Israel, Part 1
There Will Be Feasting And Dancing In Jerusalem Next Year
Listen to: “Song of the Magi” — Anais Mitchell
I almost didn’t come to Israel. History abounds here, but the politics of the country have always made me a bit uncomfortable. I was worried that showing up in Tel Aviv and visiting the old city in Jerusalem would be nothing if not tacit support for the human rights abuses of the Israeli state.
This was, obviously, pretty naive.
Israel isn’t defined by its politics, but it’s certainly pervasive in the culture. This is a relatively new country, defined internationally by 50 years of one of the most intractable conflicts in recent history. But most Israelis I met, even the most liberal ones, are reticent to have discussions about it with foreigners. They see it as a complex and nuanced topic, and I think, perhaps from experience talking to people outside of the country, visitors tend to show up, announce their beliefs as loud as possible, and leave. It’s not a space for nuance.
My first night here was spent dancing around the topic. I was on a beach, drinking with some of the people running the hostel where I was staying. The moon was shining above the mosque in Jaffa, and reflecting onto the Mediterranean. We were all sitting in a circle, drinking cheap wine. These were kind, thoughtful people. Willing to talk about issues. But what I was curious about then wasn’t the conflict with Palestine. Rather, I wanted a framework. I wanted to understand what I saw around me, and get a sense of how they all saw Jewish religion and culture’s place within this modern, relatively secular state.
It was obvious they were a bit frustrated. These weren’t religious people, and it seemed like they wanted to see more separation between a particular cultural identity and the running of a government. We talked about patriotism. After I spoke about how I had a special affection towards American culture, and thought a lot about what it means to be an American, one of the Israelis sort of laughed in a derisive but somehow still-kind way and told me I was way more of a patriot than he was. I went in with the assumption that patriotism would be honed by a culture that saw itself at a regular state of alertness, with mandatory military service and armed soldiers wandering the streets; if anything, it seemed like this wore on the more liberal younger generation and generated a sense of weariness and self-examination.
The first night I was in Tel Aviv, another guest mentioned she was going to Ramallah in the West Bank. I was immediately interested; if I still felt internally conflicted about being in Israel, that conflict could be eased a bit by seeing what was actually happening in Palestine. Getting a more complete view of what was happening here. So, I decided that after spending the night in Jerusalem, I would go to Ramallah.
Some people go to Jerusalem expecting a personal revelation of religion, a sort of up-close-and-personal view of God. There’s an entire psychological phenomenon to describe it. Jerusalem Syndrome: where a schoolteacher became convinced she was giving birth to baby Jesus without being pregnant. Where an Australian thought he was Samson and tried to rip stones out of the Wailing Wall. This was what I expected from the streets of the old city: people walking around with an almost psychotic sense of purpose and place. Instead, it felt like messianic Disney Land. Shops selling knick knacks, from icons of Mary to Alabama football memorabilia (no, seriously, if you’re feeling the need to roll tide, it’s right outside of the Church of the Holy Sepulchre). Hundreds of meandering tourists. Overpriced orange juice.
It’s really hard to imagine anyone getting caught up in religious fervor in a place that reminded me of Fisherman’s Wharf with some churches and mosques.
Pretty sure that cross can’t actually support a person’s weight. Where’s the realism here, c’mon.
That said: those churches and mosques were beautiful. Constantine’s mother may not have been thinking much about geopolitical stability when she chose the site for the Church of the Holy Sepulchre, but the architects involved in building it certainly knew how to make an impression. A massive basilica covers a small room, which is said to contain the empty tomb of Jesus. Unlike the streets of Jerusalem, this felt like a truly holy place. Everyone was quiet as they shuffled in and out of the small room containing the tomb. The ceiling is low, so you have to kneel; the woman kneeling next to me was crying, with her head down in prayer.
I started to understand Jerusalem Syndrome.
Frosted glass gives relics just the right air of mystery
It would become even clearer at the hostel where I was spending the night. I had just bought a beer, and was wandering around the rooftop bar, when I saw a man and a woman sitting and chatting. Most everyone else was on their phone, or already in a large group, so I decided to stop by and chat for a bit.
