We left the hotel early to travel to Bethlehem, which is
very near to Jerusalem but in the ‘A zone’, which means it is under full
authority of the Palestinians.
They have a municipal government here, and their own police force
(albeit, one without guns). In order to get there, we had to pass through a
checkpoint, which was like a toll booth but with armed guards. Americans are welcome, but if an Israeli
wants to enter Bethlehem, he or she needs a visa. We learned that Palestinians also need a visa to get into
Jerusalem. Apparently this doesn’t
happen easily or often, but our guide Iyad (ee-YAD), an Arab Palestinian
Christian, was able to get a month-long pass over Christmas for religious
reasons.
We head into the Aida (ay-EE-da) Refuge Camp first, which is
next to the security wall in Bethlehem, and the first thing I notice is the
graffiti art. There are beautiful
depictions of pain, resistance, anger, and sadness on the wall. Some are
written in English, obviously hoping for a foreign audience. They say a lot.
Iyad takes the opportunity to remind us about the reason for the existence of the refugee camps; during or as a result of the 1948-9 War, 800,000 Palestinian people were forcibly removed from their homes, often at gunpoint. Some were promised that they could come back tomorrow, or in a few weeks. Iyad says, “We were a simple people, a village people. Then somebody tells us to leave. Maybe they heard there was a massacre, heard that it might be dangerous, may have left to save themselves or their family. But it certainly wasn’t voluntarily.” The people in Aida have come from at least 8 different villages in Jerusalem, Haifa, and other areas. They lived in tents until the bad winter of 1954. At that point, the UN built units of concrete, 1 bedroom per family.
Iyad takes the opportunity to remind us about the reason for the existence of the refugee camps; during or as a result of the 1948-9 War, 800,000 Palestinian people were forcibly removed from their homes, often at gunpoint. Some were promised that they could come back tomorrow, or in a few weeks. Iyad says, “We were a simple people, a village people. Then somebody tells us to leave. Maybe they heard there was a massacre, heard that it might be dangerous, may have left to save themselves or their family. But it certainly wasn’t voluntarily.” The people in Aida have come from at least 8 different villages in Jerusalem, Haifa, and other areas. They lived in tents until the bad winter of 1954. At that point, the UN built units of concrete, 1 bedroom per family.
There are 3 refugee camps holding
20,000 people at Bethlehem. There
are 56 refugee camps recognized by the UN, but more that are not recognized.
Every refugee has a registration card from the UN, which designates that person
eligible for what the future might bring – the right to return, or compensation
for their displacement. This is
the stickiest issue in the Israel/Palestinian peace efforts. In sticking with a 2-state solution,
Israel will not be allowing Palestinians to return to Jewish areas of an
Israeli state. And, in my
knowledge, compensation has not been discussed. This issue has the power to halt negotiations and divide the
will of the Palestinian Authority, caught in a tug of war between those people
who want peace and the refugees still hoping and waiting for recognition of
their loss. There has been no progress on this front for decades, and progress
is not likely in the foreseeable future.
There are now (as these people have continued with new generations) 6 to
7 million Palestinian refugees from the war; 1.5 million of those people still
live in the camps. Iyad says, “my
grandmother used to say – when an Ottoman (Turkish) soldier or a British
soldier would walk down the street, those people were definitely scary. People would run and hide. But the
Turks and the Brits never came to replace
them [Palestinians]. Now people
are coming from all over the world, kicking them out, taking their homes,
confiscating their land, taking everything.” The unfairness is undeniable.
Palestinian land is divided into three zones, A, B, and
C. Areas A denote Palestinian
cities, and are completely under the Palestinian Authority, like
Bethlehem. Areas B encompass the
villages surrounding Palestinian cities, and are governed half by Palestinians
and half by Israelis. The
Palestinian Authority handles the bureaucratic administration, and Israel
handles security. Areas C are the
countryside – wider, open spaces behind villages that aren’t fully populated.
Often this land is farmland or olive groves. They are completely under the occupation. The land is still owned, and sometimes
worked, by Palestinians, but they are not allowed to build or repair homes, dig
wells, or create any major infrastructure. People have lived in C areas since 1916 with no electricity,
no building, and no water or wells.
The C areas account for 60% of the West Bank. A and B zones comprise 40% of Palestinian Land. 12% of all of Israel is actually zoned
as “C”. 
