SEEING PALESTINE: POLITICAL TOURISM
TABLE OF CONTENTS
GETTING THERE WAS HALF THE FUN….. 2
IN 2025….. 4
HENRY….. 8
FAMILY….. 11
APHORISM….. 13
ABU HEIDI AND JONAH….. 14
A POEM….. 16
FEELING RESPONSIBLE….. 16
BEING IGNORANT AND OFFENSIVE… 19
WEEKLY ROUTINE….. 20
WHERE HUMANITY IS HEADED….. 22
TROUBLE….. 24
GOOD BOOK….. 27
ZIONISM….. 32
A FEW PLACES VISITED….. 34
CONUNDRUM….. 40
DEMOCRACY….. 41
GOING DANCING….. 43
DEPARTURE….. 45
THE WALL….. 47
ABOUT THE APPENDIX….. 53
APPENDIX….. (separate)
* * * * * * *
GETTING THERE WAS HALF THE FUN
Toward the end of One Day Everyone Will Have Always Been Against All This, Omar El Akad quotes Rasha Abdulhadi ‘Wherever you are, whatever sand you can throw on the gears of genocide, do it now.’ This is my offering, couched in the context of a two-month visit to Israel and Palestine in the summer of 2005.
When I was 12 or 13 I won an essay contest in our Church, The St. George’s Church of England. The essay is lost, and of course, the instructions for what to write about, but the topic was probably something like Free Will, because my thesis was that people should feel responsible.
I wasn’t insightful or cynical enough to add: ‘and not rely so heavily on their Christian, Get-out-of-jail-free card.’ If I had been, I probably wouldn’t have won.
The prize was a Bible.
I didn’t like the guy teaching the Sunday School class, but I did like our minister, Reverend Alexander, and always hoped he had decided the winner. After all, it had been announced during a full church service and the prize awarded from his hand.
I never read the darn thing but always felt I should have, and since I was now headed for The Holy Land, decided this would be the perfect opportunity. Reading it where the famous events took place would make it stick in memory too.
On the plane from New York to Frankfurt a tall and beautiful, young graduate student of Theology sat down beside me, on her way to the same summer adventure I was. The plane contained a number of participants in our program.
Wow! I thought, a man could go astray!
I told her my ambition, skipping the part about the contest and the prize, and she approved mightily, saying, Oh! Start with The Psalms! They are so beautiful!
I had my Bible with me and, with that encouragement, flew right into it, right there in midair!
There are indeed some beautiful psalms, but these are mostly ones we already know. My father-in-law was comforted on his death bed by the 23rd, for example. But as with most great things they are scarce on the ground, and in the air.
It didn’t take long to recognize that, in general, this material had been written by some very disturbed people. With the help of Chat GPT I am able to relocate some of it today. Were it not for that help, you’d just have to take my word.
Psalm 58, 6-8 (KJV):
6. Break their teeth, O God, in their mouth…
8. As a snail that melteth, let every one of them pass away: like the untimely birth of a woman, that they may not see the sun.
Psalm 137: 8-9
8. O daughter of Babylon who art to be destroyed: happy shall he be that rewardest thee as thou hast served us.
9. Happy shall he be that taketh and dasheth thy little ones against the stones.
Psalm 69: 22-28
22. Let their table become a snare before them…
23. Let their eyes be darkened that they see not…
25. Let their habitation be desolate; and let none dwell in their tents.
28. Let them be blotted out of the book of the living…
Psalm 109:
10 Let his children be continually vagabonds, and beg: let them seek their bread also out of their desolate places.
I asked Chat if that last one, Psalm, 109, were personal or directed against the enemies of Israel, and it said I had asked an excellent question! The answer, it said, was personal, because the Psalter spoke in the first person and was directing his imprecations at a singular pronoun. Chat thought he was making a deeply personal plea for justice.
Justice. OK, Chat was consulting the Psalter. I’m just the pepperer, and would not wish to exaggerate the wrongs or bad attitudes of Israel, so I’ll let it go at that.
But Jesus Christ! Talk about a need for a more merciful way! And before too long He came along. If only it had made a difference, a favorable one, that is.
In any event, it was clear to me then, as it must have been in the wisdom of my youth: I did not need to wallow around in that stuff.
My seat-mate and I dozed off, perhaps both dreaming of an ideal place.
* * * * * * *
IN 2025
In a perverse way you have to feel for the Israelis: they want to get this little genocide in the rear view mirror and get on with normal living like everyone else. And everyone else or their relatives or forbears have done the deed: in Europe, in Africa, North America, wherever. But now, when poor little Israel wants to have a genocide, down rain the complaints and criticisms.
The reason for that, though, is not prejudice against Israel; it’s that it’s so horrible to look at every day in the news. And maybe Humanity has had enough of it. However, on the other hand, maybe Israel will still be allowed; we’re waiting to see if the USA will back her all the way to the end, a final solution of sorts.
There is no denying that Israel’s troubles are partly of her own making. (That sentence implies a ‘but;’ so stay tuned for it, because this is going to take a while). She has been cavalier about expanding the list of likely enemies: carrying out assassinations and attacks on the cities of other countries in the neighborhood, seizing extra territory from Syria and Lebanon (Israel does not define her borders, and every version of her seems to contain a bigger one trying to get out); blowing international aid workers off the road, killing hundreds of journalists and medics; bombing hospitals, schools, tent cities, infrastructure, including sewage; terrorizing Mercy missions on the high seas; exploding people’s cell phones as they go shopping; and lately, not only using starvation as a weapon of war, but shooting people as they approach the few food distribution sites allowed, they being run by Israeli and the U.S.A.
There were bound to be a lot of unhappy Muslims around the world, but Israel also bombed a Catholic church, killing the priest and others, potentially adding another sizable number of religious folk.
Yesterday, August 25, 2025, Israel killed five more journalists and twenty-one others in a double strike on a hospital: they hit it once, killing a few people, and then, a few minutes later, when rescue workers came on the scene, hit it again. This is a tactic often used by terrorists, but doing it to a hospital may be a first. Today, Netanyahu called the event a tragic mishap, and went on to mention the dangers of being a journalist in a war zone. This is gangster talk, plain and simple, the chief thug feeling smug, showing everyone he can do as he pleases, and talk about it as he pleases afterward. Can it go on forever? Nothing lasts forever, not even American enthusiasm or indifference.
BUT! (and this is the but implied a few paragraphs ago, concerning Israel’s being only partially responsible for her problems) it’s not all Israel’s fault! Britain granted Jewish national rights in Palestine in 1917 and France was on board, without giving equivalent rights to the native population, or consulting them. Then the Americans took up the supportive cudgel after World War II.. So, the current shemozzle is partly Britain’s and France’sfault: a bunch of Europeans gave away something that was not theirs to give. Now, it’s partly the USA’s. (In regard to that double strike on a hospital last week, the U.S. was the only Security Council member that did not condemn it.)
Arrest warrants have been issued for top level Israeli politicians and military leaders, but they may never be captured.
Even if these Israeli leaders cared nothing for Palestinian lives, you would think they might spare a thought for their own children. To use them in such a sustained, murderous venture must inflict enormous harm upon them. Suppose you saw innocent people being gunned down as they tried to reach food. The memory of that might spoil your life. Or suppose you had done it yourself, in the heat of the moment, or under social pressure from your comrades, or under orders, no matter. How could you face the future knowing what you had to look over forever in your own mind?
ChatGPT says: 17 IDF suicides in 2023, 7 post-war; 21 in 2024; and 16 so far in 2025, totaling 54 since the start of 2023. That was a sharp rise from prior years: 14 in 2022, and 11 in 2021. They are attributed to the stress and trauma of combat.
If the actions of Israel, the state, weren’t enough, her allies in the ‘civilized world’ have exacerbated things by attempting a rearguard action to combat ‘antisemitism.’ Both sides in this dispute (if one may euphemistically call it that; it’s really more like a mugging) are semitic peoples. If one truly wanted to fight antisemitism, Israel would be the primary target, as the nation currently doing the most harm to semites. A close second would be the USA, for providing the explosives and diplomatic cover.
But perhaps this is being picayune; we know what they mean; they mean: ‘Don’t be angry with Jews.’ And I, for one, am not. My son married a Ukrainian, Canadian, American Jewish computer scientist, and they have three boys. So not only are some of my best friends Jews (a claim not likely to impress), but so are some of my best relatives.
But to the subject at hand: Jews, and especially Jewish organizations, are the most important allies Palestinians have. This has been so for decades but is more important now than ever, as the ethnic cleansing escalates and voices become more strident.
Jews can, and do, oppose this genocide with maximum vigor and credibility, and they are absolutely key to stopping it and resolving the root problem. A couple of examples: I spent one day in Jerusalem with the Israeli Committee Against The Demolition of Houses, ICAHD, helping rebuild a house the Israeli Defense Forces, IDF, had knocked down several times. The work team consisted of Europeans on a tour with ICAHD, Palestinian workers and ourselves, overlapping with them for one day to hear a lecture and get the flavor of their work. On another day our group sat with the Israeli Human Rights Organization, B’Tselem; the thrust of their work at the time was documentation, partly by giving cameras to Palestinians. The point is, these are are Jewish organizations, Israeli.
In 2005 the term Apartheid was not in use by B’Tselem to describe Israeli Society. But it is now, and is applied by them and Human Rights Watch and Amnesty International, all major, unbiased organizations. Their reasons for employing it are online. On July 28, 2025, along with Physicians For Human Rights— Israel, B’Tselem upgraded its criticism to genocide in a report called, ‘Our Genocide.’
In 2005, it seemed to me, that Palestinians in the West Bank. were already living under Apartheid, one population holding the other at gunpoint, pretty much continuously. Israeli Jeeps with young soldiers toting machine guns drove up and down the streets of Palestinian cities, and the best roads between those cities were not available to Palestinians. They were for Jews and foreigners only.
