Many who visit Israel’s disputed territories come away with a strong sense of tragedy and injustice on behalf of the Palestinians. Seeing the extensive military instillations that Israel has there they feel that Israel’s ‘occupation’ weighs heavy on the ‘native’ population forced to live under it. They see the daily inconvenience of the security checks at road blocks and argue that Israel is imposing unbearable living conditions on these people. But if that’s the only tragedy they see then they really haven’t looked very far at all.
Isn’t it also a tragedy that Jews who wish to exercise their right to live in their historic homeland are forced to live in small compounds, travel on separate roads in bullet proof buses that they have to go through airport style security before even being able to board. And isn’t also a tragedy that all Israeli’s have to send their children to risk their lives trying to protect the Jewish communities living in this fiercely hostile area. The security fence that has to carve up the land is also a tragedy, what nation would ever choose such an extreme option if it really had any other choice.
No where is the tragedy more evident than in Hebron, Judaism’s second holiest site and up until the late 1920’s home to a large thriving and century old Jewish community, before many were massacred and forced to flee in the Arab uprisings of 1929. Now a tiny section of the old city is walled off and heavily guarded for Jews to live in, the ancient synagogue there that was later turned into a mosque is still only partially accessible to Jews, with several of the tombs of important biblical figures on the Muslim side where Jews and Christians can not enter. In Bethlehem and Nabulus things are even worse, here no Jewish community is able to reside, the tombs of Rachel and Joseph are virtually inaccessible, the later having been partially destroyed by the local population.
The tragedy here is the Palestinian inability to allow Jews the right to reside in their historic and spiritual homeland in the same peace and security that Arabs living on the Israeli side enjoy. If they could stop themselves from attacking and murdering Jews at every given opportunity then this military infrastructure that protects the Jewish residents in the disputed territories could be lifted and both Jews and Palestinians would be able to live their lives in far greater freedom. Instead under the current situation Jews like those in Hebron are essentially imprisoned in tiny ghettos, and Palestinians are subject to countless security measures.
Worse still is the fact that it is currently the wisdom of the international community that the only solution to this intolerable situation is not the end of Palestinian aggression against the Jewish communities in their midst, but rather they insist upon the ethnic cleansing of entirety of the Jewish population living in the most religiously significant part of their historic homeland.
There is undoubtedly a tragedy in this part of the world, but the question is one of who is perpetuating it.
Isn’t it also a tragedy that Jews who wish to exercise their right to live in their historic homeland are forced to live in small compounds, travel on separate roads in bullet proof buses that they have to go through airport style security before even being able to board. And isn’t also a tragedy that all Israeli’s have to send their children to risk their lives trying to protect the Jewish communities living in this fiercely hostile area. The security fence that has to carve up the land is also a tragedy, what nation would ever choose such an extreme option if it really had any other choice.
No where is the tragedy more evident than in Hebron, Judaism’s second holiest site and up until the late 1920’s home to a large thriving and century old Jewish community, before many were massacred and forced to flee in the Arab uprisings of 1929. Now a tiny section of the old city is walled off and heavily guarded for Jews to live in, the ancient synagogue there that was later turned into a mosque is still only partially accessible to Jews, with several of the tombs of important biblical figures on the Muslim side where Jews and Christians can not enter. In Bethlehem and Nabulus things are even worse, here no Jewish community is able to reside, the tombs of Rachel and Joseph are virtually inaccessible, the later having been partially destroyed by the local population.
The tragedy here is the Palestinian inability to allow Jews the right to reside in their historic and spiritual homeland in the same peace and security that Arabs living on the Israeli side enjoy. If they could stop themselves from attacking and murdering Jews at every given opportunity then this military infrastructure that protects the Jewish residents in the disputed territories could be lifted and both Jews and Palestinians would be able to live their lives in far greater freedom. Instead under the current situation Jews like those in Hebron are essentially imprisoned in tiny ghettos, and Palestinians are subject to countless security measures.
Worse still is the fact that it is currently the wisdom of the international community that the only solution to this intolerable situation is not the end of Palestinian aggression against the Jewish communities in their midst, but rather they insist upon the ethnic cleansing of entirety of the Jewish population living in the most religiously significant part of their historic homeland.
There is undoubtedly a tragedy in this part of the world, but the question is one of who is perpetuating it.
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