Debating Journalism: Humanity vs. Professionalism

Perched on a rock by the edge of a cliff-side village at sunset, I’m surrounded by a curious group of children. Ranging from about five to nine years of age, they eagerly watch over my shoulder, fascinated by the combination of foreigner, computer, and English. One notices my camera and soon there is a chorus of “Soureeni! Soureeni!” Take a picture of me.

The adults offer to shoo them away, but I don’t mind.

We’re sitting on the edge of the village as an orange and pink sunset colors the sky over the valley below us. Olive trees cover the hillsides, and one-lane roads weave into valleys and over ridges. Clouds move slowly in a heavy sky as energetic 5-year-old Assad is carried off by a smiling father. Within moments he’s back, jumping and laughing and making faces in his sandals and red sweats.

“Mish ‘arfa,” I don’t know, I tell him, and he bursts into laughter before resuming his rapid-fire speech in Arabic.

It’s a comforting way to end a difficult afternoon, with smiles and laughter all around as children and youth and their older counterparts gather to talk with their “international” visitors.

Just a few hours ago I sat down with two young men from this small community in northern Palestine to interview them for a story. As we talked about the changes the village has seen since the death of a 16-year-old member of the community, I discovered both young men are cousins of the boy. Slowly, our conversation shifted as the young men began to talk about their cousin.

Mohamed was shot by IDF soldiers in March 2010 as he ran to help another friend who had been shot. Neither boy had participated in the day’s peaceful demonstration against the neighboring Israeli settlement; neither was politically inclined. They were in the wrong place at the wrong time. The soldiers used live ammunition. Crowd-controlling rubber bullets were absent. The deaths were a shock to the community of 800.

As I listened to Mohamed’s cousins and our conversation drifted far from the limits of my story, the boundary between professionalism and humanity shifted, blurred – I knew the intimate testimony would remain between us. It would never be found in an article.

It is not the first time I’ve faced a situation where the line between journalism and friendship blurs. One of the challenges of being a journalist is keeping perspective and humanity at the same time, and it is not a simple challenge.

Humanity is vital. Personal connections are what make stories real – what can bring a tear to a stranger or solidarity from a reader time zones away. At the same time, one faces the dilemma of losing sight of the end goal. An article which captures pain and emotion without describing it as such is that much more powerful for doing so.

The line between journalism and friendship or between professionalism and humanity is not immovable. It shifts. At times it may not even exist. Yet while some rapport between interviewer and interviewee is vital, crossing the invisible line between them is dangerous to both.

Perhaps those with a strong sense of empathy are not meant for what can be a cut-throat profession. Empathy does not lend to cold analysis, which so often seems to be praised. Yet, is not the absence of humanity more dangerous than the alternative?

Bethlehem & Hebron

Yesterday morning we found ourselves in Hebron, a city with a very tense relationship between Palestinians and Israeli settlers. We wandered the market, bought keffiyehs made at the only remaining factory in the West Bank, surveyed the city from the rooftops, and visited the Tomb of Abraham (from the Jewish section, since the Muslim section is closed to tourists on Fridays).

In the afternoon we made our way to Bethlehem. After a relaxed lunch of various mezze, we headed to the Church of the Nativity in downtown Bethlehem. After touring the old church, the new Catholic church, and the grotto beneath, I met up with some local friends and headed home for a much-needed relaxing evening.

Today I took a quick trip through the security checkpoint and headed to Jerusalem for the morning, only to discover that the Dome of the Rock is not only closed to the public on Fridays and Muslim holidays - as I had been told - but on Saturdays as well. For the second time, I wasn't able to enter the Temple Mount.

Once I had made my way back to Bethlehem, we had lunch, ran into some friends we'd met in Hebron, and visited Shepherd's Field, the location where the Star of Bethlehem reportedly appeared in the sky the night that Christ was born.

The Old City of Nablus

Colorful fruits and vegetables. Pungent spices. The sticky sweetness of konafa. Shops whose wares of clothes and household goods spill into narrow alleyways. The aromas of falafel, shwarma, and occasionally donkey dung. Calls of “welcome!” This is the Old City of Nablus.