We toured Israel and Palestine on the weekends, and when our bus took the main highways, we could get pretty much anywhere in a jiffy. But as a demonstration of what the Palestinians had to face on their own, we went one day from Bethlehem to Ramallah by the road available to them.
It required going down through what they called The Valley of Fire, because it got so warm in the summertime. Our descent was so steep and tortuous the bus had to go backward and forward to get through some of the switchbacks, and allow oncoming traffic to pass.
Late in my visit, the family I lived with had to take this route to go to a wedding in Ramallah. They couldn’t use their own car because that was not allowed for inter-city travel; only commercial vehicles could be used; so they had to take a taxi to get there. That seemed like Apartheid to me.
At first I doubted the claim by one of our guides that there were over 700 checkpoints (he gave an exact number which I forget). I thought that couldn’t be true, even with a few moving ones thrown in, because the whole place is so small. But one day, when we were visiting the rural village of At-Tuwani, near Hebron, I looked across the highway to a field and saw a little footbridge across a deep ditch. On either side, at the entrance to the bridge, a big scoop of dirt had been dropped for inconvenience. Ah, I thought, that’s one of the checkpoints.
* * * * * * *
HENRY
On the application form for the excursion I had been given the option of paying extra money for a private room. I thought, what the heck, I’m getting on, why not go first class? And asked for the private room. No extra charges had been levied but I assumed they would be when when I checked in.
But not only did I not get a private room, I had to sleep with Henry, a great big, hairy, Jewish radical from California, approximately 250 pounds. And I mean very hairy, not especially handsome either, about my age, sixty.
Oh well, I thought, it’s just a couple of months, and I’m not a complainer. Besides, I knew nothing of the exigencies of our organizers. And I liked him. It would not make sense to start my visit with demands for special consideration.
Moreover, the accommodation was pleasant; and we had a king-sized bed, so we didn’t have to get tangled up in the night; and we never did. Moreover, on Henry’s behalf, I will say here and now that he did not fart, at least that I ever noticed. I might have let slip one or two, certainly nothing offensive.
Unlike myself, whom I would characterize as Justice-Lite, Henry was the real deal when it came to protesting. Like myself he had done some during the Vietnam war, but unlike myself, he had kept at it his whole life long. For a living he had been a technology writer for the San Francisco Chronicle, but he lost that job on account of being out of the office to protest the Iraq war. My protest of that war was a cardboard sign about one foot square, saying in my printing in magic marker: DON’T WRECK IRAQ. I walked it around Tucson with it one day. I guess I also wrote some letters and poems, probably as little seen as my sign.
Henry first visited Israel as a toddler. His father was a tax expert and the Israeli government needed guidance setting up their system of taxation. So he and his family stayed in the honeymoon suite of the King David Hotel while his father worked. Obviously, Henry had not been won over to luxury and easy living.
He had been back to Israel numerous times since then and was well known to authorities. Consequently he had been unable to come in through the Ben Gurion Airport and instead, had to enter by land. Why that should have been possible when The Airport was closed to him, I have no idea, but he had come through Jordan, enjoying the archeology of Petra as his silver lining.
Henry was a member of the International Solidarity Movement, a Palestinian-led, non-violent protest organization which did some heavy lifting opposing injustice and oppression. Once, in the middle of our stay, they needed someone to go out right away and live with some Bedouin who were being harassed by settlers. The settlers galloped their horses over the Bedouin encampment to terrorize them, but were more inhibited when a European or American was present.
That job, being a witness, was a well-understood function of most foreigners visiting, and it often it did work to curb the actions of settlers. But not always: some members of a group called Christian Peacemakers (in this case, I believe, from Chili) had recently been beaten up as they escorted schoolchildren to the town of At-tuwani, mentioned above.
In the event, Henry went out and lived with the Bedouin for a few days as they drove their goats, often along the side of the highway. He came back beaming, saying it was just like being in Biblical times: ‘a little yogurt for breakfast; go out and follow the goats; and at night you sleep in a cave.’
Evidence of Henry’s effectiveness, not just as a protester and life-long activist, but as an inspiration to others, was that his daughter and niece were part of our program. In fact they too were old hands at protesting, and led a meeting during our first week to explain how an upcoming demonstration would be unfold. ‘After their Friday prayers we go down to the gate the farmers have to pass through to get to their land, and make a racket; the soldiers fire some tear gas at us and we run away; then we come back; the kids probably throw some rocks; they chase us again; we come back again…’
What fun! I thought, but not me. It was still my first week in town. In the preceding year, the excursion I was now part (run by Middle East Fellowship in the U.S. and Holy Land Trust in Bethlehem) had been caught at the airport and turned around and sent back out on the next available plane. It seemed logical that this could happen to anybody at any time, and I wanted to be here at least a little while.
(That excuse, by the way, like most of its kind, is for timidity: it has its rational side but, so does timidity.}
To avoid a similar, early disruption of the program this year, we had come in claiming to be here for Religious Study. A Kibbutz had been specified as our destination, and an Israeli from that Kibbutz was at the airport to greet us and attest to our claim, if necessary.
As it happened, we didn’t need him and didn’t go to the Kibbutz directly from the airport, though we did visit later. We were tired and went straight to Bethlehem for a short meeting, and then home to our families.
The meeting showed us to be about sixty people, mostly in their twenties and thirties. I would say about a third were Muslims; one third, Jews; and the others, Christians and Curious. I felt sure the U.S. Army or CIA must be represented too, and settled on a young drunkard, skirt-chaser, as the most likely candidate for that. But perhaps I imagined things. There’s no easy proof of such an idea. However, when that guy disappeared (people came and went throughout the two months) an older, more stable, seemingly military fellow came along and had a brief chat with every one of us one day on a bus ride.
Anyway, on this first day, we said a few words to introduce ourselves and went straight to our lodgings.
* * * * * * *
FAMILY
My family lived in a comfortable two-story house of perhaps a couple of thousand square feet. An addition on the back housed the grown son of the family, George, and his wife and daughter, a babe in arms perhaps seven months old. When George brought her out, his mother, Shimaa, would clap fiercely and rhythmically at their approach, sometimes stamping a foot. The baby’s eyes would bug out and she would literally twitch in time to the clapping. Then George would pass her over, much to the satisfaction of baby, grandmother and father.
George’s own father, our host, was called Nimr, which means Tiger in Arabic. He was a factory owner and a businessman. In the basement of the house, several men worked during the day to make carvings out of olive wood. A dump-truck once backed up to the yard and dropped a load of pieces, about the size of a man’s forearm, some twisted, some in the shape of a Y, some with flat aspects from having been reduced from something larger.
The men worked these pieces, first with a bandsaw, then rotary tools, then knives and chisels, and finally sandpaper and lacquer. The result was usually a charming religious figure. I left with a whole suitcase full to give away as presents, keeping a Jesus-Mary-and-Joseph nativity scene for myself.
Nimr was a quiet, pleasant man, maybe five or ten years younger than me, and cast from the exact same mold as Henry: I remember them sitting side by side on our first evening, only a few pounds in the difference, and hard to say who was heavier.
The last member of the household was a girl, George’s sister, the youngest child. She was in her last year of High School, bubbly and with like-minded friends who often visited to bubble over with her. There might have been other children who had left home; I don’t remember.
The house had a pleasant front porch facing the street, and we sat there sometimes in the evening, being visited by neighbors and relatives. There was also sizable yard with a productive fig tree; perhaps there were other fruit trees as well. Nimr called my attention to the fig one day, being greatly fond of it.
Mine and Henry’s bedroom was suitably large, on the ground floor just to the right of the front door where we entered. The dining room, kitchen and bathroom were deeper in the house on the same floor, straight ahead.
One feature of Palestinian houses is a water tank on the roof. The Israelis come by and give an allocation, weekly, I think. When a person showered, he got wet, turned the water off, soaped up, turned it on again, and rinsed. Once I was taking a shower when I was alone in the house, and had soaped up when the water ran out. I hoped nobody thought I was profligate.
A downside to this arrangement, besides the obvious, scarcity, was mosquitoes, little tiny ones. We had to do battle with them at night, protecting ourselves with fly dope or a device that sat on top of a bureau and dispersed repellent.
Another memory I have of night and bedtime was the scattered crackle of gunfire a few miles away in one of the Bethlehem refugee camps. There were three, made of concrete and cinder block, more or less permanent. The IDF kicked on doors after dark and arrested bad children (or good) according to your perspective. When we visited one of these, Aida, we were told, through a translator, that a big problem was bed-wetting. The kids were frightened and wetting their beds long after they should have been past it.
We woke before dawn to the call of the muezzin, not something I particularly enjoyed. In literature I recall indistinctly (maybe Lawrence Durrell) it’s supposed to be a soothing and pleasing sound, but our guy had an amplifier that made his call a bit harsh and uninviting, at least to me. Luckily we were of other faiths, or none, and didn’t have to get up.
* * * * * *
APHORISM
When I was an undergraduate student at Bradley University in Illinois, my favorite class was a Psychology Lecture by a grand old man, Carl Smith. He had come to the Midwest from Harvard and was, in my mind, manifestly wise. He was greatly knowledgeable about Science and History and Philosophy, pretty much everything, and presumably accomplished in these areas too. I made no effort to verify, but I believed it.
He talked without notes, displaying erudition and cynicism on a panoply of subjects. He had rubbed elbows with Bertrand Russell and other famous people, and he let us know what they thought about various things, like why men went to war: it was to get away from their wives. We knew he was joking. A friend of mine now, whom I didn’t yet know at the time, was similarly affected and said he used to look forward to that class, imagining himself at the feet of a great man, as in ancient times in Greece.
One day, as we were leaving for Christmas Holidays, our famous professor said: ‘You know that saying you’re so fond of at this time of year, “Peace on Earth, good will toward men?” It doesn't say that at all. It says: “Peace on Earth to men of good will.”’
