Home from Palestine and Israel

For some reason coming back from Israel and Palestine and trying to get back to central time has inspired me to start a blog. I've thought about it for awhile and perhaps now I think I need to put my thoughts down and this might give me more impetus to do so!

It was an amazing trip and I think I'll be thinking about and processing all of the things I experienced for a long time.

Probably one of the most powerful things I experienced was spending a couple of hours at the Deheishe Refugee Camp in Bethlehem. This is one sqaure mile (the same size as Old Jerusalem) that houses 11,000 Palestinian refugees. These refugees have been displaced since 1948 when the UN set up this camp. The camp is really a small town and half of the population are children. When we arrived at the camp we were not able to go through the main entrance as the Israeli army had gone in with 14 jeeps and surrounded a house looking for a 16-year old Muath Abu Aker. Apparently he was thought to be involved in a Palestinian armed resistance group. The army did not find him at home after they arrested all the residents and lined them up outside. Through binoculars we were able to see all the people lined up and we heard tear gas canisters going off and rubber bullets being fired. A few times we also heard live ammunition; or as our host at the camp put it, "killing bullets."

I couldn't stop the tears flowing. Our host was incredibly gracious as he told us his story, unabashedly. He has two daughters and he explained that he doesn't really leave the camp as to be detained or questioned or humiliated in front of his family would be too much. His family was arrested for sixteen hours once and they were made to stand outside for that length of time in front of guns. His baby daughter was a week old at the time.

After our introduction to the camp and when it was deemed safe to go outside, we received a brief tour. News traveled fast that we were walking about and we were soon accompanied by numerous children who were glad to see us and to practice their english on us.

I have never seen more beautiful people in my life than I have in the West Bank. I was treated with more hospitality and welcome in Bethlehem and Deheishe than I experienced in Israel proper, where at one place (Sepphoris) we were spit upon by Jewish kids who were accompanied by an armed guard (hopefully they were just kids being kids).

In spite of it all, Israel and the West Bank are beautiful places. As I experienced seeing and meeting the children of Deheishe Refugee Camp it filled my heart and broke it at the same time.