Sunday, August 2, 2009

Hate Crime in Tel Aviv

In Tel Aviv on Saturday two young adults were murdered while hanging out at a gay and lesbian community center. According to newspaper reports, a man dressed in black, wearing a black mask entered the room with an M-16 and opened fire onto the young people who were socializing, listening to music, snacking, relaxing, feeling safe. Two are dead, several are wounded and two remain in critical condition.

Police are searching for the criminal but have thus far not found the hateful murderer.

There is something completely shattering and heart shredding about this crime. Yes, in Israel, it is popular and even acceptable to have less than amicable feelings toward Arabs, toward foreign workers, toward refugees. It turns out, in fact, that Israel suffers from more than its fair share of xenophobia, racism, sexism and all of the other "isms" that can be classified as the ills of society.

But I believe that what happened in Tel Aviv yesterday, to a group of teenagers who meet together to discuss how to deal with their being "different" from "mainstream" society with all of its institutionalized fictions, is absolutely blood curdling. And I am fearful of what it means for Israeli society as a whole.

True, more unbelievable things have happened. For example, the murder of Prime Minister Rabin by the hands of a religious zealot. If a Jewish-Israeli could assassinate the Israeli Prime Minister in cold blood at a peace rally, perhaps anything can happen.

So maybe with perspective, societies, within their makeup, set themselves up for these tragedies from time to time, that may or may not serve as a wake up call to the realities -- of the convoluted and intermingling dynamics of co-existence, or, resistance to diversity -- on-the-ground. And the most tragic part in the aftermath, in addition to the loss of loved ones, of dignity, of perceived images of our open society, our Tel Aviv of many colors, streams, peoples and so on, is how unprepared we are to deal with what all of this means. And how to deal with the situation before we have all of the facts, or even a lead on a suspect that could be apprehended by the police.

After discussions with friends and mulling things over myself, I believe the suspect could be member to one of two streams of society. Either, the perpetrator is a religious person, as the newspapers are presuming, an activist who took to heart the homophobic message of the religious parties such as Shas, which is being singled out as the harbinger of this hatred. Perhaps a young man with questionable mental stability served as the perfect candidate to carry out this sickening vision of divine justice, as some communities have quietly feted this act to be. Or, the individual is part of the neo-Nazi movement in Israel. Yes, the neo-Nazi movement in Israel that is primarily populated by non-Jewish Russian immigrants who forged documents to gain citizenship to a state desperate to win the demographics game against the rising Arab population.

If either of these suspects prove to be the criminal, in my opinion both are equally foreboding and worrisome.

Because how does a society deal with intolerance against a population -- a tax-paying, social security paying, army serving, active and contributing sector of the people? If it is a matter of education, then I believe the damage is already done. Indoctrination of this sort has gone on for years and now someone has come of age in that environment and acted on the hatred and fear of other, that teachers, parents and community members taught him, or her. How does a society address this hatred if the education is taking place within the religious school system over which the secular government seems to have no authority over, and, in light of the glue that keeps the coalition of the current government together, a government which seems to cater to this population's demands to the detriment of the rest?

If it is a neo-Nazi group, what sort of apparatus can be set up in a society, in part, made up of victims or offspring of victims of a Nazi regime? A society in which Nazi ideology -- discriminating, hunting and murdering of another human being in the name of removing that identity from humankind -- seemingly could never take hold. If we cannot even conceive that it could happen, then it is difficult to grasp how to manage once the inconceivable occurs.

Call it Nazi, call it neo, call it fundamentalism, we have a problem.

The police's response or recommendation to the community following the shooting was to close down the city's gay and lesbian clubs and other centers devoted to these people in Tel Aviv. If I'm not mistaken, that is an action signaling the success of terrorism. I live in Israel, and if I'm not mistaken, once again, last time I walked into my university or a local cafe or a busy restaurant or a mall or a doctor's office building or a bank (I can go on) a security guard sat at the entrance, checking bags and faces. So why close down the community and its businesses and support centers? Why not beef up the security? The gay community has been violated, abused, traumatized and threatened. It is the unnegotiable duty of the government and its law enforcing bodies to ensure the safety and security of this population, that they may be allowed to live their lives free of fear from being targets of hate crimes.

