9 - Permits & Politics
Sometimes when we had days off school we would rent a car and go to Jerusalem or to the beach in Tel Aviv. As I spent more and more time in the West Bank, I’ll be honest, I began to harbor bitterness against Israel and Israelis. There were a few reasons for this. Because our ministry was to Palestinians and in Palestinian Territory, I hardly interacted with Israelis at all. This was not intentional, but a sad reality of the political situation and the way the Land is split up. The most I conversed with Israelis was with Israeli soldiers as I was passing through checkpoints and border control. This is also the Palestinian reality. For the majority of Palestinian Arabs, the only Israelis they know and interact with (unless they are very intentional) are soldiers. This perpetuates the idea, on both sides, of Israelis and Palestinians being “the other”, instead of seeing potential similarities and humanity. Because I was living the Palestinian perspective, I was very limited in my ability to interact with Israelis as well. It was hard for me, and I began to realize how quickly and easily bitterness and distain slipped into my own heart. I would go into Israel and see beautiful homes, malls, and flowers.
I remember specifically one day going into Jerusalem and seeing this beautiful garden full of flowers and feeling so refreshed. They were beautiful. I realized I hadn’t seen a full garden of flowers in months. No one in the Palestinian Territories has the water supply to sustain a garden like the one I was looking at. Then, I was actually angry about the flowers and upset at myself that I had enjoyed them. If my Palestinian friends couldn’t enjoy them, how could I feel so entitled to them?
It was small things like this for 11 months that began to stack up in my heart. So many things were unfair and I had a hard time staying “balanced” seeing things like that all the time.
The Palestinians who live in the West Bank and Gaza cannot leave those territories without permission from Israel. This means that no Palestinian living in Gaza or the West Bank can go to Jerusalem, the beaches on the Mediterranean, the Galilee, or even the majority of areas by the Dead Sea without a permit from Israel. Israelis, however, can travel all across Israel and even throughout well over 60% of the Palestinian Territory with no question. This is what creates the feeling of living in an open air prison. All of your exits are controlled by the occupying power. Israel can deny exit or entry at any point and for any reason. This is not just to enter or exit the Holy Land to go to another country like Jordan, Lebanon, or Egypt, but also simply traveling within the Holy Land. This means that a permit is needed for a Palestinian Arab to even travel the 5 minute distance from Bethlehem to Jerusalem.
These permits are generally given during holidays; Christmas, Easter, and Eid. No one, however, is entitled to them. It is totally up to the Israeli government who gets one and who doesn’t. It is fairly common for every member of a family to get a permit except one child. The feeling among Palestinians is that this is done to keep the entire family from taking advantage of their permits. I tend to agree with them. I personally know numerous families who were given permits but one child or parent was not.
When permits are given, it is even more of a hassle to get around and use them. Palestinian Arabs are not allowed to drive in Israeli territory. So, even when they get into Israeli territory, they have to either take a bus or a taxi. Over the Easter holiday, many of my students took family trips into Israel to either go to the beach or Jerusalem. A few of my students, however, got stuck on a bus at an Israeli checkpoint for hours. Their families ended up turning back after a hot day spent at a checkpoint. Probably not their ideal vacation.
That being said, when our Arab coworkers did get permits, we took a huge group to the beaches and malls. It was a weird feeling renting a car and driving around women twice my age simply because they are not allowed to drive in Israeli territory. They knew the land much better than me and were telling (i.e. yelling at me) where to go. I felt silly being 22 and having to drive these very capable women around their own towns.
If we took our Arab friends into Jerusalem we had to take them to a special checkpoint to be inspected before they were allowed in. We Americans could get in without even being asked for our passports because we obviously looked like Westerners. They, on the other hand, had to be herded through a massive check point, checked out, and then picked up on the other side. We would drop them off, drive through while they walked inside to be inspected, and then pick them up on the other side. Once we were in Jerusalem they were so happy to see new scenery. They felt free, “as if they could fly” as one of my friends said.
It was fun going with them out of the West Bank and to the beach or malls because they didn’t have anything like that and rarely got the chance to enjoy it. It was also very stressful. Because they were Palestinians, I wasn’t sure where we should or shouldn’t go. I generally assumed no one would even know or care, but there was always a little anxiety over what could happen. Part of me dared someone to say something rude. I had already seen enough racism as it was, and I had had it up to my eyeballs. I was ready to give anyone who had a rude comment a piece of my mind.
Most of my anxiety, however, came from any conversations with Israeli officers. I rarely had to talk to them but when I did, I wanted my conversations with them to be short. For all I knew, they could find out where I was living and send me out of the country. That sounds crazy but that exact scenario has happened before. Being a white girl driving back and forth from the West Bank to Jerusalem wasn’t necessarily welcome by Israel.
I knew they were reading my emails. Every time I sent out an email I could track where it was opened. Multiple times, my emails were opened over 200 times in Tel Aviv. There was always a sense of someone watching us or listening to us. We became paranoid. When we had political conversations we would turn off our phones and computers. The Palestinians felt this also. They knew that their phones were tapped but, to them, it was normal. They were used to having their homes broken into by soldiers at all hours of the night, so comparatively, tapping a phone line, seems much less invasive.
I remember the conversation I had with Shireen when I told her that if I was honest with the Israeli border control about where I was living they would have never let me in the country. She was shocked. Obviously there is animosity between Israel and Palestine but she couldn’t believe that they would turn people around at the border if they said they wanted to visit the West Bank. Israel has created a perfectly manicured tourist visit for Westerners that does not include Shireen and her community. Not only does it not include them, it excludes anyone who wants to visit them.
I know by writing what I am writing and sharing it, my ability to go back to Palestine and visit my friends diminishes greatly. This is also what keeps a lot of people quiet about what is really happening in Palestine. If you talk about it, if you post about it, if you speak out, you're pretty much guaranteed to not be able to get through Israeli border control again. So everyone has a choice: speak out or be able to live in/visit Palestine. It’s almost impossible to do both. As soon as you get too political, your visa runs out very quickly and most likely will never be renewed.