Part I of my thoughts on the conflict: my background and an intro to Zionism

I really don't even know where to begin on this one. I've feel caught between two worlds, two opposing sides that I will never join or fully understand. I've had so many thoughts swimming around my head being here in Israel and I just hope I can satisfy my need to articulate myself with semi-intelligible writing. I know this is a really touchy topic (biggest understatement of the century) so please bear with me (and PLEASE don't leave angry comments). I've decided to just start giving some background info into the issue so that I can really explain how I feel and why. This is going to take a few posts to get it all out... 

Since I arrived in Israel, I've been silent on my political opinions surrounding the Arab-Israeli conflict. My thoughts and feeling are constantly evolving and it has just been too complicated to get into. This issue is so incredibly convoluted.

My reluctance may come as a shock to many who have spoken to me about the issue and know that at the slightest provocation I freely express my opinion, lecture, and draw maps and diagrams on napkins, paper table coverings, and scrap paper to prove my point. The question, "Hey Erin, who exactly is HAMAS?" would result in an hour and a half tirade about how people are simply the products of their surroundings and that zionism+the oppression of Palestinians=HAMAS and Israel is just sleeping in the bed it made. 

Last December, I hosted a documentary night in which I gave a presentation on AIPAC, showed a documentary (Occupation 101) on the human rights violations in West Bank and Gaza, and then had a discussion group which included two Palestinian girls (who've faced ridiculous conditions) and my professor and his wife, both from Syria and both the children of Palestinian refugees ejected from their homes in 1948. Many people approached me when it was over and said that the experience was incredibly enlightening--even shocking-- given the one-sided news coverage the American media feeds the American public for a variety of reasons that I wont get into here. I've read countless books and taken several classes on the subject. 

I don't say this because it gives me ANY authority on the subject. Saying that would only prove my incredible ignorance. I say this only to explain why exactly it is that I have no shortage of things to say concerning the matter.

I definitely came to Israel with some reasonably strong opinions about the issues as a result of a great deal of studying the issues. I wondered how living in the situation would change my opinion about the circumstances. It's just confused me more, I think.

Let me back up a little and first explain a few things. Many people really don't know a great deal about the conflict so I will provide an brief tutorial on a ridiculously complex conflict that seems will never end. I'm going to start today with explaining the idea of "Zionism" which is really at the root of the conflict we see on the news everyday. In light of current events, I usually get upset when I think too much about Zionism, but here I explain why it was actually a completely understandable movement. If you are interested in more info, just e-mail me (erinvthornhill@gmail.com) and I'll recommend some good stuff to you. Here goes:

The Jewish Diaspora (usually just referred to as The Diaspora) began when the Jewish temple was destroyed in about 70 AD and the Jews were pretty much rocked hardcore by the Romans. This ejection from Israel forced them to spread out into the surrounding areas. Jews are broken up into three groups based on where they ended up settling. Ashkenazi Jews were those in Europe and Russia (eventually the victims of the Holocaust), Sephardic Jews were those in the Iberian Peninsula and the Morocco area (usually darker in complexion). And finally, the Mizrahi "East" in Hebrew) Jews were those in the Middle Eastern/Arab countries. 

Jews still today think of themselves within these separate groups. Let me share an experience to just illustrate this point: There is this salad place near the embassy where "the salad lady" throws together these really great salads for 21 skekels. A guy who I work with commented that she looked Algerian (his wife is Algerian) and asked where she was from. She answered that she was from Afganistan. She said she was "mizrahi." When we sat on the sidewalk table eating our salads, we saw some old men completely chewing each other out (a common sight is Israel). It was all in Hebrew and my Hebrew definitely did not cover the words spewing from these men's mouths so I was asked Alan, an Australian-Israeli I was with, to tell me what they were saying. They were taxi drivers arguing about who stole who's fares yada yada yada. Finally, one guy was trying to calm one of the arguing taxi drivers down. He said in Hebrew "Listen, that guy is Sephardic and just doesn't like Ashkenazi. Just cool it."

I knew from talking to several Israelis that even within Israel, there were ethnic divisions and conflict. This little experience just illustrated to me how Israeli Jews come from all over the world (and don't necessarily like each other too much).

Okay, so let's back up a few hundred years and get back to the "brief" explanation. Jews were basically horribly persecuted for centuries, most especially in the Christian-European countries. Anything that seemed to ail these people, including The Black Plague, was blamed on the Jews. They were cast into the periphery of society and just basically treated as non-humans. Really awful stuff (interestingly enough, Jews under Muslim rule fared better). We can just look at Shakespeare's villain Shylock of "The Merchant of Venice" to see how Jews were commonly perceived. Later, you then have publications like the 1897 publication "The Protocols of the Zion," a widely-believed bit of fiction that paints Jews as horrible, evil creatures. It's anti-Semitic garbage and one would have to be a complete and utter moron to believe any of it. So naturally, the book is still widely read and distributed throughout the world. In fact, the website that had the complete work online (which I gave a link for) is, I'm pretty sure, run such morons. This is just brief image of what they endured at this time.  

In the late 1800s, Jews began to realize that persecution against them wasn't getting any better. Even those who were completely secular and were in positions of respectability endured ridiculous treatment (e.g. The Dreyfuss Afair). It was around this time that the idea of modern Zionism was born. Jews needed a Jewish State where they would be free from the violence and persecution that had plagued them for centuries. This violence eventually lead to the Holocaust and the claiming of 6 million Jewish lives (11 million was the total death count consisting of various other peoples that didn't fit into the Aryan vision of things). The danger they faced was very real and they needed sanctuary.

Theodore Herzl (I live in the Israeli city named for the man--Herzliyya) was one of the most famous zionists and in 1896 he laid out his ideas for a Jewish State in Palestine under the shocking title of The Jewish State. Please understand that this part of the world wasn't the only option considered for a Jewish homeland. Various locations around the world were considered for mass Jewish migration. However, Palestine (what it was called then--the State of Israel did not exist until 1948) was the popular choice as it was the land of their fathers. They felt a strong link to the area. And they wanted it back. Every Passover ends with the group saying together "next year in Jerusalem. It is interesting to note, however, that the majority of Jews actually immigrated to the US and not to Israel. 

Jewish immigration to Palestine began in the 1880s. One of the slogans for Zionism was that Palestine was a "land without a people for a people without a land." They thought of Israel as an empty land without any inhabitants. In other words, it was just waiting for them to take refuge. This is where the conflict begins. This area of the world was, in fact, inhabited. It was part of the Ottoman Empire and was populated by bedouins tribes other peoples. So it wasn't a "land without a people" after all. And surprise surprise, these people didn't want to just hand over the deeds to their homes and to make way for Jewish immigration.

Okay, enough for today's installment of "Erin trying to organize her thoughts and explain her opinions without taking sides or offending people (which is impossible)."  Stay tuned for "How the Jews took over the land and why the Arabs were livid."