A Turkish bath awaits behind closed doors – for women only, because today is Sunday. Women lounge on cushions or chat at tables. Some sip cups of tea with mint or Turkish coffee, others puff away at flavored tobacco or shisha, the water-pipe known by a dozen names and common throughout the Middle East. Behind closed doors are hot stones under vaulted ceilings, mosaic walls, and steam rooms, the last of which is barely discernable through the clouds of water vapor billowing out of it. This is the Old City of Nablus.

Yet the doorway to the Turkish bath is not so grand as it once was. A closer look at the alleyways reveals countless posters commemorating martyrs and patches of crumbling stone. Above the smiling faces of shopkeepers and curious eyes of children, bullet holes riddle the sides of buildings which have yet to be restored. Some of the holes are decades old, others only a few years. This, also, is the Old City of Nablus.

Today is a normal day in the Palestinian city. The violent conflicts of the Second Intifada are no longer daily occurrences, but they are far from forgotten. The martyr posters commemorate the men, women, and children Nablus has lost at the hands of Israeli soldiers, whether directly or indirectly. Hundreds of citizens are still kept in Israeli prisons, and the military maintains checkpoints outside the city. Today, many of them are open and both Palestinian and Israeli vehicles pass through them easily. A few years ago the case was very different. Entry and exit into Nablus was strictly controlled, with students of An-Najah University prohibited from crossing the checkpoints into the city. Many resorted to passing by foot through olive groves in order to attend classes.

Reminders of the conflict are easy to see, and one doesn’t always have to look hard for them. In a handful of shops, ammunition belts and bullet-proof vests hang beside keffiyehs and baseball caps.

This, too, is the Old City of Nablus.

Refugees, tear gas, and culture

Here's a brief update of the last few days. More later.

Yesterday we took a tour of the Balata Refugee Camp and Yafa Cultural Center. Balata was formed by the United Nations for refugees from Yafa and the surrounding areas of Palestine in 1951. It was intended to be temporary, and was located on one square kilometer of land in the Balata neighborhood of Nablus.

Today, the camp is still there, and over 25,000 people live in its one square kilometer.

This morning we took a bus down to Ramallah for a meeting at the headquarters of the Stop the Wall campaign. After that, we went to the village of Nilin. Nilin is one of many villages of farmers who have found themselves separated from their land due to the wall being built by Israel to separate the West Bank. As we walked about a kilometer away from the wall, we were constantly stepping around empty military-grade tear gas canisters. The cacti lining the dirt road were riddled with bullet holes. In some places rubber bullets remained embedded in the plants. Rubber bullets and regular shell casings weren't hard to find on the ground.

Reaching within half a kilometer of the wall, our local guide stopped us.

"What will happen if we go closer?" asked a member of our group.

"I don't know," he replied. "Maybe they will open the gate and shoot us."

We kept our distance.

We also ran into a peacock as we walked back into the village, before we headed to the Palestinian Popular Culture Center. Go figure.

Watching the World Cup in Palestine

Millions of people around the world gathered around TV screens to watch the World Cup finals between Spain and the Netherlands last night. In the West Bank city of Nablus, around two thousand Palestinians crowded into an open-air hillside amphitheatre to watch the game projected on a massive screen. I and three other foreigners were among them, surrounded by cheering, joking, laughing Palestinians. Spanish flags waved everywhere, with the occasional red-white-blue of the Netherlands visible. Twenty or so Italians gathered on the floor of the amphitheatre, a French couple were somewhere in the crowd, and a handful of other foreigners were interspersed across the hillside.

Young boys wove their way through the crowd carrying drinks and sunflower seeds, older boys offering steaming tea and coffee. Bags of sweets moved through the crowd, and a couple found their way into our hands after being purchased by our new Palestinian friends, who were sitting in front of us. Bags of sunflower seeds were passed. "Espana? Espana?" eager voices asked us, with a few shaking their heads as my friends and I affirmed we were rooting for Spain.

As the game neared a close after 30 minues of overtime, the cheering became deafening. Everyone was on their feet, cheering as much for every goal saved as for the goal made by Spain. Masses of Palestinian youth poured onto the streets at the end of the match, Spanish flags flying out the windows of cars and horns blaring as we hailed a cab and headed back to our Nablus flat.