As word spread in the hour following the shooting, members of the gay community and friends gathered in a demonstration against the hateful act. In moments like these there is comfort in the public gathering, to be in solidarity against what is ugly, destructive and putrid in our human inclination. But what comes next? How does whatever it is, come next? Who will lead? Who has the answers, and how will this never happen again?

Wednesday, July 29, 2009

Nablus the Journey, Part I

When I think of the West Bank City of Nablus I recall an article I read a few years ago at a point when Nablus was under siege. I have this distinct image in my mind, a description from the article I read, of the sliding door of a grocery store barely open. A sign to residents that there was bread to be had, if one was willing to risk their life.

Nablus under curfew meant no one could leave their homes, the streets were patrolled, rather, overwhelmed by the Israel Defense Forces. Anyone who broke the curfew was assumed to be dangerous and ill-meaning and thus a target. A run to the grocery store turned literally into just that. Neither bread nor the return of the designated person to go to the store were guaranteed.

I never imagined that Nablus would be a place I would one day visit.

Sunday morning, my friend Joyce and I met at the Central Bus Station in Tel Aviv.

At nearly nine o'clock in the morning, late July, the city is already steaming and stewing with humidity. The sun is beating down upon the tops of hatless heads and passengers waiting at bus stops, upon vendors selling fruits, shoes and cookies, and African refugees hanging about in the nearby park.

Heading toward familiar Jerusalem, we had our instructions to Nablus from the friend we would visit who is currently volunteer teaching at a community center in Nablus that is run by Tomorrow's Youth Organization. Making our way from West Jerusalem to the East Jerusalem Bus Station, the excitement and anxiety kept us both light in our steps, despite the rising heat of the dry, more mild morning of summer in Jerusalem.

After a little bit of wandering about in search of Bus 18 to Ramallah, by the guidance of Najat at the PIJ, we scored two seats on the green and white-striped minibus that would take us through the Qalandia checkpoint and into the West Bank.

Already two years have passed since I traveled to Birzeit via Ramallah in order to interview a professor at the university there. Like many others, I noticed that from the checkpoint to downtown Ramallah, a tremendous amount of development has taken place.

Ramallah is exploding. What used to be a rather depressing few kilometers, from the border of Jerusalem to the heart of this bustling West Bank city, are now dotted with apartments and stores, furniture shops, restaurants and the ubiquitous car garages or repair shops that are so abundant in this part of Palestine.

Joyce and I got down from the bus and found our way, thanks to a few helpful folks and and American-Palestinian man who was waiting to make his way to Jerusalem, to the Ramallah bus station. Using our newly achieved Arabic literacy we managed to locate the proper bus that said Nablus-Ramallah in its windshield. Moments later we were seated and feeling giddy with accomplishment and success.

In all, the journey to Nablus took four hours, a considerable amount of time when taking into account that Nablus is but 44 kilometers or 27 miles from Tel Aviv. (Sixty kilometers from Jerusalem, through which we passed due to the situation.) However, these four hours were hardly dull, with the last leg offering a sense of great adventure.

The long blue bus with brown-gray and crusty interior smelled of stale cigarette smoke. But the company was anything but dull. A woman sitting in front of us, of questionable sanity, was going on and on about something we couldn't understand. The men sitting around us were goading her on, as she insisted that she occupy a row of two seats instead of one at the price of ten shekels. The bus driver suggested she pay another ten and then be fully entitled to her space. At one point a Chinese man sat down next to her, another rarity in these parts, but soon thereafter he found himself another spot in which to sit.

Two young men sitting behind us were clearly fascinated with these two foreign girls siting on the bus with them. As we pulled out of the station it was obvious that they would be commenting and indirectly interacting with us the whole way to Nablus. Once in awhile words like "America" or "hello" and other signals of communication were coming our way. If we were interested in the scenery passing by, they were interested in letting us know what we were seeing.

