Differing "Voices" unite to foster awareness Institutional Diversity Committee hosts panel of Middle Eastern students

Author: Rachael Jennings

It is all over the news: Israelis and Palestinians, Arabs and Muslims and Jews - people struggling in an archaic conflict that still lives vividly in the memories and minds of the Middle East. Bombings, riots and refugees pervade the media. But there is more to their stories than an anchorperson's account of a very complex and emotional struggle.

On Feb. 18, students and professors flooded Axinn 219 for the Institutional Diversity Committee's (IDC) debut of their "Voices" series. This premiere event, "Voices from the Middle East," featured five panelists: Nathan Blumenshine '09.5, Diana Gor '12, Nisreen Hejab '10, Duna Tatour '12 and Jacob Udell '12, who shared insight into the struggle underway in the region.

Students from the IDC - a subset of the Student Government Association (SGA) - including Zach Fenster '11, Janet Rodrigues '12, Alec Weltzien '09 and Becky Harper '11, the SGA chair of diversity, have made a concerted effort to create more of a dialogue about what is going on in Israel and Palestine as a means of examining the complexity and the intense emotions that surround the conflict.

"We hope that next time you hear something in the news, you have a face and a story to remember," explained Fenster in his introduction to the event.

The speakers were asked to ground their speeches in their own personal experiences without delving too much into politics ? which many panelists expressed difficulty in doing. They spoke candidly from notes, from speeches and from their memories to help audience members relate to their emotions.

Udell, a self-described religious Jew, started off the dialogue with a captivating story of his four-month stay on a religious commune in Israel, where he studied Jewish mysticism.

"It was not only a process of learning incredible teachings, but a process of uncovering intense issues from the Israeli political sphere," said Udell.

The rabbis with whom he worked had extreme views within religious Zionism. Many believed that not one inch of Israeli land should be relinquished, agreeing with the West Bank Settlement (which refers to the settling of territory captured during the Six-Day War of June 1967).

Udell was afforded the opportunity to stay for a weekend at the house of the chief rabbi, an unbelievably beautiful place, while also spending a few days with a Palestinian family. He spoke with Rabbi Cook, the first chief rabbi of Israel, and also found time to visit the Wailing Wall. Through these experiences, he experienced the tension between the natural beauty of the West Bank, where the settlements have made that part of the desert bloom, and accounts of oppression he has encountered.

One of the most touching experiences for Udell was hearing of an Israeli gunman who opened fire in a religious Zionist school. Six children died in the religious place of study.

"They were doing exactly what I was doing," said Udell.

Udell has seen firsthand how the Israeli-Palestinian conflict has hurt human lives and he sees compassion as the primary device of implementing change.

"I believe in a two-state solution and Israeli settlements are one of the biggest obstructions to that piece," Udell said. "But I see a need for compassion. It is easy to point fingers (at the extremists of the 'enemy'), but it is actually time for people to start working more towards relating to the extremists of their own nation, engaging those people."

The second speaker began her portion with a laugh.

"They asked me not to be political," said Tatour, "but I'm sure none of you want to hear that I used to do ceramics or that I did gymnastics for two years."

Tatour, an Arab Muslim from Tel Aviv, began by explaining the Declaration of the Israeli State, which promised to ensure freedom of religion, language and culture to all inhabitants. She asked us to look, 60 years later, at the recent reality: Arabs own only three percent of national land and 29 percent of Arabs live below the poverty line, as compared to only 16 percent of Jews. A survey conducted a few years ago showed that one-third of Israeli youth admit to being racist or hating Arabs, while two-thirds of Israeli youth reported that they do not want to give Arab citizens equal rights.

"They will grant Israeli citizenship to a Jew living anywhere, while my friends and uncles can't return to their homeland," Tatour explained.

She spoke Hebrew at school and Arabic at home - one of the reasons Tatour only placed into Arabic 103 at the College.

"I never felt like I had a nation," she said, "I never really thought about identity."

That is, until she heard of 13 Arabs being shot during a protest in October 2000.

"It was at this point that I realized that I belong to a nation that is being discriminated against over and over again in its own state," Tatour said.

She has now learned how to separate the cultural, religious and political parts of her identity, and hopes to move forward with a new perspective on the conflict.

Gor, as someone who lived in Israel for her whole life, still deals with the question of what it means to be an Israeli.