I have to say, watching the World Cup finals at an open-air amphitheatre in Nablus surrounded by thousands of Palestinians was definitely the experience of a lifetime - even for someone who isn't really a football fan.

Making a new life in Amreeka, Palestinian-style

Amreeka. This is where Muna, a single mother from Bethlehem, and her teenage son, Fadi, find themselves. When a long-forgotten green card application is accepted, the pair leaves behind harrowing border checks, the increasing inconvenience imposed on Palestinians, and their family to try life in Illinois with Muna’s sister. While the youngest cousin instructs Fadi on what to wear so as not to look like a FOB (fresh off the boat), Muna struggles to find a job. Set as America is invading Iraq, Fadi is faced with hostility at school, Muna discovers her two degrees and 10 years of experience mean nothing, and patients at her brother-in-law’s medical practice are walking out every day. 

A story of family, discrimination, and understanding, Amreeka will take you through the hard times and the moments filled with laughter and dancing as Muna and Fadi struggle to find their places in America.

In her debut feature, director Cherien Dabis makes strong observations without being repetitive. While she doesn’t focus on religion in the film, she shows her viewers some of the intricacies of religious identity and blanket generalizations: Muna’s family are Christian Palestinians, yet in small-town Illinois they are assumed to be both extremist and Muslim simply because they are Arab. And Muna’s understated new friend, one of the few who doesn’t discriminate against her family, is a Polish Jew. Dabis highlights these and other ironies and injustices simply, slipping them quietly into the family’s everyday life.

Winner of 4 awards and nominated for 6 more in 2009, Amreeka is definitely a movie to see.

Why I Wear the Keffiyeh

This morning I boarded a flight from the DC/Metro area to Atlanta. As I slid into my middle seat, the woman in the window seat looked up. “You’re brave to wear that today,” she said, nodding at the black and white scarf around my neck. I smiled to myself, stowing my backpack under the seat in front of me before responding. I settled into my seat and turned to the woman, who was middle-aged with beautiful dark skin. She wore an olive-colored suede suit, large silvery earrings, and a hand-painted scarf twisted around her head in a very African style. “Believe it or not,” I told her, “I receive many more positive comments from wearing this than I do negative.” Perhaps that’s part of why I wear it, I thought. She smiled.

Yasser Arafat made the black and white keffiyeh a symbol of Palestine back in the 1960’s, much as the King of Jordan made the red & white version of the traditional Bedouin scarf a symbol of Jordan. Today, the black and white keffiyeh is strongly associated with Palestine– the fight for freedom, the oppression of the Gaza strip, the “Middle East conflict.” To some, the Palestinian keffiyeh represents resistance and solidarity; to others, it represents terrorism and the worst kind of Muslim fundamentalist. The latter view is what caused my seat-mate’s reaction.

A Chilean-German friend who lives and works in Europe and has traveled extensively in the Middle East told me once that he would never dare to wear the keffiyeh in the United States. Both friends and strangers have echoed his comment with varying degrees of awe, pride, and trepidation at my “daring.” They expect my display of such a supposedly controversial symbol to attract trouble, or at the very least some sort of derision or negativity. Their expectations aren’t unfounded, yet my experiences over the last year have been exactly the opposite – wearing the keffiyeh brings genuine interest, knowing smiles, and sometimes heartfelt thanks (occasionally discounts and job offers, too).

The only truly negative reaction I’ve received from wearing the keffiyeh came soon after I returned from Egypt around this time last year, and it came indirectly. A friend of the family picked me up from the airport one day in early January 2009, during Israel’s War on Gaza. Her parents have worked for the US Department of State for many years and are close friends of my mother’s. Nothing was said that night, but later my mother told me her friend had made a comment about noticing I was wearing a “terrorist scarf.”

More often, the reactions I receive are inquisitive or appreciative. A man came up to me in a Starbucks once and complimented me on my scarf. He asked where I got it and then said his daughter wore one every day. I was shopping with my mother in Florence when a shopkeeper asked me where I got my scarf and then if I spoke any Arabic. “Shuwayya,” I said. His Jordanian coworker was thrilled at my little bit of Arabic and proceeded to offer us a discount slightly lower than the “just for you” discount given to most tourists. Vendors in Rome’s Porta Portese occasionally ask, “enti filistina?” Are you Palestinian? Or I receive nods and smiles from strangers on the street or on buses, the sort of looks I understand and always return.