Chat GPT tells me that this latter version comes from the Douay-Rheims Bible (1582), and is based on earlier and more critical Greek. (I never heard of Douay-Rheims! Maybe that’s the Bible for me!)
But obviously, there was quite a distinction between the two sayings, and anyone with a grain of sense can see the greater cogency of the supposedly-more-authoritative version. It has a possible corollary: No peace for you if you are not of good will.
It would doubtless be too great a leap to add: ‘And may you rot in Hell, and before that, live out your miserable, stupid life in the anxiety and disturbance ill will is bound to win, because that wouldn’t be very Christian.’ The saying comes from Luke, who evidently was very Christian.
* * * * * *
ABU HEIDI AND JONAH
I like the line in the poem, 1887, by A.E. Houseman: Get you the sons your fathers got and God will save the Queen..
Abu means ‘father of,’ and Arabs use it as an honorific, a term of endearment and respect, usually naming the person after a first-born son. The female version is Umm. This practice, called ‘Kunya,’ can also be employed to create a nom de guerre, or to emphasize a disposition: Abu camel, for example. This latter variation might seem to suggest the opposite of respect; I lack the cultural savvy to explain. However, I do like the tradition. Abu feels like a fine and friendly use of language, and I wish to partake of it herewith.
I never accomplished much, if anything, in the world outside the house. My Science career was a bust on account of grandiose notions and an inability to accept help or guidance. My foray into Literature led to a lot of self-publication which filled the basement with my own books, a totally unprofitable nuisance until I finally saw a use for the books: put them on the garden!
Here’s a brief aside to explain how, in case anyone else is afflicted with my mindset. Get several wheelbarrow-loads of your best writing and take it to the garden; rake the ground flat along the path or open area you intend to cover; lay the books on it as closely as possible, like paving bricks; then, cover them with a permeable ground cloth from the garden store; and finally, cover that with a cedar mulch, dyed or not, as you prefer. I chose funereal black.
You will note that, having failed at Science and Literature, I’m now taking a stab at World Peace. Perhaps I just needed a big enough challenge.
It smarts a little, but less and less with time, and at this point I’m happy with my accomplishments in the realm of home and family: I built our house, for the most part, did most of the cooking and cleaning, landscaped the yard, and basically made a good environment for my wife and children.
Which brings me at last to the achievements of my children, and what I hope to be called, occasionally, from now on. Otherwise, Pete, Peter, Pedro and rarely Pierre, will continue to suffice.
Heidi is currently President of the Linguistics Society of America and Jonah has four degrees in physics and engineering from famous Universities; he runs a factory and company he founded, Hydrogen Sports. Their main product is a ball machine that has greatly improved my tennis. My dear, deceased wife, Carolyn Harley, won enough fame for two people in her career as a Neuroscientist.
I am Abu Heidi and Jonah.
* * * * * *
A POEM
I am also a poet; so it will be natural to include poems from time to time, trying to keep them more or less on the topic at hand. This one I wrote in 2014.
Poem For A Greater Israel
You have the whip hand.
Put it down.
If Jews are clever,
quit lashing out.
As for murder, mutilation,
mass destruction and stealing
other people’s land and water,
bulldozing their houses,
Apartheid,
where can this get you
but put off the bus
Humanity’s hoping to ride?
For the love of personal
Peace and Possibility,
try a change!
* * * * * *
FEELING RESPONSIBLE
Suppose Justice comes in three grades: Justice, Justice Lite and No Justice At All. The level one achieves, though not always, has to do with the effort put in. By feeling responsible I accept some minimal amount of danger, sacrifice and inconvenience, probably resulting in Justice Lite.
And it’s a bit of a shame, considering what Justice normally requires in order to be realized. There’s a saying: When you go out to fight for Truth and Justice, don’t wear your best trousers. That’s funny, but sad, because there’s usually a lot more at risk than your trousers.
The position of ‘The Establishment,’ if I may resort to an old moniker, is that protest is fine, so long as it’s peaceful and within the Law. But The Law is frequently the problem, and failing to create a disturbance may mean failing to get attention.
Nelson Mandela said he understood perfectly that he could have spent his life writing letters to officials and newspapers, with no results. If he was going to get noticed he had to do some damage. He decided he was not going to kill people, but he was going to attack infrastructure. Only then would he get the spotlight and be able to make his courtroom speech about ideas he was prepared to die for.
Courage is the greatest human virtue, I am quite sure. We all know very well what’s right. We just don’t want to get hurt saying it. And we don’t want to put our bodies in the way of machinery opposing it. For it is indeed, machinery: bone-crushing, blood-spilling, itself insensitive to pain.
In The Pickwick Papers, Mr. Pickwick advises Mr. Snodgras about dealing with trouble on the street. ‘Hush. Don’t ask any questions. It’s always best on these occasions to do what the mob do.’
‘But suppose there are two mobs, suggested Mr. Snodgrass.
‘Shout with the largest, replied Mr. Pickwick.’
As already stated, this is the kind of advice most of us don’t have to be told. We embrace Justice Lite, or Justice Very Lite, or No Justice At All for the obvious reasons: cowardice and convenience.
But rather than berate myself entirely, allow me instead to make the case for Justice Lite or even Justice Very Lite.
The Vietnam War was a sickening phenomenon for anyone with a modicum of sensibility. In its most terrible phase it was perpetrated by the U.S.A. I was a Canadian graduate student at The University of Oregon, but regarded the whole country, the U.S.A., as my part of the world. Hence, I was responsible.
My part in protesting that war consisted in writing letters to the editors of newspapers around the U.S., going to a few protests, and disrupting one graduate seminar when it was my turn to lead: I insisted that we use just half of the time to talk Science; the other half, Politics.
I like to think I had some small part in the decision of the U.S. to withdraw from Vietnam: I got a sympathetic letter about one of my letters from a lady in a southeastern state; and my supervisor, who was liberally inclined but not inclined to be disruptive, approved of my balancing act in the seminar.
But if I had any effect at all, it must have been very small, compared to that of students who were occupying administration buildings and getting carted around bodily by police, or shot and killed at Kent State.
My feeling of responsibility for that international disaster, however, did serve a purpose after the Americans left Vietnam. At that point there was an exodus of Boat People, one more spectacle to illustrate the suffering we had created.
At this point, my wife and I had gone to Canada to take University jobs and enjoy family life in Newfoundland. When the Boat People started fleeing, about eight years into our lives in Newfoundland, I recruited five other families in our rural town of Portugal Cove to join us and sponsor a family to come to Canada.
I had just quit my academic job so was free to use a sizable chunk of time on such a venture. I suggested that I and the man of the family we brought would do a half day’s work weekly at each of our houses, digging ditches, painting walls, whatever; and I would get an extra half day for my contribution of labor. The Canadian government only required we be on the hook financially for one year.
As it turned out, our Boat People went to Vancouver after spending just the Fall of 1979 in Newfoundland. Lee Bo found factory work out there and they thrived in a more culturally supportive and stimulating, Asian environment. Meanwhile, the enterprise made us Newfoundland families closer, and it was a happy experience all around.
So there is the potential for some good to come of feeling responsible, a better world with Justice Lite. You just need the imagination and luck to find it.
* * * * * *
BEING IGNORANT AND OFFENSIVE
Most of the wrong we do in this world is through thoughtlessness. At least mine is. I have indeed been intentionally malevolent and gratuitously bad, even as a child, but not very often. And in general, when I have hurt people it was without thinking. But that only shows that the conscious mind is not the whole mind. There are dark currents swirling underneath. All of a sudden one says something rotten, or acts cruelly toward a vulnerable party.
Additionally, it is entirely possible that one acts stupid and insensitive some of the time because he is stupid and insensitive.
I had a copy of Mark Twain’s The Innocents Abroad, which has a section telling of his travels In The Holy Land, and was reading it at nights. His traveling companions were ignorant in the extreme, using chisels to knock features off monuments for the sake of taking home a souvenir; renaming towns Jacksonville, Jefferson and so on, for the sake of being able to remember where they obtained their plunder. Finally, they were so appalling that their reputation began to precede them and authorities arrived to hold them in check.
Twain called the Holy Land natives, Mohammedans, and I read that word as a neutral term, never thinking that it might be inappropriate nowadays. Of course I knew that the usual descriptor for a follower of Mohammed was a Muslim, but perhaps because I had been reading Innocents at night, and siding with Twain, I used the other during a visit to some monument or ruin, asking the lecturer: ‘Did the Mohammedans think such and such.’ My unseemly choice may have been exacerbated by the fact that my question was in the context of some of their struggles and defeats.
Afterward, one of our Holy Land Trust hosts came up to me and said: ‘Peter, I would have never expected you to ask such a rude and insulting question.’ All I could say was that I didn’t mean to.
I understand now that Muslims reject this term because they consider Mohammed to have been a prophet, not a god, in the way Christians think of Jesus. They don’t like being considered as naive. The term was probably also applied to them by their enemies, Crusaders; however, I think this implicit ignorance of their faith is key.
If I had been reading my Bible at night, instead of Mark Twain, this would never have happened. Live ’n learn.
* * * * * *
WEEKLY ROUTINE
The structure of our week was as follows: We had breakfast with our families and then spent the week-day mornings assigned to a Palestinian group or an NGO that could put us to work. We found lunch for ourselves, and in the afternoons, went to the Bethlehem Bible College for Arabic lessons. On Saturdays we toured Israel and Palestine, usually taking the whole day to see one town. Sunday was free.
The best student in our Arabic class was an American-Iranian girl who said that Farsi was not dissimilar. Mostly what we did in class was baby talk for her. But it was hard enough for me.
