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COMPASSIONATE LISTENING TRIP REPORT - MARCH 12-26, 2001

By Leah Green
(photographs by Beverly Duperly Boos)

"The access to key leaders, key activists and informational interviews
provided a singular exposure to the nature and depth of the conflict
that I believe is unparalleled for a "citizen diplomat" and frankly exceeds that available to many political leaders.
Accordingly, we Compassionate Listening alumni have much to share with politicians and the public alike."
- participant, March delegation

Hassan Asleh, father of slain Palestinian Asel Asleh, and Bracha Yanoov, Israeli advisor, Compassionate Listening Project.

Compassionate Listening delegations always attract stellar participants. Our March group-including delegates from six states, a dual Canadian-Israeli citizen, an Ursuline Nun living in the Old City of Jerusalem and a man from Holland-was no exception We were also accompanied by a professional photographer from the Bay Area who is creating a traveling photographic exhibition of the Compassionate Listening Project, and TCLP board member Peter Hwoschinsky who tirelessly filmed each speaker with our new video camera. Rabbi David Mivisair of Congregation Or Shalom in Vancouver B.C. also joined us for several outings. This trip had seven cancellations so Munteha (our delegation-leader trainee) and I decided that the 19 who showed up in the end were indeed true warriors for peace.

Arriving in West Jerusalem the only thing that seemed noticeably different was the lack of tourists...but crossing into East Jerusalem was like entering a ghost town - even our hotel appeared to be empty. We later discovered that we were only the second group our hotel had hosted since last September. Almost all East Jerusalem hotels were now closed, and ours had reopened for our arrival. The kitchen staff had all snuck into Jerusalem together from their small villages near Hebron, walking miles through West Bank hills to avoid the checkpoints and roadblocks enforcing the siege.

Palestinian residents temporarily open an earthen roadblock at the Halhoul-Hebron checkpoint. Half an hour later Israeli soldiers closed it up.

We had decided to devote a higher proportion of our time on this trip to listening to Israeli and Palestinian peacemakers...so we could support them as much as possible during this tragic period. We heard a great deal of grief, sadness, and hopelessness from many dear friends of the project. And we felt inspired by many heroes and heroines in each community who are facing the present crisis with open hearts and minds and with determination to keep moving forward.

At the start of the trip, we didn't know if we would be able to enter the West Bank at all because the siege was very tight around that time. Friends in Bethlehem and Hebron had not made it out since September. Many friends also told me that our bus would not be allowed past the Israeli checkpoints into the West Bank. We actually did make it in three times, but not without difficulty. The first time, our trusted driver found a small side road off of a settlers' bypass road and we snaked our way from Beit Jala into Bethlehem and Hebron. Every possible road and alley into Palestinian areas was blocked with mounds of earth, concrete blocks, or a combination of the two. In Jericho, we drove alongside a huge trench that literally encircled the city. The land is so flat down there that trenching is the only way to keep Palestinians from driving out onto the main Israeli highways.

On our second trip into the West Bank we were again stopped at the Bethlehem checkpoint, so we hired two Palestinian drivers on the spot who were there with their vans to escort people in through back roads. The drivers took us on a detour via winding roads through East Jerusalem villages into Beit Sahour, through the narrow ancient alleys of Old Bethlehem, and on to Hope Flowers school. What would have generally been a 15-minute drive from the checkpoint took us one hour to navigate. We were met by Hind and Ghada Issa who told us heartbreaking stories of their daily lives. One of their teachers came to school after her house in Beit Jala was destroyed by an Israeli tank and told the children they must continue to believe in and work for peace. For those who have visited Hope Flowers, remember that stunning view from the roof and reception areas? This time we watched in the late afternoon as Israeli tanks rolled into positions on neighboring hills. Ghada told me the children say they are so used to the shelling they have trouble sleeping at night if they don't hear it. She said their recess play is all reenactment of the Intifada, with shoot-outs and dead and wounded "victims" being carried away to the hospital.

The school itself was in excellent condition. They now have a local board of directors and a great deal of community support. Fundraising is an on-going issue especially since unemployment is rampant and many of the parents can't afford their children's monthly tuition. (Their new website is: www.hopeflowers.org)

We were able to visit Hebron and spend a night with host families in areas under both Palestinian and Israeli control. A few of our delegates watched as rockets flew over their hosts' home and were told not to worry - that the Israelis were aiming at another village.

Particularly difficult was a photographic exhibition we visited on its opening day. About one hundred graphic photos by a young Palestinian Reuters photographer were displayed. We saw scores of dead and wounded Hebronites - including many young children. Surrounding the photos were personal belongings of some of the victims: eyeglasses, the pitchfork of a farmer killed by a settler in his field, a child's clothing he was wearing at the time of death. As we shared our sadness with the young university student docents, I can still hear the words of one young woman: "What you see here is nothing - this is a tiny piece of our lives in Hebron these past six months - a tiny piece."