I was waiting for a bus in Rome one evening when an older man commented on my scarf. “Are you anti-Israeli?” he asked me. “No,” I told him, trying to form a response in Italian. “No, I’m not anti-Israeli, but I don’t support their war. I have friends in Palestine, and I wear this for them.” The man, who seemed to approve of my response, asked where I was from and what I was studying. 

In February I took a shuttle bus from Logan airport to a hotel in downtown Boston. I happened to be wearing my keffiyeh, which started a conversation with the bus driver, who was Egyptian. He and I talked about everything from Palestine and the keffiyeh to Egyptian politics and cultural differences (he also told me the location of the best shwarma in Cairo – down a narrow alley across from the Mosque dedicated to the Prophet’s daughter; I didn't tell him I'm a vegetarian).

The keffiyeh has become a symbol steeped in misconceptions over the past years. Some of you may recall the Dunkin’ Donuts/ Rachael Ray “scandal” of 2008, when the popular donut shop pulled an online commercial featuring Ray because she wore a black and white scarf resembling the keffiyeh. Right-wing blogger Michelle Malkin discussed the issue in her blog, and on May 28 commented: “Anti-American fashion designers abroad and at home have mainstreamed and adapted the scarves as generic pro-Palestinian jihad or anti-war statements. Yet many folks out there remain completely oblivious to the apparel’s violent symbolism and anti-Israel overtones.” Malkin’s comments reflect the sentiments which many expect I should face.

Yes, keffiyehs are sometimes worn by Arab terrorists and have appeared in videos of hostage-takings, among other things. They are also commonplace at anti-Israeli and pro-Palestinian rallies and marches, and Malkin is right that many of the youngsters who wear different colored scarves patterned after the traditional keffiyehs have no idea what their symbolism is. Yet the keffiyehs are so much more than a symbol of “murderous Palestinian jihad,” as Malkin calls it. If terrorists start wearing Gucci jeans is Gucci suddenly going to become a ‘terrorist’ symbol? What about the fundamentalist Christians who have bombed abortion clinics – will wearing the cross come to symbolize violent Christian fundamentalism?

Perhaps the deeper question is, what does it mean to be a symbol of Palestine? A symbol of Palestine is something much greater, something much deeper than modern Islamic extremism. To represent Palestine is to represent thousands of years of rich history. The keffiyeh ties today to the past, to a deep tradition that is not only Muslim but also Christian and even Jewish. The keffiyeh has come to represent strength and solidarity, and courage in the face of adversity. Yes, the Keffiyeh is in many ways a symbol of Palestine, but this does not make it a proponent of violence or bloodshed. The keffiyeh is a symbol of freedom, of hope, of a people’s fight against repression.

I wear the keffiyeh not because it’s a great fashion accessory or because it’s totally in style. I wear it to remind myself and those who recognize it that there is still injustice in the world, and also because I know peace is possible. For me, the keffiyeh is also much more personal than that. The keffiyeh represents friendship. I wear the keffiyeh for my friends in Gaza and Ramallah, for my friends all over the Arab world who support the Palestinian struggle, for all those whom I have never or will never meet. For me, the keffiyeh is personal.

Fighting for Gaza's Heart

Today "Gaza" is a buzzword. It was last year, too. And the year before that, and before that, and back farther than is comfortable to contemplate. Gaza is in the news, on the lips of those who know her and those who don't. Gaza is facts and figures and pictures of bloody children on television and calls of jihad and terrorism on CNN (or perhaps FOX News would be more appropriate). Some of you may know where Gaza is, some may have no idea, and a few of you may know her story.

But how many of you know her heart?

Gaza is more than an occupied territory. Gaza is more than a war zone. Gaza is more, even, than a political nightmare and the breeding ground of terrorists. What, then, is she?

Gaza, a tiny place about twice the size of Washington, DC, is home to more than 1.5 million people. Gaza has - or, in many cases, had - schools, offices, stores, museums, fields. Gaza is a home; one which has persistently persevered. How often have you stopped to think about that? Have you contemplated, instead of the political reality, the day-to-day reality?

