I have been living in Hebron, Palestine for about a month now. About a week after receiving my B.A. from Boston University, I relocated here to teach English and experience firsthand everything that this land has to offer. The generosity of the people I live and work with is unmatched in any other place I have visited.
I have been to the old city of Hebron once so far, led by a student of mine. She took me to the house of an amazing woman who lives on Shuhada Street. The front door, like all the others on the now settler-only-road – the main thoroughfare of the old city – has been bolted shut by soldiers. She is lucky though, she says, to have a back stairwell, as others must go to and from their homes by climbing on rooftops and crawling through windows or makeshift doors. From the roof of her house is a view of the entire old city and Shuhada Street.
I have heard many heartrending stories in my month here. This is a group of people who have had their human dignity, a certain basic human decency, denied. This degradation has become almost banal, almost commonplace. Restricting the movement of a people, and forbidding them to enter their homes through the front door simply because of who they are, is not a matter of “security.” It is a policy of discrimination. It is the codification and legislation of a racist point of view. When soldiers can enter your home and squat there at any time, when they can prod you and make you disrobe in the middle of the street, without reason or you being able to ask why – this is unquestionably wrong. When you can only walk on the right hand side of the street, when you can only enter through the back door of the al-Ibrahim mosque, and when you can only go into the Palestinian section of the mosque; this is unmistakably wrong.
Looking out over Shuhada Street – a view that is from the ground blocked by barbed wire and enormous concrete blocks – is an intense reminder of what actually lies behind what we call the “situation,” or the “occupation,” or the “issue.” Each of these euphemisms represents something much greater, more real, and more precious than a single word can signify: human life.
Sometimes it is all too easy to forget what this is really about, to mentally streamline the situation that is the Palestinian cause. Maybe it is even a coping mechanism to forget the full scope of what we are dealing with, what we are fighting for.
The Palestinian cause is not, foremost, a political issue. Sure, politics do at times serve as a realm for open debate, and at their best provide a vehicle for change. But reducing the Palestinian “issue” to just that – an “issue” – fools us into thinking that it functions on a single plane. We end up thinking that this is a situation of politics, caused by politics, to be remedied by politics. We risk losing sight of the full issue at hand.
This is not about being right or left, conservative or liberal, Republican or Democrat. This transcends such superficial dichotomies because it deals with something much more real and much more relevant than partisan sentiments.
This is a moral issue. Anyone who can genuinely say that he values, observes, and respects the equality of men – whether by theism or some more humanistic mentality – does not have to look hard to know what should be done. Anyone who concedes to a basic understanding of human dignity as shared and deserved by all, understands what should be done.
This is foremost an issue of humanity.
As long as Zionists, Anti-Zionists, and everyone in between continues to fight this tired, cliché battle of political rhetoric, that is all that this will become – politically driven words, aimed at undoing whatever comment came before. All that such banter does is make people close their ears. They feel above it, and are usually unwilling to change what they feel to be an already informed mind. Propagating this discussion reduces the Palestinian cause to nothing more than empty words. These words aim at, mean, and accomplish very little. Don’t regulate this to politics, don’t subjugate this to the realm of the two dimensional. While the situation does penetrate the political sphere, it is by no means wholly defined by it.
Yes, there are all sorts of political reasons as to why the U.S. should support Palestine and revise its relationship with Israel, but at the end of the day that is not what this is really about. Don’t get too worked up over the idiocy of FOX News and narrow American media, Palin sporting the Star of David on her P.R. pilgrimage, or even Barack Obama breaking his old promises. Yes, in and of themselves these occurrences have meaning, but they have little bearing on the transcendent, overarching truth of the situation. Giving too much weight to such things trivializes the Palestinian cause to something as ludicrous as demanding a birth certificate of your president, or being suspicious of a middle name. This “issue” is bigger than any one media corporation, person, or Cairo campaign speech. For better or for worse, this is bigger than any one settlement, border crossing, or special interest lobby. (And indeed, to view yourself as confined or made impotent by AIPAC, to throw your hands up and say, “Well, AIPAC runs this town,” just means that you have let them win.)
The futility and daftness of politics are disheartening, but neither shocking nor novel. Politics, when it comes to the Palestinian cause, are secondary. They are not what is really at play, and they should not be where our main efforts lie. It is not until this is recognized as a moral issue that the crisis will receive all due urgency and attention. It is not until this is recognized as an issue of human rights for all that change will come. It is not until people in numbers start to understand what this is really about that BDS will become more than just a trend for urban lefties, that the U.S. might finally recognize a bid for statehood at the U.N. General Assembly. Political change follows as a secondary effect of something greater.