One of our delegation members knew that his grandfather, a Rabbi, was among the 67 Jewish residents of Hebron who were murdered during the 1929 massacre. In one of the settlements in downtown Hebron there is a museum dedicated to the pre-1929 Jewish community in Hebron. We visited the museum and found his grandfather's photograph in the memorial room. The resemblance between them was striking. We decided to walk up to the old Jewish cemetery in Tel Rumeida. We found his grave, encircled it, recited the kaddish and offered prayers for healing in a beautiful impromptu ritual.

Hisham, our Hebron coordinator, preparing to interview Palestinian residents in neighborhoods under Israeli shelling.

The difficult situation in Hebron was punctuated by a lovely visit with Hisham, our Hebron coordinator, and his fiance Nariman (who were just married the first week in June). We celebrated the good fortune of probably the most famous "bachelor of Hebron." Hisham often wears a flack jacket and helmet now since his work as a journalist and human rights field worker necessitates going out into areas under constant military attack.

It was painful to be in Hebron with people living under siege and shelling. I felt more hostility there toward outsiders than ever before. Many Hebronites responded to my usual friendly greetings in Arabic with cold, angry stares. Their sense of betrayal that the international community has not been able to help secure protection for their people is profound.

We spoke with Israelis who feel there's no one to make peace with anymore. They feel that Oslo led them down a dangerous path which ended with armed Palestinians living just a few kilometers from Jerusalem. Most Israelis no longer trust Arafat -- we heard of their shock of being in a peace process for seven years only to discover at the end of the road that "Palestinians never wanted peace with Israelis to begin with." The fact that Arafat turned down Barak's offer at Camp David only served to underscore this point of view. We heard from more than a few Israelis that Arafat could stop the violence in a minute if he wanted to, including from Peter Lerner, the Israeli military spokesman in the West Bank.

I did not sense much awareness from the Israeli mainstream of what the past seven years had been like for Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza...the deterioration of their daily lives, including land confiscation, bypass roads, house demolitions, the daily humiliations at the checkpoints and queues, etc. It was almost as if this new Intifada was a shock, which Israelis have interpreted as irrational hatred. Meanwhile our successive Compassionate Listening delegations have watched Palestinians move from guarded optimism to outright despair during this period. They lost faith in the Israeli people - not realizing that the average Israeli was largely unaware of their daily reality. Once again, it appeared that Israelis and Palestinians had completely different narratives...like two train tracks with no intersection.

We had six home visits and gatherings with Israelis - new and old friends. The sense of fear and insecurity was palpable. One Israeli friend told us about his eldest son who is now out of the army and has been living and working abroad. He told us how terrible it felt to tell his son to stay away from home. He doesn't want to see him called back to the army. At the same time, he's not comfortable sharing these feelings with his neighbors and friends and feels a sense of shame. Another Israeli friend said that her daughter, who is in the army, asked if she could come with us to Hebron as a civilian. She wanted to see and hear for herself what their lives were like and knew she would never have this opportunity in uniform. Another Israeli host told us about how all of her sons and grandsons suffer psychologically from all of their time fighting in the many wars and in the West Bank, Gaza and Lebanon.

Peter Lerner, Spokesman, Israeli Defense Forces in the West Bank (Civil Administration)

We shared an inspiring evening with about 12 Israelis at the home of a new friend in Rosh Pina (in the Galilee), Anael. We heard about their various projects and efforts in dialogue and were moved by their struggles and how much internal work they are doing to keep moving forward. We heard from several present that the Intifada served as a message to them that they had not been listening deeply enough. We gave each other a lot of mutual strength and support that night. (MECD advisor Bracha Yanoov joined us that evening since she lives nearby.)

We also met with Yuval Steinitz, a Knesset member in the Likud party and former philosophy professor at Haifa University. He is also a former Peace Now activist who was one of the first to come out against Oslo, in 1994. We met with him in his Knesset office where he generously sat with us for one and a half-hours. Yuval told us that he began to see Oslo as a war agreement, not a peace agreement - one that raised the existential threat to Israel. He said that in the first agreement Israel agreed to 9,000 rifles for a Palestinian police force. One year later, there were 24,000 police with rifles. He says he still supports a Palestinian state, a compromise on Jerusalem, and dismantling most of the settlements, but he is not ready for a "second Jewish holocaust." "Militarized Palestinian forces are now 5 - 7 kilometers from the Knesset building, and despite our airforce and military, we will not be able to defend ourselves. We must demilitarize the Palestinians."

A second issue that caused Yuval to turn against Oslo was the issue of the Palestinian right of return. He believes from the Palestinian position on this issue that they are still not prepared to accept the Jewish State. "They ask us to stop settlements and at the same time they ask us to settle Palestinians in Israel...'Two States for Two Peoples' was our Peace Now slogan. Now, Palestinians are saying 'One State for Two Peoples'. Mutual recognition means that we accept each others' right to statehood...we get the idea that their main aim is still to destroy the Jewish State."

I came away from this delegation determined to start sharing some of our Compassionate Listening interviews across enemy lines on videocassettes. I heard people on each side using exactly the same words to describe the bitterness and sense of betrayal each felt. Would they recognize themselves in each other's words?

