I got a call from a customer in Kfar Saba this morning telling me that she couldn’t meet me at the apartment I was painting for her because the police were still picking up bodyparts near her house in the aftermath of the latest suicide bombing. Two boys and the bomber were dead. So I went to work anyway and saw for the first time that a barricade was set up at the edge of town as police checked the occupants of every car. Later, as I was finishing up my job, my customer showed up, approved the work and paid the bill. Neither of us mentioned the bodyparts, or the barricade, or the war.
Then I was home, just a few kilometers away, preparing for my daughter’s birthday party. Her little friends showed up as planned and we made music, painted a mural, ate birthday cake and had a juggling show. The war was not mentioned but our bubble is becoming more fragile.
Last Friday my son ran a 3 kilometer section of the annual Ra’anana marathon. His first time. It was fun. We all cheered. Then I dropped off the family at home and went to the Rantis action on the Green Line with 200 other Israelis who proceeded to demolish army closure barricades with their bare hands. A token resistance to the occupation. Those of us feeling smug about our activity should take heed to the comment following my previous report. Until we (Israelis) stand with our Palestinian cousins and share the risks of their rebellion, our actions will have little impact on the larger Israeli public. Who among us has the strength, the courage? Could the blacks in the United States have achieved the civil rights reforms in the sixties if it were not for the solidarity of a few whites that marched with them. Then again their citizenship and the US constitution protected them. But some were still killed. Then again, in Israel we have no constitution and the Palestinians have no citizenship. ………..
Tonight I was at a political meeting in Tel Aviv with some leftist movers and shakers, and we watched our army on television bombing Gaza and Ramalla in retaliation for the earlier bombing. A celphone call came in from Hebron from the Christian Peacemakers Team. The settlers there were on the rampage there, burning Palestinian cars and setting fire to the Market. Nothing about this on the television news. Some of us went into action calling the army, the police, and all the major media and wire services. It’s amazing how much activity can be generated when everyone at a meeting has a celphone. Half an hour later we saw the settlers being subdued (gently) by the army on television.
It could be that Sharon intends to beat the Palestinians into submission while herding them into ever smaller areas, then call those areas a State and tell them to take it or leave it. After all, the American colonials got away with the same tactic with the Native Americans. Why not Israel?
It’s all pretty depressing.
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