Do what you can to show others, so that they may see the situation for what it is. This is no insurmountable political stalemate. It is, if we will it to be, just a curve in the long road toward justice. If you feel yourself at an impasse, remember the weight and gravity of this situation in full. That is what you see when you look down over Shuhada Street – a huge, gross, profound brokenness of humanity. It is both daunting and empowering. Fuck politics. Who is going to attempt to piece humanity back together besides yourself? Small insignificant you? This might be bigger than us, bigger than any political institution, but we, ourselves, are the starting point. Real change begins in our minds and emanates from action.
Violante hopes to be in Hebron for at least six months. She is currently teaching English through a local organization, and plans to do some human rights advocacy and get involved with water resource distribution issues.
I hope you go to Sderot next, which is also a matter of right and wrong.
Sderot is built on the land many people in Gaza were driven from, Hophmi.
The poor Sderotis are in situ because the Ashkenazis of Tel Aviv didn’t want them anywhere near their liberal paradise.
“Sderot is built on the land many people in Gaza were driven from, Hophmi.”
“Hebron is a disgrace. Judaism meets fascism and they move in together and start a dysfunctional family raised on hatred and untreated psychiatric disorders.”
There were plenty of peaceful Jews in Hebron before they were ethnically cleansed in 1929.
So it doesn’t matter, you say? Neither does who was in Sderot before 1948. The fact of the matter is that shooting rockets at schoolbuses is always wrong.
actually the rocketing of Najd (sderot) is a legal grey area due to it being civilians in an occupied territory.
What started Hebron massacre ? And that “ethnically cleansed” operation was made by british mandate soldiers. And they called it as evacuation.
They suffered because of Zionism, hophmi. The Palestinians knew what the Zionists would do once they got power. And they were right.
It matters who was in Sderot before 1948 because until Israel deals with its ethnic cleansing there is no long term future for Jews in the region.
Gaza is the result of what your side did in 1948. It is a concentration camp for all the unwanted Arabs of Southern Israel who don’t belong in your shoddy ethnocracy.
Why Israel reoccupied Gaza in 1967 is a total mystery to me.
Keeping 1.5 million people on a diet restricted to 2/3 of the minimum daily requirement conforms to which of the moral values of Judaism ?
67 Jews were killed in Hebron in 1929. .
Your co-religionist Baruch Goldstein (yes from Brooklyn, NY) in 1994 killed 29 Palestinians and wounded 125 -in a mosque no less! Your pathetic examples exhibit the lack of remorse you have for the current situation. You’re a bad example of a human and your argument is ridiculous. Stop posting here, for the sake of your people.
Only on your planet. On this one, Sderot is not occupied territory, and it is not in any way a legal gray area.
“67 Jews were killed in Hebron in 1929. .
Your co-religionist Baruch Goldstein (yes from Brooklyn, NY) in 1994 killed 29 Palestinians and wounded 125 -in a mosque no less!”
My co-religionist was one guy. The Hebron Massacre was an organized pogrom.
“Your pathetic examples exhibit the lack of remorse you have for the current situation. You’re a bad example of a human and your argument is ridiculous. Stop posting here, for the sake of your people.”
Moderator? I’m pretty sure “bad example of a human being” is ad hominem and against the comments policy.
name the treaty where the palestinians ceded sovriegnty of Najd to Israel? can’t? than its occupied territory for those of us whgo understand legal priciples. sorry we stole it and annexed it illegally doesn’t mean it is not occupied territory
and please don’t insult for your own ignorance of how the law views Israeli territory.
Name one international law authority that considers it occupied territory.
Who were the first to introduce terrorism in Palestine?…Its the Zionist Terrorists & 4 of their leader became prime misters of Israel
~~~~~~~
Past Zionist-Jewish Terrorism -
Some Historical Facts
From A Concerned American
“Following are just a few of the many massacres committed by Jewish-Zionist terrorists, notably by the Zionist Hagana, Irgun and Stern Gang groups.
