Israel/Palestine Update 1 - Bethlehem

Hello friends,
I'm sitting here early on Friday morning, and like many Mennonites and
Amish before me, I'm questioning the real benefits of modern
technology. With the wonder of electronic amplification, one can hear
every single mosque in town broadcast their 4:00am call to prayer. It
comes all at once, like a choir singing with different sheet music.
The Muslims of town may or may not respond with private prayers in
their homes, but the rooster and dog who live right across the street
share none of their modesty. Maybe they are Christian and they take
the verse literally that calls one to praise loudly at the top of your
voice. Then when the Christian church rings its bell around 5:00am,
this only inspires their zeal for proclaiming, as one would expect
from such pious animals. It's quite impressive they would continue to
have such enthusiasm for an event that happened yesterday, the day
before, and pretty much every day for hundreds of years. Combine this
noisy chorus with a jet-lagged internal clock, and here I sit.

My jet lag hasn't been too bad. Once you live with a medical
resident, your perspective on sleep deprivation changes drastically -
it's much easier to say to yourself, "Suck it up, it ain't gonna
killya." I landed at 5:00pm Tel Aviv time on Wednesday (which is 7
hours earlier than the east coast) and had began preparing myself for
passport control. I'd heard lots of horror stories; people being
detained for hours, grilled and questioned over and over about why
they're coming, who they're going ot see, and more than once being
denied entry. I started getting a bit nervous, until the airplane
speakers started pumping "I'm hooked on a feeling..." It's sort of
difficult to be intimidated about anything with such cheesy 80's music
as the soundtrack. Sure enough, I walked up to the young woman
checking passports, made some crack about my hair, and they let me
through with nary a question.

In the airport I met up with four other CPT team members, and we
hopped onto a minivan taxi for the 25 mile ride from Ben Gurion
airport in Tel Aviv to Jerusalem. I was immediately struck by the
beauty of the place. First of all, the airport was stunning. I
especially enjoyed watching all the families reunited and friends
running to embrace one another at the exit area. What an amazing
level of diversity - so many languages and ethnicities, all talking
loudly with big smiles. There was also a large contingent of holy
land tour members, all of whom had the eager look of people trying to
find their spiritual roots or just their tour guide. On the taxi
ride, we dropped off some people in the orthodox areas of Jerusalem,
and it was a thrill to see entire communities in the traditional black
attire and haircuts. I even caught a glimpse of a young man with the
distinctive aspect of down syndrome wearing the traditional black hat
and suit, apparently integrated right into community life. Seeing
this amazing mix of conformity, heritage, and international diversity
in Israeli society, plus seeing a few neon signs in hebrew, really
brought home that I was in a different place. On that ride, I found
myself excited about the entire Israel project - where else has such
diversity been brought together in one place? Such deep heritage
combined with a truly world-wide diversity makes this a region with
incredible potential. One could live right beside a Christian, a Jew,
and a Muslim, each from far, far away or from a local community dating
back centuries. The taxi dropped us off at the Damascus gate, leading
into the Old City of Jerusalem. Once we crossed underneath this
massive stone structure, it was like passing into another era. The
"main" street was no wider than an alleyway, and the architecture was
that distinctive mish-mash of really old cities, where everything has
been added on and rearranged in a chaotic pattern. It was all made of
stone, and with the rattle of Hebrew and Arabic from the street
vendors, I felt like I was in a movie.

The other reality was also present, seeing heavy barbwire and tall
guard towers as we briefly passed through the West Bank on our drive
from the airport. The reality is also present here in my writing,
giving me an extra challenge in relating my experiences to you.
Before I came, CPT told me that there are no fewer than three
governments interested in what I say from here, and I can just assume
they are listening. I thought it sounded a little
conspiracy-theory-ish, until the experience with the coffee shop. CPT
published a short article on a small Palestinian coffee shop that
re-opened its doors to business in the Hebron Old City, despite the
fact that all the other businesses have closed down due to the
presence of settlers and soldiers keeping customers away. They told
the owner's story, using the name Mohammed as an alias. Not two weeks
after the email report came out (sent via email to CPT folks), some
soldiers came into the shop looking for a "Mohammed" and for the
author of the article. Finding neither, they eventually left. Two
other CPT members were in the shop at the time, and reported the
incident in a later post. Hey wow, they're really keeping tabs on
this stuff. So welcome to any of you checking in from any special
agencies; glad to have you along. I have heard about a number of
other incidents since arriving - any information connecting a
Palestinian to a western organization like CPT can put them under a
great deal of harrassment and danger. Therefore, I'm unable to tell
you about the wonderful family with whom we're staying now. Maybe
when I get home and figure out a good and safe way to work with
pseudonymns and such, but we'll see. Just take it from me; wonderful
hospitality.