Many Gazans cannot get the food they need. The schools cannot get the educational materials. There are shortages of even the most basic necessities - can you even fathom buying toilet paper on the black market? And yet Gazans survive.

Yasmeen: See the TV still in their living room?

I bet they were watching TV and wondering,

when will we be next?

But, what about the "terrorists?" you might ask. A friend of my mother's told me once that Gazans had voted for Hamas, a "terrorist" organization, and in so doing had asked for Israel's January war. I could feel my heart breaking as I tried to explain to this woman, the seasoned wife of a military man, that Hamas' electoral win could not justify Israel's war.

My words fell on deaf ears. It is moments like that which sometimes cause me to wonder why I bother at all... but then I would see another dead or bloody Palestinian child flash across CNN or Al-Jazeera and remember why.

But I am a foreigner who has never set foot on Palestinian soil. What do I know?

My friend Yasmeen is from Gaza. She left home to study at the American University of Cairo. Studying abroad is difficult and risky for Palestinian students, but they have few other options to continue their education. Getting a visa can prove to be an impossible task, and those students who are lucky enough to get one face the possibility of not being allowed to return home - ever.

After nearly two years of being away, Yasmeen was able to return home to Gaza for summer break this year, after Israel's war. After returning to Egypt, she posted albums of photos on her facebook account. One album contained photos of a mass of rubble - what was once the American International School of Gaza. Yasmeen's high school. Her comments under some of the pictures clearly reflect the pain, the sense of injustice and helplessness which so many Gazans feel: under a photo of charred school buses - "The terrorist's buses." Under a photo of a bottle of Crayola powder paint - "the terrorist's gunpowder;" a playground - "the terrorist's training ground;" a textbook - "terrorism for dummies guide."

In another album there are pictures taken all around Gaza - buildings, schools, homes, businesses. Most destroyed beyond repair. Here are stairs leading to air, there a picture of the Wall. And then, suddenly, green grass? Poppies? Is that... wheat, and daisies, and children playing on a beach? Yasmeen's comment: "This is in Gaza too. Don't be shocked."

Even in a place of so much death and pain, there is still beauty. There are still bright daisies and green grass and fields of wheat and poppies and beautiful sunsets over the Mediterranean. There are weddings and birthdays and new babies. Gaza is still full of life.

What does the future hold for that life? Yasmeen offers a chilling observation: "While the world continues to build up, Gaza will build her future underground."

Maybe, if the world remembers Gaza's humanity, her heart, that won't happen. Maybe, instead, Gaza's children will be able to grow in the sunshine.



I've been wanting to write a post about Gaza for a long time now. Sometime after Israel's War on Gaza in January of this year I realized I needed to write about Gaza. But I wanted to say something which has so often been left unsaid. I wanted to capture the thoughts and feelings running around inside myself and combine them with the pain I've seen and heard, the experiences and first-hand knowledge of my friends, the facts themselves. It's taken me nearly a year of thinking and contemplating and wanting to write... and perhaps sometimes that's what it takes.


Special thanks to Yasmeen for her pictures, her insight, and her courage. Allah ma3ik.

Israel's 'defense' hard to defend

Israel has justified its offensive against the Gaza Strip by claiming that it is fighting a defensive war. This ‘defensive’ war, however, is hard to defend in light of facts and information coming from every party except Israel.

These are some recent headlines from various international news media covering the conflict in Gaza:

• Israel ‘shelled Gaza civilians’ (Al Jazeera)
• Gaza under fire despite truce (Al Jazeera) / UN ceasefire call goes unheeded (BBC) / Israel, Hamas brush off U.N. cease-fire resolution (CNN)
• Obama’s strategic silence on Gaza (BBC)
• Gaza ‘human shields’ criticized (BBC)
• UN agency says 80 pct of Gaza needs urgent food aid (Reuters)

For most news media covering international news, Israel’s offensive against Gaza has remained the top story over the past 14 days. Of the major news networks – Al Jazeera, BBC, CNN, Reuters – only CNN has found something more news-worthy than Gaza: debate over Obama’s position on the War on Terror.

