Constructing Kasun, Educator

On Monday, we spent most of our day at the US Consulate in Jerusalem learning about Palestinian issues. Prior to that we visited Al-Qasimi Academic College of Education in the Arab town of Baqa El Garbiah. About 19% of the population of Israel is Arab—Muslim, Christian, or Druze (a small sect that is a sort of offshoot of Islam with communities in Syria and Lebanon as well). Just to be clear, those 19% are living within the country of Israel, independent of the West Bank and Gaza (Palestinian territories). The territories have about 4.5 million people, in addition to the Arabs who live in Israel. Al-Qasimi College has about 1600 students, 99% of them being women (an d almost all are Arab, with the exception of exchange program students). They have a model of multicultural instruction where they work with other colleges and universities in sponsoring exchanges, dialog days, and other activities. Their project is to create a sensitive balance between cultural heritage and participation in the 21st century, according to the professors we met. Instructors are both Arab and Jewish. They are working at creating a culture of dialog. Some of the professors discussed some of the difficulties they experience as Arabs living in Israel. They said many Arabs ask questions such as, “Am I Israeli [since this is a Jewish state]? Am I an Arab?” These questions are both painful and probably lead to changing answers depending on the history of the day. Several of the faculty members expressed that they feel they are discriminated against in Israel due to lower funding for their institutions, among other things. They also said they still feel “wounded and injured” by the history and the continued treatment. One member said, “OK, I’m here, but not a Jew. Who am I?” I tried to imagine what it would be like to be an Arab living in Israel, and I can’t say it would be easy. Afterwards, at the US Consulate, we listened to presenters who described what Israel is doing to Arabs as “soft ethnic cleansing,” presumably to try to maintain a high percentage of Jews in the state, as I don’t believe the presenter elaborated. Another presenter also explained how the Koran has claims to the holy city of Jerusalem, just as Jews and Christians do. Several statistics were presented from an Israeli organization which seemed to indicate state-sponsored discrimination (see www.btselem.org). Afterwards we heard a presented from the UN Office for Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs titled, “Occupied Palestine Territory—Humanitarian Situation.” Note the title; seldom do Americans refer to the territories as “Occupied Palestine.” The speaker provided a presentation full of well-documented maps and graphics demonstrating many of the difficulties Palestinians experience in daily life. Because Israel has been building an enormous barrier, Gaza and the West Bank (the territories) have largely been cut off from economic activity, the ability to make it to school or other public spaces with ease of passage. What was most surprising to me was the strange interplay between Jewish settlers (who live inside Palestinian land often for political reasons, but also sometimes because it’s cheaper to live there). Those settlements are mini enclaves of security with special roads that the settlers are allowed access to. To date, approximately 450,000 Jewish settlers live throughout the West Bank. Suddenly, when you see the map of barriers and settlements, you realize there is no easy solution to what to do with in 149 settlements in the West Bank. Obviously, something needs to change, as the Palestinians are subject to 539 checkpoints currently. We also heard from a man who has helped write an innovative textbook comparing the Jewish narrative with the Palestinian narrative, starting in 1920 to the present day. On each page, the left side presents one side, and the right presents another. In the middle is a blank column where students are supposed to synthesize and write their own narratives. This speaker described how it often takes students seven to ten years to finish their degrees because of the political instability. He also showed a series of about eight slides depicting young Palestinians being turned away from checkpoints by angry looking Israeli military forces (usually quite young), obstructing their safe passage to school. I think I heard one woman in our group gasp out loud at the first image. I wasn’t surprised by the images and also realize that Israelis could present their own shocking images as well (perhaps the remains of the work of suicide bombers). I was surprised at the last slide he presented, which read something to the effect of, “If you have a heart, explain to others so the world can know what Palestinians go through everyday.” I was surprised by the simplicity of the presentation—hard to look at images (which are also about six or seven years old now…though he certainly could have found new ones where Palestinians are suffering at the hands of Israeli soldiers) and then a simple message appealing to our emotional response. Finally, a US Consulate specialist and an USAID employee discussed the government perspectives on the situation. As it stands, the US Government is advocating a two-state solution for Israel and the Palestine. The questions which remain at this point are: 1. Who do you trust to broker peace? 2. How can you ensure security of Israelis? 3. How do you deal with the settlers in the West Bank? 4. How you do help the Palestinian territories rebuild? I’m sure there are other questions as well.

This entry was posted on Wednesday, August 8th, 2007 at 3:05 pm and is filed under Israel, education. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.