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.”