Don’t expect any Hollywood films highlighting any of these massacres:
1. King David Hotel, July 22, 1946.
2. Sharafat, Feb. 7, 1951.
3. Deir Yassin, April 10, 1948.
4. Falameh, April 2, 1951.
5. Naseruddine, April 14, 1948.
6. Quibya, Oct. 14, 1953.
7. Carmel, April 20, 1948.
8. Nahalin, March, 28, 1954.
9. Al-Qabu, May 1, 1948.
10. Gaza, Feb. 28, 1955.
11. Beit Kiras, May 3, 1948.
12. Khan Yunis, May 31, 1955.
13. Beitkhoury, May 5, 1948.
14. Khan Yunis Again, Aug. 31, 1955
15. Az-Zaytoun, May 6, 1948.
16. Tiberia, Dec. 11, 1955.
17. Wadi Araba, May 13, 1950.
18. As-Sabha, Nov. 2, 1955.
19. Gaza Again, April 5, 1956.
20. Houssan, Sept. 25, 1956.
21. Rafa, Aug. 16, 1956.
22. Qalqilyah, Oct. 10, 1956.
23. Ar-Rahwa, Sept. 12, 1956.
24. Kahr Kassem, Oct. 29, 1956.
25. Gharandal, Sept. 13, 1956.
26. Gaza Strip, Nov. 1956.
26. Gaza Strip, Nov. 1956.
July 22, 1946: The King David Hotel in Jerusalem was bombed, killing 91 people.
Menachem Begin, who was later awarded the Nobel Prize for peace, is the same man who planned the destruction of the King David Hotel and the massacre of Deir Yassin. Ex prime minister, Shamir, was originally a member of the Jewish terrorist gang called Irgun, which was headed by none other than Menachem Begin. Shamir later moved over to the even more radical “Stern Gang,” which committed many vicious atrocities.
Shamir himself has defended the various assassinations committed by the Irgun and Stern gangs on the grounds that “it was the only way we could operate, because we were so small. So it was more efficient and more moral to go for selected targets.” The selected moral targets in those early days of the founding of the state of Israel included bombing of the King David Hotel and the massacre of Deir Yassin.
April 9, 1948: A combined force of Irgun and Stern Gangs committed a brutal massacre of 260 Arab residents of the village of Deir Yassin. Most of whom were women and children. The Israeli hordes even attacked the dead to satisfy their bestial tendencies. In April, 1954, during Holy Week, and on the eve of Easter, The Christian cemeteries in Haifa were invaded, crosses broken down and trampled under the feet of these miscreants, and the tombs desecrated. The Israeli military conquest, therefore was made against a defenseless people, who had been softened up by such earlier massacres at Deir Yasin (where 250 Arabs; men, women and children were massacred).”
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Click on link for the rest of the details:
link to rense.com
whether or not they decide to enforce or act upon the law doesn’t change the law. Now name the treaty in which the palestinians signed territory over to Israel.
My co-religionist was one guy.
Actually there is evidence that Goldstein did not act alone, the IDF essential destroyed all the evidence of the massacre BEFORE investigating it, almost as many Palestinians died after the massacre, killed by the IDF during Palestinian protests of the massacre, and the investigation that was done proved that IDF soldiers were under strict orders NEVER to fire any weapon at any Jewish settlers, even if those settlers were firing at Palestinians, or even at the IDF for that matter, and that Goldstein was allowed to continue serving as a doctor in the IDF even though he refused to treat injured Arabs, even if they were fellow Israeli soldiers. It pretty much qualifies as a pogrom, even more so than the 1929 Hebron massacre, being as how the police authority in Hebron( the IDF) was implicated in the attack by Goldstein, but not so in 1929.
link to nytimes.com
link to realnews247.com
link to realnews247.com
In 1929 about 600-700 Jews who were living in Hebron were attacked by a mob who had been angered by zionists laying claim to the al-Haram ash-Sharif in Jerusalem. Over 400 of the Jews found shelter from the mob in the homes of their Palestinian Arab neighbors. Zionists are always pointing out the Hebron massacre as an example of the irredeemable hatred Arabs have for Jews.
Hebron is a disgrace. Judaism meets fascism and they move in together and start a dysfunctional family raised on hatred and untreated psychiatric disorders.
>> This is a moral issue. Anyone who can genuinely say that he values, observes, and respects the equality of men … does not have to look hard to know what should be done. Anyone who concedes to a basic understanding of human dignity as shared and deserved by all, understands what should be done.
>> This is foremost an issue of humanity.
Well, that rules out immoral Zio-supremacists like RW and the more hateful and violent co-collectivists like eee.
They approve of the past ethnic cleansing of Palestinians (as “necessary” and a “required” evil), and…
- despite the fact that Israel is engaged in an illegal, immoral and ON-GOING campaign of aggression, oppression, theft, colonization, destruction and murder
…and…
- despite the fact that Israel refuses to halt its campaign immediately and completely (something it has the power to do)
…they blame Hamas.
