The Promised Land: Interviews with Israeli Experts, Leaders and Citizens
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Today is our third full day in Israel and Palestine. Thanks to the hard work of Danny Grossman with the American Jewish Committee here in Jerusalem, we have done several powerful interviews, beginning with Bob Lang, an American who moved here over 20 years ago. He is a classic political activist who shared his personal experiences in and around the settlements in Jerusalem’s suburbs. We then went to the offices of the American Jewish Congress where we interviewed Rabbi David Rosen and Dr. Eran Lerman where we gained a new perspective on history and religion.
Leaving there we visited Arab East Jerusalem and the Town of Abudis. Abudis’ major street into Jerusalem is now blocked by a 30-foot high wall of concrete. We watched kids climb a short gate nearby but traffic and commerce are stymied, exacerbating the already poor economic conditions in the entire region. We made our way down the wall to a vantagepoint which you’ll see in some of our pictures. “The Wall” cuts off, not Jew from Arab, but rather Arab family from Arab Family. The level of increased anger among the Palestinians is very evident. We interviewed an Arab school teacher who is separated from her school by the wall and whose property she says will be just the latest Israeli confiscation (there is more to this we’ll talk about).
We took lots of pictures in an attempt at accurate portrayal of the “wall’s” effect. The “wall” snakes up and over surrounding hills and allegedly will pave the way for another Jewish settlement in East Jerusalem.
As has been the case on many days we didn’t have time for lunch until 3:00pm, but we had fried chicken and french fries along the road, from a Henny Penny!
Friday we began with Capt. Jacob Dellal, spokesman for the Israeli Defense Forces (IDF). A very articulate young man, he clearly laid out that their goal was to protect Israeli citizens and that Operation Defensive Shield (which began in 2002 as a response to suicide bombing) is working to enhance checkpoint security and build the fence/wall/barrier. Our next interview was Prof. Gerald Steinberg, an expert on unilateral withdrawal who is an advocate of building the wall and leaving it up for perhaps 20 years as a cooling off period. He also supports Israel abandoning significant settlements. Dore Gold, a former UN Representative was next. He is the author of Saudi Hatred, a book that asserts that the Saudis are the source of Islamist hate and funding. The book has copies of original documents proving his claims.
We also spoke with two female students and an American who moved here two years ago and served in the military. We finished by having a drink at the historic Hotel David and then dinner at Cielo, where they had to unlock the door to let us in due to concerns over suicide bombing.
Saturday our driver took us to the West Bank town of Ramallah, where our guide took us through Arafat’s bombed out compound. He was unavailable but we interviewed the Head of Fateh, Sakhr Habash. He and Arafat were together at the founding of Fateh and the PLO in the ’60s. His historical perspective was amazing if not totally credible. A nice guy, he bought Henny Penny Fried Chicken for us after the interview. His office has been blown up more than once by the Israelis.
We spoke with Abdul Rahman Tamimi, Head of the Palestinian Hydrological Group. Water, as we know, is the issue notwithstanding Israeli opinions to the contrary, water in Gaza is not even fit for agricultural use not to mention drinking; hence, Sharon’s unilateral withdrawal is merely leaving an unviable economy with no water.
At noon we interviewed 2003 Sydney Peace Prize awardee, Dr. Hanan Ashrawi. She was very impressive on women’s rights and the need to make the P.A. more accountable. Though no real fan of President Arafat, she also was not interested in hearing any negative information about him.
We finished our day of interviews with Dr. Mustafa Barghouthi, President of the Union of Palestinian Medical Relief Committees and Secretary General of the Palestinian National Initiative. He told of the health problems and pregnant women dying at checkpoints. He is not an Arafat fan and is running a political initiative for free and competitive elections. We wished him luck. And speaking of luck, our checkpoint wait was only 30 minutes. According to Dr. Barghouthi, Israel now runs over 700 checkpoints throughout the occupied territories.
