MysteriousFaith

Gaza Strip: The Israeli-Palestinian Conflict From the Eyes of a Child

The most political of situations rightly disolves when we view its implications through the eyes of a child. This essay, in part a review of James Longley’s documentary “Gaza Strip” is such a needed insight into the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

DVD Review: Gaza Strip

In writing this review, I run the risk of two things. First, I must be transparent and admit that I am in the process of educating myself on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and as such, the reader will have to be patient as I evaluate both sides of the debate and weigh the credibility of the claims from either side. Second, there is a tendency for this debate to become very hateful. Regardless of whether you or I are pro-either position, we will only find a reasonable and appropriate solution to this conflict if we can lessen the hyperbole, ask meaningful questions, and sincerely explore the roots and ongoing actions that have created such violence and vitriol in Palestine.

Within the US, the Israeli-Palestinian conflict is understood along very simple and clean lines: Israel is surrounded by Arabs looking to push them into the sea. These Arabs share with Hitler a common desire of a “final solution” for the Jews. Radio personalities coin phrases like “homicide bombers” in an effort to properly characterize what they see as the aggression and evil felt by the terrorists towards innocent Israelis; and rightfully so. Within the US, it serves our purposes very well to believe that the Arabs are terrorists; their hate for Israel being the fuel for terrorism that Israel, Europe and the US must withstand.

What would it mean for us to give up this simple perspective and delve more deeply into the history of this conflict? Would it mean that within the US, we would have to substitute the belief that “they hate us because we support Israel” for “they hate us because we support a heavy handed country that represses legitimate democratic activities”? Are we conveniently substituting their supposed evil for our real hypocrisy? Let me suggest that resources like “Gaza Strip” are essential if we are to rightly understand the catastrophe that is the Middle East.

We all know instinctively that the personalization of any story, even the driest history, causes us to reflect on our beliefs and to appreciate the human toll. This DVD - a documentary by James Longley is an excellent tool that will help in the appreciation of how the Israeli-Palestinian conflict has impacted the average family, specifically the average Palestinian child. To the extent that it sacrifices objectivity in being so personal is the extent to which a common bridge can and should be built between those who recognize the personal terror that both sides are bearing during this time of conflict.

The documentary loosely follows the life of 13 year old Mohammed Hejazi. He has quit school in order to work as a newspaper sales-boy in the hopes of supporting his family. While he has the duties of a man, he is still very much a lovable child. During the evenings, he and his friends will often go to Karni to pick oranges “because they are expensive;” they could not otherwise afford such a delicacy. In order to get into the orange grove the children must sneak into an area held by the Israeli settlers. Although he has promised his mother he will not go to Karni Crossing to throw stones, he has made no such promise for oranges.

Every time they go to Karni, the Israeli soldiers shoot at them. On one such trip, his friend spies a small block of copper (for those who do not know this, in third world countries, metals of various types are precious commodities and can be resold in the scrap market for very good money - they are literally and figuratively worth their weight in gold). His friend looks above the broken piece of concrete to see the copper bar, but sees that the Israeli’s also see him; they fire, but miss. The child fashions a small wire loop thinking that he can throw a lasso around the bar and pull it to him. No doubt his mind thinking, “Yes, mama will be mad that I went to Karni, but how happy she will be when I return with such a treasure!” As the child raises his head again to throw the wire lasso, an Israeli soldier shoots and blows his head apart - all in front of Mohammed and his friends. They run off in terror - the brutality of that moment having been seared into their minds forever. As Mohammed the man-child cries over the memory of his friend (he tells us later on that almost all his friends are dead now), we are rightly cut to the quick over such a pain felt at such a young age.

The setting of the documentary is contentiously debated Gaza Strip. This small parcel of land is only 28 miles long and 4 miles wide, yet it holds over 1.2 million Palestinians. Roughly one-third of them live in refugee camps in the area. However, within that same tract of land live 6,000 Israeli settlers, claiming more than 30% of the available land. The Israeli occupation, the destruction of homes, deforestation of the needed olive trees and general longing for independence all contributed to the uprising of the Palestinian people and the second Intifada, which began in September 2000.

For those (and I certainly would have placed myself squarely in this camp some time ago) who believe that Israel is only defending itself, let me offer some statistics that are helpful in understanding the respective terror both sides have had to live through. Since the beginning of the second Intifada, the militant Hamas movement has been responsible for 425 terror attacks which killed 377 Israelis and wounded 2,076 (Source - Israel Forum). In response to these attacks, Israel (in the same period of time) has killed 2,925 Palestinians (Source - Palestinian Central Bureau of Statistics, Secondary Source Middle East Policy Council). Almost 25,000 Palestinians have also been injured during this period of time.