Must be their brand of “common sense” that makes them think this way. Or maybe it’s because they’re all about “peace, not ‘justice’”. It certainly isn’t because they value morality, universal human rights, justice and accountability.
your right erasing a people’s history and connection to their homes is a matter of right and wrong.
@hophmi
The people of Sderot seem to really be suffering. According to all the latest zionist reports, Gaza is a paradise with shopping malls and elevators, and the people are getting fat. I think it would be only fair if all the people in Gaza were to go live in Sderot for a couple of years at least, and the people in Sderot go live in Gaza.
Maybe Glen Beck will make that recommendation when he’s in Israel very soon–hopefully, he will join the poor oppressed people of Sderot when they exchange their domain for the fat shipping mall-addicted people of Gaza’s.
Cristina,
Take pictures and start sending your reports to churches here, telling them This is what you support.
I think this is good advice but I’ve noticed how thick the carapace of indifference in the British churches – well, I really mean the CofE, my religious crowd – has become. It’s getting worse rather than better. I saw a rather sad statement by the authors of Kairos Palestine, the anti-Israel Christian protest that was ruthlessly ignored, made partly in response to recent gnomic statements by the Archbishop of Canterbury, to the effect that they no longer looked for ‘faith, hope and charity’ from international Christian sources. But there must be some sparks of conscience somewhere even amid all that famous Anglo complacency of ours.
The Archbishop and his Catholic counterpart are organising a conference on Christians in the ME, now due to meet in a few days, but giving it rather minimal publicity. Who will speak and whether the proceedings will be published I don’t know.
MHughes, seems like the pending conference is just a cover, similar to
the on-going “peace process,” which is another thin cover for the status quo–after all, both churches you name are very much part of The Establishment.
This is an issue of human justice, no more and no less. Change is not going to come from within Israel, so this is why international observers and volunteers like yourself are so important. Proud of you Cristina!
It is not until this is recognized as a moral issue that the crisis will receive all due urgency and attention.
Many here recognize this moral decay emanating from the Jewish state.
They want to be seen as victims, but they are the aggressor and oppressor. It’s a crusty & dirty game that is peddled in large part by American Zionist Jews and their goyish moronic followers.
The main problem is the corrupted mainstream media controls this narrative, and the politicians follow suit. Breaking the back of the media domination on this ‘poor Israel as the victim’ narrative, is the first challenge to breaking the levee on selective information. It’s happening by the internet grassroots, but it will take a few more Mavi Marmara’s to make it clear to the world, just what we are blindly supporting is the antithesis of what the purpose of the Jewish state intended to do.
Cristina,
Ask those “generous” people of Hebron about the 1929 massacre, before the founding of the State of Israel, before occupation.
link to youtube.com
The riots of 1929 shook one of the great historians of the 20th century Hans Kohn and prompted his subsequent departure from Palestine. As Craig Calhoun noted in his introduction to Kohn’s magnum opus, The Idea of Nationalism: A Study in Its Origins and Background:
digging in the archives [1929 really?] ‘long live Israel’.
Nice work. Yonira used to post dumb shit like this.
Christina must be under the Arab spell, no?
Word of Advice: stop being so shallow.
Your pathetic name says it all.
Typical bellicose chauvanism.
Maybe someone should check IP address. You know. Just in case.
How many people did the Israelis butcher in Hebron today? Zero but the day continues….
In Hama, Assad killed 13 and counting, including a 15 year-old boy. 67 wounded and hospitalized. Interestingly, this is the town where Assad’s father murdered 20,000 in a week or so over 30 years ago. Hama remains the seat of civil unrest in Syria.
link to youtube.com
btw, the question is not weather I care; the question is do you?
How many have been murdered in Israel’s 7 invasions of Lebanon, Biorabbi?
How many dead Arabs is enough for Zionism?
How many dead Arabs is enough for Zionism?
Seafoid, that might be exactly my point I make in an around about manner. But you nailed it. Answer the question and compare it to Sudan, a few weeks in Syria, the tumult of Iran after the Shah fell. Compare it to the carnage in Syria or Lebanon, now or historically. Contrast it. But you can’t because it requires taking a long look in the mirror. Evil existed predating zionism. Evil against arabs, murder of arabs by arabs predates and will probably outlive zionism.
As for your earlier point on Lebanon and those “seven” invasions. How many dead compared to what Syria has done ‘in Lebanon’ during their occupation and double game… which continues.
Syria and Iran have done much to contribute to the “success” of Lebanon.
