Home at Last

Just a quick note to let everyone know that we've arrived home. After getting stuck in Salt Lake City for a day--where we couldn't get a flight to Medford--we rerouted to Reno, rented a car and drove the rest of the way.

Thank you all for joining us on our journey through the Middle East. I hope that this blog and the photos were able to provide you with a sense of place and events. Of course, now that we're back, I'm realizing that there's a lot that I've left out; like the night in Nablus when we awoke to the sound of tank engines and gunfire at the south end of the city. Perhaps that didn't seem relevant at the time because we'd been there for several nights and there had been gunfire every night.

Escape from Tel-Aviv

Getting on a flight out of Tel-Aviv on standby requires persistence, patience and athletic ability. The first I have. The second, no. And the third is waning as I slide down the backside of my 30s.

I only sustained minor injuries on the last-minute dash to the gate, but I'll get to that in a bit.

The flight we needed to get on was scheduled to depart at 11:40 p.m. At 10:40, things were looking really good for the dozen of us who were hoping to get out of Tel-Aviv that night. One group we knew from Tuesday night's failed mission.

All the regular passengers had boarded and they had told us that they would begin calling us by priority level and processing boarding passes. There were several people who had higher priority standby status than we did and after they were processed, it was a our turn.

It was 10:50 when they began processing our tickets and that's when things started going to hell. First a late-arriving revenue customer arrived. There was a flurry of activity to get his baggage checked and tagged, get his boarding pass processed and get him to the gate.

They closed all their windows and began processing standby customers again. We were in the process of getting our boarding passes when another late passenger showed up. They informed him that they had closed the windows. He wouldn't take no for an answer and began arguing with the attendant. Everything stopped and the moments ticked away.

Apparently, he was a Palestinian. He said he had been detained at a checkpoint for 3 hours. There were no checkpoints inside of Israel, so I assumed he was a West Bank Palestinian who had come from Ramallah through Qalandiya checkpoint. I was fairly certain that the Israelis did not allow West Bank Palestinians to fly out of Tel-Aviv.

He had papers, which he waived at the attendants while arguing. I'm sure they had heard his story before. The Israelis at the counter most likely had worked at checkpoints during their mandatory service in the Israeli military. There was no way this guy was getting on the flight. Meanwhile, precious seconds ticked by while they argued instead of finishing our boarding passes.

Eventually, two security guards led the Palestinian man away while he yelled and waived his papers in the air.

"You'll need to run if you're going to make it," one of the counter attendants told us.

We took off along with another attendant who would help expedite our passage through the security checkpoint and passport control.

After passing through the security checkpoint, we took off at a full sprint down a long corridor that led to the passport control area.

The floor on the corridor leading from security to passport control is not designed for running. It was like trying to run on an ice rink. But we had no choice if we were going to make the gate.

Everything was going fine until Sophia dropped her book. It slid across the floor and out in front of me. Rather than stopping to pick the book up, I attempted to scoop it off the floor without breaking stride. This turned out to not be a good idea. I got the book, but my foot slipped and I quickly found myself sliding down the corridor while doing the splits.

People behind us were laughing at the sight of the big white guy with a backpack sliding down the corridor while holding a book and doing the splits. I would have been laughing too except that I was completely stressed out and the splits had been accompanied by a tearing sound. Unfortunately, the tearing sound I'd heard was not the crotch of my pants, but my actual crotch. I realized this when I got back up and tried to continue running. Pain shot through my leg like electrical shocks. I kept running. All I cared about was making the gate. We had to make this flight. Adrenaline masked the pain that I would get to encounter later.

We went through passport control where some guy tried to step in front of us because he was in a hurry. I was just about to pick him up and throw him across the airport when I realized that I wouldn't make the flight for sure if I did that. Instead I pushed his passport out of the way at the window counter so that the passport control agent could continue with ours. He tried to push it back up under the window but I kept the path blocked with my hand and moved my body so that the passport control agent couldn't see the guy nor hear his ramblings about his passport problem.

After getting our passports stamped with exit visas, we took off down the final leg to the gate.

This part was carpeted and I ran as fast as my injured leg would allow. My goal was to get to the gate and stall them until Kacey and the girls caught up.

While I ran the 400 meters to the gate, Kacey and the girls were picked up by an airport courtesy car.

We arrived at the gate at the same time.

I was bent over, sweating and ready to puke.

"Daddy, we rode on a cart!" Emma exclaimed.

"That's...nice," I said between breaths.

"Are you okay Daddy?"

"Yeah, Daddy's just fine. Get on the plane."

We boarded and they closed the airplane door right behind us.

I slugged back a handful of ibuprofen as the flight attendants made final preparations for takeoff. Pain continued shooting through my leg but I didn't care. We made the flight and were finally getting the hell out of Tel-Aviv. And at the moment, that was all that mattered.

Ground Hog Day

We're at the Ben Gurion Airport, going through the same thing we did Tuesday. It's pretty much the same, but we hope the ending will be different and we'll get on tonights flight.

Meanwhile, a Palestinian family just got led away from the luggage inspection center behind us. We don't know what for, presumably for something that was in one of their bags. The woman was carrying a baby, she was sobbing and hyperventilating as they led her and her husband away with all their baggage.

Life's a Beach

Yesterday's flight looked bad and today looked better. So we spent the day at the beach playing in the Mediterranean and recovering from the late night we'd had. It was very pleasant even with the gunship helicopters and military transports that flew over the beach every five minutes or so. There was a lot of activity up and down the coast with helicopters and aircraft coming and going, presumably from Lebanon.

Night in Hell-Aviv

We left Jerusalem on Tuesday evening, which was the same day Condi was in town causing all sorts of traffic jams and mayhem.

There's one Delta flight per day from Tel-Aviv to Atlanta that departs at 11:40 p.m. We're flying on pass, which means we show up at the airport and hope there are open seats. There were none Tuesday night so we had to find a hotel in Tel-Aviv, which is about 20 minutes north of Ben Gurion Airport.

Tel-Aviv is a tourist/vacation town located on the Mediterranean. Summer time is when most Israelis are taking there vacations and all the hotels we called didn't have any rooms available, except one: The Ami Hotel. By the time we had called hotels, rounded up our bags, got a cab and got to Tel-Aviv, it was 2:00 a.m.

When we arrived at the Ami Hotel it was difficult to discern if it was a crack house or a whore house. Maybe both. One thing was for sure: my family was not going to stay in this place. Things got even better when we realized we had no more sheckels (Israeli currency) for paying additional taxi fare to search for hotels up and down the main strip.

It was unclear whether our taxi driver was in a hurry or just a dick when he left me, my wife, two little girls and all our baggage in front of a crack/whore house, speeding off into the night without even giving me the change he owed me.

We went to a hotel across the street from the Ami. it was nicer than the Ami and the front desk guy wasn't loaded. They didn't have any rooms available and no, our children could not sit in the lobby while one of us walked up and down the main strip inquiring about room availability at the many hotels that lined the street. So at 2:30 a.m., I found myself standing on a street corner in Tel-Aviv with a pile of luggage and two very tired and cranky little girls while Kacey went across the main strip to check for room availability at the hotels there.

At one of the hotels, Kacey encountered an angel of a woman at the front desk who actually called other hotels to see if they had a room was available. She found one and we hauled our bags several blocks up the street to the Shalom Hotel. It was a meager hotel, but very nice and clean. It was 3 a.m. by the time we got checked in and to bed.

Waiting at Ben Gurion

We're at Ben Gurion Airport, hoping to get seats on the 11:40 p.m. flight to Atlanta. It's not looking good at the moment, but we'll give it a shot nonetheless. The worst thing that can happen is that our luggage will be put on a flight will be sent to Peru and we'll stay the night in Tel Aviv then do this all over again tomorrow.

Meanwhile, it gives me time to sit in the food court where people keep coming up to me and talking to me in Hebrew. I'm not sure why this keeps happening to me. I've checked the top of my head to make sure somone didn't slip a yarmulke up there as a practical joke. I just smile, say "shalom" then confess that I don't speak Hebrew.

Working the Jewish Quarter

On Sunday, we got a handful of interviews at Hebrew University, but needed to talk to more people. So, we went to the Jewish Quarter of the Old City where Kacey spent yesterday afternoon interviewing Jewish shop owners and every day people she approached. Of course, some people didn’t want to be interviewed, but most were happy to talk about their life in Israel.

The overall all tone here is this: tired. Israelis are tired of constantly being at war. There are tired of having to defend themselves against attacks. They are tired of having to send their young people to war to defend Israel. They want peace. They want to go on with their lives without disruption and fear.

Opinions of how to achieve peace range greatly.

Some saw a two-state solution as the only hope for peace. Others saw no hope for peace; rather, it was an all-or-nothing deal. One side would win and one side would lose. And the losing side could not and would not be Israel.

One woman Kacey interviewed said that the situation wouldn’t end until all the Arabs left Israel.

“Where would they go?” Kacey asked.

“To live in one of the 22 other Arab countries out there.”

Based on our interviews with Palestinians, that’s not going to happen. Their home is here—not in Saudi Arabia, Syria or Egypt.

