Subject: Thoughts on time in Jenin ISM
Date: Fri, 14 Nov 2003 14:23:53 -0700

Greetings and Solidarity from Occupied Jenin. tonite i wanted to talk
about time, and ironically i'm in a hurry-smile. The internet cafe might
close soon, so if this ends abruptly you'll know why.
i think alot about time here, in many different senses. on a personal
level, i think alot about the time warp i feel i'm in being here with
Jenin ISM. it amazes me that i've been in Jenin slightly less than 2 months,
i honestly can't believe it. i really feel like i've been here here 6 or
8 months, and the only thing that indicates otherwise is the hard fact of
the calendar. ALL of my other senses percieve a much longer stay here, and
even writing this now its hard for me to believe that i have been here a
short time. i wonder sometimes about my friends and others reading my
updates, for whom the last 2 months have simply been another 2 months, and how
they think of my dispatches? Do these updates sound melodramatic? When i
get home will people tell me to get a grip, it was only 3 months? What
would i think if i was at home reading them? Would i think that the writer was
getting carried away and losing perspective? Brain-washed? i have
travelled a good bit overseas before, and have experienced some inkling
of this timewarp. Like after 3 beautiful but trying months in India, i
couldn't believe that all those experiences and perceptions, all that
living, had taken place in 3 months. But this is alot different, a
different time warp altogether. The best i can figure out, the main
thing that makes me feel like at least 6 months have gone by is exactly what
makes up a day, being here in this capacity. on some days i might deal with
2 or 3 situations, each one of which would've blown me away before i came
here, ya know? Each one of which would've been immensely memorable and
earth-shattering in my activist life back home, fodder for story swaps
and late night activist chats for years to come. i guess i'm saying that
the framework into which i place risks, sadness, achievements, empathy,
sacrifice, glee, all these things and more, has been shattered and put
itself back together, in an ultimately positive way. i never really
knew if i could do some of the things i do here. i hoped i could, and was
confident i probably could, but that wasn't an answer for me. now i have the
answer, largely, but its the sum of a thousand tragedies. how could these
tragedies lead me to a fairly self-positive result, i wonder? is it messed up
that they have? there is just so much sheer human experience here,
everything we feel as humans is amplified here. The people are SO great, their
struggle is SO arduous, their losses SO staggering, their resolve SO strong, the
injustice is SO palpable, the land SO beautiful, the tea SO
sweet-smile,the irreversible natural and societal damage SO tragic,everything is SO
intense and apparent. its like a flood, in both the positive and negative
aspects. all i can say is that most days feel like 3, and every conversation is
truly an experience, packed with extremes of beauty and sadness.
Thoughts on time.....56 years since the creation of Israel,
alNaqba {the Disaster} as many old folks here call it, 56 years of paying in
blood and dehumanization for German war crimes. 56 years of abandonment,
frustration, disenfranchisement and slow death punctuated by fast
violence and ineffective, misunderstood resistance. 56 years of not being in
charge of one's life, not being allowed to go home, living in camps in someone
else's city, treated like crap. 56 years of being called terrorists
for resisting a genocide that the west won't recognize because of its own
guilt and complicity in the horrors of WW2. 56 years of bullets and bombs,
tanks and jeeps, dirty looks and long lines, denied entry, denied a voice,
denied the right to resist what absolutely NO ONE else would accept. 56 years
of torn flesh, broken bones, dead kids and stunted lives. 56 years is a
long time. The official Occupation of the West Bank and the Gaza Strip {aka
Palestine} began at the end of the 1967 War, the "Six Day War" to
Israel, "The Setback" to Palestinians, in which Palestinians were once again
forced to pay for for the actions of other external forces. Egypt and Jordan
aren't Palestine, and all Arabs are not interchangeable, dammit!!!
Palestinians didn't plan or participate in that pathetic attempt to
defeat Israel, so why are they paying for it now?? Should i be tried for war
crimes in Yugoslavia because i'm white, and so is Milosevic? All Arabs
aren't the same, or even close, and anyone who says they are are should
be looked upon as the modern equivalent of the very worst elements
of/participants in Europe's regrettable colonial past in Africa, Asia,
and the Americas. Palestinians are a distinct people who cannot simply go
to some other Arab country and move on!! That is a ridiculous, racist and
hateful argument built solely upon convenience for those who wish to
take their land. Where else in the world would we accept such an argument,
even allow it on the table for discussion? Its a disgusting insult to the
sacredness and uniqueness of the countless spokes on our amazing wheel
of common humanity. 36 years of grinding, in your face, tireless daily Occupation.
36 years of heightened disempowerment and the complete absence of the most
basic human rights. 36 years of no freedom of self determination, no
freedom of movement, right to education, the right to material and
societal prosperity, the right to function as a human being, born on this earth
like everyone else. 36 years of land grab, 36 years without even a pretense
of safety or security, never knowing when they'll come, only knowing that
they will. 36 years of daily checkpoints, cultural humiliation, anger and
pain. 36 years of settlements, more soldiers to guard them, watching the best
of whats left slip away, grain by grain, day by day. They build the
settlements a brick at a time, a bullet at a time, a Palestinian life
at a time. These are my thoughts on time, writing from the eye of the West Bank
storm, a beautiful place called Jenin, Palestine.
My great friend Josiah has put up a website with all my updates
since i got here, please feel free to check it out. Thanks, Si!!! i should
also apologize to alot of great folks i worked with here who i just now put
on my list. The website will catch anyone up on my humble observations from
here, if they are so inclined.
http://www.angelfire.com/indie/benjones/index.html
Yours In Struggle, Ben , Jenin, PALESTINE