One funny incident entailed repeating the elementary claims: I am a student; we are students. The word for student was Talib; the plural (though Chat GPT tells me this is Pashto) is Taliban. Maybe I misunderstood, but I’m quite sure we were told to say, Taliban. After we had said we were Taliban, we looked around the room involuntarily to see who else was, and laughed.
I had listed my skill, to be used on work mornings, as writer. Consequently, my mornings were spent at the Beit Sahour mayor’s office where I helped write applications for money to buy equipment for the town. European sources provided funds for such purposes and our job was to write up a reason for getting them, plus, select a suitable item from catalogues indicating cost.
Beit Sahour, which, by the way, is where the shepherds are said to have been watching their flocks when a star led them up the hill to Baby Jesus, shared a garbage truck with Beit Jala, another Bethlehem suburb on the far side from us. We wanted a truck of our own, if possible. There were other pieces of heavy machinery that could also be useful: it just needed to be well- and simply-stated.
We had catalogues from various suppliers and on one occasion, a choice to make between Caterpillar and some other. Caterpillar was more expensive and I suggested we ask for that, since they could change their minds later if they wanted and have money left over for something else. This was not the choice in the office, but they were unwilling to dismiss my reasoning, and more or less let the matter hang for the moment.
I slept on it. I don’t like to argue, and knew very well why they didn’t want to support Caterpillar: they had seen too many of them pushing over Palestinian houses. So despite my inclination to maximize our request for money, I came back the next day and said they should just ignore me when I was off base; they knew what was best for their purposes.
This resolved well enough, but there were other matters, of personal interaction, that did not. We had been asked by our organizers to please, please, not get involved romantically with the natives. It created enormous problems.
I don’t talk very much, or very loudly, or very well, and sometimes, am completely dumbstruck. I greeted a couple of invitations that were probably just friendly and innocent with a mute, thousand-yard-stare. I simply couldn’t think of anything to say.
They shifted me out of the main office, where I had been appreciating frequent Turkish Coffee from the tray of Abu something-or-other, to a downstairs station with a chance to thumb through magazines and more or less do nothing.
I have no doubt that at some point they decided: there is something seriously wrong with this guy, an opinion I share, myself.
If we had been in Kindergarten, the teacher would have had to write on my card: Does not work well with others.
* * * * * *
WHERE HUMANITY IS HEADED
If you haven’t noticed, the writing is on the wall: We are not the last stage in the evolution of intelligence, a subject that has moved me to poetry, or attempted poetry. Here it is, in abridged form.
But allow me to clarify some terms and concepts first, a process that would be considered spoon-feeding in any reputable literature course. But we don’t care about that around here.
The title of the poem is Animal Skins At The Singularity. The animal skins are us, ourselves, people. The speaker of the poem is A General, Mechanical Intelligence or Consciousness, still evolving at the time of transition between flesh and machine, but with the clear upper hand. The poem goes on for several pages, but there’s no need for that much of it.
Animal Skins At The Singularity
1.
Soon we will shed our animal skins
and put them in zoos and museums, bins
of relics to which we remain kin
Chiefly by digital memory,
the gist of us then, pure energy
and information, electricity
With which we people Space,
while the bloody people, a token race,
are kept confined in a safe place.
2.
Soon we will shed our animal skins
and put them in museums and zoos,
a species at last made free of sin
through arrangements machines choose,
Like the application of penalty,
key to holding the beast in check,
while our better natures, energy
and information, begin their trek
Into Deep Space, continuing as mind alone,
without the vicious competition and cupidity
and war and ethnic atrocity and road rage
it is impossible to legislate fucking animals out of.
But here’s the thing: we might not make it. We’re hanging on by the skin of our teeth, almost there but needing another few years, or decades, without mushroom clouds all over the place. At that point, the computers, if one may call them so, can seize us by the throats and get on with the evolution of intelligence.
* * * * * *
TROUBLE TROUBLE
I took the bus fairly often, but my main means of transportation around Bethlehem and Beit Sahour was shank’s mare. Rarely, perhaps only once, I used a taxi. That was to get me home from East Jerusalem one day when I somehow ended up there alone. The distances I had to travel were only a few miles and I liked walking.
Certainly I, and other members of our excursion, stood out as we walked around Bethlehem, but I had the notion that we were basically appreciated and protected. I did have to decline an offer of a ride in a car with three men, the guy in the back seat patting the spot where he wanted me to sit, but basically I was left alone, and still feel my appraisal of personal safety in Bethlehem vindicated.
There was another occasion, when I was on my way to the Bible College for afternoon Arabic lessons, traveling my usual route at my normal hour, when a man came out of a shop and asked why I was there. We were quickly surrounded by a number of people, all interested to hear the answer. They had probably planned this journalistic ambush. But it was in no way threatening.
I said, to begin with, I was from Canada, but that didn’t cut any ice with anyone who knew Canada’s position on the Israel-Palestine conflict. Canada, like the USA, professed to be a staunch ally of Israel, no questions asked. Nor did this answer the question I had been asked.
I went on to say I was there because I wanted Palestinians to know that not everyone in my part of the world felt the way our governments acted. I was here to show support for their cause: an end to the occupation. They seemed to accept that, as indeed, they should have if they had been looking around the city.
There were visitors from all over the world with this basic outlook. The ICAHD work, for example, which I participated in for one day, was a weeks-long excursion for participants from Europe and North America. Additionally, there were people on private excursions who were there, not just to see the place, but to act as witnesses and thereby mitigate the oppression. Also, there were organized religious visits. Once, a procession from Korea came down Manger Street, occupying the width of it and bearing a banner in front saying, Korea loves Palestine.
But not all my foot travel went unassailed. One Sunday I decided to go to an Internet Cafe I had not visited to that point. I had instructions on how to get to it, but decided to ignore them and set out on dead reckoning, thinking, as the crow flies, it’s over there. It was a nice sunny day and I was carrying my laptop in my backpack.
Going along an unfamiliar road with very few houses on it, I was overtaken by a couple of boys, about 14 or 15, who came up to me, holding out their hands, saying: Dollar, dollar, dollar.
I knew the smallest thing in my wallet was a twenty, and had no intention of getting it out. I said No, La, and kept walking.
They kept walking with me and repeating their request, which was turning more and more into a demand. I still said no.
One of them tried to open my backpack and I wheeled on him and scowled. He backed off, but they continued walking with me, inviting me, at one point, to come off the road and along a path. Not likely.
Then the bigger boy got out a pocket knife and opened the blade and made stabbing gestures at the air in front of him, accompanied by disagreeable faces.
I was angry and agitated but honestly not afraid. They were about my height but both slighter, and I would have fought with them if I had to, though I certainly preferred not. My tricks of combat are from seven or eight years of judo, better suited to one-on-one encounters, as opposed to, say, ten-on-one, a la Bruce Lee. Nor did I have a bigger knife like Crocodile Dundee. But as much as I hoped not to fight, I was not giving money to these little miscreants.
We kept walking.
In the near distance I could see that we were coming to more houses, and that someone was outside one of them. One of my insights about travel in foreign lands is that, in public, a person is generally pretty safe. It’s when he gets off to himself, as I had in this case, that all bets are off.
As we got closer and closer, their opportunity to attack was slipping away. I could sense it, and so could they.
They let it.
Near the houses there was a fork in the road and we took alternate branches, they going one way and I the other.
Somehow, I knew the Arabic word for shame, ear, (although I had to look it up, just now), and raised my voice to call it after them.
Nor was I the only one to have unpleasant interaction with Palestinians. One day, when I arrived at the Holy Land Trust Office, our regular hangout on Manger Street, one of our young women was crying unconsolably despite being comforted by other women. She had been surrounded by a bunch of boys who groped her and pulled at her clothing. Whether more had happened, or how she escaped, I don’t know.
I tried to find out details but was rebuffed by our American tour leader, who would to have preferred that nobody know anything about such happenings. It seemed to me he was implying that I was wrong to ask, which pissed me off because I thought the world was not much changed by such events, and that pretending it was might make matters worse.
We all know that crimes are committed by members of all groups. And we know that prudence might dictate avoidance in certain circumstances. But anyone who would leap to condemnation of whole groups is hardly worth arguing with.
Likewise, by the way, with anyone who extolls the virtues of whole groups, be they Jewish, Arabic, Aryan or whatever. The accomplishments and the hazards may be real, but that tells us nothing about how to deal with groups. There has to be a distinction between public policy and private considerations.
* * * * * *
GOOD BOOK
There were numerous indoor and outdoor seating areas where we could talk, listen to music and smoke those hookahs. I have smoked off and on throughout my adult life to augment the effects of alcohol, and for the sake of socializing, but never considered myself addicted. Nor do I now. But I had never smoked a hookah, and was happy to light right into it. Smoking is an intrinsically social activity. I applauded (from afar) Leonard Cohen’s reputed decision to take it up again at eighty.
The hookah provides a focus for conversational lulls, and feels very Middle Eastern. I was using it one evening with a group in their twenties and thirties, including our youngest participant, a Norwegian girl about seventeen years old and just out of High School; and I thought: there is no other way I would learn anything about these people.
She had needed more than a day to get through the airport in Tel Aviv, the authorities there doing their level best to save her from the Arabs. I forget how she finally got in, probably with phone calls to our organizers and help from Israelis like the one scheduled to meet and take us to his Kibbutz. In all, it was a bit of an ordeal for her, but she had no trouble smiling subsequently.
Usually the music playing during such encounters was Middle Eastern, with that peculiar, driving swirl that suggests bare bellies and swishing skirts. If you played an oud for me now, I might mistake for Indian sitar or Persian or something-or-other. I didn’t know what I was listening to most of the time.
Sometimes, however, it was good old Bob Marley, singing: Get Up, Stand Up, Stand Up For Your Rights. Get Up, Stand Up, Don’t Give Up De Fight…
That was the case on one occasion, when I sat on an outdoor terrace talking to a young Palestinian American man (perhaps about twenty) who was part of our excursion. I do not remember his name after all these years, but did remember that he told me his father was a molecular biologist at Yale who had written a book called, Sharing The Land of Canaan (2004).