Night Trip to Ramla

We had been told about a house in Ramla, a small town west of Jerusalem, that was called Open House. The house had been owned by a Palestinian family prior to the war in 1948 at which time they were driven out by Israeli forces along with thousands of other Palestinians who lost their homes.

Years later, the son of the Palestinian man who had built the house in 1936 returned to his home where he was greeted by a young Israeli Jewish girl named Dalia who gave them a tour of the house.

After Dalia’s parents died, she dedicated the house as a place of education and reconciliation. Today, a kindergarten of mixed Arab and Jewish children is run in the Open House.

[The history and moving story of Open House is told in The Lemon Tree: An Arab, a Jew, and the Heart of the Middle East by Sandy Tolan.]

Kacey had contacted the resident director, whose name was Ofer, and asked if she could come interview him.

Ofer was very open to being interviewed and told us that if we could come that evening there would be a houseful of people, both Arab and Jewish Israelis, that she could interview.

They were having a going away party that night for a group of Dutch people who had raised money to come and do some needed repairs on the house. They were leaving to return to Holland that night.

We caught an 8:00 p.m. bus to Ramla from the central bus station in Jerusalem. The journey took about 40 minutes. Most of the other passengers on the bus were young military personnel. At first, it’s a bit frightful to be around so many young people with automatic machine guns. But after a while, you get used to it and don’t really think about it much anymore. After a while, you just get used to seeing Israeli soldiers with machine guns all over the place and stop noticing it any longer. It just becomes the norm.

Open House is a meager brick home. The going away party for the Dutch group was out back on the patio. We sat and talked and ate while the girls played on the small playground equipment.

Kacey got several good interviews with people there before we had to go catch the return bus to Jerusalem.

A couple days later, she met with and interviewed Dalia at our hotel here in Jerusalem.

The Theft of "The General Lee"

At dinner Monday evening, Isaac introduced us to a friend of his named Aryeh because he believed he could help us with our project.

Aryeh had been a journalist with the Jerusalem Post and knew all sorts of people, including very important people. Now Aryeh worked for the Anti-Defamation League (ADL) and was quickly eating dinner before having to go across the street to the King David Hotel for a meeting.

The head of the ADL was in town from New York and there would be a flurry of activity. The ADL is a Jewish organization that seeks to combat defamation of Jews. Specifically, according to the ADL Charter of October 1913, “[The ADL’s] ultimate purpose is to secure justice and fair treatment to all citizens alike and to put an end forever to unjust and unfair discrimination against and ridicule of any sect or body of citizens.”

Aryeh was a small energetic man who ate his pasta at warp speed. Between bites, he provided us with some ideas of where we could speak with Israeli Jews. He didn’t seem very interested in our project or perhaps he just became preoccupied with telling stories.

Once upon a time Aryeh had owned a blue and white Suzuki jeep he called “The General Lee”. He called it that because he had a sticker of the Confederate flag on the back and a plastic statue of General Lee mounted on the dashboard.

I thought it a bit odd for someone from the ADL to display such icons of American history. Aryeh was born to Irish parents who converted to Judaism. He grew up in Louisiana. Surely he knew what the Confederate flag and General Lee represented. Perhaps he was just mocking racist rednecks who still proudly waved the Confederate flag as a representation that African-Americans, as a lower race of people, should have remained slaves. If that were the case, however, I didn’t see the connection. It seemed to me that someone from the ADL shouldn’t be anywhere near condoning the symbolism of the Confederate flag nor drive a jeep that was christened “The General Lee”. If it was indeed some sort of mocking of such things, it was at best in the poorest of taste. At worst, he was truly celebrating what the South had stood for—the hypocrisy of which would be staggering.

Aryeh loved The General Lee and was very upset when it was stolen one day.

“I began calling all my contacts in the Palestinian Authority to see if they could find my jeep,” he said.

The jeep was finally tracked down in Hebron. Aryeh was informed that the jeep had already changed hands about a half dozen times and he would need to pay NIS 7,000 (about $1,500) to get it back.

“Of course, I had to get The General Lee back,” Aryeh said. “So I went to Hebron to buy it back.”

After many hours of coffee and tea and waiting for someone to bring The General Lee, it finally arrived.

“The flag had been torn off the back and the statue of General Lee busted off the dashboard,” Aryeh said. “I couldn’t believe it. Why would they do that? Only his boots remained.”

Isaac tried to console Aryeh that he could probably find another plastic statue of General Lee to mount on the dashboard of The General Lee.

“Maybe on eBay,” he said.

“I don’t know,” Aryeh said. “I got that one at a museum when I was a kid. I doubt it.”

Aryeh was done with his story, done with his pasta and needed to get over to the King David Hotel for the important meeting with the head of the ADL.

Interviews at Hebrew University

On Sunday morning, Kacey telephoned the public relations department at Hebrew University requesting permission to come on campus and interview students for her project. HU’s spokesperson granted the permission and we jumped in a cab to go across town to the campus.

We interviewed a dozen people at HU. Mostly students but some other people too, including the librarian.

The best interviews were a group of four young men with differing opinions of why things were the way they were. At one point, their discussion swung to Hamas and Hezbollah. One of the security guards, who I’d noticed loitering near us where we sat on the grass lawn, came over and spoke to one of the young men.

While the interviews carried on, I went over and told the security guard that we had permission from the public relations department to be on campus conducting interviews.

“It’s okay,” the student said. “I tell him we are open-minded campus and discuss politics openly. No problem.”

But apparently it was a problem.

After the student sat down with the rest of the group. I stayed with the security officer and talked some more. Apparently, it wasn’t okay to have open discussions about politics, especially regarding the Arabs.

“We have lots of Arabs here,” the security guard explained. “No political discussions like that about Hezbollah or Hamas. It could create big problem.”

“Okay, okay. It thing they are done now,” I said. “We were just talking to them about life here and, you know, the situation in Lebanon just came up.”

And how could it not have? Hezbollah rockets being fired into northern Israel where two dozen Israelis, mostly civilians, had been killed during the past two weeks was on everyone’s minds and permeated every discussion we had, especially with Israeli Jews.

Meeting Isaac

We met Isaac because the woman carrying his coffee thought I was his son.

She was carrying his coffee because Isaac is old and walks with a cane. He’s missing his right middle index finger from mid-knuckle down and when I shook his hand, I could feel the nub of knuckle pressing firmly into my palm.

Isaac laughed at the woman’s mistake.

I laughed too and offered for him to just sit with us.

“No, no, I don’t want to interrupt you,” he said. He had picked up his coffee by the saucer beneath the cup. It was quaking in his hands as he barely grasped it with the nub of index finger.

“Really, it’s not a problem,” I said.

He sat.

Isaac was visiting from Florida. He was a Jew and had lived in Jerusalem all his life prior to retiring to Florida. He had served in the Israeli army during the War of Independence in 1948. Before that, he lived under British occupation.

“Now, you see the King David over there?” he asked, pointing over to the King David Hotel across the street from where we sat.

We did.

“Now, that was the central hub of the British administration,” he said. “Listen, before Israel became a state there were underground organizations that were working to uproot and oust the occupying British. One of the tactics used was…” He paused for a second. “Well, it was terrorism against the British occupiers,” he continued. “There’s no other way to describe it.”

“Now,” he said. “They knew that the hub of the British administration was right there in the King David Hotel, so they picked that as a target. They cased the joint and noticed that milk was delivered everyday at 6:00 a.m. A truck would arrive carrying large metal containers of milk and those containers would be unloaded into the kitchen. So the Ergon—that was the name of one of the resistance groups—made a plan to get bombs into the building by faking the milk delivery. One morning, about 20 minutes before the regular delivery, some Ergon members in Arab dress, arrived at the King David with a truck-load of explosives hidden inside milk containers. The containers were unloaded into the kitchen and they drove away. Now, they wanted to limit the number of casualties, so they telephoned the British high commander whose office was located in the the King David and told him that there were explosives in the administrative wing of the hotel and that they had 20 minutes to evacuate. Now, instead of notifying everyone, the commander went to the opposite end of the hotel. When the regular milk truck arrived at 6 a.m., the guys in the kitchen knew that something strange was going on. But it was too late. The explosives hidden inside the milk containers went off. Ninety-six people perished.”

We told Isaac about our project and that we were having problems finding Israeli Jews to interview. He gave us the names of some places he thought we would find people to interview.

We asked if we could interview him.

He smiled and laughed.

“No, I’m just a boring old man who will only talk about the past,” he said.

“The past is very important,” I told him, thinking of the story he had just told us about the King David Hotel.

But he declined to be interviewed and his opinions and stories would go unrecorded.

O Jerusalem

We arrived in Jerusalem late Friday afternoon, just in time to check into our hotel and walk down to the Western Wall to witness the celebration of the beginning of the Sabbath. The plaza was packed with groups of people, some just tourists like us observing everything, but mostly Jews celebrating. Some were clearly large Jewish tour groups. They were standing in circles singing songs in Hebrew.

To get into the Western Wall plaza, you pass through a metal detector and security check where they search your bags. There are a lot of police and soldiers in the plaza as well. I also noticed that there were young Jewish males who were carrying crude bolt-action rifles along with their backpacks. The Jewish man in front of me on the steps going down to the security checkpoint had a 9mm slipped into the waist-band of his pants.