"I never thought 'I am an Israeli' until I left Israel," she explained.

Gor traveled to the United World College in Wales for her last two years of high school, and it was there - outside of her comfort zone as one of only two Israelis in the entire school -that she suddenly felt responsible for representing Israel.

She cited the example of debate nights that were held at the school.

"In a way, when you leave your country, you feel like you have to defend it, even if you don't agree with everything they do," Gor said.

Comparing her life in the United Kingdom with her life in America, Gor maintained that it is much easier to be an Israeli in the United States.

"Everyone understands," she said, "or they think they understand," she added with a laugh.

"It is fashionable to be pro-Palestinian," Gor clarified, explaining the atmosphere at her liberal European school. "It is cool to be a peace supporter. However, people don't know as much as they think they know."

"Before you represent a political view," she advised, "find your own understanding. Take advantage of our international school."

Hejab, who is from the West Bank, elaborated on this idea of finding real understanding before assuming things about the Middle Eastern conflict and the people involved in it.

She said that when most people meet her and ask where she is from, their response is usually, "Wow, that is so cool!"

"Do you really know, though?" Hejab asked the audience.

Between the years of 1948 and 1967, Hejab's grandparents lived in a refugee camp in tents with no running water. Eventually, they received a house. Since houses were allocated according to how many people were in a given family, her grandparents' family of 13 received a one-room house that was smaller than the classroom in which Hejab spoke.

Hejab herself was born in the refugee camp where she lived until 1999. She described it as "not the best experience."

She told a few stories from her experiences as a Palestinian, one of which took place in 2002, when there was a huge invasion on the West Bank. There was tremendous destruction, and a curfew was set - they could not walk on the streets or even open the blinds on their windows without the risk of being shot. There was no water or electricity for twenty days.

That year, her house was bombed while her family was sleeping. The glass from the window fell on their faces, but luckily, no one was killed.

"There are a lot of scars on my memory," explained Hejab. "So, yeah, it is not cool."

Hejab then took some time to delve into her thoughts on the problems in Palestine.

"Yes, it is an unfai
r, unjust war, but it is not only the Israelis' fault," she said. "We are not doing much to help the situation. We are putting ourselves into this dogma: 'We're the victims, we're the victims, we're the victims.'"

She explained that Palestine needs to become more economically independent.

Hejab also told of her Winter Term trip to Ukraine last year with her class. She explained that she really respected the Jews.

"Jews are able to overcome the hardship they faced in the Holocaust," she said. "They have learned. They don't stand and point finers. They made a beautiful thing out of their pain - they move forward."

Hejab expressed her desire to move forward as well, and concluded in saying, "I hope one day I'll have a country."

Next, Blumenshine took the floor, wearing a t-shirt that read: "God bless the world. No exceptions."

"Although my name sounds Jewish, I'm not. I have no Muslim blood or Palestinian background," he said. "I am a Lutheran from Minnesota."

Blumenshine's platform was simple: "Everyone is a person."

"Every Israeli is a person," he explained. "Every Palestinian is a person. Every terrorist is a person. Every extremist settler is a person. And I mean people like you and me."

After working for five months at a joint-advocacy initiative in Bethlehem, Blumenshine gained many insightful experiences. While in Bethlehem, he found a new best friend in a 14 year-old boy named Odai.

Odai had the patience to speak Arabic with him, and they enjoyed talking about girls, playing Frisbee and baking cookies together.

Blumenshine explained to Odai that he had been to Israel and that Israelis were "awesome. They are great people."

But it was a hard sell until Odai approached Blumenshine and asked him if they could go to Jerusalem. Despite his proximity to the border, Odai had never been there because no Palestinian over 15 is allowed to go without a special permit.

After being turned away at the first checkpoint, the pair entered Jerusalem through a different one and Odai saw Israelis and Palestinians walking on the same streets for the first time. They visited the Holocaust museum and the Old City. Later, while attempting to enter the Al-Aqsa mosque, they were once again stopped very aggressively by soldiers and Odai was pushed around a little.

Afterward, Blumenshine could tell that his friend was a little shaken after being intimidated by people so much bigger than he. Even so, seeing so many other Israelis and Palestinians helped Odai learn an important lesson - the decidedly simple truth that even our enemies are people.

"Odai is a person," concluded Blumenshine, "and so is everyone else."