A Young Jewish American Woman in the West Bank

Curiosity has the ability to inspire profound adventure. And fortunately for me, I am a very curious individual.

The sign reads: This Road leads To Area "A" Under The Palestinian Authority The Entrance For Israeli Citizens Is Forbidden, Dangerous To Your Lives And Is Against The Israeli Law 

To all of my family and friends who usually tend to worry about things, I have a confession: three months ago I journeyed to the land most Westerners refer to as the West Bank. For the purpose of this blog post I too will refer to it as the West Bank.

You are probably wondering why I ever would want to do this. Isn’t it a war zone, you might be thinking. 

First things first. The West Bank is not Gaza. The West Bank and Gaza Strip are the two territories, sometimes included in the map of Israel and sometimes not, that are often referred to as “the occupied territories.” Depending on who you ask, some people will say they are occupied and some people will say they are not.

A little geography lesson. The West Bank is located just east of Jerusalem, and just west of Jordan. The name, “The West Bank” comes from the geographical location of the land area… it is west of the Jordan River bank. I advise you do a quick Google search to look for yourself.

The West Bank is militarily controlled by Israel but Israeli citizens are not actually allowed to travel into certain parts of the West Bank for security reasons. The Arabs who live in this land call themselves Palestinians and they refer to the land, and in most cases to all of Israel, as Palestine. These people are not considered to be Israeli citizens and they do not possess Israeli passports. For them to travel outside of the region they have to travel via the Jordanian airport and not Israel’s airport (this is one someone told me, I apologize if it is inaccurate).

Gaza Strip is a literally a small strip of land on the Mediterranean Sea that borders Israel and Egypt. Gaza Strip and the West Bank do not border one another. Israel used to have military control over Gaza but it withdrew from Gaza in 2005. Now, a group called “Hamas” that most Westerners refer to as a militant terrorist organization (myself included), has military control over Gaza. But they don’t really have complete control over everything. Gaza is like a big prison. No one can really enter or exit. There is no airport there, and Israel monitors everything that comes in and out by sea (… not that it stops Hamas from ordering thousands of rockets to be launched at Israel as we saw in the summer of 2014).

I am not sure how I feel about all of this but I do know that I feel a lot differently now that I have actually gone and seen the grass on the other side. While I cannot speak to what things are like in Gaza, I can share my account of the West Bank.

Leaving Israel and entering the West Bank.

On the other side.

My roommate, Brielle, and I were due to depart with an organized tour group from our hostel in Jerusalem to see the West Bank but the tour was postponed and time was of the essence to us. So… a young Canadian man, Abdullah, from our hostel asked if we wanted to accompany him on an unorganized trip there. Abdullah speaks fluent Arabic and has Palestinian heritage but he himself has never travelled to the West Bank or to Gaza. Also accompanying us was another traveler from our hostel- Allard from the Netherlands.

Left to right: Brielle, Abdullah and Allard.

Crossing into the West Bank from Jerusalem was quite easy. Literally all we did was walk through a turnstyle. There was no one standing guard to check our passports or to ask us any questions - NOTHING!

And although the barrier was bare, I felt in the West Bank like I was in a completely different country - I felt like I was in Palestine, though I’m not sure what that even means. 

We first rode a shared taxi to get to Ramallah, one of the major population centers in the West Bank.

Me and two Palestinian girls. Their father said it was okay for me to be photographed with them. The girls were adorable!

(Side note: the day we did this trip was the day after it snowed in the region, and since these people don’t know how to handle the smallest bit of snow, the streets were pretty empty!)

Of all of the passerbys on the streets, there were few women. And the majority of the women that we did see were accompanied by men and wore head scarves (known as hijabs). This was a stark contrast from the scene in Israel where women serve as soldiers, live and travel often alone and wear sometimes some pretty skimpy outfits. I’m not saying either society is better, I’m just saying what was.

Abdullah found a mosque and led us inside where Brielle and I were asked to cover our hair and remove our shoes before stepping inside. There was only one person inside the mosque praying.

Abdullah told me I looked very Turkish with the head covering.. which makes sense because I am. 

Inside the mosque in Ramallah.

After a good 45 minutes after crossing the border we decided we wanted to see what a refugee camp in the West Bank looks like. 

We hailed a taxi and boy did we luck out! Our driver, Aymn, was the sweetest most genuine taxi driver I’ve ever had the pleasure of being a passenger for. He offered to be our driver for the duration of our visit to the West Bank and I’m so glad we said yes :) 

We arrived to the refugee camp in Ramallah and I have just one word to describe it: dirty. There was trash EVERYWHERE! I don’t know whose responsibility it is to keep the camp clean, but they are not doing it. 

The refugee camp was not at all what I thought it would be. I thought it would be a closed off area of temporary tent-stye housing. It was not. It was more just a section of town. It had little shops, apartment buildings and streets. But you felt like you were in a severely impoverished area.

And then, staring out from an alleyway at me was something I was not at all expecting to see. But there it was, like a bullet to my eyes, see the picture below.

Note the swastika on the bottom right of the purple gate.