Meanwhile, a constant stream of Orthodox Jews passed through the plaza on the way to the Western Wall to pray. They were easily recognizable because they wore black suits and large black hats. Some of them wore large, round furry hats.

Emma noticed this right away and inquired about this seemingly unsensible fashion choice for such a climate.

"Why do they wear furry hats when it is so hot?"

Indeed, it must have been uncomfortable along with the long black overcoats they were wearing.

"It's their tradition," Kacey explained.

Emma contemplated the furry hats a bit longer. She began giggling.

"Mama?"

"Yes?"

"Those hats are funny."

Down on the plaza, there were signs posted that informed visitors that smoking, use of cellphones and taking of pictures were prohibited on the plaza.

Kacey wanted to film of course, so we went up a set of stairs leading out of the plaza and she filmed from there.

"You can't film this," I told her. I could read one of the posted signs right from where we were sitting.

"It says that you can't take pictures 'on the plaza'," she said. "We're not on the plaza any longer. I'm going with a very literal interpretation."

She kept filming until one of the officers came up the steps wagging his finger at her and telling her "No picture, no picture."

She put the camera away.

"Told you so," I said.

"Well, I got a few minutes of footage anyway."

We left the Western Wall and walked up through the Muslim Quarter of the Old City.

The sun had gone down the shops were reopening for the evening. One of the shops we stopped in was run by a Palestinian from Hebron. We told him about our project and he agreed to be interviewed. Like most of the Palestinians we've interviewed, he was eager to pour forth his story and his opinions, especially about the war in Lebanon. For the most part his view of the current situation was quite similar to the Arab view I put forth in an earlier blog entry (see: Burning, Burning, Burning). He added, however, that he believed that America was purposefully using Israel to do its dirty work against Hezbollah with the hope of dragging Iran into the conflict.

"I think American people are very good," he said, smiling at me. "But your government is making tragedy for Lebanese people."

Returning to Ramallah

We woke at 4 a.m. to begin the journey from Amman back to Ramallah.

We took a cab to the Allenby Bridge (King Hussein) Crossing, where Linda was separated from us to go with the rest of the Palestinians who are segregated from the rest of the foreigners crossing the border.

After paying the Jordanian exit tax and getting an exit visa, we sat in the waiting area where we waited for the bus that would take us to the crossing.

We waited and waited. We were attacked by tiny flies that had invaded the waiting area. Meanwhile the day grew hotter.

Our plan was to cross the border and take a bus to Jericho where we'd meet up with Linda's friend, Rami, and wait there for her.

Things weren't looking good though. The Jordanian officer at the entry gate told Linda to go with us and just show her British passport. Linda didn't think that would work and when we finally got to the passport window, that's when the officer there sent Linda packing over to the Palestinian area. It wasn't his fault. He said that the Jordanians would let here through, but as soon as she showed up on the Israeli side, they would send her back.

Finally our bus arrived and we took the short trip to the border crossing. When you arrive at checkpoint on the Israeli side, everyone gets off the bus and lines up for passports checks. If you have no stamps in your passport (as we did), the officer looks at you suspiciously.

"Do you have another passport?"

"No," I said.

"Why no stamps?"

"The stamps we received were on separate pieces of paper."

He flipped back through each page of my passport again looking for stamps that were not there.

He didn't seem content with the fact that there were no stamps in my passport, but handed it back and told me to have a nice day.

That was just the checkpoint. When you get to the arrival gate, you hand your passport over with your baggage. Your baggage goes on a conveyor belt to be x-rayed and checked for bombs. After they check your passports, you go through a metal detector and any bags you're carrying go through an x-ray machine.

When we came through the metal detector, the officer on the other side asked what the purpose of our visit was.

"Tourism," I said.

"Are you aware of the situation here?" she asked, referring to ongoing rocket attacks by Hezbollah in northern Israel.

"Yes, we are aware," I told her.

"You are brave tourists I think," she said.

I smiled at her. Maybe we were. Or maybe we were just foolish. Either way, we needed to go to Israel.

If you were a Palestinian, you went into this large detector device that blasted you with air while sensors looked for trace residue of bomb-making material.

If you were American, they ushered you past the ominous device and on to Passport Control where you fill out paperwork and get your visa.

If you're Palestinian you go to one area. All other nationalities go to other booths.

"Where are you going?" the officer at the booth asked.

"Jerusalem."

"Where will you be staying?"

"With a friend."

"What's the friend's name?"

"Um, we only know her first name," Kacey said then explained how we'd never met her but had been given her name by Rabbi David Zaslow who we knew in the States.

"Are you Jewish?" she asked.

"No."

She stamped our passports and sent us on our way to go pickup our baggage.

If you're Palestinian, you wait in one area why they manually search your bags.

All other nationalities went directly to the conveyor belts to pickup luggage.

Outside, we caught a bus to Jericho where we met up with Rami and waited for Linda.

She wasn't far behind us, but only because the Jordanians had moved her quickly through the processing on their side of the border because they knew she was traveling with us.

We saw some the sites in Jericho, but tired quickly from the heat. Most everything was closed too. On Wednesday, Israeli Defense Forces invaded Nablus. Nine Palestinans were killed during the invasion, one of whom was a from Jericho. The shops were closed in memory of him and in protest of his killing. Every once in a while we were passed by a truck full of young men waving posters of the martyered young man and blaring music.

We began the long, hot drive from Jericho to Ramallah, which consists of miles and miles of nothing but barren hills. Every once in a while, we'd pass a small shack with a corrugated roof and walls made from abandoned automobile doors and hoods. Sometimes there were people herding goats and you'd wonder how they were all (man and goat alike) surviving amidst so much emptiness and heat.

We went through five checkpoints along the way. Apparently the sun had cooked any interest out of the Israeli soldiers at the checkpoints. We handed them all four of our American passports, which they'd just leaf through then hand back and send us on our way.

We arrived in the evening at the City Palace Inn Hotel in Ramallah, which is where we are now hanging out and arranging for a place to stay in Jerusalem. Linda is translating the last few interviews from Arabic to English.

We're leaving for Jerusalem today and Linda is heading back to Nablus. Nablus has been closed for the past few days, following the invasion of Nablus on Wednesday.

Updated Photogallery

I've updated the online photogallery with recent photos from Bethlehem, the Dead Sea and Petra:
Middle East Travel Photogallery

Burning, Burning, Burning

I’m watching the Al Jazeera news channel this morning. I don’t understand most of the Arabic, but a picture is worth a thousand words. I’m watching demonstrations in both Beruit and Cairo where they are burning cheap paper drawings of the Israeli flag and chanting “Allahu akbar” (God is great) over and over again as the paper flags curl at the corners and fly away like tiny black birds.

Yesterday, I watched another demonstration in which an Israeli flag was being burned and was then used to light an American flag on fire. The two then burned together. This is symbolic of the growing worldview in the Middle East that is being indelibly burned into the social consciousness of all Arabs; that is, the U.S. giving unconditional support to Israel.

Whether or not you agree with this is irrelevant. What is relevant is that you understand how America is viewed in the Arab world.

I am not an Arab. I am not a Middle East expert or a scholar. I’m just an American who has lived and traveled in the Middle East and read a lot of books by other people who are Arabs and/or Middle East experts and scholars. While this is hardly a solid foundation for what I’m about to do here, but I’m going to take a stab at it nonetheless because being here now, in this place at this time, I’m compelled to do so. Here is what I think the Arab worldview of America is as the crisis in Lebanon deepens and moves closer and closer toward long-term intractable violence.

America supports Israel unconditionally and cares little about the lives and future of the Arabs, especially the Palestinians.

America is quick to label Hamas and Hezbollah as “terrorist organizations” while the real terrorist organization in the Middle East is the Israeli military, which daily kills countless civilians.

The Israeli military is funded in large part by U.S. foreign aid; therefore, America is funding this large-scale terrorism against the Arabs as currently demonstrated by Israeli military operations in Gaza and in Lebanon.

America calls for peace, but won’t call Israel to the carpet for it’s unjust and brutal actions against civilians.

Together, America and Israel are using their military might to subdue and control the Arabs.

While Arab governments, the UN and the rest of the international community sit idly by, Hezbollah is the only organization that is attempting to defend the Lebanese people from Israeli military attacks.

Whether or not you agree with this is irrelevant. What is relevant and important is that you understand that this worldview is being created and reinforced by direct actions (as well as inactions) as the crisis in Lebanon escalates. I believe this is a critical juncture for the future of U.S. foreign policy in the Middle East. If the U.S. administration continues to plow forward through this crisis unconscious of the Arab worldview then they are ensuring a future in which hatred of America among everyday people here will continue to grow and the American flag will burn along with the dreams of a peaceful future.

Lebanese Lunch

When we arrived in Ramallah, I registered our travel itinerary online at the U.S. Department of State website. This morning, I received the following notification email from the American embassy here in Amman:

The escalation of hostilities along the Israeli and Lebanese border has prompted demonstrations in Jordan. While these have been peaceful, we nonetheless urge all Americans in Jordan to be aware of the potential for violent demonstrations. American citizens are therefore urged to avoid the areas of demonstrations if possible, and to exercise caution if within the vicinity of any demonstrations.