Palestine is hilly. Rolling hills of sparse vegetation, beautiful nonetheless. Terraced land with olive trees and every few kilometers, a lot of car wrecks in all sorts of disrepair.

Of course I was looking for this spider web system of apartheid roads for which so many in the world criticize Israel. But our route was rather direct and according to one of my professors, in the past few months many of the roads that were closed to Palestinians have been opened and there is more and more free passage through the area. I am sure that this is both accurate and also inaccurate. As I have mentioned before, when it comes to the settlements and the West Bank, at times, I have imagined it to be the wild wild west. What drives and determines policy or military action is confusing and there are always so many sides and stories accompanying each event, that I begin to liken the reporting of activity in the West Bank to "choose your own adventure" novels.

The first checkpoint we went through was empty, no soldiers and no stopping, just an empty concrete structure. But further along near an overpass between nothing and more nothing, seven I.D.F. soldiers were standing around with a truck between them. And after this, I noticed the settlements on the hilltops above us. Places like Shilo and Eli and a few others along the way. These structures had red-tiled slanted roofs without the characteristic black water tanks of Arab villages and cities. Signs began to appear in Hebrew and at the bus stops along the road, young Jewish-settler women were talking on cell phones waiting for Egged buses that I imagine expressly serve these settler populations.

Here I need to say that when I venture into these parts of Israel and Palestine, there is a sort of split that occurs in my psyche. I see everything. I note everything. I react mildly to everything, the things that surprise me, the things that I expect. I can only feel later and analyze later, and often it is painful and affects my mood and general well being for awhile. It is very difficult to take it all in. So much of it simply doesn't make sense. But, first, the visual observations.

I was surprised that we didn't reach a guarded checkpoint until very near to the entrance of Nablus. I thought the journey would be a frustrating stop and start with inspections and the like. It was not.

I was shocked to see white, clearly Jewish religious young women in their modest yet modern dress at the bus stops. I couldn't understand what the hell they were doing out there and why anyone would want to live in the middle of nowhere where they are not wanted and how they could believe and buy into this fanatical ideology that the Jews have the right to populate all of the Biblical Eretz Yisrael. And on the other side of the coin, how they believe that the Palestinians in between them have no right to be there. I recall a thought passing through my mind regarding the soldiers. What mother in her right mind living in Tel Aviv or Jerusalem, Holon or Ashdod wants her son to be standing with a weapon in the midst of Palestine to protect people whose ideology she herself deems crazy and unwarranted?

And of course the inevitable, how can this be going on? I just couldn't and still can't understand. And frankly, I don't want to understand why these fewer than 300,000 people (because apparently there are different strands of settler feelings and policies on being in illegal settlements), with every day of their lives, feel entitled to put Israel in a position in which the conflict can never end. In which the hands of Israel are tied as global civil society challenges, more and more, whether or not the State of Israel is a legitimate thing or not.

Accusations of apartheid although inaccurate and misdiagnosed are nonetheless spreading throughout academic and social circles. The Boycott, Sanctions and Divestment (BDS) Campaign against Israel has recently expanded its efforts to protest against Israeli academics and cultural events. This is above and beyond the boycotting of West Bank products, which is a reasonable approach in trying to remove any economic incentive to perpetuating the occupation. Now though, this is a movement attempting to get the world, not to rally around the realization of the Palestinian state, but rather to fight for the erosion of favor, interest, curiosity and inclusion of Israel, and all that is Israeli, in the global community. A simple phrase in Hebrew allows for verdict on that realization, "Lo moomlatz," not recommended.

Returning to the journey. The bus began the approach to Nablus. On the right side of the road at the tops of lampposts and poles there were faded posters of young men who had martyred themselves for the struggle for Palestine. Such young faces, with images of guns on either sides of their head and faded blue and red Arabic writing praising their efforts and their sacrifice. The checkpoint before the entrance into the city was manned with soldiers who waved us through and on our way.

We had finally arrived in Nablus.

