Hi All,
Today I'm in the mid-part of the Gaza Strip.
Yesterday, we were taken to a checkpoint where many hundreds of
cars filled with probably 1000 people waited in the broiling sun
for an Israeli in a concrete bunker to waive his hand and allow
them to pass. They waited in dusty acres, which had recently been
a thriving, productive orange grove. Our group of ten left our
van at the end of an ever growing line, three vehicles wide, of
trucks, buses, private cars, taxis, pickups piled with household
contents and goods for sale, an ambulance with a boy obviously
ill and his family, and UN vehicles packed with women and men
in Muslim dress.
We 10 made our way to the front of the
line where we moved forward slowly with our hands and passports
stretched over our heads. We addressed the soldiers in the concrete
tower telling them our van was at the end of the line and we were
on our way to Rafah in the southern part of Gaza. The soldiers
shouted that they would allow the cars to go in five minutes.
While we waited, we spoke to Palestinians at the front of the
line who asked us what we thought of this situation. We were clear
that we were opposed to the occupation and that we were trying
to do what we could to inform the world about what was happening.
We also told them that five of us are Jews. We have been told
again and again that Palestinians understand the difference between
people and their governments. This time, one man told us he has
met with Noam Chomsky and understands that all Jews are not supporters
of the Israeli occupation. The soldiers waved a hand and the cars
began to go through with no checking of identity cards, no search
of vehicles. There seemed to be no reason for people to have been
held up in that field for five hours except to degrade and humiliate.
This goes on every day and sometimes for days at a time. A nearby
Palestinian farmer has put up a tent and made a place for people
who have to wait for many hours or sometimes for several nights
for the checkpoint to open. After about ten minutes, the hand
waived and the cars were halted. We approached the tower with
our cameras and the hand waived again.
After
I finished cursing, I wept right out there in that hot dusty field,
with anger and shame, that people, that Jews can behave in this
way, with weapons and ammunition paid for with my taxes. I cannot
begin to express how I feel. I am grateful for the chance to be
here with people who are humanitarian human rights activists throwing
pebbles in the path of Goliath. Somebody has to do something and
I am proud to be one of the somebodies.
Gail