The C zones are where Jewish Settlers plant new housing
developments in defiance of Palestinian ownership. (According to our guide Iyad, he's had conversations with Israelis who feel that Palestine can have their cities and villages, and the Jewish Settlers can just absorb all of Area C. These people usually have no real comprehension of how much of the potential Palestinian state is Area C - 60%). And it would seem that the state of Israel is paving the way
for that reality. The 20-foot high
security wall that we are standing next to has been placed, not on the border
of Jewish neighborhoods, but kissing distance to the Aida refugee camp and the
city of Bethlehem – dividing the territory that is Area C outside of Bethlehem
from the actual city of Bethlehem, and making an obstacle for mobility,
relationships, and livelihood for the Palestinians living or working there. Israel
justifies the wall by pointing to the decrease in suicide bombings. Iyad, however, says that suicide
bombings have decrease because there is growing recognition that “every bombing
hurts us; we may be in a good place and it sets us back”. Rather, standing in front of the wall,
Iyad says, “You may call this a security wall, or border wall, or apartheid. I
call it an expansion and annexation wall”. 
We spend some time looking through the conditions of the camp – which are pretty flush with trash and run-down. People here are allowed to add 1 room, perhaps two, to the 1-unit concrete block shacks built by the UN. He shows us the school, whose windows have now been blocked out because it sits too close to the security wall and during skirmishes with the Israeli Army, Israeli soldiers’ bullets were landing in the classrooms. The teachers have not been paid in the refugee camp for one month. Last summer the camp went 40 days without water. Our guides allege this is to ‘pressure’ the Palestinian people. Camp residents are aware that we are Westerners. Some tourists drive through Aida on their way to the Church of the Nativity, which is why much of the graffiti is in English.
We’re met by Marwan, who works with the community through
nonviolent means for change. He
points us to a gate with a huge key which is the symbol for Palestinian
refugees. This denotes the key
that many of them still hold to a home that no longer exists, one that they
were forced to leave in 1948 and never compensated for. This key has recently returned from a
world exhibition in Europe, using art to raise awareness about the Palestinian
plight. Stamped in the middle of
the key, it says “Not for Sale”.
As a leader and rabblerouser in the Refugee camps, Marwan is on an Israel watch list. He told us an anecdote about trying to get a visa to go into Jerusalem so his son could have surgery in a better health facility. The usual channels had failed, so Marwan called up an old friend who worked security. The old friend said, “I have pictures of you all over my computer”, indicating how much surveillance he had been under by Israel. Eventually he was able to get a one-day pass for this surgery. Marwan says that he works through nonviolent means because he has hope, in his heart, and freedom in his mind, which allows him to continue his work for his children’s sake.
 |
| Over the stairs as we descend |
Iyad explains that his family, historically,
were shepherds, and they had no trouble understanding what was meant in the
scripture when Jesus was “laid in a manger”.
 |
| Marking the spot of the Manger in the cave |
When you are a shepherd in the desert, Iyad says, you keep your animals in caves at night. There are scarce building materials for stables, but caves are plentiful and cool. As this evolved, shepherd families came to build rooms outside the caves, where the animals would walk through the front door and directly into the cave, and the family would stay off the to side. But these were often small rooms with 7, 10, or 12 people in the extended family. So when a woman is pregnant, does she give birth in the middle of all that cloistered company? No, she goes down into the cave for some privacy, and gives birth near the animals. They understood what it meant to ‘lay him in a manger’ because all their women gave birth in caves.
We headed to the Bethlehem Fair Trade Artisans for some fair
souvenir shopping before having one of our most meaningful stops of the trip
with Sami at the Holy Land Trust.
This peace organization, so named because they aspire to build trust in
the Holy Land - a concept sorely lacking in the conflict - and by doing so
become better trustees of the land.
Sami, a Palestinian, has his own family tale of loss at the hands of the
Israelis. Instead of letting
bitterness direct his life he has started an organization that aims for
dialogue and understanding between the two peoples. In beginning this work, Sami traveled to Auschwitz and
Bergen-Belsen to see, firsthand, the trauma of the Jewish people, and it deeply
affected his approach to his work.
This was the first time we began to talk about the effects of
Trauma. Sami pointed out that fear
and trauma still strongly anchored in the Jewish culture, inherited generation after
generation, anchors the need to protect Jewish community with strength and
desire for exclusivity. He
questioned what is needed in Israeli society – what kind of healing – will
allow them to move forward with peace, and how the Holocaust is manipulated to
keep people rooted in the horrid memory and allow the past to dictate the
decisions about the future. Sami
mentioned that the State of Israel pays for youth group trips to Auschwitz, and
while he was there, he overheard the leaders telling the kids; “this is your
past, but it is also your present and your future. This has always happened to the Jews, and will always keep
happening. Safeguard Israel.”