This was a mistake.
The woman, it turns out, was from Monterey, and was visiting a friend in Israel. She had that California kindness about her, all smiles, incredibly easy-going, very relaxed. She was, in short, the opposite of the man next to her.
The man was an American ex-pat who moved to Jerusalem in 1999. He was argumentative, clearly high-strung, and seemed to just want me gone. At one point, he told me gentrification was a globally-coordinated plot, run by a conspiratorial cabal of the UN and IMF. I tried to steer the conversation away from conspiracies, and asked him what it was like living in Jerusalem for 15 years. Which meant he got to talk about the Second Intifada, the uprising that started around 2000 and ended in 2005.
This was another mistake.
It turns out his idea for handling all of the world’s problems, including the Palestinian one, was to essentially foment a series of uprisings around the world that would install governments loyal to Israel. Eventually, they’d all band together and Earth would be ruled by Israel in peace. When I expressed a bit of well-placed concern about this semi-apocalyptic scenario, he told me the only reason it hasn’t happened already was that various governments were controlling people’s minds through the use of fluoride in the drinking water.
I was trying to make my escape at this point, but I wanted to do it politely. Someone who talks about fluoride conspiracy theories at hostels to strangers is maybe not the most stable individual, so I hoped I could ease my way out of this conversation.
But I’m also not the kind of person who can let a bad argument stand.
I pointed out that I know a ton of scientists, chemists, public health people, and not one of them has considered the fluoride conspiracy worth their time and effort, that maybe fluoridation was just a way of making sure people’s teeth didn’t fall out.
He told me my arguments didn’t have any evidence, and that I was relying on hearsay from people in the establishment.
I told him I was leaving.
As I got up, he shouted at me, “maybe you’re just drinking too much fluoride!”
After standing in the stairwell for a few minutes to tweet this obviously hilarious anecdote, the woman that was sitting next to the guy came up behind me.
“Thank you so much for giving me an exit there,” she told me. “That guy just sat down next to me a few minutes before you showed up. He kept asking me if I wanted to go out of the hostel and get dinner with him. I took the chance to say goodbye right after you did.”
We chatted for a bit about the weird situation, played an incredibly embarrassing game of pool in the downstairs lounge (we were both horrible, and it took like an hour to finish a single game), and then she left, and I went to sleep.
The next day, I hiked up to the top of the Mount of Olives, took some images of the Dome of the Rock (which was probably the most gorgeous building I’ve seen in my entire life), and headed towards the Qalandia checkpoint, into Palestine.
The wall, outside of the Qalandia checkpoint
I’m mostly finished writing a short narrative podcast that explains my experiences in Palestine, so please listen to that for an explanation of what I saw there. The area is mostly at peace these days, but it’s an unsteady peace with the shadow of a military occupation and nighttime raids. That said, Ramallah itself feels like it exists in an entirely separate world from the rest of the West Bank. The Palestinian Authority is headquartered there, along with many aid organizations, which has turned Ramallah into the de-facto social, cultural, and economic capital of Palestine. The town was historically Christian, so bars, clubs, and nightlife abound.
Hebron, where I went on a day trip, feels like the opposite of this. The clash between Israeli settlers and the Palestinian residents is palpable. A market street was closed off by Israeli soldiers in 1994 and lies dormant, a buffer between a settlement on a hill overlooking the city, and the city itself. It’s tense, and very tangibly so. Soldiers patrol the streets. Armed raids aren’t uncommon.
An IDF soldier patrols the closed Shuhada Street in Hebron, with a settlement looking down on it
Getting in line to enter Shuhada Street
Those felt like two poles of the West Bank experience, and the contrast was striking. Ramallah had Palestinian police patrolling the town, thriving businesses, and a relaxed air. Hebron had streets full of uniformed IDF soldiers, a ghost town of former market stalls, and a series of checkpoints to get around the town.
That’s all for part one! Part two will be posted tomorrow, where the adventure continues north, and then back south again, to Haifa, and the Judean desert. And the first ever episode of the Waywords Podcast is coming soon too!
Stay tuned.
-Esten
