One Palestinian's View

By Osama Shabaneh, a Palestinian American who lives in Redmond

March 3, 2001
 
Just four months prior to the first Palestinian uprising against Israeli occupation of the West Bank and Gaza Strip, I left my hometown of Hebron in the West Bank to finish my higher education in the United States.
 
That six-year intifada lasted six years and claimed hundred of Palestinian lives. But I was not there to share in the misery.
 
Yet I wasn't spared the emotional roller coaster. The distance that separated me from the events in my home made me feel a deep sense of guilt. While my family considered me lucky for being far away, I considered myself the least lucky among my brothers and sisters for the same reason.
 
A few days after my arrival in the United States for the first time, a fellow student told me to 'have fun' as I was leaving for my classes. That was the first time anyone had ever greeted me by 'have fun'. To the puzzlement of the poor student, I took insult at the greeting.
 
Like most Palestinians, I grew up deprived of the basic freedoms that many people around the world took for granted. Fun was a foreign word for me. It was something I didn't feel I deserved because even if I felt happy, I knew that many Palestinians were suffering immensely in an oblivious world.
 
How could I be happy with the dark memories of an oppressive occupation fresh in my mind?
 
I was only two years old when the Six Day War broke out in 1967. Although I was too young to remember, my parents describe how we had to leave Hebron for Jordan in a hurry, and how bombs were exploding on both sides of the road as my mother shielded me with her arms.  After spending a few weeks in Jordan, we went back to Hebron. Many others weren't as lucky. They became refugees in foreign lands, and are until today.
 
How could I be happy when I lost loved ones to a senseless death, and when I had, and still have, family members languishing in Israeli jails for their political beliefs?
 
I will never forget the sight of Israeli soldiers, fully armed, breaking into my junior or high school every once in a while, coming into the classroom, and, while holding the teacher at bay, dragging away fellow students for no apparent reason. Only two months after leaving the West Bank, I learned that one of my fellow students was shot dead behind the walls of the college where we studied together. Before leaving, I helped him with his graduation project, but he never lived to finish it.
 
As the years passed and peace in the Middle East seemed close at hand, my sense of guilt started to dissipate. It came back with a bang a few months ago.  At the end of September 2000, the second intifada started against provocations by the now prime minister of Israel, Ariel Sharon. This time, however, Israel, with total impunity, used tanks and gun ships against the Palestinian people.
 
On September 30, 2000, Israeli soldiers shot dead a 12-year old Palestinian boy, Mohammad El-Durra, as he crouched behind his protective father. His cheeks were still wet with tears when he fell, followed by his father who was shot unconscious. As I watched this event unfold on TV, I was struck with an unimaginable grief, limitless and infinite.
 
Hundreds of Palestinians were destined to follow the child Mohammad in martyrdom -- all as a result of a brutal military Israeli machine against a people striving for freedom and basic human rights.
 
Every time I call my family in Hebron, I am full of fear that they may tell me that something has happened to my little brother or my elderly father. A phone call, which is supposed to be a joyous occasion, turns into an exercise in nervousness and fear. Then I don't rest until I hear everyone's voice. Yet nothing can bring me joy while my people are suffering.
 
Why is it that some in the Western media are blaming the Palestinians for the recent violence that became rampant in the Middle East? Is it too much for a Palestinian child to throw a rock at an Israeli tank to vent his frustration at a merciless occupier?
 
We Palestinians are a proud people, and we have seen our share of humiliation at the hands of Israeli soldiers. Whether it is in our homes, schools, mosques, churches, streets or borders, we are always subjected to inhumane treatment by the soldiers. Are we expected to endure our loss of dignity forever?
 
We have a black mulberry tree in our home backyard in Hebron. Even on the hottest summer days, I used to sit with my family members under that tree, enjoying its shade. Whenever I go back and visit my family these days, I still sit with them under the tree. While I look down at the earth beneath my feet, I feel a deep sense of attachment to the dusty particles of earth. I think to myself that this land is very precious, that I want to die and be buried there, and that losing the land means losing my soul.
 
We Palestinians lost more than land because of the Israeli occupation. We lost our childhood to the sight of guns and tanks. We are trying to preserve our dignity and our pride that are wounded every day by the occupation. We are striving for freedom so that our children don't have to endure the grief and heartbreak that our lives had become.