From there Aymn took us to Jericho, which he told us is the lowest city in the world, elevation-wise. 

The drive was about 40 minutes. On the way Aymn pointed out to us “Israeli settlements.” I use quotation marks here because not everyone will agree on the term “settlement,” but for the purpose of this blog post I will use it.

The settlements are large gated mini-cities whose residents are Jews that have decided, for whatever the reason, to move east into the West Bank. These settlements are a very hot topic as they are planned by the Israeli government. Some claim they are in violation of international law and others claim that the land belongs to Israel. It is not particularly safe for the settlers to travel outside of their settlements. When they do, often Palestinians throw stones at them to show they are not welcome.

From the car we could see one of the settlements up on a hill.

In the past Israel also had settlements in Gaza Strip, but when it withdrew from Gaza in 2005 it also withdrew from the settlements.

While driving to Jericho we passed through a couple of Israeli military checkpoints. We weren’t asked to stop, we just had to slow down a bit. Aymn explained to us that the purpose of the checkpoints are to ensure drivers are obeying traffic laws and have the proper permits for their vehicles. When there is no visible enforcement, people drive too fast.

On our way to Jericho we saw the Dead Sea from its northern tip, which was beautiful to see. We stopped at a Greek Orthodox temple, I’m not sure of the name or the significance of it, but it was beautiful. We walked inside of the temple to the main sanctuary and inside of it there were some human bones. Aymn told us they were the bones of the people who built the temple. Although it was kind of cool I think I was more freaked out than anything.

Here is the Greek Orthodox temple. I swear this is a real picture that I took!

Inside the temple a woman prays.

Self explanatory.

Following our temple rendevous we visited the ruins of Hirsham’s Palace. This is where things got interesting. -Whatever the reason you are thinking, you are wrong.- Abdullah, Brielle, Aymn and I entered the ruins. Allard decided to stay behind and wait for us by the taxi.

Read the sign.

Aymn shows us the ancient mosaic tile floor beneath the earth.

A wide shot of the ruins.

When we finished touring the ruins Allard was nowhere to be found. At that point Aymn was very worried. You would have thought one of his nieces or nephews went missing. None of us had a way of reaching Allard by phone. Aymn drove around near to the ruins to search for Allard but couldn’t find him. At that point we knew we had to assume the worst: Allard ditched us. 

I should have known from this picture I took of him that he was not to be trusted. There is a certain look in his eyes...

We decided we should continue on with our journey. We drove to what I assume was the city center and got lunch. There we ran into Allard and you can bet there was some interesting energy flowing. Allard said he didn’t want to have to wait for us so he left. From this I draw the conclusion that this guy was raised by wolves, since he didn’t even have the decency to let us know he was leaving, and that he was not in fact kidnapped or taken hostage. And no, Allard did not offer to cover his portion of the cost for the taxi.

In Jericho...

Left to right: Brielle, Abdullah and Aymn

Abdullah buying from a local fruit merchant in Jericho.

From there, without Allard, we headed back to the Jerusalem border checkpoint (in an Israeli taxi this time) where, since we were in an Israeli taxi, we crossed back over with ease.

This photo and that which is subsequent we took at the ruins with Abdullah's GoPro!

Hope you enjoyed the tales :)

And now it is reflection time.

As a young woman of the Western world, it was evident there that I was a foreigner. The entire time I was there I felt like I was hiding my Jewish identity behind my American identity. I was careful not to let a single word of Hebrew slip from my mouth to my roommate in fear of the wrong person taking notice.

The people there couldn’t have been more warm. Everyone had a smile to share. My expectations were exceeded. The term “occupied territory” makes me envision Israeli soldiers marching on every street to watch the Palestinians’ every moves. But the soldiers were only present at road checkpoints which also do exist in Israel.

I didn’t feel like I was in a “disputed territory.” Though I’m not sure exactly what a disputed territory is supposed to feel like. I just felt like I was in a different country - Palestine. Maybe they should be able to have their own independent country - but then I remember back the summer of 2014 in Gaza with Hamas taking rule over the land and using its resources to fire rockets into Israel… It is a big paradox in my head. 

People often compare Israel to Nazi Germany. Now that I have been to one of the “occupied territories” I have to disagree with steadfast opposition. Though I have never travelled back in time to Nazi Germany I have read about it, heard about it from those who lived it and seen it in movies and documentaries. 

Israel is NOT Nazi Germany. However, knowing what I know now I don’t think it’s right to build population centers in land that is recognized internationally as a disputed territory. There are a lot of Israelis who would agree.

If you follow this issue in the news you have probably heard of the concepts “one-state solution” and “two-state solution.” Under the one-state solution Israel, the West Bank and Gaza would merge together, becoming one unified country. Under the two-state solution, the Palestinians would receive their own internationally recognized state.

In my ideal world countries would not exist and people would just live. But this is not reality, it is life of the past. I have no idea what lies ahead.

A small segment of the wall that divides the two polarized and yet so similar worlds.

What I do know, now, is where I want to go from here. I will leave it at that for now.