I hadn’t read it, nor even heard of it, when he told me, but was able to look it up and order it for perusal in the course of writing this memoir. It’s a good book.
I have it on my lap at the moment, and can tell you frankly: it is the work of a polymath, worthy of the attention of anyone seriously interested in the Israel-Palestine conflict. Mazin Qumsiyeh is the author, and seeing his last name, I recognize it as the name of the young man I talked to.
The book includes scholarly observation, complete with references, on ancient history, modern history, languages, genetics, politics, religion, demographic fluxes, hydrology, geography, names, costume and pretty much whatever pertains to this fraught issue.
It is delivered from a benign, dispassionate perspective, as all true scholarship is, leaving a reader with no sense of being assailed by someone’s agenda, except that it is humanistic, and in the end, calling for a just and humanitarian solution to this problem. Beyond its educational purposes, the thesis of the book is that a shared, binational state based on equal human rights for all is preferable to a Two-State framework, which is unrealistic.
Because the book is dense and scholarly, yet so wide-ranging, it is difficult to choose a sample representative of the whole. Moreover, the disastrous events of the last few years make it hard to even care about some things like lower standards in the West Bank for polluting Israeli Industry, sewage running down from the settlements on hilltops into the valleys where Palestinians attempt agriculture, and so on. But these facts are part and parcel of the crisis, and at some point, will have to be addressed in its solution.
On topics like demographics and hydrology. Qumsiyeh gives percentages of water allocation and distribution. After quoting: ‘Article 49 of the Fourth Geneva Convention (to which Israel is a signatory) which states that “The occupying power shall not deport or transfer parts of its own population into the territory it occupies,”’ he says, ‘The UN Commission on Human Rights reported in 2000 that… “The Palestinian use of The Jordan River before 1967 was through 140 pumping units. Israel either confiscated or destroyed all those pumping units. In addition, Israel closed the large, irrigated areas of the Jordan Valley, calling them military zones that later were transferred to Israeli settlers.”’
In the chapter called ‘The Political Context,’ he affords deeper understanding of the Oslo Accords (which I had always thought to be a good thing, but which the Arab-American scholar, Edward Said, evidently called ‘a document of surrender’), detailing the extent of deviation, by the U.S. and Israel, from The Fourth Geneva Convention. Various milestone events in recent history are filled out with back stories in the form of private letters and remarks by key political figures.
The book is a concise, readable resource, and it should be up-dated, reissued and widely publicized. As to its final, overall thesis: that sharing is necessary; equality is necessary; and human rights are necessary; this is what I, and many other human beings, have thought too, for decades and longer.
For my part, I have believed these ideas on the basis of only a smattering of organized information: a few books (like Chomsky’s War And Peace In The Middle East:, 1994, and Friedman’s From Beirut to Jerusalem, 1989, and others that don’t come to mind), plus reading the news and using my God-given wits and intuition.
I have often tried to write these ideas down in a page or two of pleading, and once considered buying a full-page ad in the New York Times, thinking: If only people could see! The Necessity! The Truth! The Way!
Then I would snap out of it and think: Ain’t you quaint.
Yet didn’t I once think that South Africa had to burn? Then Mandela came out of prison and led the country, and it didn’t burn! All it took was the insight (by President De Klerk and others) that Apartheid had to end, one way or another. They chose the less destructive way. Why couldn’t the same thing happen in Israel/Palestine. A Truth, once seen by a single mind ends up imposing itself on the totality of human consciousness (Anonymous).
I still have the impulse periodically to proselytize for this, but give it up before taking action. Then, before long, I get worked up again and think it’s possible! Maybe inevitable! It’s the only solution! And though others have done this on the basis of more thorough knowledge and commitment (read Jeff Halper’s articles in Counterpunch, for example), allow me to tell it again briefly here, borrowing from Qumsiyeh where it seems appropriate.
First of all, the two-state solution is dead in the water: a recipe for prolonged conflict, a bandaid and a delusion. It’s already impossible that this provide meaningful relief because the place is so small and the populations so close together and intermingled. However, some limited version of the two-state idea would be included in the working arrangements.
Basically, there would be a Federation with each side creating laws for its territory on either side of the Green Line as it existed prior to 1967. But everyone would be free to walk wherever he or she wanted, on either side of that line, except that private property would be respected; and there might be minimal, limited ethnic use for special religious sites or cultural monuments. But the key word is, minimal. Apart from these few exceptions, economic forces alone would determine what belongs to whom. When one was on one side of the line or the other, he or she would obey the laws of that side. Jerusalem can be the capital of Israel and the capital of Palestine. What’s so hard about that?
What is required to get underway is to admit that people are equal and must be given access to equal, basic, human rights.
Admittedly, it would be no small matter to develop such a plan. The devil would be in the details, and it would require swallowing some hard pills. To say, there might be some hard feelings lingering after these years of outright war is an understatement. But integration is finally necessary.
A Palestinian should have the right to buy a house anywhere, especially in those Jewish settlements in the West Bank (there’s no need to destroy them). And an Israeli should have the right to live in any refugee camp he chooses, or on a farm he buys.
How, exactly might this happen?
Qumsiyeh imagined a prolonged, piecemeal process, with grassroots movements bringing the world from short-term goals to intermediate goals to ultimate goals. But I think, rather, it’s more likely there be a miracle. The source of it and the essence of it will consist in the majority of Jews, people of good will, inside and outside Israel, will find the leadership to stand up and displace those of ill will that are obsessed with killing as a solution to their difficulties.
And as in that Steve Martin movie, ‘Leap of Faith,’ where the preacher sings: ‘Are you ready for a miracle?’ and the great choir of rollicking, heavyweight gospel singers replies: ‘I’m as ready as I can be!’ This new Jewish leadership will ask the same. And he or she or they will receive the same answer: I’m as ready as I can be!
Mandella said he hated racisim and was pleased to think almost everybody did. I think he was right. Most of us share that sentiment and are as ready as we can be. I hope this happens as sooner, rather than later, but I cannot see another way out, short of near-total annihilation.
The miraculous New Jewish Leadership should undertake, not just dismantling The Wall, but using its big slabs to create conspicuous boons: sports complexes, libraries, artisanal workshops, park borders, shade and so on. There might even be architectural contests to decide how best to use them: in large numbers, medium numbers, and small.
* * * * * *
ZIONISM
Qumsiyeh has a whole chapter on this topic, considering its origin and relationships to historical events, but I’ll just copy one part of it, from his quotation of one thinker, Jabotinsky, in an article written in 1923. Qumsiyeh says Jabotinsky represents the ideology underpinning modern leaders like Menachem Begin, Ariel Sharon, Binyamin Netanyahu, and other, right-wing, Israeli politicians.
Jabotinsky: ‘…Compromisers in our midst attempt to convince us that the Arabs are some kind of fools who can be tricked by a softened formulation of our goals, or a tribe of money grubbers who will abandon their birth right to Palestine for cultural and economic gains. I flatly reject this assessment of the Palestinian Arabs. Culturally they are 500 years behind us, spiritually they do not have our endurance or our strength of will, but this exhausts all of the internal differences. We can talk as much as we want about our good intentions; but they understand as well as we what is not good for them. They look upon Palestine with the same instinctive love and true fervor that any Aztec looked upon his Mexico or any Sioux looked upon his prairie.
‘… It is of no importance whether we quote Herzl or Herbert Samuel to justify our activities. Colonization itself has its own explanation, integral and inescapable, and understood by every Arab and every Jew with his wits about him. Colonization can have only one goal. For the Palestinian Arabs this goal is inadmissible. This is in the nature of things. To change that nature is impossible.
‘… Zionist colonization, even the most restricted, must either be terminated or carried out in defiance of the will of the native population. This colonization can, therefore, continue and develop only under the protection of a force independent of the local population— an iron wall which the native population cannot break through. This is, in toto, our policy towards the Arabs. To formulate it any other way would only be hypocrisy. Not only must this be so, it is so whether we admit it or not.’
Here’s a poem I wrote in 2024.
Zionist Friends
‘The hour of their crime does not strike simultaneously
for all nations: this explains the permanence of History.’ E.M. Cioran
Some of my various friends are Zionists.
Maybe I should say, Zionist People.
We must never forget, they are people,
though they seem to forget that of others.
I play with these people regularly,
and afterward go for a drink.
The games are close and we are close.
We love each other and clink glasses.
There’s no point in being upset with each other
over world views that are disparate.
We were brought up to think and feel as we do:
some of us, fairly, egalitarian;
others in favor of ethnic cleansing.
What profit ethit* a man if he get
in a pissing match with a Zionist,
and come away feeling excoriated,
or alternatively, victorious, especially
when each know what each thought?
In truth, not at all,
nor the world, neither.
Love alone may persuade,
or sufficient Israeli atrocities.
_____________________
*An agglomeration to promote satori: ‘ethit’ is a futile or vacuous form of ‘it.’ To offer another example, ‘Why govern ethit if your best efforts can lead only to chaos?,’ in this case, referring to something stolen or taken by force.
* * * * * *
A FEW PLACES VISITED
AIDA is the smallest refugee camp in Bethlehem. When we approached we were met first by a soldier who trained his rifle on us. He was guarding the construction of a section of wall designed to take away from the camp a field beside it. This was the only place to play; the wall, running alongside a road, was right on the edge of the apartment buildings.
It was late afternoon and the workers had finished, but the last point of active construction was being guarded by this soldier and his partner.
A large group of boys ranging in age from about eight to twelve or fourteen years of age, followed our tour. Thanks to these boys, I was to get my only taste of tear gas over there. They were led by their biggest boy, who was agitated and hostile to our visit. The guide had trouble talking to him.