Thursday was the day of overwhelming. In the morning we took a quick
minivan tour around Jerusalem with Angela from the Israeli Committee
Against House Demolitions. We got to see the new security fence
cutting through parts of East Jerusalem - the Palestinian side. In
this part of town, it is a striking picture: 12meter high concrete
with razor wire on top. We saw the empty gas stations along a
once-busy highway which was completely blockaded by the wall, and the
rubble from a home torn down in order to build it. We saw new
settlements being built in the Palestinian areas, and 88 homes all
with demolition orders waiting to be filled because they are in an
"archeological zone" where King David once walked. The litany of
legislation and the long, methodical story behind occupied East
Jerusalem nearly became too much. By the time we finished the tour,
I'd stopped trying to keep up with all the details - they just run
together after a while. Then in the afternoon, we met another Israeli
organization called B'Tselem. They pursue legal responses to these
injustices and also work to change the government policies toward the
Palestinians, with only moderate success. At the end of the day, it
is nothing less than overwhelming.

Since there are many folks on this list who are, like I have been,
unsure about the conflict here, I want to tell you about my mindset
now. I came with many questions; first of all I wanted to find some
sense of discernment about what's actually happening. So much of the
literature I found in the U.S. seems to be propaganda for one side or
the other, I wanted to find out some truth first-hand. Now, in just
the briefest time here, I have seen it for myself; seen where the
security fence plows through neighborhoods, cutting Palestinian
Christians and Muslims off from their schools and work; seen
settlements being rapidly built on land outside the official state of
Israel; seen the stumps of entire fields of olive trees cut down for
being too close to a new highway - one of the highways in Palestinian
territory but closed to Palestinians; seen the ruins of houses plus
some of the nearly 1,000 homes with outstanding demolition orders in
Jerusalem alone. Make no mistake nor excuse: the injustice is clear
and real. It does indeed have direct similarities to the stories from
South Africa, from the pre-Civil Rights southern U.S., from
(ironically) the Warsaw ghetto, and other situations of control -
where one party has great power and works to control and exploit a
party without power. And the spiritual reality - if you believe in
such - is palpable. Even a bone-head like myself can pick up on the
draining sensation present on the line seperating the occupied
territory from Israel proper. There are unique elements here, to be
sure, but I have no more question that the principalities and powers
behind the policies and occupation of Palestine are destructive and
wrong. "That ain't right," to borrow the eloquent phrase of an
Atlanta friend.

Now, the challenge is how to call a spade a spade, stand up against
clear injustice (as my faith demands), and still keep an open mind
about the future. This is clearly not simply a good guys/bad guys
affair, and there is beautiful potential for what can happen with
Israelis and Palestinians. Yet the current situation is being
corrupted by policies which, under the all-powerful reasoning of
"security," are confiscating land, preventing Palestinians from
working, dividing them from their families, and creating poverty and
despair. I still hope to remain open to discernment while here, but
to ignore these clear examples of injustice would be, to use a phrase
from Dr. King, a bad case of "analysis paralysis." Open-mindedness
cannot mean becoming frozen in a neutral, passive state in the face of
evil. If I remember correctly, Jesus did love and respect everyone,
but that never stopped him from standing up and acting decisively for
the sake of real justice. The remaining question is "how to respond?"
Violence obviously doesn't do anyone any good - just look at current
events in Gaza and Lebanon. This will be the next question I want to
think about while over here - how does one deal with this? Especially
as an outsider from another country?

First of all, I can deal with it by respecting the tradition of
hospitality in Palestine, and continue eating myself sick at every
meal prepared for us. Grape leaves, hummus, pita... I do this for the
sake of world peace, of course. And the falafel stand for lunch
yesterday: scrumptious. Every one of you should be really jealous
that you didn't get one of these sandwiches. I have worked hard to
earn the reputation as someone who can help finish off another's
leftovers, and sister Jean and I have formed a wonderful symbiotic
relationship. She is a Maryknoll sister who worked in Japan over 50
years, and doesn't like to see food go to waste. We get along great.

Okay, sun's coming up. I'm signing off for now. God's peace to you,
Andy

PS - For those new to the list, here's the website for previous posts.
I also hope to get some pictures up there soon.
www.johnstonontheweb.blogspot.com