My journey to Palestine

BY ESTHER OURAY

Esther Ouray sits on Mount Sinai.

Editor’s note: As part of a two-week, interfaith Olive Harvest Delegation to Israel and Palestine late last year, longtime Powderhorn resident Esther Ouray was able to see firsthand the land and people involved in what is perhaps a defining conflict of our times. Ouray, a Heart of the Beast associate artist for the past 25 years, presents the hows and whys of her journey in her own words.

I googled “Israel nonviolence” and was eventually led to the Olive Harvest Delegation cosponsored by Interfaith Peacebuilders and the American Friends Service Committee. I believe it is important for me, as an American Jew— as a Jewish woman who is committed and connected to the Jewishcommunity—to share this experience, especially within the Jewish community. We do not hear these voices enough, if at all. The people I met and the organizations I was exposed to, both Israeli and Palestinian, were deeply committed to the well-being of each other’s people and to a viable and peaceful solution to the crisis.

Although the delegation was called an interfaith delegation, the majority of the delegates were Christian. I was very aware of being one of the few Jewish members of the delegation and was surprised to learn that many of the
other delegates had very narrow views of Jewish people.

I brought the last remains of my father’s ashes with me to spread on the Mount of Olives where there is an ancient Jewish cemetery. The Jewish belief is that, when the messianic age arrives, souls will rise up first from the Mount of Olives. After my first day, in which I had a tour of East and South Jerusalem with ICAHD (the Israeli Committee Against House Demolitions) and met with a representative
from UN-OCHA (the UN Office of the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs), I was somewhat in despair and confusion. I did not want to let my father’s ashes fly and land on this disputed/occupied territory. To make matters worse, they were in my luggage, which was temporarily lost.When the airlines found my bags, KLM refused to deliver them to me because they did not want to drive into Palestinian East Jerusalem where we were staying. Eventually, I got my luggage, and after the delegation ended, came to a place of peace about spreading
my father’s ashes and did so from atop the Mount of Olives.

The peace movement in Israel has grown weak. We met with an Israeli and a Palestinian at the Alternative Information Center. They said that in July 2000, Barak [former Israeli Prime Minister and current Minister of Defense Ehud
Barak] announced that Arafat really never had intended to negotiate,
that he wanted to throw all the Jews into the sea. He stated that
there was no partner with which to negotiate peace. The peace movement
became disillusioned because they had hope in Arafat. It basically collapsed at that point. The nonviolent movement in Palestine needs the support of a strong Israeli peace movement.

I observed a lot of fear. Some of this fear is well-founded, like in Sderot, an Israeli town close to the border of Gaza. Here kassam rockets from Gaza explode at random times in random places. People in Sderot are victim to a high state of anxiety .We Jews have a long history of persecution. The Holocaust was not so long ago. Some of this “ancestral fear” must be healed and transcended so that the Israeli government can be supported to make decisions that will truly lead to security and peace for Israel.

One of the Israelis I photographed was a 98-year-old woman who was participating at the weekly Women in Black protest. Every Friday afternoon for over 20 years in Jerusalem,Women in Black have protested the occupation. I also met with an Israeli man whose 14-year-old daughter was killed in a suicide bombing in Ben Yehuda mall in West Jerusalem. His wife had written a letter, which said she believed the enemy is the occupation, not the Palestinian people. She said her people were those who supported peace.

We visited with a family in Hebron. Their neighbors had been the victims of a house demolition. One of the family members was believed to have been involved in terrorist activities. Early in the morning the family was told they had seven minutes to vacate the house. The neighbors came to help get things out of the house. After three minutes they were told to leave and were then beaten when they objected. The house demolition destroyed some of the neighbor’s fruit and olive trees. House demolition of this nature is clearly a collective punishment and prohibited by international law.

The Israeli wall being built on the premise of keeping Israel secure is four times longer, and in places, two times as high as the Berlin wall. It not only puts Palestinians in enclaves in some areas, but also serves to separate Israelis and Palestinians even further. Less than 20 percent of the wall is constructed along the internationally recognized border, thereby confiscating Palestinian land.

The Israeli government has drilled hundreds of wells (creating a lot of deep holes and making itreally a holey place!) along the wall. These wells are deeper than the wells that exist in Palestine. They are drawing water from the aquifers, giving Israel control of the water in the region. Seven percent of Palestinians in the occupied territory have no access to water. In some areas, people spend between 20 and 40 percent of their income to purchase water.

Many of the settlers who are living in illegal settlements are Americans who have immigrated to Israel. We repeatedly encountered the point of view that the United States was using Israel to fulfill its own interests. Often this is a barrier to the peace process.

The issues are so complex. The history is complex. The emotions feeding both the Israeli and Palestinian narratives are complex. The peace community here in the Twin Cities tends to oversimplify issues and look at the conflict in a simplistic manner.

The Temple Mount is the symbolic epitome of the importance of the same land for two peoples. It is not surprising that both Jews and Muslims find the same place to be sacred. The Temple Mount is believed by Jews to be the place where the holy of holies was, a place so sacred that only the high priest could enter once a year. This is the same place where the Dome of the Rock and al Aqsa mosque stands to honor the spot from which Mohammad ascended.

There are two separate road systems being created in the occupied territories—one for Israelis and one for Palestinians. Many of the Palestinian roads are planned to be underground. This is one of many examples of restricted movement and access for Palestinians Until we acknowledge what is really occurring, until we come to grips with the truth within the Palestinian narrative as well as the Israeli narrative, Eretz Yisrael [Hebrew for the Land of Israel] remains a myth. This is a land where heaven and earth meet. We must be grounded in the realities of earth. We will arrive in Eretz Yisrael only when Israel reconciles
with the Palestinian people.

I reject the terms pro- Palestinian or pro-Israeli. The security and well being of both nations are so intertwined. Either you are pro-peace or for the occupation.

Under international law the Palestinians are recognized as a people with a right to self-determination; they have the right of return and compensation; the occupation is illegal based on the principle of the inadmissibility of the acquisition of territory by war, and Palestinians living in Israel have the right to equality as citizens of Israel.

The Geneva conventions were created in response to the Holocaust. Israel has relied on international law when prosecuting and bringing to justice Nazi war criminals. It is incumbent that both the USA and Israel respect international law.

Esther Ouray will discuss her trip at various locations in the Twin Cities, as part of her commitment to trip sponsors.