Sami’s organization focuses on creating leadership on both
sides that strives to understand the trauma and pain of the other side. The
Holy Land Trust also plans demonstrations and has achieved a sort of love/hate
relationship with the local Israeli police chief. They’ve had meetings where the police chief confessed that
he respects Sami’s work, even though the chief still shuts down his rallies, at
times brutally. Sami has finally
been dropped from the Israeli black list and is able to get visas again. The Holy Land Trust regularly sends
Palestinians to see the concentration camps, and trains people for listening
and taking action rather than making opinions. He made the allegory to football fans – people in the stands
are very emotional, very opinionated, and spend a lot of time shouting and
yelling, but don’t play the game.
He said there are very different conversations happening on the
field. He challenges – are you in
the stands or on the field? If so,
the conversation has to be different.
“If someone has an opinion, we suggest this test: go out and find an
evening with no clouds. Lie on
your back, share your opinion, and if any of the stars move – you are right.”
So much of what we talked about the Sami was inspired, from
the very heart of a very hot, raw and emotional conflict. In the end, he said something about
working for peace that I loved; “We cannot do everything, and there is
liberation in that; because it enables us to do something, and to do it very,
very well.”
…
Reflection: Heat
Heat. It comes
down to heat. It’s a sad fact that
Americans use more energy per person than anywhere else on the globe. Confronted with that fact, most think immediately
of oil and the ‘car culture’ of the US.
But the consumption also results from central heat. We heat our entire buildings, our
entire homes – from the basement to the upper floors, whether we are in the
rooms or not – and even when we’re not home. It’s incredibly wasteful. From living in China, I learned that
central heating is not a universal practice throughout the world. It’s a clear indication of quality of
life. But because it is our
practice, we become accustomed to being heated from the outside in - even, in this
age, making sure our car is preheated before we have to go out on a wintry
morning - and have forgotten how to heat ourselves – for example, by wearing
layers.
From
the beginning of Day 4, the day we spent in Palestinian-governed Bethlehem, we
were cold. In the Aida Refugee
Camp, the temperature inside the Community Center was actually colder than it
was outside in the sunshine. The
quick baggage and toilet stop at the Holy Land Trust, and later our wonderful
relaxing discussion and reflection in the meditation room were surprisingly
chilly. And the homestays, while
extremely gracious, had most of us shivering in our beds. The heated water was so tepid that it
was not worth showering. In
contrast, the very first thing I noticed in the beautiful home of Rabbi Aryeh
Ben David, in the spacious and clean settlement of Efrat, was the heat. I sat right on the wall radiator and
let my cold cocoon melt away. As I
said, it’s a clear indication of quality of life. Haunted by our chilly homestay, I asked Ben David if he had
contact with Palestinians, or had ever visited a Palestinian town – seeing as
he was living in a home and settlement which were technically on Palestinian
Land where Palestinians are not allowed.
No. Ben David met
Palestinians who work for him, but has never been in a Palestinian village – in
fact, he’s probably not allowed, because Israelis can rarely get visas for
Palestinian areas, just as Palestinians are rarely able to enter Israel except
for work (and that entails a 2 hour wait at a checkpoint each way). It’s effective at keeping each group
blamelessly ignorant of the disparity in quality of life.
Heat. Heat can
also denote tension, as in ‘the argument got heated’. Facing the disparities brings this type of heat – the heat
of anger. You cannot listen to
Iyad (our Arab Christian Palestinian guide through Bethlehem) explain the
refugee situation without heat showing up. You cannot NOT be angry when you hear about the events of
the prior afternoon, when kids threw a rock at Israeli soldiers on the wall,
and in return, were tear-gassed and sound-bombed. Heat is what the kids learn here. Their children’s games play out the occupation – shooting,
arresting, and imprisonment. It’s
no wonder they throw rocks.
Heat is what comes as we listen to Ben David call the
removal of Palestinians from land their families lived on for centuries as ‘an
historical glitch’, dismiss the Settlers breaking international law because of
Arafat’s semantics, and put the responsibility for peace on the oppressed
minority to ‘change their curriculum’ and live for 10 years in peace before Israel
makes concessions. This heat, for
me, erupted in burning tears of frustration and outrage.
But Sami, Director of the Holy Land Trust, talked about a different way of approaching heat. As a Palestinian, he discussed his trip to Auschwitz and Bergen, and his hope to really understand the Jewish people’s hurt, and heat - to shed light on their drive to live in the land of Palestine. He uses the face to face encounters to bring heat out in the open and into dialogue. In Yoga, yogis instruct you to breath to ‘bring heat into the system’ of your body, allowing your blood to heat up, circulate better, and improve flexibility and health. That is how I think of Sami’s work - bringing heat into dialogue to try to put out the fire of Israel and Palestine. Listening with open ears to another’s heat – their painful memories, anger, and sense of betrayal – is difficult and likely gets hot at times. But bringing in another’s trauma allows us to share heat. And shared heat, like shared grief in my opinion, dissipates the burn.
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