Let’s consider some of these issues in regard to Israel’s claims:

Israel ‘shelled Gaza civilians’:

According to the United Nations, the Israeli military moved approximately 110 Palestinian civilians – half of whom were children – into one home, advising them to stay indoors. Over the next 24 hours, the home was shelled repeatedly by the Israeli military, killing more than 30 people. An Israeli spokesperson said the issue would be looked into.

Even supposing the Israeli army forgot it had moved Palestinian civilians into this particular home specifically, the structure was of no military threat. In addition, it is believed that the Israelis stationed 100 meters away from the building were aware that there were injured civilians inside and that they did nothing to help, which is a breech of international law.

Gaza ‘human sheilds’ criticized:

Both the Israeli military and Hamas have been accused of putting civilian lives in danger and using civilians as ‘human shields,’ which is also illegal under international law.

UN agency says 80 pct of Gaza needs urgent food aid:

Israeli spokesmen have insisted that Israel is working in "close co-operation with international aid organizations during the fighting, so that civilians can be provided with assistance." If this is true, why must international aid agencies, such as the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) continuously appeal to be allowed to provide aid? The Gaza Strip has suffered a shortage of food, medicine, and other essential supplies for the last 18 months due to an Israeli-enforced blockade. Since the Israeli offensive has essentially cut Gaza into two pieces, neither side may obtain aid from the other. In some documented cases, wounded civilians have languished for as many as 4 days without food, water, or medical supplies – and aid workers have continuously been denied access.

According to Palestinian medical sources, at least 10 paramedics have been killed while attempting to assist the injured. In addition, Israel guaranteed a 3-hour reprieve from fighting on Wednesday to allow aid to enter the area and to allow bodies to be claimed.

When the UN aid convoy fell under Israeli fire, one Palestinian driver was killed and two more were injured.

Clearly, Israeli statements simply cannot be taken at face value. Nor, however, can Hamas: Hamas also fired on Israeli troops during Wednesday’s 3-hour ceasefire.

As I’ve mentioned before, no one denies that Israel has frequently fallen under fire of rockets fired by Hamas and other militant groups inside Gaza, and Israel has a history of responding with greater force than was used against it. In no way do I suggest that Israel should let itself be a sitting duck for terrorists.

However.

I’m sure we’ve all heard the old adage, ‘an eye for an eye.’ But think about that for a moment: an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth would leave the whole world blind and toothless. The number of children killed in Gaza has risen by two hundred fifty percent since the ground operation began. Excuse my sarcasm for a moment, but how much damage can unarmed infants do to the mighty state of Israel?

Murdering civilians will not lessen Israel’s problems – if anything, it will exacerbate them. Cardinal Renato Martino, Justice Minister to the Pope, has likened the situation in Gaza to a “big concentration camp,” as the Vatican condemns Israel’s actions. "The world cannot sit back and watch without doing anything," said Cardinal Martino.

As Israel continues its offensive in the face of world opposition, it will only serve to justify the actions of Hamas and other Palestinian militant groups in the eyes of the Palestinian people. Violence only begets violence, and it is difficult to suppose that the massacre being committed by Israel as I type this will have any positive repercussions for either Israel or Gaza.

We are not all Gaza – no one is like those in Gaza. They are unique – irreplaceable.

Reality of the long-awaited Security Council resolution

Less than an hour ago, the United Nations Security Council passed a resolution. The international community has been calling for such a resolution since Israel began its offensive against Gaza on December 27 – 14 days ago. Members of the UN Security Council passed the resolution unanimously with the exception of the United States, who abstained.

The resolution calls for an "immediate, durable and fully respected ceasefire" in Gaza. It gives no timeline. Israel’s offensive is not specifically condemned, nor is Hamas rocket fire mentioned – although the resolution reportedly condemns all acts of violence against civilians and all acts of “terrorism.”

Legally, the resolution is binding. However, the United Nations has no mechanism with which to enforce this resolution or any other – a fact that is well-known and has often been cited as one of the many reasons the UN is ultimately ineffective at best. Due to this lack of enforcement, it would not be surprising for Israel to simply ignore this resolution as it has ignored other UN resolutions in the past. Or perhaps Israel will use the lack of a timeline as an excuse to continue its offensive.