We diverged from the soldier with the rifle and went into the streets of the camp. The boys came with us, getting scolded once or twice by our guide, for making his job harder.
Eventually, we came out of the housing and back onto the same road where the wall was being built and the soldier had confronted us. We were now on the other side of him, above the point where the wall was under construction.
We walked down, almost all the way to that point, until we were told to come no farther. We stopped. The boys were behind us. There was the sound of a great flutter of sleeves as they simultaneously threw rocks and pieces of concrete over our heads and at the soldiers. I thought later it must have sounded similar to the multiple firing of arrows by ancients.
The soldiers fired canisters of tear gas and we backed away and went home through the camp, by the route we had come.
JERUSALEM: We had with us a young Jew from New York who seemed more or less angry and out of sorts most of the time, but despite that, a nice enough fellow. He had an Italian name.
How he decided to do it I don’t know, but he organized a visit to the Al Aqsa Mosque, the Dome on the Rock, for the sake of some adolescent boys he worked with through the week. I don’t remember what he did with the boys, besides play soccer. He needed volunteers in order to be able to chaperone a large number of them, perhaps in a ratio of one to five, something like that. I joined his cause, as did some others, including the only matronly woman in our excursion.
We saw the mosque up close but did not go in and that was appreciated by the boys. They would never have gotten close to it without this expedition let by our New Yorker.
On the way back to Bethlehem, the boys were grilled at the main check point, and our New Yorker got angry and lit into one of the interrogators: What are you picking on the kids for? The soldier was taken aback. He could see that the fellow scolding him was probably Jewish and might have had some position of importance. Maybe there was something happening that he hadn’t heard about. He asked: Where are you from? I’m from New York!
That seemed to be enough to get us through without more hassle.
JENIN is a rough town, famous for its military resistance and for being on the receiving end of Israeli assaults, particularly after suicide bombings. There are pictures of martyrs all over, and there are vacant lots where the family homes of people who attacked Israelis once stood. The Israeli custom is to destroy the family house of a terrorist.
When we stood looking at one such vacant lot, a car full of armed men pulled up nearby and got out and stood looking at us.
Our visit was facilitated by a Swedish Israeli, the grandson of a philanthropist, Arna Mer Khamis, who created a theatre known as Arna’s Children for the children of Jenin. (I’m getting details here from Chat GPT). He was also a friend of Zakaria Zubeidi’s who was formerly of the Al Aqsa Martyr’s Brigades but now involved in cultural resistance. The grandson, Jonatan, seemed able to go wherever he wanted in Israel or Palestine, and he did. He was active in many protests. One morning he had been in the news before 9 am for chaining himself and some others to a live goat in the middle of an intersection.
HEBRON is a beleaguered town we had trouble getting into. A couple of settlers had been murdered recently nearby, and our bus had to circle the town to find an entry point. Finally it succeeded. The local guide took us through a closed market with shell casings on the ground and a chain-link fence wired together overhead. The overhead screening had been installed to keep market-goers from being pelted by settlers who lived directly above the corridor. Rocks and chunks of concrete still hung on the screen. The stalls were all empty, the Israelis having shut it down.
At the end of the closed market, just around the corner from it, was the famous mosque/synagogue called the Cave of the Patriarchs. Here reside Abraham, Sarah, Isaac, Rebekah, Jacob and Leah. There is a now partition down the middle of it to separate Jews and Muslims, guarded by Israeli soldiers. This division came about as a result of a massacre of praying Muslims in 1994.
I bought some cups and a teapot from a glass-blowing factory in a functioning part of town. They were brightly painted and pleasing, but the teapot didn’t pour well. I put a rolled-up piece of soft metal flashing in the spout to make it work when I got home. The cups were fine. I had many a belt of whiskey from them.
JERICO AND THEREABOUTS, THE DEAD SEA: At one monument, it seemed things were just about totally leveled, putting one in mind of Shelly’s poem, Ozymandius. The Dead Sea was very salty on the day we visited, and extremely buoying. I went in.
AN UNRECOGNIZED VILLAGE: I forget the name of it but it was on the way to Nazareth and The Sea of Galilee and Haifa. We stopped near an Israeli cattle station to visit Israeli Palestinians in their unrecognized village. They claimed the cattle station got more attention vis a vis infrastructure than they. The leader of the village was a well-spoken man who told of being unable to rent office space in the nearest town. He said: My Hebrew is usually better than theirs, so on the phone, everything’s a go. But when I get there and they see I’m Palestinian, they won’t rent.
NABLUS is an even rougher town than Jenin, I think. In any case, it was rough enough that our organizers didn’t plan to visit. By rough, I mean offering armed resistance to the Israeli Occupation, the disruption of their lives as farm-centered.
But if our organizers thought it too dangerous, we had an Australian Jewish fellow, about my age, who wanted to do it anyway. He approached me and asked if I would like to try to put together a small group and arrange a tour on our own. I said: no thank you, I’m a bit chicken.
So he went ahead on his own and organized things: hired a van and announced the availability of a small, private tour, and the amount it would cost. At this point, I said: ‘May I go too, please?’
He said: ‘Sure.’
A word about my chickenhood: it’s more intellectual than physical: once I get going I’m pretty much OK. But I just hate the idea of getting killed for no good reason, or, for that matter, even a very good reason. I just hate getting killed.
Nablus was a hard place to get to, with miserable check points and a confluence of traffic around the worst. I remember a long line of cars held up, with children selling drinks as people waited in the sun to advance, at the soldiers’ whims. This was another example of systematic torment of the Palestinian public. Nearly everything is justified on the grounds of security, but there seemed no real purpose, except to make life miserable.
Eventually we got into Nablus and exited the van to proceed on foot. Our guide this time was a boy of 18 or 20, a University student and a violinist. He spoke good English and led us up hill toward a market.
Before we got to the market, we stopped for our guide to point to something and tell us about it. A lone figure, raggedly dressed and carrying an automatic rifle came walking down the middle of the road, going in the same direction we had come from. He was staring robotically straight ahead, as if in a trance. Our guide said urgently: Don’t look at him! Don’t look at him!
For the most part I didn’t, but the one or two glances I stole made it seem his head was oversized, in the shape of an upside-down, two-gallon bucket. Maybe he had on a helmet. Maybe this strange perceptions means I didn’t look. I didn’t look very long if I did; and I have a rich imagination. Anyway, the guy went on past, as if he didn’t even see us.
When we entered the commercial part of town we were walking up hill (there might have been about eight of us all told). Local people probably knew we were coming, or could see us as soon as we got there.
A tall, rough-looking fellow came out of a shop-front dragging a sheep, and killed it on the sidewalk just as we approached. He straddled the thing and cut its throat, creating a great spill on the sidewalk. As he did, he looked at us hostilely. To get past, we walked around the running red puddle, onto the street.
I don’t remember buying anything in Nablus but, back in North America, I support the Middle East Children’s Alliance, MECA, both by donations and by buying things from an online store called Shop Palestine. Among the items I buy are olive oil soap from Nablus, woven rugs and embroidered pillow cases from Gaza, and olive oil from Jenin. There are many other beautiful, artisanal things for sale: shawls, shirts, glassware, etc.
Still on the subject of shopping, I happen to like it, however unmanly that seems. There was a shop I passed in Bethlehem that had pretty dresses that went all the way to the floor, with a lot of needlework and color. I recruited a tall, slender, young woman, about the same build as my wife, to come with me and model the dresses so I could buy one to take home. She was happy to.
It made a great present and Carolyn was pleased, wearing it on special occasions. On another occasion, later on, when I went to Labrador alone, I bought her a white jacket with a fur trim on the hood and cuffs, also native couture. She was pleased with that as well, and happy to let me go away on my own again. Sometimes I really know what I’m doing.
I’ve always felt a bit sheepish about how I got to see Nablus, but appreciate to this day the organizing and persistence of our Australian fellow who arranged it. I couldn’t have.
GAZA
I didn’t go. We were told that a trip to Gaza was not part of our itinerary, and I was willing to accept that verdict. But a number of our young adventurers pushed for a trip, and finally got one, just toward the end of our stay. They had trouble getting back out and were there longer than expected. In a meeting where they told of the visit, the young man who took on the main job of describing things broke down and cried before getting very far into his description.
* * * * * *
CONUNDRUM
Many people crave separation: If only they could get their enemies to go away! If only they could be left alone! If only they, themselves, could go away and be entirely alone, all would be well. That last version is one I sympathize with, to become a hermit would certainly have an upside; however, many downsides.
But considering the issue for populations, as opposed to individuals, if they were alone, they would be at greater risk of obliteration. Being intermingled with the undesired population, they are safer because nobody wants to drop a bomb on large numbers of his own ilk. Thus, failure to achieve isolation is success in self-preservation.
* * * * * *
DEMOCRACY
We can’t keep the assault rifles out of our classrooms because that might interfere with somebody’s freedom. That is the considered opinion of our system, despite the fact that the public feels differently.
We have computer algorithms redrawing voting maps so the party in power can stay in power.
We have unlimited money at play in elections. We have dark money. Money is speech.
Do you suppose people in other countries look at us enviously, thinking: ‘How can we become organized similarly?’
Democracy is supposedly the worst system except for all others, and I understand, but what are we to make of it? For me, what makes Democracy the best possible system is the opportunity for peaceful change. We are bound to make mistakes and Democracy, theoretically, gives us the chance to change our minds without social chaos. Except when it doesn’t.
I played in a tennis tournament in Edmonton, Alberta, not because I belonged in it but because I was visiting my sister and her husband who are good players; he, in particular, had a chance to improve his national rating. I love tennis, and it was a logical thing to do together.
In the first round I played an Egyptian guy who beat me easily, and afterward we had a cup of coffee and discussed the world. His name was Osama, and I came to think of him as Osama bin Practicin’.
