Just imagine if this happened in your city,” Abu repeatedly asked in his rhetorical questioning. “How would you feel if someone came in and took your land and bulldozed your home? Made it nearly impossible to go to work everyday? Took your pride and humiliated you at every checkpoint? Would you too become angry?” We cannot answer this.
We traveled to Bethlehem, which involved taking a bus from Jerusalem a few kilometers, disembarking, walking through the checkpoint, and then continuing on in a separate bus on the Palestinian side. On our return, we were chatting with a Palestinian gentleman on his way to Jerusalem for work. His paperwork was scrutinized, after which he was electronically fingerprinted. Meanwhile, the same guard waved the two of us through without so much as a cursory glance — we barely flashed our unopened passports. How is it that two people who live half a world away can travel more freely in a country than someone who lives a few kilometers down the street?
Unless we live here, we will neither understand the quiet subtleties nor the complex immensity of this conflict. We apologize to the people here for anything we may have misinterpreted. But we feel we now understand better what compels the actions of both sides. We asked Mr. Hassan what he sees as a solution: “We either learn to live together, or we die together.” We hope it is the former.
Graffiti on the Separation Barrier outside Bethlehem
A collection of interesting and informative resources:
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What are the solutions to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict? (presented in a non-partisan pro-con format)
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Al-Haq’s Documentary, In the Spider’s Web (day-in-the-life of a girls’ school in Hebron, and discusses the implications of the security wall/annexation wall)
- One Jerusalem
…and some Christians would claim that it’s all in the name of the New Jerusalem. Just doesn’t sound like the work of Jesus to me. Besides, I think he can handle bringing about the New Jerusalem on his own–no walls involved. Don’t you think? It’s enough to make Abraham cry.
Be careful you two.
Love, Heather
Hey guys,
I can’t imagine seeing this in person. Thanks to Netflix I’ve seen some pretty telling documentaries on the situation there. The international community pretends to want peace, but no one wants to deal with the ridiculous amount of international law violations on Israel’s behalf. It is beyond sad. Of course, while there are international laws they are un-enforced all over the world so what’s the point. Personally I don’t thing Israel deserves the support it receives from the US and especially from Christian Zionists. Unfortunately or fortunately, depending on your view, there is only one answer. Forgiveness. It is the only thing that could end such a prolonged history of conflict where every generation can rightly hold their anger and has been personally transgressed against. If only forgiveness was more highly valued on either side of the wall.
Four hundred years of “Arab/Muslim settlements”? What about 1,374 years?
Don’t you know that that Islam came into Palestine in 634 AD?
When the Ottomans came, Palestine remained predominantly Muslim but the Christian and Jewish minorities lived there peacefully.
What are the “Arabs” of Palestine then? A mixture of many people, dating back to pre-Hebrew populations (e.g. the Canaanites among others).
The only people with a right to be in Palestine are the non-Jews whom the Zionists have been trying to eject even since they set foot there.
We should all support the Palestinians in their struggle and keep telling the colonists that, if they want to remain, they should learn how to behave like guests, not warmongering racists and supremacists.
I must add:
The indigenous Jews are, of course, different from the foreign Zionist Jews and should have the same status as the indigenous non-Jews.
CJL - Agreed, Islam originally came to Palestine in 634/8AD. For the sake of some brevity, we started our history after the Crusaders were defeated by the Ottomans in 1516. Our (attempted) point is that in the four hundred years prior to Britain arriving in 1917, modern day Israel had been controlled by the Muslims (prior to that the Crusaders, and prior to that it would take another few pages to detail) — hence, the ardent conflict that exists no less than a hundred years later.
Heather & Luke - agreed. (Mark & Jen)
“The ardent conflict”, in my opinion, was not caused by the dominance of the Muslim Ottomans from 1516. The Crusaders might have been present in the “Holy Land” for 150+ years but never managed to chase the local Muslims; then the (Muslim) Mameluks seized the last Latin possessions in 1291. The important fact is that Palestine is very much a Middle Eastern country and was invaded by EUROPEAN Zionist Jews who transformed a religion into a “national cause” and created chaos in the region, aided and abetted by colonial powers, Britain and France the the USA. The EUROPEAN Jews, like the EUROPEAN Christians have no right over the indigenous people of Palestine, whether Muslim, Christian or Jewish.
The Crusaders were defeated, the Zionists will suffer the same fate if they do not learn how to live as equals with the indigenous Palestinians, as I said above!
NB: I do not swear allegiance to any particular religion, mine is simply to care about justice and peace.