I do not dispute – and have yet to hear any who do – that Hamas, and others, have fired rockets into Israel. I do, however, challenge Israel’s statement that it is fighting a defensive war. Israel is one of the strongest military powers in the world. It is engaging, via ground and air, in an offensive attack against an unarmed and unorganized civilian population. All it takes to determine that something is very clearly uneven here is a look at the numbers: over the past 14 days, more than 760 Palestinians have been killed (and 3,000 more injured) and in the same period 13 Israelis have been killed (there are no numbers available on how many Israelis have been injured).

Of those 13 Israelis, only 3 were civilians. The others were soldiers, one of whom was killed before Israel’s offensive began.

What about the Palestinians? Of the more than 760 killed so far, over 200 were children. Come, now, Israel – where are your militants?

A few days ago, Israeli forces bombed a UN school, killing more than 40 Palestinians. The world was outraged – but Israel claimed the strike was in retaliation, as were other strikes against UN schools. Israeli military sources claimed that missiles were fired from within the school and that Hamas militants were using refugees in the building as “human shields.”

Today, Qatar-based Al Jazeera announced that a UN investigation had stated no militants were in the building at the time it was bombed. Where is this piece of information in Western media? Apparently, non-existent.

Any of you reading this may check these facts for yourselves. Read Al Jazeera and BBC and CNN. Find the articles and the information and decide for yourself how the facts are being portrayed – but however they are portrayed, the facts are there. Israel promised a 3-hour ceasefire yesterday in order to allow humanitarian aid into Gaza – and then fired on the convoy, killing one Palestinian driver and injuring two others. Decide for yourselves whether rockets shot from southern Lebanon hit a retirement centre or a nursing home in Israel – and decide whether it matters.

The world has denounced this offensive, although it has adopted softer language than that many would have preferred. Still, the United States remains silent. Motionless. Neither the outgoing president nor the incoming one have spoken strongly – Israel’s timing, it seems, was perfect. However, even if Israel had acted at a time when the administration in the United States was not undergoing change, can we assume at all that the outcome would be different?

Again, I ask Israel, where are your militants? Where is your proof? And of the world, I beg – who will stop this massacre? For what can the murder of innocent civilians, of children, be, if it is not a massacre? The United Nations cannot stop it. The authority to do so, then, must come from somewhere else.

Wake up, America. Remember that your tax dollars are helping to fund the murder of hundreds of children. If America truly is a nation that stands united, let us do so, but let us stand against the murder of innocents. This does not mean we will stand with terrorists, but that we may condemn the injustices committed by both sides. But first we must learn what it is we are supporting and why we should reconsider what to this point has been unconditional support.

Israel under fire?

“Israel under fire,” read a blurb at the bottom of CNN this morning. Photographs of wounded and bleeding Palestinian children flashed across the screen. The voice of the newscaster reported that Egypt and France were working on a ceasefire deal and that Israel would accept only if the deal included an international arms embargo on Hamas.

No mention was made of Palestinian deaths. No numbers or blurbs on the screen reported that 680 Palestinians have been killed and more than 3,000 injured.

Later in the news broadcast, a CNN reporter was seen on camera in Israel. He was taking shelter in a bunker with Israelis, waiting for the rocket hit that was preceded by a siren. The reporter translated that a man in the bunker was calling for him to “tell them,” the viewers, about these attacks. The rocket hit and everyone rushed out of the bunker towards the site – arriving there, a part of the road was slightly blackened and the windows of an unoccupied taxi had been blown out. No one was injured.

The reporter stressed the need to stop these attacks, and demonstrated how quickly emergency personnel were on the scene. There was no mention of Israel’s refusal, up to this point, to allow humanitarian aid into Gaza. No mention of overburdened hospitals or lack of aid to civilians.

Eventually, after discussing the current hot news from Capitol Hill for the third time, CNN reported that Israel had bombed a United Nations school. According to the report, Israel was claiming that Hamas was firing missiles from this location and using civilians as “human shields.” In the last breath, the newscaster mentioned that the UN was calling for an investigation.

