The story never ends

In September 1993 when Israel and the PLO signed the Oslo Agreement in Washington, I thought that a new era would begin in the Middle East. In Nablus, the largest city in the West Bank (not counting occupied East Jerusalem) people were hopeful. People were celebrating in the streets and singing national songs. They thought that the historical conflict between Israelis and Palestinians was coming to its end and that a better future was coming from the horizon.

When I saw these people celebrating, I was thinking�is it possible to live without an enemy ? I thought it was difficult to live without something to fight for .I thought my life would be use- less without having an enemy, it encourages you to think; to be active; to discover yourself, your abilities and your fellowmen. It creates your personality.

But a few days later I realized that it was more ink on paper and even on paper, the Oslo Agreements were bad for the Palestinians and good for the Israelis to the extent that it preserves Israeli domination in Palestine and the Middle East. I realized that we had to guarantee Israeli security , but how can an occupied people guarantee the security of their occupiers? We were fighting for our freedom and our independent state but I realized that we will soon find our selves in microscopical cantons. This agreement divided our land into three parts: A, B, and C. Each part has its own specific laws, for example, you cannot search for water in A-area without taking a permission from Israel and they of course will never give it.

Meanwhile, Israel continues building Jewish colonies on our lands, since signing the Oslo agreements even more than ever before. The palestine economy declined after the signing of the agreements instead of growing as was promised to us. Unemployment doubled because of the Israeli closure policy in which they forbid Palestinian workers to enter Israel to work.

They also promised us to develop our own factories to keep our market open for their goods. Some closures were temporarily, sometimes between cities and its villages, which prevented us to travel from are place to the other. Gaza has been closed since 1993 and Jerusalem even before that. For me as a Palestinian from the West Bank it is more easily to visit Europe or the US than to travel from the West Bank to Gaza.

Many students from Gaza who study at my university in Birzeit couldn't visit their families, since they attended the university. Two students from Gaza couldn't come back to the West Bank to attend the university. So they went to Egypt and they took a flight from Cairo to Tel-Aviv and from there they went illegally to the university in Birzeit.

I thought that the signing of the Oslo Agreement meant no more bloodshed. But two months after the signing of the agreement, Jewish colonists killed three Palestinians in Turkumia and Hebron. On 25 February 1994, a Jewish colonist opened fire on praying Palestinians in the Ibrahimi Mosque in Hebron under the protection of Israeli soldiers, killing 29 Palestinians and injuring 88 others. During the demonstrations, in the aftermath of this massacre, Israeli soldiers shot and killed 28 more Palestinians. In September 1996, Israeli soldiers shot and killed 65 Palestinians and injured 1600 in various Palestinian cities. Cobra helicopters were used and many journalists and members of medical teams were among the victims. Three months ago, Israeli soldiers killed 3 Palestinian workers and injured 17 others near the checkpoint. And only one month ago, Israeli soldiers killed 5 Palestinians and injured hundred during the peaceful marches in commemoration of the anniversary of the Nakba (the catastrophe).

Here I mentioned some massacres which happened after Israel and the PLO agreed to be partners in peace. These massacres happened in the period of the peace process. How would it have been without the peace process?