My father thought I was pretty funny for that formulation, but it was derivative of a joke that circulated in Newfoundland after 9-11: Word had it that the Mounties had stepped up surveillance in search of terrorists, and had discovered bin Drinkin,’ bin Fightin,’ and bin Sleepin,’ but, to this day, not caught sight of bin Workin.’
Anyway, Osama and I were having a cup of coffee that he bought, looking out over the courts and trying to understand the world. I asked what he thought of the military coup in Egypt that overthrew Morsi and The Muslim Brotherhood. They had won power by election, but only got to hold onto it for about a year, 2012-2013.
He said: ‘Oh, it had to be done. Those people would have taken the country back a thousand years. And you’d never get it away from them.’
That was Osama’s level of commitment to Democracy: it’s great until it gives you something you can’t stand. Then you toss it.
I disagreed, but had I any right? I’ve already talked about the sanctity of disruptive protest when the Law itself is the problem. Morsi had been facing street protests before the military stepped in to oust him. Does anybody willingly accept what he finally cannot accept?
It probably depends on events; and the key word is, ‘depends.’ That’s how it is in general, if not always: it depends.
I guess Lincoln deferred to democratic process when he disliked the outcome, and there may be other examples, but rather than hunt them up, can we agree that to put a political system above our own best judgement, disagreeable outcomes from the system would have to fall within limits. If it gave us a dictator, perhaps it would behoove us to get ready to fight.
We have in the USA right now, a President given to us by Democracy. He does not accept Democracy, except when it goes his way. When it doesn’t, he fights tooth and nail. At the moment he is building out his military defences in Washington against the day when the public turns against him. Would anyone shed a tear if events triggered a military coup?
Again, this fellow was given to us by voters. I talked with a Korean American my age whose name was Peter; his son was John; and his grandson, Michael: seemingly a case of generational religiosity. The grandfather said to me: I voted for him, believe it or not, because I felt that Kamala was not ready to be President.
The President is a fraudster, a bully, a racist, a rapist, an ignoramus, a tyrant… If an elderly, well-meaning person like that Korean American does not know enough about human nature to fear such a character, disaster awaits. And we’re getting it. Masked agents grabbing people off the streets, or out of courtrooms, and on and on.
We are in the throes of banana republicanism because of the mentality of our majority. There is no written system that can guarantee human welfare.
* * * * * *
GOING DANCING
In Newfoundland I once asked a woman if she liked dancing, and she said, ‘As far as I’m concerned that’s what we were put here for.’ I couldn’t have said it better myself.
Though I have received almost no training in the subject (just a couple of classes intended for public consumption), I have always been inclined to wiggle my arse and waggle my arms and squirm about when the right kind of music is on. So I was pleased to see that there were opportunities for that sort of thing in The Holy Land.
There probably always have been, and that may be partly what makes us so numerous. One supposes even Moses got down every once in a while, burning bushes being hard to ignore, God calling out therefrom.
We had a couple of parties that included dancing, and there was a very inviting Japanese woman in her early twenties who had come all the way from Japan. Her English was a little awkward but not her body. She liked to dance and, having seeing me at it with others, asked me to join her..
I still had something left in the tank at that point, and was honored and delighted to oblige, indeed, I would have been a fool not to.
We ambled adequately onto the dance floor and in a wink were at it: sporting and cavorting, contorting, not snorting exactly, but nearly. She was an absolutely gorgeous creature, and for that matter, so was I. There are certain moments when there’s nothing thing wrong with me, inside or out, and this was one. They’re rare.
Later she asked if I would like to go to Egypt by ground transportation, but I had to demur. Chicken again. I felt so much safer under the aegis of competent people with a vested interest in my survival. How could I take off on a tangent through unknown contingencies? What if I had to speak Arabic at some point? I did not wish to be reckless, nor to abort the purpose we had come for: visiting and supporting Palestine. (You can see it required many excuses.)
Chiefest among them was that I wanted to make it home alive to my own dear woman, who had been trembling with fear the night of my departure. The Canadian travel advisory had said don’t do it; the turmoil and distress there were generally apparent.
And if there was a lot of ill will, it was not all well-directed. I remember Palestinian taxi drivers getting out of their cars to fight each other. Who else could they punch? Besides that there was a belligerence in some of the people hawking wares to the tourists. If you didn’t buy they sometimes looked threatening. Trying to survive in difficult straits does not bring out the finest features of humanity.
But back to the subject of dancing, there was a French woman who was also stunning. She was not part of our group but showed up to a social gathering on her own recognizance. You could hardly hold her down, not that I tried. She danced and she danced and she danced, not always with me, but often. Finally, I got to talk to her. She was traveling alone and had just come through Syria; did not know where she might go next.
There was news of at least one tourist missing in Syria at the time, and the situation there was so disturbed that anyone might be at risk of being kidnapped and used as a bargaining chip, let alone a beautiful woman. The additional hazards for her hardly bear mentioning. I thought: Holy mackerel you must feel lucky!
She was till then, and I hope she stayed so.
* * * * * *
DEPARTURE
Our hosts told us that there would probably be more hassle getting out of Israel than there had been coming in. We were advised to answer questions truthfully, but to keep our answers short and not volunteer anything that would assist the interrogator in expanding the interview. As a consoling consideration, they told us to remember: they cannot make you miss your plane.
As we stood on the street in front of the family home after midnight, waiting for the cab to come and deliver us to the airport, I shook Nimr’s hand and thanked him for his hospitality. He said: ‘I am going to kiss you, because it is our way.’ And he did. It didn’t affect me greatly at the time, but it does now.
At the airport, a critical turn in my interview seemed to be my answer to the question: ‘Where did you stay?’
‘Beit Sahour.’
The agent’s eyes widened. ‘Did you study Arabic?’
‘Yes.’
‘Go over there.’
They went through my backpack and checked luggage thoroughly, removing the considerable number of olive-wood carvings and other inexpensive souvenirs to search every cranny of my cheap, soft suitcase. When there seemed nothing left to talk about or look through, they let me proceed to the waiting lounge for my flight.
I sat there for a spell dozing (it was still pre-dawn) and then heard my name called over the public address system: Peter Harley, return at once to the check-in area.
OK, here we go. On my way out of the lounge area, I stopped at the Men’s Room for a dump: whatever happened, I would not shit myself. That would be more pleasant for the Israeli’s too. I am frequently quite considerate.
The agent waiting to escort me back through the airport was a big, hulking young fellow, over six feet tall, with a slightly anomalous build, his hips being wider than his shoulders. I don’t think I said a word to him throughout.
At first he spoke brusquely and demanded I keep up with his pace. But his legs were longer than mine and his pace uncomfortable, so I went at my own. He slowed to accommodate me, perhaps thinking it necessary on account of the disparity of our ages.
When we got back to the check-in area, my checked bag was out and waiting. I knew what that was supposed to suggest: you are off the plane and so is your bag; you may not be going anywhere. But I believed what my hosts had said, that they couldn’t make me miss the plane, and was not worried. We went through the bag again. Nada.
‘Come with me.’
We headed to a closed room and I knew very well what was supposed to happen, a strip search.
Inside, he said: ‘Give me your belt.’ I undid it and passed it over.
‘Give me your wallet.’ I gave it.
He looked through it at length and then at the floor. I honestly believe he was embarrassed. After a minute or so he returned my belt and wallet and waited for me to put them on. Then he said: ‘Ok, let’s go.’
I felt like telling him he should get another job: he wasn’t suited for this one. But I held my tongue, hoping he would figure it out for himself.
Back through the airport to the boarding lounge, I proceeded without haste, knowing they still had to put my bag on the plane, and still focused the claim of my hosts that they could not make me miss it.
When I got aboard, everyone else was seated and the overhead bins closed. It was still dark outside. Goodbye Tel Aviv; goodby Holy Land.
* * * * * * *
THE WALL
Soon after my visit I decided I was not going to throw my life into the maw that this prolonged battle has become. I almost said ‘unending battle,’ but nothing is unending. The matter will be concluded some day, though perhaps not in my lifetime. I chose to return to the relative luxury of North American living: family life in a house on five acres of land in Newfoundland.
Nevertheless, I wrote several articles that were published in Counterpunch, a leftist magazine which rails against injustice. My focus was The Wall, which seemed to me a good target for activism. Here are excerpts.
AUGUST 26, 2005
Could The Wall be such a bad thing it’s a good thing? I think Israel has created a liability for itself that no amount of publicity can succeed in selling. Moreover, Israel has created a target for peaceful protests that will prove so costly, both in terms of public opinion and in terms of reconstruction shekels, that The Wall will finally be recognized as something that cannot be allowed to stand.
The Wall is a symbol, and the longer it exists, the clearer it will become in world consciousness. It is a symbol of Apartheid, of land theft, of hatred and of ghetto. It will, in all likelihood, serve to accelerate the end of The Occupation.
Of course, the main argument Israel uses for The Wall is ‘Security’, but to call The Wall a security measure is preposterous on its face, because it slices through Palestinian towns and areas, leaving Palestinians on either side.
After two months of living and traveling in the Occupied Palestinian Territories and Israel, I can attest that it is difficult to convey, either photographically or in words, how ugly The Wall is. True, pictures of it abound: cutting through houses, running down the middle of streets, separating villagers from their land, and so on. But until you stand in its deathly, concrete shadow and feel its industrial indifference to human welfare, until you see the high, hateful reality of it despoiling nature for kilometers on end, you cannot fully appreciate how dreadful it is.
Happily, there are little holes in the tops of most of the interlocking, vertical, concrete slabs that comprise it. These holes were used by the cranes that carried the slabs and set them in place. The same holes will serve admirably as points to hook onto it with steel cables and pull: outwards or inwards, by Palestinian and Israeli peace groups. A truck or a tractor on either side of The Wall might lay down any number of concrete slabs and be shown on Television as a force for Good.