Saturday, June 27, 2009

Simply Lowered into the Earth

One week ago Friday I spent nearly 12 hours in a hospital watching my boyfriend's father fight the cancer that took him away a few hours after the entrance of Shabbat. With Eitan, his mother, sister and brother, I watched Eitan's father, Yisrael, take his final breaths through a bag of oxygen and a telling heart monitor that we all watched in fear and a dreaded knowing of how the evening was going to end.

Having watched my own grandfather slip away from the world of the living just eight months ago, I promised Eitan that once the struggle finished, he would see his father at peace, there would be no more worry in his brow or pain in his clenched jaw. Just as my grandfather let go of all of us with a tear and a smile, so too would his abba.

The death of my boyfriend's father is not a likely topic for a blog that seeks to explore truths on the journey to resolution. But after a year of studying the history of the Middle East, I'm not so sure that resolution is an option, but the truths are still important for the hope that someday something will change. And so, after witnessing the death, burial and mourning rituals for Eitan's father, I believe that there is a truth to be told, a truth of Israel as the state for the Jewish people, to be Jewish in sorrow and in joy.

Eitan's father came from Romania to Israel in the 1960s. Much of his family was killed in the Holocaust, he was born in 1949, one year after the birth of the State of Israel. Yisrael Harod grew up in Yash, a small Romanian city, perhaps even a village. He grew up in an abusive household until his mother left his father for a better life. Yisrael and his mother were poor, very poor. Many of his meals were bread and sometimes onions that made the meal seem like a feast. As a boy at school, as a Jewish boy, he was often beat up and made fun of. He could not always play with other children for fear of his safety. I imagine the fact that he was destitute did not help the situation either. He managed to get small jobs here and there and he saved his meager earnings so that he could purchase for himself a brand new screwdriver, a shiny tool that he never actually used. He would once in awhile remove the tool from its box, admire and polish the specimen, the reward of his hard work and a glimpse into the value and respect he placed in his hard-earned belongings from unceasing work in the future.

When Yisrael Harod arrived in Israel, escaping the clutches of Ceaucescu, he was placed with other new immigrants, in tents, where he would stay with his mother until more permanent arrangements could be made. He learned Hebrew. He joined the army as was his national duty. He met Amira, Eitan's mother. He knew he wanted to marry her very early on in knowing her. She thought he was interested in her friend or her sister, but he had eyes only for her and told her as much.

Only 39 years later, a moment in time, three children later, two of them married, two grandchildren, only 60 years of life, I watched Amira gently smooth the tensed skin of her husband's forehead. His eyes had already rolled back into his head, or perhaps directed heavenward and into the abyss of eternity.

The sun began to lower onto the horizon line of Petach Tikvah, a city of Israel that dates back to the late 19th century. One of the first Jewish settlements in what was then a province of the Ottoman Empire, where Russian immigrants came to escape pogroms, to make real an ideology that sought a safe haven for self-determination of the Jewish people.

We gathered around Yisrael's bed on this Friday night, as though we were standing around the dining room table in his home in Holon, just 20 minutes south of Tel Aviv. Eitan's older brother Yaakov led us in the kiddush. Usually he pours a special grape juice into the kiddush cup. On this night he poured a glass of the sweetest Shabbat wine. We started singing together Shalom Aleichem, welcoming the Shabbat. There is a verse in this song that wishes that those who come may also go in peace. It is my hope that Yisrael heard us singing and was calmed by it and that his journey into whatever it is that comes after life was peaceful. We blessed the wine, each took a sip. Amira dipped her finger into the cup and placed the wine-dripping fingertip to the lips of her husband's mouth, struggling to lift the elastic band of the oxygen bag.

And, as every Friday night, and every Shabbat, when the prayers were finished, she wished all of us a "Shabbat Shalom U'mevurakh", a peaceful and blessed Shabbat. And as every other Shabbat, she kissed each of us, Eitan, Yaakov, Ronit, Yisrael and me, Heidi, wishing us luck on our way and more blessings. I couldn't imagine a more beautiful farewell for a loved one.

In the hallway a small table was set up for the pairs of lit Shabbat candles blessed by other family members of other hospital patients. Sometimes it is the most subtle things that remind me of where I am. Shabbat candles in the hospital corridor.