No mention was made of the 43 Palestinian lives lost or the 100 Palestinians injured in that single attack.

The rest of the world is not denying that Israeli lives have been lost. The rest of the world is not denying that there has, indeed, been distress to Israel and the Israeli people. The rest of the world also recognizes the extreme suffering of the Palestinian people by the hands of the Israeli government. But the United States alone seems to deny that Israel has caused any distress to the Palestinian populations. The United States has vetoed UN resolution after resolution that criticizes Israel. The United States seems to deny that the Palestinians are people, simply believing that they are all terrorists who deserve to die in order to protect Israel. Hamas is blamed for everything, and even accused of using its own people as “human shields,” while as little blame as possible is placed on the shoulders of Israeli militancy.

With blanket support from the United States, Israel effectively has free reign to do whatever it wants.

It's no wonder the American people have no idea what is really happening in Gaza - the news media paints an unbelievably one-sided picture. For further reading:

Today I stood on the mountain where Moses died

I arrived in Jordan late last night, and had no trouble getting my visa (for 10JOD). My Iraqi friend Shahnaz picked me up at the airport with a few friends, and we headed back to her house in Amman.

Clean streets. Bright lights. New cars. Little traffic. A mixture of English and Arabic on the radio. These were my first impressions of Jordan.

After a 9:15 wake-up turned into a 9:45 wake-up, we headed out to pick up another of Shahnaz's friends and then drove off toward a place I had heard of before, but had since quite forgotten - Mount Nebo. According to the Old Testament, Mount Nebo is the place where Moses went to die. And, thus, I stood on the mountain where Moses, bringer of God's law to the Hebrew people, climbed to take his last breaths.

The first church known to be build upon the crest of the mountain was build around 500 A.D., and successive churches have been built on and around the mountain. Franciscan monks have made the sight a memorial to Moses and have excavated incredible examples of early Jordanian Christian mosaics, with inscriptions in both Greek and Palestinian-Aramaic (with the help of Queen Noor, the Jordanian government, and a vast amount of assistance from the Italians). Unfortunately, the church happened to be closed for work while we were there, so we were not able to walk around the ruins of the early church.

From there, we started down a narrow, steep, winding road through the hilly Jordanian countryside toward a place which in English was simply called "Baptismal Place." As we wound our way through the hot desert in the comfortable interior of an air-conditioned Mercedes, before the vast expanse of the Dead Sea came into sight, a thought occurred to me. Looking at the rough, barren landscape around me, coming from the place where Moses died and knowing where we were going next, I realized that I was in a place where Moses had walked probably 3000 years ago. Where Jesus Christ walked 2000 years ago.

After the roads had flattened out and the heat had climbed a few degrees higher, we reached 'Baptismal Place.' We paid our admission and boarded a poorly air-conditioned bus which dropped our small group by a dusty pathway. Our guide soon led us to a view of the Jordan River - a small, greenish waterway that wound through banks of green reeds. A bit farther and the gold-covered dome of some church came into view. Farther still and our guide stopped, for the first time waiting for everyone to catch up. "Here," he said in broken but understandable English, "is where Jesus Christus was baptized by John the Baptist."



And so I stood, looking down at the ruins of stone steps and a hole that had been dug in the earth to show the greenish Jordan; looking at the spot where John the Baptist baptised Jesus Christ 2000 years ago.

In the US, and even in Rome, the places of the Bible are remote in both space and time. Suddenly, I have found myself, physically, right in the middle of Biblical geography.

Of course, the Jordan river is now much smaller that in once was (because of 'dams' in the North or because of the Israeli Occupation, depending on whom you ask) and its waters no longer flow through this spot, necessitating the hole that was dug to show its waters. But, there it is - and in the background, the remains of three successive churches named after John the Baptist and built between 500-600 A.D.

Nearing the end of our walk, we pass the gold dome seen through the trees earlier - it belongs to a 5-year-old Greek Orthodox Church, the most recent monument to John the Baptist. Our guide then leads us down to a platform build over ther edge of the river, with steps built in to allow visitors to touch its waters. Something catches my eye - a crisp, bright, blue and white Israeli flag snapping in the wind, barely 20 yards from where I stand.


"There," our guide points, "is Palestine."