Larry Snider was one of our delegates. He is also the coordinator of New Hope for Peace, a Jewish/Palestinian dialogue and educational forum for understanding and peace in Lambertville, New Jersey. Larry wrote about a particularly moving visit we had with Hassan and Nardin, the father and sister of Asel Asleh, a 17-year old Palestinian-Israeli who was killed by Israeli police last October in his village, Arrabeh. He was also a young leader in the Seeds of Peace (www.seedsofpeace.org) organization and was wearing his Seeds of Peace tee-shirt when he died. We cried a lot that afternoon, listening to the soft voices of Nardin and Hassan as they told us story after story about this amazing young peace leader who continues to inspire, even in his death. In an op-ed piece by Larry published in the Intelligencer Record, Larry wrote about the conclusion of our visit: "After more discussion and some tears, Hassan ended by saying: 'I feel angry. But there is no choice. Peace must be here. We must give our best time and best money and best children maybe to reach this. I feel Asel and his friends are not the last victims here. We will try to stop the problems here in Israel. We need help from the outside. Don't be sorry, just do something!'

The tears of parents who have suffered the loss of a child to the violence bear no nationality. It is a mark of the human spirit that in spite of their loss, Hassan Asleh and many others push the boundaries of their humanity in an effort to speak a language beyond words, calling the human heart to seek peace."

Salah's car, destroyed by Israeli settlers while escorting us on a home visit.

At the end of our trip, Peter, Beverly and I returned to stay with our friend Hisham in Hebron. While the group had been fortunate to have had two quiet days in Hebron, we arrived at the exact hour that a 10-month old settler baby was killed by sniper fire. While we strolled through the hills on the western side of the city after our picnic, the east-side neighborhoods of Abu Snehneh and al-Taroory came under continuous shelling. The sound and the vibrations in the ground have haunted me since. All that night and early morning, the settlers went on rampages through these neighborhoods breaking everything in sight, chanting "Death to the Arabs" and smashing windows and cars. Families we interviewed the next morning told us how they had huddled with their children on the upper floors, not knowing if the settlers would succeed in breaking into their homes. Hisham's mother, an unfortunate resident of Abu Snehneh, showed us where she had crouched all night between her hutch and the dining room wall to stay as safe as possible. While her daughter was showing us the new damage to the house the settlers again ran up to attack the neighborhood and we watched from her second floor windows as Israeli soldiers beat the settlers bloody while trying to contain them and herd them back into Israeli-controlled Hebron. This was something I had never seen before. After the attack we went out to the street to find the car we were travelling in, which belonged to Hisham's brother-in-law Salah. The car had been completely destroyed by the settlers...tires slashed, every window destroyed (Salah had narrowly escaped being attacked himself).

Returning home to the United States, I had a more difficult reentry than usual. Hardest for me was that we could enter a town under siege, live with the people under bombardment and leave them there-returning to our comfortable lives back home.

I'm reminded of something that Father Elias Chacour told me many years ago - during the first Intifada: "Peace is closely linked to suffering; with working very hard; with getting your hands dirty so that others may know relief and joy. There's a price for the peacemaker. Refusing to hate the other side is the hardest path. Peace is possible. We Arabs and Jews lived together in peace for centuries. We are much more than the children of Abraham...we are the children of God."

Thanks to all of you - Israelis and Palestinians - who entrusted us with your stories, your pain, your tears and laughter. May the stories be carried. May your prayers be heard.

Esther Golan's parents were killed in Auschwitz. Esther escaped to England with a children's transport. Baby Raed Sharabati sits in the living room below a new bullet hole from Israeli fire earlier in the day Judy Balint, settlement proponent, in front of Har Homa - a new Israeli settlement in East Jerusalem.

March 2001 Itinerary

From the participants, March 2001:

"There were so many precious moments in this journey. I cried a lot of tears, laughed with a lot of deep joy...it was a combination of highs and lows, a virtual emotional and mental roller coaster. But, roller coasters can shake us out of our old realities and crystallized perceptions...and I feel that this trip helped me do that, and can help countless others do the same."

"This trip meant many things to me: the opportunity to learn, to practice compassion, to be of service, to reconcile my Jewish heritage, and to bear witness to human suffering and courage."

"This trip has provided me with the resources, courage and knowledge to go forward with several projects that had been on hold. Beforehand, I was hesitant because I was unable to speak from my heart. Now that I have spent time listening to the people of Palestine and Israel, I am sure of the path I need to follow. I am very grateful for the whole experience"

"It provided contacts and context in places I've never been as well as places I have visited in the past. I appreciated the access to people who work for justice on both sides. I also appreciated the opportunity to hear government officials and spokesmen/women - and to discover and test a new tool - Compassionate Listening - as a way of influencing change from the heart. I learned so much - about politics, people, momentum, heart, spirit, and about myself."

"People who go on this trip are receiving gifts of knowledge, friendship, connection, wisdom...and they are giving the gift of love, acknowledgement, energy, light and hope. It is a most precious opportunity."