Visit Palestine - (Doug)

Last year I bought a really cool poster from our friend, Suliman, in the Old City of Jerusalem. It’s reproduction of an old advertisement from the British Mandate period (end of WWI until 1948). It’s a painting of Jerusalem and on the bottom it says simply “Visit Palestine.” At the time I bought it because I thought it was sort of quaint. Lately, Mandy and I have been visiting Palestine and that poster has become all the more special to me.
With our time here in Bethlehem winding down, it is becoming more and more apparent to us that we have seen a whole lot of Israel but not much of Palestine. Therefore over the past month we have been doing our best to get around the West Bank a bit more and see some of the places that are uniquely Palestinian. Of course we know Bethlehem. I’m driving more and more like a Bethlehem native these days, a habit I will need to break quickly upon our return to the states or I am going to face some serious traffic tickets. But we want to know Palestine beyond our own “little town of Bethlehem.” We took the students in grades 3-12 on a field trip to Jericho the other day. Jericho, the oldest city in the world and the lowest city on earth, is under the control of the Palestinian Authority. It boasts fantastic produce such as dates, figs, and a cornucopia of various other delights. You can visit the ancient Tel of Jericho and a monastery said to be where Jesus was tempted in the wilderness for 40 days.
Last weekend one of my seniors, Osama, reached a significant milestone. His SAT grades were verified by the Palestinian Ministry of Education (a group whom I affectionately refer to as the Palestinian Ministry of Misinformation) to be eligible for graduation. They have a long and confusing list of points which must be satisfied if a student from a private school wishes to graduate and Osama is the first in his class to reach this goal. He needed to travel to an office in Ramallah to do so and Mandy and I offered to tag along. In part, I wanted to be there to shake Osama’s hand after it became official, but also we just really wanted to see Ramallah.
Ramallah is sort of the unofficial capital of Palestine. Officially of course when you ask Palestinians what their capital is they will say Jerusalem. Practically speaking though, Ramallah is the capital. Most of the big businesses are centered there. The government offices are there. Yasser Arafat is buried there. So we took off for Ramallah with Osama and we had a lovely day. I got to shake Osama’s hand and congratulate him on making it through high school alive. We got to go to the famous Stars and Bucks. Yes you read that correctly and yes it is a shameless knock off of Starbucks but let me tell you when it’s been 8 months since you last saw a Starbucks, Stars and Bucks ain’t half bad. And we visited the grave of Yasser Arafat as well. Though Ramallah is quite busy and I wouldn’t want to live there I have to admit that is fairly modern and impressive city. I jokingly said to Osama that they really ought to just give up and call Ramallah the capital and move on. He’s mulling the idea over. I’m sure he’ll get back to me soon.
Just today we made our next stop on our tour of Palestine. We have a five day weekend in honor of Orthodox Easter so we went with our friends, (and fellow teachers) Paris and Lily, to Hebron. Hebron is famous for their glass industry. We got to watch a man take molten glass from a giant furnace and blow life into it before our eyes. I also watched in amazement as the same man took out a chunk of hot glass with the tongs to light a cigarette; not exactly as beautiful but fascinating nonetheless.
Hebron is probably most famous as being the final resting place of the Patriarchs. Genesis 23:19 says “Afterward Abraham buried his wife Sarah in the cave in the field of Machpelah near Mamre (which is at Hebron) in the land of Canaan.” Today we stood overtop of the graves of Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, and Joseph (not to mention Sarah and Rebecca, and Leah.) This site is holy to both Muslims and Jews. It’s sort of a symbol of Hebron as a whole. One half of this building is a mosque and the other half is a synagogue and the gate between them is guarded by Israeli soldiers. Hebron is one of the most fought over spots in the West Bank. There are settlers in Hebron who are violent and spiteful towards the Palestinians who live there. We walked through one part of the city where the shopkeepers had put fencing up over the road to catch the trash that the Jewish settlers throw down upon them. They also warned us that often times when the settlers are done washing their floor they will dump the dirty, bleach filled water down onto the street and passersby below. Part of me wanted to cry at the thought of standing over the bones of Abraham. The rest of me wondered if Abraham cries watching his children fight over his grave.
This chapter of the Priore Palestine Parade will soon draw to a close. But when I get home and hang that “Visit Palestine” poster up on my wall it will mean something different to me than it did when I first bought it. It will represent friends. It will represent memories. It will represent hope. I hope you all will take the time to visit Israel. I hope you will all get the privilege to Visit Palestine.