We haven't witnessed any demonstrations here in Amman. People are definitely tuned into the news. Most every cab we've been in has the radio news on and every restaurant TV is on a news channel.

Yesterday afternoon, after having gone to the Syrian Embassy, we had lunch at Lubnani Snack (Lebanese Snack). The food was great but the atmosphere not so great. Just outside the restaurant, workers were busy constructing a massive suspension bridge.

In order to make room for the bridge, the square footage of the street-facing restaurant had to be reduced. Workers had begun this process and the front of the restaurant looked as though it had been hit by a missile. Metal and wires hung down from the ceiling. Floor tiles were broken and the front entry pillars scarred and crumbling.

One of the workers was perched precariously on lopsided scaffolding. He had a big hammer and a powersaw with a metal-cutting blade on it. He was trying to remove the metal frame that had held the awning over the front entry way. He would saw on the metal, which made a high-pitched grinding sound that cut right through your eardrums. Then he would bang away on the metal frame with a hammer. He made a lot of noise, but little progress.

Meanwhile, a large flat panel TV mounted on the wall blared out the news of continued Israeli bombing of Lebanon where more civilians had been killed. Amidst the noise and chaos of the Lebanese restaurant, we ate and watched the news of noise and chaos in Lebanon. Buildings were destroyed. People were killed. And somehow, amidst the chaos and destruction, life just continued on in Lebanon just as it did in this Lebanese restaurant.

Catching Up

Okay, I got a bit behind on my blogs. I'd like to blame this on the spotty Internet connectivity I'm getting from the wireless connection 4 flights down in the apartment complex. Anyway, I'm caught up now, having gone back and done some entries chronilogically. In addition to today's entries, I've gone back and added: A Passage to Petra and Floating the Dead.

Walking in Qunaytra

[I visited Qunaytra, a Syrian town near the Golan Heights, many years ago. Today, I am reminded of that visit and this poem.]


Walking in Qunaytra

A graveyard of dead giants with toppled tombstones,
a land full of ghosts with voices, sharp cries of wind
cut upon 100 miles of encircling concertina wire:
this is a town of flat houses that buckled beneath
gravity and the weight of a thousand Zionist bombs.

The day I arrived, the sun sat on the ground
and we all suffered its immense heat. Our guide
smiled at the destruction, proud of how the Syrians
have preserved this martyrdom-at-the-border,
a national idol sculpted from hate, their golden calf
for worshipping broken dreams. Broken like these
homes of old where all the lights have gone out
and laughter no longer spills from the windows,
broken like this bullet-pocked hospital
where fire-scarred staircases zig-zag up
four flights of nothingness; broken like
the heart of this nobody tourist who’s tumbled
into this place like a newborn colt battling gravity
and the weight of the sun’s brightness.

Standing on the roof-top I looked out
across one million acres of burnt brown,
so unlike back home where there’s nothing
but pissing down rain year round. We go about
our lives as though nothing else has happened
except what’s happened to us. At best we’re zombies
high on Speed and seeing the world with Technicolor
tunnel-vision. But mostly our heads are selfish wounds
we lap at all day with those equally irksome tongues
yo-yoing in and out and in-and-out the mouth.

So much nothing in my heart it wanted to leap
from the hospital roof, a seemingly meager
sacrifice to the emptiness of this place.
But looking west there was finally something:
Mount Hermon, a dirt-ramp of a mountain
presiding over the mighty Golan
and looking hardly worth dieing for.
It was here, long before I was born,
two nations offered up their sacrifices
and legions of men were torn away from this life.

Napalm fell from heaven turning a thousand men
to pillars of fire, their black hair burning
like an angry forest. The Syrian generals
escaped on horseback to the tune
of jingling medals playing upon their fat breasts.
The road to Damascus lay open like a wound
while the king’s radio station declared
an empty victory and war-weary soldiers
returned to herding goats in the hills
of their ancestors.

These are the same hills where Cain slew Abel
and blood cried out from the ground to God on high.
Blood cried out to a god who allowed
this first sacrifice of a brother
murdering his brother.

And as I walked the streets of Qunaytra,
I stopped and stooped low my ear to the ground
to discover something much worse:
that same blood flows though my heart and in my body,
still crying out to a god whose boundless love
somehow allows us this timeless curse.

Birthdays, Bombs and Burials

Today is my birthday. I am 37, which makes me either young or old depending on what side of the hill you are standing on.

Overcome with nostalgia, I wanted to have my birthday in Damascus, which is where, on this day 13 years ago, I celebrated my 24th birthday at our apartment in Damascus. At 24, there was no nostalgia--only looking forward to the future. I’m wondering now if the strong presence of nostalgia indicates that I am more on the older end of the spectrum rather than the younger end. Again, I guess that depends on how one looks at it.

We found out yesterday that there is no way we’ll get into Syria. We visited the Syrian embassy here in Amman and spoke to a lady that worked there.

“You are American citizens only?” she asked.

“Yes.”

“Not Jordanian too?”

“No.”

“Then the only way you can get visa is through the Syrian embassy in Washington, D.C.”

We suspected that would be the case but wanted to find out for sure.

Apparently, you need to get your Syrian visa as far away from the Middle East as possible. Once you’re here in an Arab country, you’re screwed. On the surface this doesn’t make much sense until you understand that Syria is a heavily controlled police state that has been under a dictatorship for over 30 years. All foreign entry and travel within the country is under the watchful eye of the mukabarat (police).

We knew all this from having lived in Damascus in 1993 under the watchful eye of Hafiz al-Asad. Following his death in 2000, presidential power was ceded to his son Bashar. The face on the presidential posters and billboards all over the country have changed, but for the most part, it’s politics as usual.

This morning, I watched the official Syrian news channel on ArabSat. There was a huge demonstration in central Damascus where thousands of people holding Syrian and Palestinian flags, pickets signs with either slogans or pictures of Bashar al-Asad.

There looked to be over 10,000 people jammed into the central square and the four major streets feeding into it.

The chaos and death that has occurred this past week in Lebanon and northern Israel will pale in comparison to the tragedy that will occur if Syria becomes militarily involved in the escalating conflict, which is looking to be more and more likely.

I am no Middle East political expert, but based on what I do know, I believe the following scenario is possible and likely if the UN Security Council continues to be unsuccessful at brokering a cease-fire and/or neither side backs down:

Israeli Defense Forces (IDF) will continue to bomb southern Lebanon where Hezbollah is most concentrated.

[According to The Daily Star, an English language newspaper in Lebanon, the Israeli military on Thursday, dropped leaflets across Lebanon warning residents to evacuate areas where Hezbollah is active. “Due to the terrorist activities carried out by Hezbollah,” the leaflets read, “the Israeli Army will continue its work within Lebanese territories for as long as it deems fit to protect Israeli citizens. For your own safety and because we do not wish to cause any more civilian deaths, you are advised to avoid all places frequented by Hezbollah. You should know that the continuation of terrorist activities against Israel will be considered a double-edged sword for you and Lebanon.”]

Hezbollah will continue to launch kyutsha rockets into northern Israel, targeting population centers in Haifa where more civilians will be killed.

The IDF will also continue to bomb airports and transportation routes (especially the highway to Damascus) in Beruit and other areas in northern Lebanon. They will continue to bomb power and communications infrastructure throughout the country. The civilian death toll will rise and more Lebanese will continue to flee Lebanon, primarily into Syria.

The IDF will carry out a ground offensive into southern Lebanon at which point Syrian troops coming across the western border near the Golan will join Hezbollah militants to fight against the IDF. The IDF will retreat to the south and west toward the Mediterranean, leaving Syrian troops and Hezbollah militants to be annihilated by Israeli naval shelling and air force sorties.

Southern Lebanon will be transformed into scorched earth and a mass grave just like what happened in the Golan Heights in 1967. Israel will occupy southern Lebanon where it will set up a security zone.

[Some will see this as Israeli aggression resulting in the taking of more Arab territory. Others will see it as Israel defending itself from terrorism. Some will see it as a tragedy, others will see it as victory.]

If the situation escalates like this, the possibility of direct military involvement by Iran (the primary supporter of Hezbollah) will become imminent. Should that occur, it will create an international security crisis and a complex political quagmire that will be difficult for all involved to navigate without sinking further into the depths of war.

I hope I am wrong about all of this. Meanwhile, here in Amman on my 37th birthday with the afternoon call to prayer coming into the room from the open window, I’m wondering what God thinks of all this mischief we’re creating here during our short time upon the earth where the glory of Man becomes buried again and again beneath a dark mound of hate and violence.

A Passage to Petra

A day trip to Petra is easy: You get up at 5:00 a.m. to get ready and get to the Jett bus station in Amman by 6:30, which is when the bus leaves. There you join a bunch of other yawning and crazy tourist who think that a day trip is a good idea. If you're lucky, you bring your children. And if you're really lucky they're tired and cranky and fighting before the sun has even risen.

This was us and we were on our way to Petra for the day.

The bus ride from Amman to Petra takes three hours and when Sophia complained about being cold I told her to enjoy it and remember what it felt like later in the day when we were engulfed in the desert sun. (She wouldn't of course. And hours later, complaining of the heat, I reminded her of the cool morning. "Dad," she said, "Stop. It doesn't work. I was cold in the morning and now I'm hot." So it goes.)

