Yesterday we took a bus to Be'er Sheva, where we had plans to be with a group of around 40 others to see Yoel Hasson—a prominent Kadima Knesset member, and Saeb Erekat—the negotiator of the Oslo accords, and the former chief negotiator for the PLO. Unfortunately, Erekat could not make it because he was called away to a meeting in the US. In his place there was a former Palestinian Government Minister.
When we arrived at the panel, we originally were told it would be in English, but the administrator of the event took a hand count of who wanted it in Hebrew and who wanted it in English, Hebrew won. Luckily for me, my Israeli friend translated the entire event for me. Both Hasson and the former Minister spoke about the approaching September deadline, co-existance, and the two-state solution. Interestingly enough, they both agreed on mostly all the goals, but had different paths there. They both agreed that the September deadline would like to be avoided, and that direct negotiations are the most desirable option. They also both agreed that Netanyahu was intentionally blocking attempts at negotiations, especially with his call for the recognition of Israel as the "Jewish" state, which Yoel Hasson said Netanyahu knows will never happen. What I found to be most interesting was when someone in the audience asked the Minister if he would recognize Israel as the "Jewish" state to which he replied with, "no." He stated that he would recognize it as the "Israeli" state, since that includes 20% of the population that is not Jewish. Yoel Hasson responded, (paraphrasing) "Who cares? We don't need your recognition. We know who we are. We know what we are. If you recognize the state of Israel, then we can decide for ourselves what kind of state we are." Both presented well thought out and logical arguments, and I personally thought that the former Minister has the least amount of emotional appeal, and a more logical appeal. Near the end, an Israeli female college student asked what was supposed to be the last question to the Minister, yet not only was her question hostile, she continued to interrupt him and attack him. The audience (almost exclusively Israeli), and Yoel Hasson himself quickly hushed the women and either told her to let him finish, or just cut her off completely. Afterwards, we spoke briefly with both speakers and they were warm and receptive. I have a picture with Yoel Hasson that I'll try to upload later.
Today we went on a walking tour from 9-6 throughout mostly East Jerusalem, and parts of West Jerusalem. A few of the highlights of today were: eating with, and meeting the Palestinian family which lives right next to the City of David archeology site, exploring Silwan for a good part of the day where we met with a Community Center director, and meeting with a Palestinian family who had half of their house taken from them and given to Settlers; so they live in half of a house, where the other half they used to own now belongs to Settlers. From all this, I know the goal of the tour was to make me feel a lot of pain, but frankly I didn't feel it. Not because I am heartless (debatable), but because our goal here is to be doing objective research on the conflict, and we cannot do that if we just go on tours catered to show one side of the conflict. I felt very cynical about the whole event, and knew it was a very one sided presentation of the conflict. I brought up, to the rest of the group, that there are many parallel fears that exist in the Israeli community, that the tour did not touch upon at all. I also asked everyone to think about the idea, if the percentages were reversed, how would the Palestinians treat the Jews? The Community Center director, and the Palestinian family, whose house was taken by Settlers, both said that they would kick the Jews out, that "Palestine is for the Palestinians, and that the Jews should go back to where they came from. This thought is scary knowing that if as the minority they believe this, what would they believe if they had the power? I know that soon we will be meeting with a representative of the Settlers, and I am both curious and eager to hear there (potentially "out-there") justifications for taking Palestinian land.
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