any coffee. I would just try to keep warm from the steam issuing from my fast-moving pen. We sat at a table just outside the door. I faced toward the street and watched partygoers and businessmen hurrying past as I waited. Sarah soon returned carrying a bowl-sized cup of cappuccino topped with whipped cream, like a nebula swirled with a chocolate-powder galaxy. She pulled a half-empty carton of cigarettes from her pocket, sticking one in her mouth and flicking a lighter at one end. She seemed skeptical of me, almost uncomfortable with the whole idea of the interview.
Sarah was born in Israel and raised in a very orthodox Jewish household. Her dad made aliyah from New York, which was evident in the slight inflections of Sarah’s English. Her mom immigrated to Israel from England.
“I was very sheltered,” she said, waving her hands as she spoke. Her cigarette left blurry circular trails like overexposed photographs and ashes dropped onto the patio.
“What I knew of Palestinians is that our neighborhood was shot at and that the Wall runs near my parent’s house. That was it.”
But, in 2008, she was introduced to the teachings of an ancient Jewish carpenter whose way of life she began to believe was the fulfillment of Jewish law and prophets. She kept her new faith quiet for awhile, worried about her family’s reactions. And with this new faith came questions about the people on the other side of that Wall near her parent’s home. Maybe the teachings of this person she believed was the Messiah, who at every turn challenged the sexism, classism, and ethnocentrism of his day, had something to say about Palestinians.
“I met some Israelis Arabs after I became a Christian, including Nussi Khalil, and she does young adult work for Musalaha. She told me about the work that Musalaha does and invited me to come to Jordan on one of the desert experiences.”
Sarah took a sip of her drink and tapped her second cigarette against an ashtray.
“I think I was very open to it, but I was definitely nervous. I didn’t really know what I was getting into.”
Four months after her entire life changed, she went to Wadi Rum with a group of Israelis and Palestinians. The trip was the first time in her life that she was on equal ground with people she once thought of as her enemies. Throughout the week she felt like a wind was crumbling her stereotypes in the face of friendship. Talking and listening and sharing emptied her so that she was ready to be filled with something new. One day, the group raced through the canyons in jeeps.
“Five or six people were placed in each car and, of course, at least one person next to you didn’t share your ethnicity. You’re very close to each other and you really have to listen to the other side in such a tight place. You can’t really get away if you wanted to. The only thing you have to do is listen. I realized that they share the same kind of pain, but on the other side of the hallway I guess. And then, in the evenings, we were split up again, one Israeli and one Palestinian, and we had to sit down and pray with each other and again we found so much in common and dropped so many of our differences in the desert. It really showed how human we all are. We did the opposite of dehumanization really fast.”
When she left for Jordan, her family still didn’t know about the new facet to her faith. But her dad soon found out when pictures of her with Palestinians at Wadi Rum were posted on Facebook. Sarah was surprised that her family didn’t react very negatively, but some of her more religious friends were very upset. But they were more upset because she now had friends who were Palestinian.
“I went to a very Zionist high school,” she explained, “and during the second intifada there was a lot of very anti-Arab stuff going on in my school. I mean, when you’re caught up in the midst of that, you find yourself going along with some things. I mean, people you knew were being killed and you kinda feel compelled to hate them.”
Her face turned red, like she was ashamed, and she opened her mouth to say something, but stopped. She leaned forward, maybe trying to see what I was writing down in my notebook.
“I don’t know if I can say that. But I have had a complete transformation in my passions.”
Even though entering the West Bank is illegal for Israeli citizens, she once snuck into Bethlehem using her American passport. Sarah wanted to see what life on the other side of that Wall was like.
“They always say stones can talk,” she said. “The Wall really tells a story that needs to be heard.”
Not long after her desert trip, Musalaha sent out a mass email concerning a trip to Norway. They wanted to send an Israeli and a Palestinian to speak about the organization’s work in schools, churches, and universities. She learned that the Israeli originally going had to pull out, so she volunteered. In February of 2009, Sarah went to Norway with a Palestinian guy from Bethlehem named Raed Hanania. The trip was a difficult one for both of them. Sarah was very frustrated by the more pro-Palestinian perspective she encountered in the universities; Raed was deeply hurt by the unquestioning support of Israel that confronted them in some of the churches.
“We felt like many of the people we met were very cold so Raed and I became good friends and I really realized how similar we were. We have to realize there are two sides, and for us to be together with a common faith, at least something in common, it was good.”
I asked if she thought the conflict in this land would ever stop. After I asked, I wished I hadn’t, because it’s almost a ridiculous question without any possible answer. But she responded with a brief story.
On the plane back from Norway, she sat next to two Muslim teenagers. At one time in her life, she would have been afraid. But she remembered the cramped jeeps racing through the desert, which weren’t all that different from a cramped jet flying through the air. She started talking to them and telling them about her trip to Norway. They were extremely interested in this Israeli who talked about Palestinians as brothers and sisters.
“It kinda gave me hope,” she said, stabbing her last cigarette into the ashtray, pushing her mug away from her and her chair away from the table, “because here were Muslims who had a passion for peace and we could talk about it. All great things start small. So, I mean, what can one person do? We can do a lot.”
Raed Hanania
Raed Hanania stood in front of the sink. He thoroughly washed two mugs, glancing over at the kettle to see if the water was almost boiling. I sat in a swiveling chair next to his cluttered desk. His office combined a work space with a kitchen, and a large table seamlessly connected the two like a bridge. The kettle began steaming and Raed immediately flipped the boiler off and pitched two teabags into the sparkling clean mugs.
I met Raed two weeks earlier at the Talitha Qumi School in Beit Jala, where Musalaha holds a monthly curriculum teaching seminar. Evan Thomas presented the first of two lectures on Israeli Messianic Jewish identity before everyone gathered downstairs for lunch. Raed and I stood in line together and I soon realized that his name was on my list of thirty people to interview. He was incredibly friendly, constantly smiling, and he spoke quickly and laughed spiritedly. He had very short, curly, gelled hair, like almost every other Palestinian male his age. Between mouthfuls of pita and hummus, we talked about a possible upcoming interview and his impressions of Musalaha. I confessed that I had heard some questions concerning the organization and if, in all the vital and needed talk about reconciliation, talk about justice was ignored. He thought for a minute and looked around, his head lowering between his shoulders as we hovered over the table.
“Musalaha does many great things and I think it is so good to try and bring people from both sides together through, you know, a shared faith. But, sometimes, I think they try to say that we are equal, and we are not. In the eyes of God, yes, we are