Biorabbi
The imposition of the Jewish State on the middle East against the wishes of the people has destabilised the region for over 60 years. How many Iraqis died in Zionism’s war, the one run by Feith, Wolfowitz and the organisers of the Herzliya conference ? How many dead Iranians would another 5 years of exclusive Jewish regional hegemony justify?
Israel has a chronic addiction to violence. What sort of judaism is that?
Americans, note that biorabbi lists countries that do not get your tax dollars, while Israel is the largest recipient of them by far, and has been for going on for 4o years. Thus you are responsible for Israel’s atrocities (and poorer too).
“btw, the question is not weather I care”
Indeed. We know you don’t, beyond material for your moronic distraction routine. After all, if you cared, you’d discuss this at an appropriate place instead of dragging it into an unrelated topic to deflect arguments away from your indefensible position.
I find Hebron a hateful place. I haven’t been there in over 20 years.
As an idealistic teenage visiting Israel with my Zionist youth group we were taken to the cave of machpelah which is the place where Abraham and Sarah, Isaac and Rebecca and Jacob and Leah are buried.
I don’t know if it’s changed but in those days we had to walk through a mosque in order to get to the tombs Even in my callow youth, I found it incredibly disrespectful to take a group of noisy teens through a prayer session on what was essentially a tourist visit. I never went back.
Nevertheless I urge everyone to read the wikipedia entry on Hebron to learn how intertwined Jewish and Arab life in Hebron was for over a thousand years up until 1948 when Egypt took control and the last Jew left the city. link to en.wikipedia.org
Just like the Palestinians, there are many Israelis who can identify their family’s homes in Hebron before they were forced to leave by the British army in 1936 to protect them from the Arab revolt. link to en.wikipedia.org
“I find Hebron a hateful place.”
Places aren’t hateful.
Towns or cities that are crucibles of ethnic cruelty can be hateful.
Portadown in Northern Ireland is one. Hebron is the worst I have seen.
I imagine Ciudad Juarez is also hateful, although for different reasons.
Buildings, streets and parks are not hateful. People are. And saying that Hebron is a hateful place just dances around the problem of the hateful people we need to talk about. And that, as far as the 21st century is concerned, means the settlers, who are not only hateful, but also something worse: Contempteous of other human beings.
Really? Because Egypt started the whole problem? The hundreds of Palestinian villages that had been purged to that point by people like you are irrelevant to a small populating of Jews leaving Hebron? (And not, you know, under a hail of gunfire and having their homes festooned with landmines the way Plan Dalet laid out for Zionists to operate.)
The children of the Jewish settlers in Hebron should be taken away by social services. The Jewish settlers in Hebron are not fit to parent kids.
link to youtube.com
link to youtube.com
I’d say people who expose children to terrorist training camps and cartoon characters who glorify suicide terrorism are not fit to parent either.
Then that just means the Israelis again. Those are the only people who expose their children to fake MEMRI propaganda.
hophmi …said…
“I’d say people who expose children to terrorist training camps and cartoon characters who glorify suicide terrorism are not fit to parent. ”
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Hmm…take a look at these Israeli kids…they must have had nice & fit parents!!! They are sending “love messages” to the other children, their neighbors, who are on the other side of the fence. Nice gifts..eh!!!
Click on link to view :
Israeli children sign their missiles ‘with love’
link to wakeupfromyourslumber.blogspot.com
the BBC’s Louis Theroux looks at the settler movement, the movement that will bring down Zionism.
link to bbc.co.uk
Radio interview 1/4
link to youtube.com
And Hebron is the most wicked and most deluded of all.
I accept Cristina’s contention that injustice has never triumphed while any voice is raised against it but I’m not sure how the attempt to make things better for humanity leads away, rather than right into, politics and so to all the pressures and cross-currents that accompany politics.
Where’s Witty reminding us of the need to humanize these charming settlers? Heaven forbid we should ever talk of removing these thugs from their position – that would be “ethnic cleansing”!
European Court of HR in Strassburg passes “Monumental Judgement” wrt to Occupying Powers and their Responsibility to Investigate
This Ruling will have far reaching consequences for military operations EVERYWHERE – i trust also also for the occupied Palestinian Terrorities and IDF operations……
See Article in : Guardian 07July2011-07-07
link to guardian.co.uk
>> This Ruling will have far reaching consequences for military operations EVERYWHERE – i trust also also for the occupied Palestinian Terrorities and IDF operations……
I hope so, but I doubt it. Well, maybe “we” will be able to use this ruling against “them” (as it suits “us”), but I doubt it’ll amount to much the other way ’round.