Kacey and I had been to Petra in 1993. While the ancient rock buildings hadn't changed much, the town of Wadi Musa just outside the entrance had. There were easily twice as many resturants and hotels and there had been 13 years ago. There were more tourists and more tourist hustlers too. Two of them, Uthman and his brother Ahmed latched onto us like a shackle.

We had stopped at the ampitheter, which back in its prime held 4,000 guests. Today, it held only a dozen tourist, three of whom were Kacey, Sophia and Emma. I stayed on the outside to take their picture. That's where I became surrounded by boys on donkeys, making their various sales pitches for a donkey ride. When I told them in Arabic that I didn't need a donkey ride and that I was just waiting for my wife and children, Uthman, who was about 12, became my best friend.

He called me "Musri", which means "Egyptian" because I used mostly Egyptian words when I spoke with him.

Uthman liked to laugh and slap hands. He spent his days riding a donkey and hustling tourists. For sure, I was just another tourist. But I was also a big white guy who talked like an Egyptian and that was pretty damn funny.

While we were waiting for Kacey and girls to come out of the ampitheater, a middle aged man came up and began yelling at the kids. I didn't understand what he was saying. Uthman pointed at me and yelled back. The guy left and went after some little girls who were carrying boxes of rocks and trinkets. They ran away from him giggling.

"Who is that man?" I asked.

"He's like the police," Uthman said.

"But not a policeman?"

"No, not a policeman."

"I think he is a little bit crazy," I said.

Uthman laughed and held his hand up for a slap.

Later, on our way to the monestary, Uthman would whisper, "The crazy man is behind us," then begin laughing again.

We bargained a price for Uthman and his brother to take the girls on donkey to the monestary then back to the Khazneh, which is at the beginning of Petra.

[For more information about Petra, go to: http://www.kinghussein.gov.jo/tourism6d.html]

Hiking to the monestary is easy: you only need to climb 900 crumbling steps. If you want to get some good exercise and lose some weight, I recommend doing it in during the hottest part of the day as we did. It's definitely worth the view and the risk of heat stroke. And if you really want a workout, I suggest wearing a heavy back pack and trying to keep up with two young boys who are charging off ahead with your children on donkeys.

The girls did amazingly well. All in all we spent 7 hours in Petra before boarding the bus and heading back to Amman where we arrived home at 9:00 p.m., tired, hot and hungry.

Apathy in Amman

Just a quick note to let everyone know that we're just fine.

While it would be an easy out to say that I've been distracted with the latest escalation of violence here, that would be a lie. I've just had a bad bout of apathy here in Amman where we've been for the past few days. We've fallen into limbo here. Seems everywhere we want to go is either being bombed or under the threat of being dragged into the current escalation.

I would like to believe that I know the region and the politics well enough to make informed decisions. But based on this week's events in Lebanon, I'm doubting my insight and judgement. For example, the Israeli bombing of Beruit is not the response I expected for Hezbollah's kidnapping of two Israeli soldiers. As of this morning, the civilian death toll has reached 80 in Lebanon and 8 in northern Israel where Hezbollah has been lobbing kyutsha rockets for the past several days in response to the Isreali bombing of Beruit.

The problem with political exteremist on all sides of the complex conflicts here in the Middle East is that they will remember every wrong ever done to them when it is convenient for justifying their current actions. They’ll also forget what happened yesterday should that be convenient as well. They plow forward unconsciously and self-righteously through every situation taking advantage of each tragedy to further their cause.

Meanwhile, innocent civilians and children, people just like you and me, are killed each day--the sacrificial lambs on a bloody political chessboard where the moves are dictated by men who plow forward unconsciously and self-righteously through every situation taking advantage of each tragedy to further their cause.

Floating the Dead

You cannot drown in the Dead Sea.

Well, I suppose you could if you were really desperate. But I don't recommend it. The water is too buoyant because of all the salt. The water is nasty too. Everything dies in this sea and turns to black sludge at the bottom that could be mistaken for something else. Visitors scoop up handfuls of this black crap and rub it on their bodies and faces.

Apparently this is good for you and has all sorts of healing effects. I rubbed my body with this black goo and must admit that it did make me feel different. I wouldn't say that it made me feel ten years younger or 30 pounds lighter. For sure, I felt much dirtier than before application of said goo. I felt like I needed a shower. The smell made me feel like puking. Perhaps this is medicinal.

If you can't make it to the Dead Sea, you can purchase this stinky black goo for exorbitant prices from online stores and select spas all over the world. But if you go to the Dead Sea, you go with a feeling of obligation to float in the salty water and bath your body in the black mud.

Our youngest daughter, Emma, was not so easily convinced. At six-years-old, she was wary of entering a sea called the "Dead Sea" because it must mean that people die there. After much parental coaxing, she took a couple of cautious steps into the water, but immediately retreated to the shore.

"I can feel the bones of the dead people," she cried.

"Those aren't bones, they're rocks," her mother said. "Come on silly."

Emma walked out cautiously again to her mother's waiting arms. While she overcame the imaginary bones beneath her feet, she could not withstand the very real burning that the salt water causes when it opens any scrape, cut or other body cavity opening.

I can attest to this. My ass was on fire as I floated in the Dead. It's like I'd just been administered an enema of habañeros sauce.

After repeating "no pain, no gain" for a couple of minutes, I realized that I was getting no gain from the pain and should get my ass out of the warm salty water and to a cold shower.

I'M WITH STUPID, or How We Got Into Jordan

Here’s a bit of travel advice: consult your guide book before traveling anywhere. This will likely save you time and headache. We did not do this before traveling to Jordan and had a hellish day because of it.

We left Ramallah at 9:00 a.m. to go to the Allenby bridge border crossing. Our cab driver got lost in the desert and had to make a cell phone call back to the taxi office to figure out where he needed to turn to get to the Allenby bridge. When we finally arrived to Allenby at around 10 a.m., there was a long queue of buses, micro-buses and cabs. Our driver could not take us through the Israeli checkpoint there to the Jordanian border. We had to switch to an Arab-Israeli micro-bus.

We sat in the micro-bus and waited for our turn to cross.

We sat and waited for our turn.

We sat and waited.

And waited.

And waited.

After about an hour, it was clear that our line wasn’t moving. What was clear, however, is that Israeli micro-buses kept arriving and being called right to the front of the line. I was seated next to Samir who was a Palestinian-American from Chicago. He was waiting there to take his sick mother, who was in the cab in front of our micro-bus, to Amman to be treated for a recent stroke she had.

Samir said that they’d been there since 7:00 a.m.

“They have a special arrangement,” he said, pointing over to the yellow and white Israeli micro-buses that passed us on the right.

Kacey, the girls and I got out and walked up to the checkpoint where the soldiers were.

“Why aren’t we moving?” Kacey asked one of the soldiers.

“You should take a taxi.”

“We are in a taxi,” Kacey said. “We have small children and there are other children on our bus. It’s hot and they’re uncomfortable. You need to move us across.”

“I’m sorry,” the soldier said. “There’s nothing I can do.”

Kacey was not convinced and persisted.

“Yes there is,” she said. “You are making a choice to allow this line through,” she said pointing to the queue of Israeli micro-buses, “and not these,” pointing now to the Palestinian line.

She was right. You could tell the soldier was slightly embarrassed by our observation of what was going on at Allenby.

“There’s nothing I can do,” he said again, then turned and left.

We went back to the bus.

Some of the Palestinian drivers were becoming agitated and were arguing with the main guy who was standing there deciding who would go next.

We waited. The girls were hungry. The Palestinian families that we were on the bus with shared the bread and cheese they had brought with them for the long wait they knew they’d have.

Another half hour passed. It was 11:00 a.m. If we didn’t get to the other side before noon. Linda, who left at 5:00 a.m. in the morning, would leave without us. That’s assuming that she wasn’t on one of the big buses queued on our left bringing the Palestinians who were brought over from the Jericho processing area. Because Linda was a West Bank Palestinian, she had to go through a different area before coming to Allenby. The Palestinians on the micro-bus with us were Arab-Israelis, probably from the Arab quarter of Jerusalem. Linda left at 5:00 hoping that would give her enough lead time to meet with us on the other side.

Kacey got out and went back up to the checkpoint to talk to the soldiers. I followed a bit later to make sure she didn’t get in an argument with the soldiers, an event that probably wouldn’t improve our situation.

As I walked up to the checkpoint, I passed the Palestinian drivers who were still standing out in the sun arguing with the head guy. It seemed as though a riot was about to start. Kacey was talking to a different soldier this time. I hung back because the soldier was a small guy and I didn’t want him to think I was coming up to intimidate him in some way. I could tell from Kacey’s hand motions and pointing that she was remaining calm during her discussion. After a bit, she turned and came back toward the buses.

“What did he say?”

“He said that the lines are treated equally,” she said. “I told him that they weren’t and it was obvious that they were giving preferential treatment to the Israeli micro-buses. He said he’d get us moving. I think he will.”

As we passed the cab at the front of the Palestinian queue, the head guy called it forward. The cab driver gave us a thumbs up as if knowing that Kacey’s conversation with the soldier broke the dead-lock on our line.

