A few weeks before I came to this country, I was in Texas reading about the humanitarian disaster that was the war in Gaza. I worried myself sick about how I was going to exist here. I knew that I would be very close, a few kilometers, away from both the suffering in Gaza and the occupation of the West Bank. And I knew that the general population of Israel would not be discussing the reports of Palestinian devastation and that I would feel a roucous in my stomach about it.
Now that I am here, the feeling is very similar to the general sourness of guilt that I have living, working, and paying taxes in the U.S. There, I am reminded occasionally by the gentle voices of NPR that the U.S. governemt invaded a distant nation without justification and thousands of civillians and soldiers have suffered deeply in the process. The U.S. government is not only responsible for crimes against humanity, but most of its leaders don't even pretend to have any vision for an egalitatrian global humanity. I know that when I contribute to the U.S. economy I am contributing to a ruthless capitalism that makes unfair choices about who in the world will be fortunate and who will be exploited, who will be bombed and who will be educated.
With regard to living in a powerful and exploitive nation, being here feels quite similar to being in the states. A guilty nagging deep in my head motivates me to try to live in such a way that does not depend on the exploitation of others. In both places, I want to recognize and minimize the suffering of others while myself living as joyful a life as I can.
Like the U.S., Israel is also a democracy with freedom of speech and humane societies and social programming for Sudanese refugees and art. Like the U.S. Israel has racists and criminals and extremists. I just want it to be clear, that while I deplore the occupation and violence enflicted by Israel, Israel is also a wonderful place where a lot of really good people are doing a lot of really wonderful things. This blog is in large part about how I am sorting out those two realities. I assume that I will never be able to sort them.
I planned a schedule for this past Thursday and Friday that was intended to involve me in a peace/coexistance/environmental movement here in the middle east. On Thursday I was to go to "Chava V'adam," an ecological farm between Tel Aviv and Jerusalem, where I would meet up with a woman I had found on the internet. She is working on seed exchange among Israeli and Palestinian farmers and other coexistance projects. Then, the next day, Friday, I had scheduled to take a tour of the South Hebron Hills with an organization called "Breaking the Silence." The idea of the tour is to show people the situation of the settlements, the conditions of the West Bank etc.
Wow, Chava V'adam, the ecological farm, felt amazing. There were weeds to pull and kohlrabi to plant. Bok Choi and peas and lettuce and cilarntro were growing. The soil was alive, the toilets were composting my waste into useful material, and the communication pathway between myself and the people working there felt wide open and friendly. I wanted to stay there, planting, weeding, and breaking to eat collard greens.
I believe that taking responsibility for how you live and how you relate to your resources and community, is the most powerful tool for peace. Living "off the grid", growing your own food and managing your own resources, as they do at Chava v'Adam, is a response to the exploitive corporate stronghold that creates deep poverty and filthy wealth all over the world. The more localized an economy you live in, the less room there is for corporations and governments to widdle their way between you and your resources.
The American "peace activist/ seed exchanger" who had invited me to the farm was very inspiring. Finally, someone taking a practical approach to exchange between Palestinians and Israelis, an approach that will empower both. I revelled in hearing about ancient heirloom Palesinian wheat varieites and her efforts to save them. She talked about Palestinian farming villages, their effective use of draught resistant landrace crops and how the Israeli government isn't interested in adopting their methods. The Israeli-Palestinian seed exchange organization she is creating to increase the biodiversity in the area and support the independence of small farmers sounds amazing.
And then her address hit me like a ton of bricks. She lives in Tekoa, a Jewish settlement within the green line boundaries of the West Bank. She is a settler. She invited us, me and a few other travelling Americans, to her home for Shabbat to help her work on her garden and the new house she is building. I was at a loss. I had no category to put her in in my head. She didn't go into "Religious Zealot, deluded into thinking god gave Judea and Sameria to the Jews so the arabs who live there should just disappear" or into the category of "Racist Nationalist, deulded into thinking that Israel can be both an occupier and a peaceful nation." I couldn't make a drop of sense out of her.
That night I debated back and forth, should I go to her house for Shabbat? 'No!,' my moral compass shouted. 'You can't be just one more entitled Jew who takes a bus right on into the West Bank like you have every right in the world to do so. No! You cannot work in her illegal garden as though she has a right to grow kale in the West Bank. That Kale is a roadblock to peace and an oppressive occupier of a self determined nation! '
Another voice in my head sighed, 'Give me a break, one kale plant is not what is standing in the way of a peace deal. Often a person can learn the most and the deepest from putting themselves in uncomfortable situations. If Palestinians and Israelis, supposed enemies, are supposed to sit down and listen to each other then shouldn't you put some effort into figuring out what is going on with this very confusing woman? She obviously had some justification and some world view I can't even concieve of, so shouldn't I try to understand?' There was a major roucous in my stomach.
The question of whether or not to go into that settlement brought about another dilemna. Should I go on the "Breaking the Silence" tour that I had planned for the morning? If going into the West Bank is the act of a self-entightled occupier, why would I get on a tour bus, even if it is full of lefties and peace activists, and tromp around? I would only be able to do so because of the Israeli military presence there and I am very against the Israeli military presence there. But of course, I would learn a lot by doing so, and don't crimes against humanity happen only when we aren't looking? I am already against the occupation, so is it really so essential that I get riled up by what would be (as all brief one-day tours inevitably are) a simplistic education? By bedtime I was resolved to go through with both plans for the next day, the South Hebron Hills tour and shabbat in Tekoa. I didn't want to leave Israel without having faced the occupation of Palestine head on.
I slept through my alarm. Sivan tried to wake me up but I slept right through. I missed the tour.
I forced myself to call the woman in Tekoa at 10:45. It was then that I found out the last bus to her place left Jerusalem at 1:45 (buses in Israel stop running Friday evening for Shabbat and don't start again until Saturday evening). 1:45 was much earlier than I thought the last bus would be. Holy, stress ball. I rush rush rushed because I was a long way from Jerusalem and still in my pajamas. I got to Jerusalem at 1:50. Too late.
So was it fate that I missed it all? Was it my inner chicken that made subconcious decisions that got me out of it? Was it just coincidence?
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