"some are guilty, all are responsible"

So, it has been a while since my last post, but as my mother and grandmother were here visiting me last week, the blog was put aside.

And a lot has happened since that last post in my life and in the country I am currently residing. First, I said in the last post that I would comment on my feelings and thoughts after my trip in Bet Lehem, so quickly I will do that. BUT, I want to start with the fact that it only left me in many ways more confused. 

I realized in Bet Lehem first and most importantly that I cannot believe in walls whether for security or not. Children cannot grow up walled in like prisoners in their cities and turn out full of love and wanting of peace. If I am against a wall around Mexico and celebrated the bringing down of the Berlin Wall in the womb, I can not stand for this wall either. And I guess what really bothers me about the whole situation is that if you are a member of the Jewish Diaspora Community, to care about Palestinians or recognize that their human rights may be violated is considered "self-hating" and "anti-Israel" and "forgetting the Holocaust." Which to me just doesn't fit with our values. Aren't we the people that have always been persecuted and treat the stranger like ourself? Isn't Tikkun Olam our big thing I always hear about? So why can we not see that in the Palestinians? Why is it so horrible to instead look to our religion in this conflict? Why do the greater Jewish leaders not trust us (the youth, the college students, the "next gen," the taglit birthrighters) to be able to hold such complicated, apposing ideas together to make our nation and our people stronger? Why is black and white, evil and good the only way to go in this conflict?  And what scares me the most is that occupation does not work just as colonialism does not work. Eventually the occupier seems to throughout history at best loses the colony and at worst falls apart. And I can not have Israel fall apart. All of this said, I understand that I am an American, that I do not really understand all of this. My family members have not died for this country, I have not fought for this country. Hell, I can't even speak the language. Who do I think I am to say any of this? But sometimes I wonder if maybe not growing up Palestinian v. Israeli, Jew v. Arab (Muslim or Christian) and not being surrounded by it and in a way drowning in it, if we diaspora Jews are better able to lead the way?

Anyways, I could talk more, but I'll move on. So, as many of you know, there is a war going on in Gaza right now and that's scary. Sure there are wars in America, we've been in Iraq and Afghanistan since 2001, but does anyone really feel it? Every once in a while someone from the greater community is killed and its horrible and we send things to our soldiers and support our troops, but its not every 18-20-ish old person you know that you are worried about because they are invading Gaza. Yesterday, I went to my Ulpan class and my teacher's cousin was one of the four dead at that time. She was going to the funeral. At night sometimes its hard to fall asleep with the army planes flying overhead as the windows rattle. And again how do I feel? I don't know. Israel has a right to protect herself and not watch her people live in fear. But how many Palestinians have to die for that to happen. And it starts to get weird when more soldiers have died than people attacked by qassamim. And the whole time all I am thinking is that just another generation of Hamas has been created. I see a man on the news who had 10 children and all of them are dead now in this past week and all he is doing is crying as he holds one asking god what he has done to deserve all of this. And its horrible. And at the same time, Hamas pulls the IDF into the cities where the largest populations are because they people of Gaza are stuck there, causing higher casualties. And at the end of the day, all I can think about is that in 5 years, it will all happen again. Hamas will rebuild, Israel will go in and wipe them out, cease-fire. When does the cycle end? And who's responsible? 

One more thing: I'm deathly sick of the Holocaust. Sometimes, all I can hear from the Jewish community is "never again" and I hate it. I know saying this makes me look heartless, but my religion, this nation, my community HAS to stop at some point in building itself off of the death of millions. When will we be able to move forward without that shadow? When will the UJC's Next Generation day not begin at Yad Vashem? When will we heal? When will we stop looking at ourselves as victims? And we wonder why we are losing the youth to other religions?

On to happy news, I recently started a new volunteering thing (for the city of Jerusalem?!?--I have a special volunteer card) and three days a week for 2 hours each time, I go to tutor Embet, a Junior in high school of Ethiopian descent in English and a little bit of math. She's great. She loves Chris Brown (hates Rihanna) and wants to be a doctor. Being able to work one on one with her is rewarding for me because I really feel like I am making a difference which doesn't always happen in my volunteering. And its more of a friendship as we speak mostly in Hebrew and she helps me as I help her. Hopefully, in the future, I will be able to write more on her than on wars.

Love always