A few hours after Eitan's father passed, we sat with his body in a room until the family was ready to leave him. Eitan went to look at his father and called to his sister to show her the smile that had appeared on his wan and weary face. There was no more struggle, his ever-thinning face in that past months revealed a very noble bone structure that gave him much dignity throughout his illness and into his death.

As it was Shabbat when Yisrael left his family, the funeral was held on Sunday morning. We gathered at a cemetery in Rishon LeTzion, where Yisrael's mother was buried, where Amira, one day far from now, will rest beside him.

In Israel, the Jewish funeral is simple, as is the burial, it is a humble admission of the frailty and brevity of our human experience. Friends and family gathered at 2:30 in the afternoon on Sunday, June 21, 2009, the first day of summer, to honor the memory of Eitan's father and to support the family, because that is the job of the Jewish community in times of death as well as celebration.

Yisrael was brought out on a simple black stretcher, carried by Eitan, his father's co-workers and friends. His small, emaciated, frail shell was wrapped in a tallit, a prayer shawl. I was indescribably moved by this simple shroud, so symbolic in its form. The tallit helps to bring one, in prayer, to a place of concentration, to help one elevate the spirit to the Creator, to arrive at a place of reflection, redemption, wonder and atonement. When we say the Shema and the V'ahavta, two of the most quintessential and beautiful prayers of the Jewish liturgy, the four corners of fringes, tzitzit, of the tallit are wrapped around the index finger of the right hand, symbolizing the four corners of the earth, that we gather everything and everyone in our prayer, as we are reminded that we are commanded to love and know the unity of creation, of humanity, with all of our hearts and all of our souls.

The rabbi officiating began his chanting. The Lord gives and the Lord takes away...He took an exacto knife to the shirts of Eitan and Yaakov, creating a tear to indicate the loss of a loved one. A woman did the same to Amira and Ronit. They were officially in mourning. Eitan gave a moving eulogy about his father, who came to Israel, who struggled throughout his life, who wanted to have a family with a Jewish identity, freely and safely in this land, where his children would never be beaten for being Jewish. Would not be hungry from the deprivations of life under Communist rule, and could achieve the dreams he could not realize for himself.

The pall bearers carried Yisrael's body to his grave site. His body was lowered into the grave. And two by two or three by three, friends helped the Harod family to bury their father and husband in the rust-colored dirt just unearthed to make space for Yisrael's body to rest. They were not alone in this shattering moment. Gathered around were friends and superiors of Eitan from the army, in a variety of uniforms and ranks, friends of his from high school and from childhood. They came from the North and from the South. Yaakov's friends and teachers from the Haredi yeshiva that he attends in the black hats and dark suits. Ronit's friends and old boyfriends. The small and intimate sides of the family of Yisrael and Amira. My international friends and their Israeli boyfriends who came to support me as well as Eitan. All of us young people, dressed in our youth, in our dresses and tank tops, our shorts and our flipflops, our lives ahead of us, the child inside of us taking a moment to imagine ourselves in Eitan's place.

The rabbi continued his blessings...The Lord gives and the Lord takes away...the Mourner's Kaddish was recited. Rocks were picked up off the ground and placed on the gravesite with memorial candles and wreaths of flowers from Eitan's army colleagues and his father's co-workers from the electrical engineering plant that he worked at for decades.

Amira insisted that we leave, it was time to leave Yisrael alone. "He told me so!" she said, as she handed out coins for all of us to give to the man collecting charity as we exited the cemetery.

For the past week, the Harod family household has been in strict mourning. The mirrors are covered, there has been prayer three times a day, a Torah has sat in a holy ark in the living room for the shacharit (morning) service and Torah reading. The family has not changed its clothes, nor washed, nor left the house. A time to reconnect, a time to mourn, a time to allow the community to serve and comfort them.

