U3 Three For Free

--Motzei Shabbat--
1.

I'm on a train from Nahariyya to Tel Aviv, where I will grab a connection to Jerusalem. Total cost around 13 dollars. The people across the aisle from me are speaking English, which is distracting. There's a kid speaking Hebrew shrilly aways down. I'm on my way back from Kibbutz Sasa in the North, to Jerusalem, in the center-east of the country. Total travel time, perhaps 3.5 hours the way that I'm going. I don't find a conversation nearly as distracting as a monologue. If I had headphones I'd put them on. I guess it's worth investigating if I have any...

Can't find any. But I found some halvah, almost as good. I put my hood up. That doesn't help almost at all. With my hat on too, it still doesn't help much. Okay, Jacob, concentrate. You are bigger than this. You can tune them out, you can focus yourself and say what it is you want to say.

Good.

Last week I went to Ramallah. I think it was on... a Tuesday. Anyways, it wasn't long after the construction-type work that was happening at Haram Al-Sharif (Dome of the Rock, Al-Aqsa Mosque), and there were huge protests in the street. I watched from a third storey narguila bar. Mansour was hosting me graciously; he wouldn't let me, the American Jew, pick up the tab (probably a total of 4 dollars for soft drinks and nargila).

The loudspeaker tells me that we are reaching Central Haifa (Chaifa Merkaz). Across the aisle they are talking about books about love.

I like the train.

So, I went to Ramallah, but one of the Arabs in my Ulpan said I should wear a hat or something so that I didn't look like a Jewy Jew travelling through Palestine. I get it. It sucks, but I get it. I like the way my hair looks, I like my funktified peyos. It's a minor death to hide your identity, at all, ever. I wore a bandana on my head, I think it helped.

Mansour greeted me well, we talked about ISM a little, about why he wasn't involved, about where it is today, and the ways he's involved now. And we watched, as perhaps 10, or 15 thousand men walked solemnly through the street, hands folded in front, dressed pretty nicely. And they were shouting too: a lot of religious sloganing. About God, and how great he is, for example.

A new friend's analysis of the situation is thus: this is a non-issue. The temporary path was cutting through the women's side for praying at the Kotel. There wasn't enough room for them to pray. Finally, the Israeli authority agreed to fix it. Because it was within 100 feet of Al-Aqsa, it created a stir, but there was no real issue in terms of damage to the Mosque. Their leaders are lying and misinforming their people in order to galvanize their ranks, and these protests are happening as far away as Kashmir.
Okay, so it's a non-issue, so it's bullshit. But this is symptomatic of a different problem; Muslims should be included in decisions related to Al-Aqsa, even if it's 50 feet away. There's an Israeli saying: it's better to be smart than to be right.

Back in Ramallah, a falafel sandwich is 75 cents, so I got two of them. I walked around the town a little, marvelling at the spectacle. The protest had great security; they paced themselves well; the slogans were clear and able to be followed (if you understood Arabic); it was formidible in every sense. Content with my short adventure, I grabbed a 'service taxi' back to Jerusalem for a dollar. On the way back, we went through Qalandia checkpoint, which looks way different now; rather than standing in a 20 person line, handing my passport to the soldier, and crossing into Israel after answering a couple questions about where I had been, this looks now like any international border, where the vehicles can drive through, and talk to a beaurocrat in a booth who decides whether you pass or not.

All the Palestinians had to load off, but myself, the driver, and a couple of other people stayed in the vehicle. I don't know what their status was that they didn't have to walk through the checkpoint. Nobody even spoke to me, much less checked my passport, I stayed in the service taxi the whole time. On the other side of the checkpoint, the Palestinians that had loaded off before filed back in.

2.
One night, I went to hear Tali speak about her experience. She's Israeli, and she spent time in Jenin, and was hanging out with the wrong crowd (ie Palestinian militants). She was arrested, interrogated; they asked her if she would work for them, and spy on Jihad Islami. She refused, and went to jail for two years. I caught a ride in the same car as her back towards Tel Aviv; our driver wasn't an ace on the roads, and we had a hard time finding the right road to Tel Aviv. Finally, we found some Tel Aviv signs to follow, and ten minutes later ran into a checkpoint; the road goes through the West Bank for part of the way. Because Tali was strictly forbidden from going to the West Bank, we turned around, and drove back ten minutes to a place where we could hook up with a road to Tel Aviv that *didn't* go through the West Bank. It's kind of a difficult thing, when you don't even properly know how to avoid the West Bank if you wanted to.

While I was in Tel Aviv, I was hanging out with Callie (Berman's friend), who used to be roommates with Alexis (in Cairo), who used to be my roommate (in Oly). Anyways, Callie is working with an organization called "Chalonot." ("Windows") They're super-cool; they develop cross-cultural curricula, events, gatherings for Israelis and Palestinian youth, and they publish their work as journalists (print and video). They put out an Arabic-Hebrew magazine together. They also offer humanitarian support.

Hung out on the beach with a family friend (Yardena); Dropped in on an infoshop, because I heard that I'm in a movie (called Bi'lin Habibti); went on a long trek to track down my grandfather's first cousin (left a note on her door).

3.
Kibbutz Sasa looks pretty much the same as I remember it; a little quaint people-sized village. It's very practical, very personable. Getting there was a trip; I took a religious bus up, on which they segregate by gender. When I was looking for information about the bus online, all I could find were references to a woman who rode on the bus and wouldn't move to the back (sound familiar?). She was assaulted by men on the bus, so she's suing the public bus company, that they let this happen.

In any case, I benefited from the discounts offered this religious bus, although I did experience a bit of anxiety after I boarded and didn't see any seats available in the men's section. I mean, I think I would have been okay to sit in the women's section (if not just a little out-of-place), but I really didn't want to draw any extra attention to myself. As it was, I was the only guy who wasn't wearing black-and-white, with a black velvet kipah. And it got me very close to my destination.

So I hung out on the kibbutz for shabbat, which was a funny experience because nobody I know there does any shabbat ritual, besides not working. But my home-away-from-home was gracious enough to support me to light candles, bless wine, challah, and sing some songs (by myself). I got to be the only person in the dining hall wearing a kipah.

I kind of got a glimpse that I would personally enjoy living at a place like Sasa. Which is a good thing, because I keep talking like I want to start a kibbutz near Olympia. I better like what a kibbutz is, if I'm going to make it a huge part of my life!

Right after shabbat, I got my hair cut, for the express purpose of making myself more beautiful. Okay, really I got my hair cut because now I feel more comfortable traveling in the West Bank. Here's to the day when I can travel in the West Bank with Peyos and long hair and a kippah, and every Palestinian who sees me will know that I am there to support him and her.

Well, I suppose that's enough for now. To Bed, To Bed, L'Chayim!

Shavua Tov! Shalom y'all,
Jacob in J-Town

1 Article about Al-Aqsa Shenanigans:
http://jewschool.com/2007/02/08/dont-believe-the-hype-mughrabi-path-r...
2 Windows- http://www.win-peace.org/
3 Religious Action Center's article about the bus thing:
http://rac.org/advocacy/irac/enewsletters/january_monthly_2006/egged_...