They moved some more taxis and micro-buses through. They even moved the some of the big busses filled with other Palestinians who had come over from the processing area in Jericho. Perhaps Linda was on one of those buses. We didn’t know.

Finally, at around 11:30 a.m., it was our turn. We pulled up to the gate. They checked under the micro-bus with a mirror. Then a soldier boarded and asked for passports.

When he got to us, he asked if we had a Jordanian visa.

“No, we’ll get them at the entry point,” Kacey said.

He told us to wait a minute and left the bus with our passports.

A few minutes later the head guy came on board and called me forward to the door.

“I must advise you,” he said, “that you cannot get a Jordanian visa at this crossing.”

“What?” I said. I couldn’t believe I was hearing this.

Kacey came to the door too.

I gave her the bad news.

“You’re kidding.”

“No.”

“You can try,” the head guy said, “But I guarantee they won’t give you one. Not from this crossing. Then you will have paid the $150 exit tax for nothing.”

“What? A hundred and fifty bucks to leave Israel?”

“Yes. You need to go to the Sheik Hussein crossing north of here.

“How far is that?”

“About an hour, maybe hour and a half.”

Shit.

Our driver, who didn’t speak any English, was getting antsy. He wanted to get his passengers across and wanted us to either stay or go.

“It’s your decision,” the head guy said.

Kacey was crying.

I was pissed.

The girls sat in the back of the micro-bus oblivious to their parents blunder.

“I think we have to get out and go to Sheik Hussein.”

We got the girls off and unloaded all our bags right there at the checkpoint.

The driver spoke with the head guy who explained our predicament.

The driver told us to wait right here and that he would pick us up on the way back from the border crossing then take us to Sheik Hussein.

We really had no choice. We were stuck out in the desert with no other options.

We sat and waited.

The head guy apologized for our situation and offered us water.

“It’s all our fault,” I told him. While we had been waiting there, we read in our guidebook about crossing into Jordan. Out situation was right there in black and white:

“Americans need a visa to enter the country [Jordan], which can be bought on the spot everywhere except at the Allenby Bridge crossing.”

I felt as though Kacey and I should be standing side-by-side wearing matching T-shirts that said: I’M WITH STUPID→

What was already going to be a long trip had just become a lot longer. And a lot more expensive too.

The driver returned. We loaded our baggage back up and began the journey north to Sheik Hussein, which took about an hour and a half.

We had another problem too. We didn’t have enough sheckels to pay the driver and would need to cash some more travelers checks.

The driver said that was no problem and we’d figure it out at Sheik Hussein.

The drive to Sheik Hussein was pleasant. We chatted with our driver about his family and the landscape. We were passing through a large swath of land in the West Bank that West Bank Palestinians were not allowed to enter. If you find that ironic, that’s because it is. A large portion of the West Bank is closed to West Bank Palestinians, even those who have land there like Linda’s father. This area is rich in agriculture and even though it is technically Palestinian territory, there are numerous Israeli settlements, which are easy to spot because they are new and beautiful and stand out amongst the squalid tent homes of the Bedouins farming small patches of land and herding goats. There’s other indicators too such as all the road signs being in Hebrew and the Israeli flag popping up here and there along the road to Sheik Hussein. The crossing is so far north that we actually left the West Bank and entered Israel proper up by the southern end of the Sea of Galilee. Unfortunately, we would have to travel this same distance all the way south on the Jordanian side of the border to get to Amman. All in all, I calculated that our blunder would cost us 6 hours.

The checkpoint at Sheik Hussein was staffed by young Israelis in white polo shirts. They carried only radios and no machine guns. Our driver explained our situation to the guy at the checkpoint.

“You have no sheckels to pay?” he asked, looking at us as though we were wearing matching T-shirts that said: I’M WITH STUPID→

“Yes, that is correct. We have travelers’ checks and need to change money.”

“Wait here,” he said, stepping off the micro-bus and shaking his head.

He picked up the phone at the checkpoint and made a phone call. A bit later he came on the bus and told the driver he’d let him through to the terminal, but only for a little bit while we changed money.

The driver thanked him. Clearly, this was not normal, but our stupidity had created an abnormality, a glitch in the Matrix of daily life Arab and Israeli relations.

We changed money and paid our driver. Then began the process of exiting Israel. After we were done with that, we went outside to wait for the bus that would take us and the other people there across the Jordan River and to the Jordanian processing center.

The bus finally arrived and took us all across.

We got our visas on the Jordanian side. Because we were traveling to Syria, the passport agent put our stamps on a separate piece of paper as had the Israelis when we arrived at Tel Aviv. Syria does not recognize Israel as a sovereign nation. If you have an Israeli stamp in your passport or a point of entry stamp into Jordan that made it obvious you had crossed over from Israel, the Syrians would deny you entry. The irony of this was not lost on me: denying entry to Syria because you had an Israeli stamp or another country visa indicating you had come from Israel was more of a recognition of Israel than a denial of its existence.
Once we got our visas and went through the inspections, we got a service taxi for the long drive to Amman.

We didn’t arrive until 6:00 p.m. We were hot, tired and hungry. We were frustrated too. Linda had given Kacey directions to her parent’s apartment in Amman, but the driver had problems finding it. He drove around asking people if they knew of such and such market and school that the apartment was near to. No one seemed to know. Kacey suggested that the driver call Linda at the apartment—assuming she had arrived already.

“But I have the keys to the apartment in my bag,” I said. “So even if she was here already, how would she get into the flat?”

“Maybe her aunt has a key and let her in,” Kacey said. Linda’s aunt and uncle lived downstairs in the same apartment building.

The driver called. Linda answered. She gave him directions and seemed quite confident that we were very close to the apartment and he’d get us there no problem.

Ten minutes later, we were driving around lost in the same neighborhoods we had driven through earlier. The driver tried calling Linda again, but she didn’t answer.

“She’s probably outside looking for us,” I said.

I just wanted to get out of the cab. I was sick of cab. I was sick of driving around all day.

One of the landmarks Linda had given was Jabri Restaurant. We had passed by it several times during our meandering drive through the neighborhoods.

“Let’s just get out at Jabri,” I said. “We’ll wait here and keep trying to call Linda until she goes back inside. Then we’ll have her come get us and take us to the apartment.”

“Okay,” Kacey said. “How do we say that to the driver in Arabic?”

I was tired and frustrated and really wanted out of the cab. This somehow dramatically improved my fluency in Arabic. I told the driver to take us to Jabri and we’d wait there for our friend.

We unloaded all our bags onto the sidewalk, paid the driver, then just sat for a bit before going in search of a telephone to call Linda at the apartment.

While we were sitting there, I noticed that there was a small sign on the road that said Jabri in Arabic with an arrow pointing down the road.

“Hey, look at that sign,” I said to Kacey. “It says Jabri too. Maybe there’s two or something.”

I walked down the road to check and as I was walking I saw Linda coming the other way.

Indeed there were two parts to Jabri: the main banquet part and the smaller restaurant down the street. Our driver had been driving around and around the wrong area.

We grabbed another cab and loaded up our bags for the short trip to the apartment.

It had been a long trip and I was tired and frustrated until Linda said she had just gotten there too. She had left Ramallah four hours before us. And while she had gone a much shorter distance than we had, her overall travel time was much more because she was a Palestinian. So who was I to complain? Who was I to complain?

Coming to Jesus

On Tuesday, we traveled to Bethlehem to visit the Church of the Nativity and see the birthplace of Jesus. Bethlehem is not far from Ramallah, but it took an hour to get there, weaving through the back roads and villages in order to avoid the main checkpoints along the way. We did get stuck at a tiyar for about 20 minutes. Tiyar is the Arabic word for a temporary checkpoint. The permanent ones are called masoob. If you’re lucky, you only have to go through a masoob to get to where you are going. But usually, you’ll hit a tiyar or two along the way.

As we waited at the tiyar, I asked our driver, Ahmed, if it was like this most days.

“Yes, most days,” he said. Ahmed was missing fingers from his stay in an Israeli prison some years ago.

When we finally got to Bethlehem, we met up with a tour guide that one of Linda’s friends had arranged for us.

He spoke English and gave us a great tour of the church.

There were very few other tourist, and our guide told us that tourism had plummeted since the Israeli military invaded Bethlehem and the entire city was locked down with Palestinian militants trapped inside the church. Some of the windows in the main sanctuary were still broken from gunfire.

The place were Jesus was born is literally underneath the church. You go down some stairs into a crepuscular, cave-like room. The birthplace is surrounded by candles and icons. A star in the floor marks the supposed exact spot where Jesus spilled out of Mary’s womb. I didn’t get a very good view of it because there was another group that came down with us that had some very devout Christians in it who were compelled to kneel down and kiss the star again and again. While said ground kissing may have been spiritually cleansing, it was far from sanitary. Just to the right of the birthplace and down some more steps is the manager.

Unfortunately, because we left in the early afternoon and it had taken so long to get to Bethlehem from Ramallah, we only had time to see the Church of Nativity. We left to head back across the main checkpoint through the wall the Israelis are building. Here there were x-ray machines and metal detectors, similar to an airport. [For more information about the wall, see: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Israeli_West_Bank_barrier ]

“Are we getting on an airplane?” Emma asked.

“No this is just a checkpoint.”