Eitan has not had to worry about work. Nor Ronit, nor Yaakov. It is understood in the state of the Jews that in times of rites of passage, caring for the soul, carrying out the rituals of over 5,000 years of history is the most important thing to do. We can do this here, without penalty, in perfect observance according to our own needs, from the most fanatic and finicky, to whatever comforts the bereaved. We can immerse ourselves in the practices of the ancestors and find solace in the cycle of life, that death happens and when it does, we have methods to attend to our grief, to our loss, to the most permanent thing that happens in our impermanent existence.

May the memory of Yisrael Harod be for a blessing...

Sunday, March 15, 2009

Tristan Anderson

This afternoon, I received an e-mail message from a fellow member of the online organization mepeace.org. In it was a link to an event that took place on Friday, March 13, 2009 in the West Bank city of Nil'in.

Nil'in and Bil'in are often in international news media as two cities which have been divided by the separation fence/security wall/apartheid wall, as you see fit to call it. I choose the first, the separation fence plus the addition of separation wall.

Every Friday, various international, including Israeli and Palestinian peace organizations gather at Nil'in to protest the wall and the damage it has caused to the livelihoods of the residents there. Often there are clashes between I.D.F. soldiers and nonviolent activists.

Apparently, this past Friday the 13th, Tristan Anderson, a resident of Oakland, California, a peace activist and a journalist was hit in the head by a tear gas canister fired at the protesters by I.D.F. forces. Tristan suffered serious wounds to his head and is currently receiving treatment at the Sheba Medical Center located at the Tel HaShomer army base near to Tel Aviv. The hospital at Tel HaShomer often makes it into the headlines as it is the hospital where many Israelis, Palestinians and internationals receive treatment following conflict-induced injuries.

As far as Google tells me, no major news networks, until the last half hour, have picked up this story, although it happened already nearly three days ago. The Jerusalem Post now features a story stating that Tristan's condition is stable, although he is on a respirator.

I have a few questions.

According to the group Anarchists Against the Wall, the fact that Tristan was hit in the head by a tear gas canister is not that surprising. This group claims that it is becoming a recurring event that I.D.F. troops fire these canisters directly at protesters instead of in an arch so as to avoid direct hits.

If this is true, why are I.D.F. troops doing this?

If these protesters are nonviolent demonstrators, why are I.D.F. troops firing weapons at them at all?

Are the protestors warned?

If so, how are they warned?

If warned, how much time do they receive after warning to move out of the designated target area?

Are there regulations as to what kind of weapons can be fired at nonviolent protesters?

If rocks are thrown or catapults used, at what point does the army decide to use weapons?

What security breach or territorial breach are the protesters making, if any, which warrants a military action against them?

What is the responsibility of the occupying army to protect internationals in such a zone as the West Bank?

Another issue. There was a delay in transporting Tristan to Tel HaShomer because he was first attended to by medics of a Red Crescent ambulance and not an Israeli Magen David Adom or other ambulance service. Unable to cross the checkpoint, Tristan waited fifteen minutes before the Israeli ambulance arrived, transferred him from the Red Crescent ambulance to the Israeli ambulance and then he was on his way to the hospital. Israeli activists on the scene called the Israeli ambulance and I say, fortunately, Tristan was picked up in a timely fashion and swiftly carried to the Sheba Medical Center. Red Crescent ambulances are not permitted past certain areas in Israel because of the fear that they are a disguise for weapons and terrorists. People lose their lives pretty regularly here because of these past experiences and realities and the perpetual fear.

I live in Israel. I can say with all of my heart and soul that a person in this country is free to demonstrate, to protest, to libel and to slander the State of Israel with immense rage, freely and openly without fear of bodily harm.

Every year, in spite of threats from the Ultra Orthodox residents of Mea Shearim in Jerusalem that they will bomb buses if the Gay Pride Parade will take place, the Pride Parade proudly occurs with growing numbers every year.

Within Israel's borders, I am willing to say that things are normal for better and for worse, just like any other country in which the people are decision makers in the country's processes and actions.

However, when it comes to the Territories, the West Bank and the Gaza Strip, it seems to me that everything changes. It is the wild, wild west, it is hell and there is no order and only chaos. And I can only discuss what I know from hearsay and from photographs and from links on the internet.