During the second Intifada, Israel has leveled the Palestinian land. Over 13,000 Palestinian homes and buildings have been completely ruined from 9/29/2000 to 12/28/2003. This does not include public buildings or Palestinian security buildings; only homes and residences of Palestinians. The documentary has moments that are brutal, and it is gruesome at points. But no part of the documentary is more eerie than when it shows school children in the school yard as a gun fight (sounding very one sided) takes place around them. The children occasionally scatter, some look frightened, but the majority of the kids are more fixated on the novelty of the camera crew than on the fire fight with .50 caliber heavy machine gun fire taking place around them. To think what a child has to grow up around to become so desensitized to warfare is a tragedy in and of itself.

For those who rightly question whether or not such statistics are purposefully skewed to victimize those who support and purposefully nurture terror, I fully understand and would seek to not trivialize such a question. Let me suggest a review of the Al-Haq organization, an organization whose mission is “To work for the promotion and protection of human rights and the rule of law in the Occupied Palestinian Territories by monitoring and documenting human rights abuses committed by the Israeli and Palestinian authorities and by advocating for the protection of Palestinians’ rights both locally and internationally.”

A specific report Al-Haq has completed called “Israel’s Punitive House Demolition Policy: Collective Punishment in Violation of International Law” is worth reviewing in detail. A copy of the report can be found at their web site. Let me suggest that at the very least, Al-Haq’s claim that “collective punishment is a war crime” needs to be seriously entertained. If, as they claim, Israel is conducting purely punitive punishments towards innocent Palestinians, the commonly understood morality of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict needs to be further deconstructed.

At what point do we begin to ask ourselves whether or not the Israeli response is out of proportion to the real evil of Palestinian terror? Is the charge of immorality better placed at the feet of Israelis than of Palestinians? If you seriously reflect on the previously mentioned statistics, which is the actual terrorist state?

This morning, as I sit at my computer working on finishing this article, I have had the documentary playing again in my DVD player. Just now, the anguished cry of a teenage boy can be heard; men circled round him holding his legs, his arms and his body down as he writhes in pain. His fellow child-friends are around him, most of them in the corners of the room looking very afraid. Their eyes do not have hate in them; no, these are the eyes of child-like fear. He cries out in a non-human cry, the anguish of which would drive most to tears. His crime? Being home when Israel launched an offensive in Gaza. During this offensive the Israeli army used what they claim is tear gas; however, the hospitals are full of Palestinians after the attack that are just like this young man. They lose their sight, their bodies respond under the classic symptoms of a neuro-toxin. The side effects last for a very long time, in one case causing a young man to scratch himself till his body is raw and bleeding - another classic response to nerve gas.

Which side is more right than the other? I have no idea, and I doubt that a discussion fixated on answering that question will prove constructive. Rather, I think it is important that more people come to understand both sides are employing sick and twisted policies that are only ensuring continued violence. Unless someone within the Israeli-Palestinian conflict rises up and leads a peaceful resistance, this situation will end badly for the Middle East and, I would suggest, much of the world.

I wonder whether or not this discussion can evolve unless we can agree that violence only breeds more violence. There is little in world history that has occurred without a reference to sins of the past. When past loss of life is avenged by taking a new life from the present; the cycle continues endlessly. Unless this cycle can be transcended, the future of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict will never cease. The Roman historian Tacitus, when seeing the devastation of Carthage by the Roman army commented “you have made a desert and called it peace.” I fear that the path this conflict is on will result in a similar loss of human life, as much a desert of morality as it is a desert of reality.

Additional Recommended Resources:

On-Line - Gaza Film Resources
On-Line - Al-Haq Organization
On-Line - Palestinian Central Bureau of Statistics
On-Line - Arab Films
DVD - Tragedy in the Holy Land: The Second Uprising
Book - David Fromkin - A Peace to End All Peace
Book - Noam Chomsky - Middle East Illusions
Book - Noam Chomsky - Fateful Triangle

previous post: Bumper Sticker Spirituality - Excerpts from Chapter 3
next post: April 2004 Bookshelf

• Posted in Politics
• 1 comment
• Trackback
• May 18, 2004

• Bookmark on del.icio.us
• Bookmark on Digg

One Response to “Gaza Strip: The Israeli-Palestinian Conflict From the Eyes of a Child”

1. Herb Burnell Says:
   April 9th, 2004 at 9:32 am

   It is quite tragic to hear about a child being shot for picking oranges or trying to get a bar of copper. I would ask if the occurance of shooting children has any relationship to the use of children as suicide bombers. Just last week the 15 or 16 year old boy was caught and dissarmed.

   I believe that it is equally tragic to recruit children to carry out such terrible acts. The article did bring a perspective that is not usually reported in the U.S. It did make me think and consider the other side, and certainly symathize.

Leave a Reply

Name (required)

Mail (will not be published) (required)

Website