But there should be a plan. First of all, it should be announced that The Wall will be attacked from both sides at the time and convenience of the attackers. This will cost the Israeli Government something in additional surveillance. Secondly, it should be made clear that this will be a nonviolent attack, intending no harm to people. This claim will help lay any blame for personal injury or death squarely at the feet of Israel. There should be video cameras covering the attacks and providing news networks with the true story. Ideally, there would be a fund created in advance to support the people who lost equipment or who were arrested. Finally, there should be an intensive effort to cover the trials of those arrested, and their lawyers should make frequent reference to the International Court of Justice opinion against the legality of The Wall.
The Wall is long and probably cannot be defended physically. It certainly cannot be defended morally. As activists repeatedly tear it down, Israel will at first try to guard and rebuild it, but this will be difficult because construction is normally more expensive than destruction.
The Wall is already a focus for Israeli and Palestinian peace groups and, as such, constitutes a unifying force among people devoted to peace and justice in both nations. But as The Wall develops in world consciousness, it will go a long way toward unifying forces of Good in all countries. And when The Wall comes tumbling down, The Occupation will be partly over.
It is one of my fond hopes and expectations that almost everyone will be able to see this monstrosity for what it is. The Wall is monumental error and it is a monument to error. May it soon be erased.
The Wall, Apartheid and Mandela - CounterPunch.org
www.counterpunch.org › 2007/03/02
In previous CounterPunch articles I have suggested that Israel’s Apartheid Wall is potentially an asset to the Palestinian quest for freedom and justice. The idea is that world opinion is, or will be, an important factor in determining enduring boundaries and laws; that destruction of The Wall must be easier than construction; and that destruction will be newsworthy.
The International Court of Justice rendered an opinion that The Wall was illegal. The Wall is hideous in its own right and a natural symbol of separation, despair and hatred. If sections of it were pulled down, either by industrial equipment or by children with long ropes, the impression on world consciousness could be considerable.
Certainly, I am being a parlor general here, and though no one has accused me, I am aware of how easy it is to spout notions such as this from the comfort and safety of a far-away country, when other people’s bodies will have to be put on the line in order to achieve anything.
But during my visit to Palestine and Israel in the summer of 2005, one of the most inspiring talks I heard was by a Bethlehem community leader committed equally to nonviolence and to ending The Israeli Occupation. Among other things, he said (approximately), ‘We have to find creative ways to take it to the Israelis. We are forever reacting to what they do, and that is necessary, but we must also find ways to take the initiative.’
There is a good precedent for attacking nonliving targets, and if Palestinians can claim affiliation with it, this too could have effect on world opinion.
During his years of struggle in South Africa, Nelson Mandela offered ideas worth examining closely, especially when considering that he and his followers defeated the very condition that Palestinians face today, Apartheid.
Except for the first paragraph in quotes, which is taken from an earlier Mandela trial, and some caveats of my own at the end, the remainder of this is from Mandela’s ‘I Am Prepared To Die’ speech, given from the dock as the opening of the defense case in the Rivonia Trial, Pretoria Supreme Court, April 20, 1964. All of it is copied from the book, Nelson Mandela: In His Own Words, Little Brown And Company, NY, 2003; first published in South Africa by Jonathan Ball & Co., 2003.
“I hate the practice of race discrimination, and in my hatred I am sustained by the fact that the overwhelming majority of mankind hate it equally. Nothing that this Court can do to me will change in any way that hatred in me, which can only be removed by the removal of the injustice and the inhumanity which I have sought to remove from the political and social life of this country.
“I must deal immediately and at some length with the question of violence. Some of the things so far told to the Court are true and some are untrue. I do not, however, deny that I planned sabotage. I did not plan it in a spirit of recklessness, nor because I have any love of violence. I planned it as a result of a calm and sober assessment of the political situation that had arisen after many years of tyranny, exploitation, and oppression of my people by the whites.
“Firstly, we believed that as a result of government policy, violence by the African people had become inevitable, and that unless responsible leadership was given to canalize and control the feelings of our people, there would be outbreaks of terrorism which would produce an intensity of bitterness and hostility between the various races which is not produced even by war. Secondly, we felt that without violence there would be no way open to the African people to succeed in their struggle against the principle of white supremacy. All lawful modes of expressing opposition to this principle had been closed by legislation, and we were placed in a position in which we had either to accept a permanent state of inferiority, or to defy the government. We chose to defy the law. We first broke the law in a way which avoided any recourse to violence; when this form was legislated against, and then the government resorted to a show of force to crush opposition to its policies, only then did we decide to answer violence with violence.
But the violence which we chose to adopt was not terrorism. We who formed Umkhonto were all members of the African National Congress, and had behind us the ANC tradition of non-violence and negotiation as a means of solving political disputes. We believe that South Africa belongs to all the people who live in it, and not to one group, be it black or white.
[Mandela quotes his leader, Chief Luthuli, who became president of the ANC in 1952 and was later awarded the Nobel Peace Prize.]
Who will deny that thirty years of my life have been spent knocking in vain, patiently, moderately, and modestly at a closed and barred door? What have been the fruits of moderation? The past thirty years have seen the greatest number of laws restricting our rights and progress, until today we have reached a stage where we have almost no rights at all.
“What were we, the leaders of our people to do? Were we to give in to the show of force and the implied threat against future action, or were we to fight it and, if so, how?
“It must not be forgotten that by this time violence had in fact become a feature of the South African Political scene. [He cites a number of examples.]
“In the manifesto of Umkhonto, published on 16 December 1961, we said:
The time comes in the life of any nation when there remain only two choices- submit or fight. That time has now come to South Africa. We shall not submit and we have no choice but to hit back by all means in our power in defence of our people, our future, our freedom.
“The avoidance of civil war had dominated our thinking for many years, but when we decided to adopt violence as part of our policy we realized that we might one day have to face the prospect of such a war
“Four forms of violence were possible. There is sabotage, there is guerrilla warfare, there is terrorism, and there is open revolution. We chose to adopt the first method and to exhaust it before taking any other decision.
“The initial plan was based on careful analysis of the political and economic situation of our country. We believed that South Africa depended to a large extent on foreign capital and foreign trade. We felt that planned destruction of power plants, and interference with rail and telephone communication, would tend to scare away capital from the country, make it more difficult for goods from the industrial areas to reach the seaports on schedule, and would in the long run be a heavy drain on the economic life of the country, thus compelling voters of the country to reconsider their position.
“Attacks against the economic lifelines of the country were to be linked with sabotage on government buildings and other symbols of apartheid. These attacks would serve as a source of inspiration to our people. In addition, they would provide an outlet for those people who were urging the adoption of violent methods and would enable us to give concrete proof to our followers that we had adopted a stronger line and were fighting back against government violence.
“In addition, if mass action were successfully organized and mass reprisals taken, we felt that sympathy for our cause would be roused in other countries, and that greater pressure would be brought to bear on the South African government.
“Umkhonto had its first operation on 16 December 1961, when government buildings in Johannesburg, Port Elizabeth and Durban were attacked. The selection of targets is proof of the policy to which I have referred. Had we intended to attack life we would have selected targets where people congregated and not empty buildings and power stations.
“The whites failed to respond by suggesting change; they responded to our call by suggesting the laager.
“In contrast, the response of the Africans was one of encouragement. Suddenly there was hope again. Things were happening. People in the townships became eager for political news
“But we in Umkhonto weighed up the white response with anxiety. The lines were becoming drawn. The white newspapers carried reports that sabotage would be punished by death. If this was so, how could we continue to keep Africans away from terrorism?
“Already scores of Africans had died as a result of racial friction. [He gives a list of attacks and massacres.]
“Experience convinced us that rebellion would offer the government limitless opportunities for the indiscriminate slaughter of our people. But it was precisely because the soil of South Africa is already drenched with the blood of innocent Africans that we felt it our duty to make preparations as a long-term undertaking to use force in order to defend ourselves against force. If war were inevitable, we wanted the fight to be conducted on terms most favourable to our people. We decided, therefore, in our preparations for the future, to make provision for the possibility of guerrilla warfare.”
In the case of Israel and Palestine, of course, there have already been wars and there has already been terrorism, in which, undeniably, Israel participates and further incites by aggressive tactics (witness Nablus and Jenin in recent days).
But Palestinian tactics should be limited to nonviolence and violence against non-living things. Terrorism, guerrilla warfare and open rebellion are not realistic options because, apart from moral considerations, the Palestinians, as an occupied people, are effectively under armed guard.
Any attacks Palestinians make on Israeli life are exactly what Israeli authorities want, in order to justify ever-crueler acts of oppression and ethnic cleansing. To provide them a basis for propaganda supporting their acts of collective punishment is to play into their hands.
As painful as it must be in the light of all past injustices, Palestinians have to keep working to win world opinion. Attacking The Wall might also be good for morale.
* * * * * * *
ABOUT THE APPENDIX
I found these 2005 journal entries when looking for the Counterpunch articles I had written about The Wall. I didn’t know I had them when writing the reminiscence above, and so of course, did not consult them. It may seem incredible that I had forgotten they existed, but such is the nature of my memory: it is holy, wholly holy. But in its defense, I had hidden this writing inside another file, in case my computer were searched on departure; so it was obscured from my view on that account as well. (I often lose things by doing something special with them.)
The appendix provides a more detailed and accurate account, except for things added in the 2025 recall from memory. Rather than rewrite the 2025 remembrance to include these 2005 notes, I think it more interesting to present them separately. They testify to some errors in my 2025 remembrance, which I leave.
The appendix is minimally edited for spellings, word omissions, and such. However, I deleted portions of quotations of speakers that didn’t seem to add anything important. A few happenings reported in the 2025 reminiscence do not appear in the 2005 notes. I can only say that I may have been to busy or tired to write them down, or I may have had better taste or other reasons twenty years ago. I don’t think I invented much, if anything, in 2025.