“Oh, it’s like an airport.”

Through the checkpoint you enter the Arab quarter of Jerusalem. From there we got on a micro-bus back to Ramallah, through narrow and winding pot-holed streets the went right along the wall until you reach Qalandiya and cross back into Ramallah.

Crossing Huwara

This is Huwara, hot and cruel, the first of several checkpoints on the way from Nablus to Ramallah. We wait with several hundred Palestinians under a currogated roof. There are full-height metal turnstiles in front of us and on the other side of those turnstiles are Israeli soldiers with machine guns.

Nothing is moving; not even the air.

We're told that the soldiers are cranky this morning at Huwara and things are moving slowly today as they do most days here.

I'd be cranky too if I were an Israeli soldier. They're dressed in dark green with heavy body armor on. They wear big helmets on their heads. It's hot and there's all these Palestinians around them who are hot and tired of waiting, agitated and crammed like cattle into the waiting area.

Thousands of Palestinians have to pass through Huwara every day. We wait along with everybody else. It's mostly men here waiting; some women and children too. The men tell us to move forward to another line, a "special" line that has a gate along the side. We're ajnabi (foreigners) and will receive special treatment.

We work our way up to the gate. The soldier there lets two other people through then closes the gate and wraps a heavy metal chain across the top. We'll need to wait for him to return.

All the soldiers here are in their early to mid 20s. There are males and females but with all the heavy gear on the only way you can tell the difference is that the women have hair spilling out the back of their helmets.

We wait.

They begin allowing people queued up in the line next to use through the metal turnstile. They go through one by one, stopping at the booth with soldiers in it on the other side. They hand over their Palestinian ID and any items they may be carrying. They pull up their shirts. They pull up their pant legs. While all this is happening another soldier standing off just to the side is pointing a machine gun at them.

I want to take photos of all this, but don't dare take my camera out here at Huwara.

We stand and watch Palestinians going through the checkpoint one at a time. I'm timing them. It takes an average of two minutes per person. One is turned away, comes back through and begins to head back toward Nablus.

An old man makes his way to the front and walks up to one of the turnstiles that isn't in use. He begins to try and go through but he's turning the turnstile toward him as if pulling open a door. The soldier on the other side pointing his machine gun at people as they come through begins shouting "No, no, no," to him in Arabic. The old man seems lost and confused by the turnstile door that keeps closing the path through each time he tries to open it by pulling it toward him. The other Palestinian men in line pull him away and bring him over to the turnstile that is in use. They tell him to go next. He begins pulling the turnstile bars toward him just as he'd done on the other one and seems just as confused by the way this one keeps closing on him too. The younger men help him through. He shuffles forward, seemingly oblivious to the soldiers. They have to physically make him stop. He seems startled and confused by their sudden appearance. They check his ID, then he shuffles on and out into the sun on the other side of Huwara.

We wait. Abu Majdi dropped us off at Huwara a half hour ago. It is now mid-morning and getting hotter by the minute.

The soldier working the side gate returns. A Palestinian man and his daughter are in front of us. He lets the daughter through but tells the man he has to go to the back of the line that is going through the turnstile. He says he needs to accompany his daughter. The soldier tells him to go to the back of the line. The men at the front of the line for the turnstiles tell him to come over and go in front of them. He begins to come over, but the soldier tells him that he can't do that, even if the others will let him. The soldier tells him again to go to the back of the line. The man looks very frustrated and turns with his head down and begins walking slowly to the back of the line. I do a head count. There are about 60 people in that line. If the current average of 1 person per 2 minutes keeps up, he's looking at a 2-hour wait. And that's his best case scenario.

We're next.

The soldier asks me where I'm going in Arabic.

"What?" I say to him in English.

"Who are you?" he asks in English.

"My name is Scott," I say.

"You are American?"

"Yes."

I hand him my passport along with Kacey's and girls' passports.

"This is your family?"

"Yes."

"What are you doing here?"

"We went to Nablus."

"You shouldn't be here. It's dangerous."

By "here" he means the Palestinian terretories.

I just nod my head. I agree with him. It is dangerous. However, based on my experience in Nablus the past couple of days, my view of what the source of danger in Nablus is probably very different from his.

"Weren't you scared in Nablus?" he asks.

"A little bit," I say, remembering the other night when you could hear the Israeli Defense Forces (IDF) invasion going on in Askar and wondering if they would come into the city center.

"I recommend you don't go into the Palestinian territories. It's dangerous and once you go in we cannot guarantee your safety."

Cannot guarantee your safety? I nod my head again in agreement. He's absolutely right. Nobody's safety is guaranteed in Nablus, especially when the IDF invades and starts shooting up the town.

I want to tell him how I think he can guarantee my safety: tear down this checkpoint and all the other checkpoints between Palestinian cities and towns in the West Bank. Stop invading Nablus and other cities in the middle of the night. Stop preventing the Palestinian people from moving between their own towns and cities. Stop disrupting their education. Stop strangling their economy. Stop making them live every day in fear. Just stop all of it and get out and return to Israel to patrol and protect your borders just like every other country in the world. Do this and I guarantee that my safety and the safety of millions of Palestinians and Isrealis will increase 10 fold. This checkpoint, this hell called Huwara inside of Palestinian territory will not stop one suicide bomber from entering Israel. But through this daily humiliation and overbearing occupation, there is one thing here at Huwara that I am certain of: all of this will only help create the hatred that opens the door to the dark path that leads to desperate and disastrous actions.

But I don't say anything to him. I just remain silent as he hands our passports back to me and tells me to move on through to the other side and not return to the Palestinian territories. He's the one who calls the shots here at Huwara. He's the one in control, the one who tells me what to do and where to go or not go. And as I walk along the chain-link fence and concrete barriers—an American in Palestine who has known nothing his entire life but the freedom to go wherever he wanted to go in his own country—I feel for a fleeting moment what it must be like to be a Palestinian.

We wait now on the other side among the fleet of taxis waiting to take those who got across to Ramallah. Everybody is just waiting. We're waiting for Linda, who was right behind us, but she does not show. We go try and find our luggage, which had been taken across the checkpoint after being X-rayed by the IDF on the other side. I don't see our luggage, so I stop and ask a man making coffee in a dilapidated and partially covered wagon if he knows where the porters drop off the bags. He says somewhere over here, waiving his hand along the rows of taxis waiting for a fare. He asks if we need a taxi. I tell him we're waiting for a friend of ours to cross the checkpoint. He asks were I'm from. I tell him. He asks if I can arrange an American wife for him so that he can have dual citizenship. I laugh and tell him the bad news. He offers me coffee and refuses to take any money from me for it.

We wait.

I walk back up the row of taxis, back toward the checkpoint. There is no sign of Linda. There is no sign of our luggage. I stop and talk with one of the guys working at the covered stands selling drinks and food. While I'm asking him where we might find our bags, I see that they are right there in the stall behind him so I go and get Kacey and the girls.

We continue waiting for Linda. She should be here by now. Something has gone wrong. Perhaps the soldier figured she was with us and sent her packing back to Nablus just because she was friends with Americans. We don't know and we can't go back now and find out without probably stiring up more trouble. So we do the only thing you can do at Huwara: we wait.

Twenty minutes later Linda emerges from the checkpoint. She's flustered and frustrated. Apparently, the soldier closed the side gate again right after we went through. She told him she needed to go with us. He wouldn't let her through. She yelled at him that she had a British passport. After Linda had some more verbal volleys with the soldier in charge, all the young Palestinian men were yelling together for them to let her through. This made the soldiers nervous and when they couldn't get everyone to calm and quite down, they let her through the side gate and sent her on her way.

Photogallery

Click on the link below to go to the photogallery I've setup at kodakgallery.com:
Middle East Travel Photogallery

Refugee Camps and Najah University

Today has been a long day. I had gone to bed at around midnight, but was awoken at 2 a.m. by the sound of heavy gunfire just to the south. Between booms you could here the motor of a tank humming. I laid awake wondering if the Israeli Defense Forces (IDF) was invading the city. The gunfire lasted for about a half hour, then everything was silent again and I feel back into a light sleep until the call to prayer at 4:00 a.m.

In the morning, I asked Majdi what he thought the gunfire was all about.

“Probably they [IDF] were trying to capture somebody.”

I asked if maybe we shouldn’t listen to the news to see what it was about.

He switched on the radio.

“There probably won’t be anything about it,” he said. “It was small. This happens most every night. But maybe there is something.”

There wasn’t.

We left the house at 7:00 a.m. Majdi was taking Kacey and I to Askar and Balata, which are two of the half dozen refugee camps located on the outskirts of Nablus.

We drove through Askar. Majdi was looking for someone he knew that we could perhaps interview. Kacey filmed while I took pictures. Najar began as a tent camp for refugees of the 1948 War. During the ensuing decades, the tent camps were transformed into densely packed neighborhoods of cement buildings and narrow streets. These are the poorest areas in Nablus and the poverty is stark as is the ongoing destruction from IDF invasions.

“Probably what you heard last night was something happening here.”

We stopped and Majdi talked to a man he knew. Majdi explained to him our project, but he declined to be interviewed.

We moved on to Balata, where we stopped at the UN station. Majdi went inside and talked to the people there. They said there was no one to talk to until 12:00 if we wanted to come back then.

