79. Jerusalem, 2000 - Armistice Day

In which Eleanor lays a wreath.

This has all happened before. It will all happen again. When will we learn?

Eleanor

11 November, 2000

It’s Armistice Day today. The diplomatic community laid wreaths, as usual, at the Allied Military Cemetery on Mount Scopus. But there is no armistice here. There is only despair and rage, and grief and loss. And heartbreak. So much heartbreak.

How can I describe the sense of pain and anguish and suffering I feel for the Palestinians? Bombarded nightly. And for what? For Israel’s security. That’s as barbaric as it is a cruel lie. These are people I work with, play with, hike with, dance with, sing with, pray with. They just want to be left in peace, to live with freedom and dignity. And Israel is threatened by that.

And my responses to all of this are so complex. Sometimes I feel detached, just waiting for the end of my posting to come, to go to the US and do my Masters. But other times I am strangely glad to be here. Talking with Damien back in the UK tonight, I heard how it’s a sort of torture not to be here, wondering, thinking about all the people one knows, not knowing what is really happening, helpless to do anything. He asked about the Cathedral; I can’t remember the last time I was there. Do I even call myself a Christian anymore?

Being here at least I know what is happening. I can do something. My job has meaning and may help.

But coupled with that is a feeling of impotence and isolation. I do know what is happening. Yet here I sit curled up with the cats, safe and snug. In the midst of this I am still protected. I know South Africa needs me to stay safe so that I can do my job. Yet part of me wants to be out there on the front lines.

I am battling to know how to deal with this. The strange work hours. All routines gone. The nights empty and quiet. The gang is slowly dispersing: Thomas is back in Australia, Rajji and Gillian are in New York, others have already, or will be soon, dispersing to other parts of the world. Jerry’s had to limit where the Sunday Group walks. We can no longer go anywhere in the West Bank, the risk with the settlers is just too high. With the diplomatic plates on my car, I can still get in and out of Jericho—so I’ve taken to spending more and more time at the stables when I can. But most of the casino crowd have gone back to their home countries—there’s not enough business to keep them employed. So the stables are quiet.

I am always tired. I want to sleep and sleep and sleep. I get jumpy and agitated. I know I could fall into a deep depression. But I can’t afford to do that.

How much closer I feel to Black South Africans now, what they felt under the boot of the white policeman. Their rage at the injustice, at the callous brutality of the police. I can feel it. The blind desire to hit back, fight, to the death if need be, for the right to breathe and live in freedom.

Yet I know too the awful price Palestinians will pay for the brutalization of their society. How this violence will feed inwards, tearing at the inner core of Palestinian society. I do not wish that on them. I have not wished it on South Africa. But part of me also knows that the only way to make Israel leave the Palestinians alone is to make it too painful for them to continue to try and hold on to Palestinian land. I hate the violence. Yet I see too how it has a way like no other to set the terms of the debate, of forcing matters to a head. If I feel all of this rage and anger and I’m only a South African who has been here for three and a half years, what must the Palestinians be feeling?

Today’s Armistice Day service in Jerusalem was very moving. As we thought of the dead from the previous World Wars, all of our thoughts were turned to the dead, the dying, the maimed and the living here, now. “Never again” we say. But in the countless wars since then the tragedy is repeated, compounded, reenacted.

I am trying to find solid ground, something I can stand on, and not feel as if I am on a roller coaster, up and down and all over the place a hundred times a day.

There isn’t any.

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