And if for a moment anyone wonders why Israelis don't rise up against the immorality that occurs on both sides of the wall, it is important to know that they are either so cynical and jaded by decades of conflict that they don't believe it, even the video footage, or, they are afraid, scared and willing to consent to anything that tells them the actions are necessary for security.

I wasn't there. I didn't see Tristan receive the blow by the tear gas canister. I watched the video clip. And I have questions. I don't know who will answer them.

Friday, March 13, 2009

Ahmadinejad Between the Palms of My Hands

Every good yoga class begins with a moment of silence in meditation on an intention. The intention could be a wish for oneself or for a friend or family member. The intention can be set on a principle in the physical, the emotional or the intellectual -- flexibility, compassion, acceptance, ambition.

Lately, when I sit down on my mat and fold my hands against one another to my heart, instead of pressing them to each other I make something of a cup. And in that cup, I like to imagine President Ahmadinejad. I hold him between the palm of my hands. In my mind's eye I can see him in the photographs of newspapers and websites and television clips. I think of his smile, he seems to always have such a sincere smile, it starts from his eyes. If you notice, his eyes in some shots actually sparkle. Once I have the clear image of him, I start to ask him not to spew such hatred all over the world. I ask him not to make statements that lead to the Israeli mentality that one day, Iran will send nuclear weapons to destroy Israel, as Ahmadinejad insinuates, dictates and rallies in exact words and nuances. I ask him to stop using his influence to instill fear that perpetuates violence that the majority of Israeli society believes to be justified.

Suddenly, Ahmadinejad morphs into Omar al-Bashir of Sudan, the Chinese government in its ocupation and administration of Tibet, the Tamil Tigers of Sri Lanka, Ismail Haniyeh and Khaled Meshal of Hamas, Binyamin Netanyahu of the Likud in Israel, and the hundreds of thousands of young men and women in the world, learning religion-manufactured and condoned hatred and intolerance -- in the madrasas of Pakistan and Afghanistan, in the fundamentalist revival churches of the United States and the extremist yeshivas of Israel.

Of course one will argue and take offense that I have equated some of these people with others who are outright terrorists, racists, bigots, plain haters. But my intention is not to call Netanyahu a terrorist, for I do not believe that is what he is, nor would I ever call Israel a terrorist state, as so many seem to be doing these days. My point is to draw attention to the spotlight and power of which all of these players possess. With guns, armies, youth and ideology, leaders of a military occupation of an interminably fragmented Palestinian nation, such as Netanyahu, leaders of pseudo-governments using terrorism to achieve its aims like Meshal and Haniyeh, and leaders of an Islamic repressive Republic with unapologetic ill will towards others like Ahmadinejad hold an incredible position in the eyes of the world. Often I am floored by the vast, limitless fanfare they receive for all of their misdeeds, for the oppression they inflict, for the hate and disaster with which they infest the world.

When I see Ahmadinejad between the palms of my hand and the rest of these men and movements, I ask them and I ask the world to give them attention for making positive contributions to the world. I ask Ahmadinejad to stop pointing a finger to Israel so that he may divert the misery and dissatisfaction of his people away from the sorry state in which Iran finds itself today. I ask him and his fellow leadership to take some damn responsibility for the way things are and to fix them, and not by method of destroying another nation-state. I ask al-Bashir to exorcise the Satan that resides within him and reflect on the genocide that he has orchestrated. I ask Meshal and Haniyeh to stop fighting the battle to the end of days, to lift up their people from the dependence on the compassion and sympathy derived from perpetual victimhood for the purpose of the Palestinian national movement's progression.

I ask Netanyahu to stop building settlements. Not because I believe, anymore, that that is the answer to the problems. But we have to do something that makes sense, something that comes from the need to live in the here and now with peace of mind.

At the end of the yoga practice, one finishes where one began. On the mat, hands folded, the journey completed. I see Ahmadinejad once again, full smile on newspapers, websites and television clips. With a full heart, I ask him and the others to try getting attention and adoration by leading from a different angle.