We left Balata and went back toward the house. On the way, we passed a prison that had been bombed by the IDF during an invasion in 2002. I asked Majdi to pull the car over so I could take a picture of the prison. He said he would take us up onto the hillside where the view was better. We stopped up on the hillside not far from Majdi house. While we taking pictures a man called out to Majdi from his balcony. He invited us to come have coffee with him, which we did. Kacey interviewed the man and his grandfather. We also interviewed a man and his wife who lived with their two children in the flat upstairs.

We got back to the house around 9:00 a.m., downloaded pictures and video then headed to the offices of Amideast, which is where Linda’s sister, Saleena, teaches English. Kacey interviewed teachers and students for about an hour and a half. After that, we took a cab to Najah University where we met with the Head of the English Department. He was kind and spoke with us, but did not want to be filmed. He said that the checkpoints were a big disruption to education. Students traveling from outside Nablus often couldn’t make it to class because of delays at checkpoints. IDF checkpoints are located throughout the West Bank. Essentially, every town is cut off from the other by a checkpoint. Palestinians cannot move freely between towns in the West Bank. While this has an impact on education, it also has an impact on the economy and on healthcare.

We then met with the Public Relations Director. He told us that two Palestinian students who had been in Israeli prisons were going to speak to a visiting delegation from Scotland. We asked if we could film their talk. He said he would check and that he’d let us know at the beginning if it was alright to film them. It was.

We left the university, returned to the house for dinner, which is traditionally around 3:00 here. After dinner, we downloaded more pictures and video footage, then took a much-needed nap.

This evening we went to Majdi’s shop to interview more people. We interviewed several people, one of whom was old enough to remember his entire family fleeing Jaffa in 1948. One of the other interviews was 25 and paralyzed from the waist down. He repaired cell phones in Majdi’s shop. He had been paralyzed two years ago when an IDF sniper bullet entered his shoulder and lodged in his spine. He was sitting in his living room having tea with his mother when he was shot.

He was an apprentice furniture maker when he was shot and paralyzed.

“I ask God,” he said, “why does this happen to me? Then I realize it is the will of God and I would need to do something different. So I go to school and learn how to repair cell phones.”

It is now after midnight. We are watching the local news, which is giving live coverage of an IDF invasion of Askar refugee camp where we visited in the morning. They are also showing footage from Gaza where a 6-year-old girl was killed when her home was blasted during shelling in Rafah. The IDF has denied responsibility:
http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-3272708,00.html
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/5161034.stm

Old City of Nablus

I awoke this morning at 4 a.m. to the call to prayer. It was still dark, but from the veranda I could see the lights of downtown Nablus twinkling like stars that had fallen to the ground but continued to burn brightly.

We have gone all over Nablus the past two days with Linda’s father, Majdi, as our guide. Majdi has lived in Nablus his whole life and in the same house since he was 5 years old. Today, we went through the old city of Nablus, which is a maize of narrow streets and shops. It took us a while to make our way through as it seemed that every other person we passed knew Majdi and we would stop while he exchanged greetings. Majdi owns a shop in downtown that sells cell phone and other electronics. His shop was our first stop of the morning outing where we got a great interview with one of his friends regarding the Palestinian-Israeli conflict.

The old city is the heart of where the resistance fighters live. Many of the walls and doors in the old city are covered with posters of young men who had been killed by Israeli soldiers. Some of the areas in the old city were blackened with soot from fires during various invasions.

I asked Majdi why people didn’t rebuild and open the destroyed shops.

“There is no money for this. And even if there was, no one rebuilds because they know the Israeli will come again and destroy.”

Crossing Qalandiya

We arrived in Tel Aviv two days ago and went straight to the taxi service to Jerusalem. When I asked the driver to take us to Qalandiya Checkpoint, he looked at me quizzically and repeated, “Qalandiya?”

“Yes, that’s right, Qalandiya.” I said.

“Where you go?”

“Ramallah.”

“I no take you to Qalandiya. We go to Damascus Gate, then you take taxi Arabic to Qalandiya.”

The driver was Israeli. Maybe he wanted nothing to do with being near Qalandiya Checkpoint, which is where you cross into the West Bank, into Palestinian territory.

So, we did what he said and took the taxi van to Damascus Gate where we would find an Arab driver to take us the rest of the way to Qalandiya.

Our cab driver from Damascus Gate to Qalandiya was an Arab-Israeli, a Palestinian who was one of the “Arab 48”. An “Arab 48” is one of the Palestinians who were allowed to remain in Israel following the 1948 War. They were the fortunate ones. The rest of the Palestinians (approximately 780,000) lost their homes to the Israelis and became refugees.

Our Palestinian driver drove us to Qalandiya. It was night. Linda’s mother said that we might have problems getting across the checkpoint because we were foreigners.

“It just depends on the soldier,” she said when we spoke with her on the phone the day before we left. “Just try to blend in with everybody else.”

I explained to her that as a big white guy, “blending in” could pose a challenge for me—not to mention that the girls with their blonde hair would likely not blend in as well.

We would just have to go for it and hope for the best.

We passed through the checkpoint without a problem. The driver’s car had a yellow license plate, which is the color of Israeli plates. The Palestinian cars have either green or white plates. Cars with yellow plates can often cross into the West Bank without stopping. I slouched down in my seat and turned my face away from the soldier seated in the booth, but at the last second as we eased to a stop then began accelerating again, I glanced over at the soldier. She was reading a newspaper and I could see her hand finishing off the waive that told the driver to move along. I also saw other soldiers busy searching Palestinian cars that were coming the other way into Israel. The cars were in a long queue

“See how long this?” the driver said to me, waiving his hand over at the queue of waiting cars.

“Maybe it take two, maybe three hour to get across,” he said. “Sometimes longer, maybe being four or six hour.”

In a car, you can tell when you’ve left Israel and entered Palestinian territory. The ride suddenly becomes much bumpier because of the poorer conditions of the roads. I think this has less to do with the Palestinians preferring to have bad roads and more to do with the fact that they have no money to fix the roads.

The driver took us directly to the hotel in Ramallah that Linda’s uncle, Na’eel, had arranged for us to stay at.

[For those of you who do not already know, Linda is a Palestinian who lived with our family in Oregon last year. We were going to the West Bank to visit her family. We were also going with a bag full of camera equipment with the intention of interviewing Palestinians and Israelis about the conflict. Kacey had been awarded a teaching grant to go do this. With our two young daughters in-tow, we would travel to the West Bank, Jordan, Syria and Israel.]

It was 9:00 p.m. From door to door, we had been traveling for over 30 hours straight. Na’eel took us to dinner with his family. We ate a feast of hummous, babaganoosh, salata lamb, chicken and kebab. After dinner, Na’eel took us all over Ramallah, showing us where Abbas lived as well as the palatial mansions of the wealthy who lived in the hills overlooking Ramallah. Above those, on the highest point around the city, was a Jewish settlement overlooking everything. It was easy to identify because of the tall communications towers that rose up from the hills like spikes.

“This house belonging to American citizen,” Na’eel explained as we went by a three-story mansion with nobody home. “This one American citizen too.” He made a point of pointing out how many of the homes in Ramallah were owned by American citizens.

“Why are so many of the homes owned by Americans?” I asked.

“These are the Palestinians who left during the first Intifada,” he said. The first Intifada began in 1987 and lasted until 1995. Many Palestinians left the country. Many others stayed and died. Of those that left, many of them went to the U.S., became U.S. citizens and prospered. After the Intifada was over, they came back to the West Bank, started businesses and families and built large homes. It was a prosperous time and the future looked brighter than it had for some time. Then the second Intifada started in 2000 and everything began going to hell again. Many left and the homes we drove past were dark and empty.

Back in downtown Ramallah, the streets were crowded with shabab (young men) and loud with the honking of horns as taxis, cars, buses and vans did a bumper to bumper dance in which I counted, at a minimum, half a dozen near collisions. Or so it seemed like that to me. For Na’eel, it was just another day of driving in Ramallah. At one point, we were right next to a jeep full of Palestinian with machine guns bouncing up and down as we went through the pot-holed streets.

“Um, who are those guys?” I asked Na’eel, partly out of curiosity and partly because I wanted to bring to, which would perhaps prompt him to take evasive action.

“Those are the police,” he said matter-of-factly and kept the car steady driving along side the jeep. I hoped that the policemen all had the safeties on their machine guns flipped on.

We returned to the hotel. The girls all went to sleep. I couldn’t sleep and went down to the lobby to use their wireless Internet connection to check my email and to place some phone calls to America. As I sat there in a hotel in Ramallah, thousands of miles from home, it felt strange to be so easily and completely connected to that world. Except for the time zone difference, it didn’t really seem to matter that I was in a hotel in Ramallah. I could have been anywhere. I couldn’t help but think how much the world had shrunk since the last time I was in the Middle East in the early 1990s. Back then, it was like I’d fallen off the ends of the earth and no one knew how I was doing or what I had been up to until they received a letter or a postcard. There was time lapse and the distance made a difference. Now there was only time zones and the distance made no difference whatsoever. The physical me was far away, while the virtual me was still completely connected and in the same place I’d left him.