Sunday, January 4, 2009

From Tel Aviv

Last year on my birthday, Benazir Bhutto was assassinated in Pakistan. This year on my birthday, the Israeli Air Force (IAF) began bombing targets in Gaza to stop the rain of rockets falling on Southern Israel since the end of the ceasefire with Hamas on December 19. I wonder what next year's birthday will bring.

Technically, it is arguable that the incursion into Gaza can be called a war, as it is not a conflict between two countries but rather one country and a political-military entity. In Israel, however, the media has called it as such, as have the politicians. And so I state, that, my observations in Israel during a time of war are most disheartening.

What fails to make sense to me is: How is it that war is still considered an effective method of change? The United States got away with dropping nuclear weapons on Japan in 1945, bringing the war on that front to a stark and horrifying conclusion, but do we, as a human race ever EVER want for that to happen again? Are we not more evolved, more refined, more capable in the 21st century of managing conflict in a place, by the way, where people have more in common that what they have been led to believe?

It is understandable that the world is up at arms, marching through streets shouting slogans to end the war, to call for a ceasefire. It is unfathomable how in a week and a few days, hundreds have lost their lives, thousands have been wounded and those who survive this disaster will be left with nearly nothing to eke out an existence in the aftermath of Israel's attempt to remove Hamas from rule in the Gaza Strip.

However, there is more in the streets than a call for a ceasefire and a call for peace. There is a continued call for the end of Israel, and that is where the conflict intensifies and the Israel-supporting Jews and Israelis supporting the government's decision to invade Gaza, become more hardened, more embittered and more alienated from the rest of the human population.

The discussion, the demonstration, the debate, the tears, the anger cannot be about bringing an end to the State of Israel; it has to be a call for Israel to abide by international law and to make good on its promises. If anyone, the residents of the West Bank have greater reason to be fed up with Israel's policies than with those in Gaza, because Abbas and Fayad are toeing the line and, still, for the Palestinians the situation under occupation has not improved.

The violence is unforgivable on both sides. How it is that Hamas believes it will prevail with this method of rockets falling, killing, destroying, terrorizing and harassing Israelis of all walks of life, including Arab-Israelis, is incomprehensible. How an organization claiming to be for a living, developing nation could be so willing to jeopardize the lives of so many, filling them with hatred along way is also beyond my capabilities of understanding. But they have a right to resist, but they have a right to a country, but they have a right to Jerusalem, to compensation for refugees...
This is not what Hamas wants. Hamas wants an eternal battle, they will always need an enemy, if it is not the Jews or Israel, it is Fatah. If it is not Fatah, it is the United States, it is Egypt, one day it could be their current sponsor, Iran. They play a despicable game with people's lives, with children's lives. Children who have no choice but to emulate what they see and experience in their environment.

At the Tel Aviv University campus last week, Palestinian and Arab-Israeli students held a protest against the violence. Around a hundred students came out in their keffiyehs and their signs of solidarity with Gaza. They were angry and I found out, extremely sad.

My friend Davide and I spoke to two female demonstrators to ask what they wanted to get out of this demonstration. They wanted a stop to the violence. Telling us about a mother and her four children who were killed that morning in IAF bombings. One of the young women said, "They want all of the land," then thought again, "All of OUR land."

I responded to her, "It's all of our land, there's enough for all of us, and we have to all live here, so what do we do?"

I continued to ask her how do we make it stop? What's our plan? Other Jewish students were coming up to them and asking, "what about the rockets?"

They couldn't answer how to make the rockets stop, and neither were they justifying them.

But I wasn't interested in that argument. I was more concerned with the fact that none of us had a plan or a vision of what instead.

I continued to talk to the other young woman about the situation. She continued to tell me about the brutality, the starving, the suffering. And I told her, "I know, I want it to stop too, but how?"

We looked at each other and I asked her if I could give her a hug. I did, and when I pulled away I could feel tears forming in my eyes. When I looked up at her, she had started crying. There was no more anger in her body language, there was total sadness, defeat and helplessness.

She said, "I am so sad I feel like crying."

"Me too," I said.